Where It All Goes Down
Somewhere in the U.S. in the future, sometime after 1990 (remember that the novel was written in the 1950s)
We get a sense of the world in which this story takes place from a variety of details. From Clarisse’s comments we know that violence is prevalent. From the plumbers who come to the Mildred’s rescue, we know that everyone is unhappy and death isn’t taken seriously. We know wars are casual – there have been two atomic wars since 1990, and Mildred’s friends' husbands are off at war…again. Family has gone by the wayside to be replaced by television, and the same goes for religion. We even get a monetary scale – 6,000 dollars is Montag’s yearly salary. Bradbury skillfully creates an entire world for his story and characters.