Fahrenheit 451 Transcendentalism Analysis

“A great nuzzling gout of fire leapt out to lap at the books and knock them against the wall” (Bradbury 110). Burning and shouting all for a book! They are burning books because they are illegal to own. In Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 no one is allowed to have books. Most people don’t want to speak out for fear of their house being burned, and some don’t care. For this reason many are conformists. Although it was hard for them to not conform, the idea of nonconformity was simple for philosophers, writers like transcendentalists. Transcendentalists would have an aversion to the conformity in Fahrenheit 451 and in our society, also by the lack of civil disobedience in the novel. However, they would be proud by how peacefully we protest today.
Although in our society we are good at civil disobediences. This year, 2016, was an election year for president. Donald Trump unexpectedly won and many were outraged. A lot of people protested “He’s not my president” but many of the protests were peaceful. Even America's most elite are peacefully protesting for example Shailene Woodley. She was arrested for trespassing while peacefully protesting for a pipeline not to go into missouri river. The Standing Rock Sioux tribe was protesting pipes will disrupt ancient burial grounds and affect the tribe's water supply (Shailene Woodley). Although not all are protests in america are peaceful, that doesn’t discourage the fact that we do have civil disobedience. A transcendentalist would be proud by this. As said in the essay “Civil Disobedience” by Henry David Thoreau, “Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.” (Thoreau 213). Thoreau is saying that the reason why we have American and our liberty is because of disobedience, our revolution against Great Britain is our disobedience. Thoreau is an advocate for civil disobedience and why transcendentalists, such as Thoreau, would be proud of