Thursday, September 26, 2013

When the story says the men leave with "their case of liquid melancholy," what does that mean in Fahrenheit 451?

Literally, what has happened here is that the men have
pumped out Mildred Montag's stomach and they have replaced her blood.  They are leaving
with her old blood and the contents of her stomach there in their "suitcase," as the one
man calls it.


Bradbury calls this their case of liquid
melancholy because they are taking away the stuff that (physically speaking) has been
making Millie unhappy.  This is a bunch of liquid that has caused her to be
sad.


Of course, they are not really curing her.  What they
are doing is just temporary because the real cause of her melancholy is the fact that
her life is empty.

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