Estimated Time: 45 minutes

Read:

One way to become a better writer is to read good writing. In this Online Book Club, you will be reading essays by young authors about things that inspired them.

This week read "A Matter of Infinite Hope" by Jimmy Kollar of Bookmarked: Teen Essays on Life and Literature from Tolkien to Twilight.

Writing Project

Spotting Conflicts

This month, your writing project will be an essay about conflict in Fahrenheit 451. Ray Bradbury fills this novel with struggles between people, within people, and against society. Your job is to choose one type of conflict and show how Bradbury uses it to teach the reader something important, also known as a theme.

Your task this week:

• As you read, make a list of conflicts you notice. Use the graphic organizer to help you sort them into categories (Man vs. Society, Man vs. Self, etc.).
• Don’t worry yet about choosing just one. For now, focus on gathering as many strong examples as you can.
• To guide your thinking, read this article on writing about conflict.

💡 Tip: Look closely at Montag. He is pulled in so many directions: by his job, his wife, Clarisse, and his own doubts. Each of these tensions is a potential conflict worth writing about.