Fahrenheit 451: The Sieve and the Sand

The second part of Fahrenheit 451 takes it's name from a memory of Guy's. He recalls being at a beach and attempting to fill a sieve with sand and crying because of the impossibility of the task. The section begins with Mildred and Guy still reading the books. Guy wonders about what made Clarisse such an interesting character and why she acted the way she did. Montag remembers an English professor he once met in a park who gave him his phone number and he tries to contact him with information about the bible, but he thinks he is being tricked so he hangs up on him. Mildred goes back to watching TV and Montag takes a subway over to Faber's house with the bible. On the train he is distracted by an ad and waves the bible around while yelling at the passengers. After this he quickly departs at the next stop. He reaches Faber's house and chats with him for a while attempting to convince him to make a copy of the bible. Faber is convinced and he helps Montag by giving him a two way radio piece for his ear. Guy returns home and talks with Mildred and her friends. He is enraged by their shallow and idiotic viewpoints and actions and reveals a book of poetry that he reads to them. This causes one of the women to break down and cry because of the emotions that the poetry brings up while the other yells about it's evil nature. After this the next day Montag returns to work and hands Beatty a copy of a book which he tosses in the street. As the two are talking an alarm goes off and they head to the source which is revealed to be none other than the house of Montag. At this point the second section of the novel ends and the third beings with Montag at his house and discovering the source of the alarm.