First Russian edition.

Place of publication: Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House
Year of publishing: 1956
Pages and Illustrations: 150 р.

"Fahrenheit 451" is a dystopian novel by American writer Ray Bradbury, first published in 1953. Often regarded as one of his best works, the novel presents a future American society where books are outlawed and "firemen" burn any that are found. The book's tagline explains the title: "Fahrenheit 451 — a temperature at which book paper catches fire, and burns..." The lead character, Guy Montag, is a fireman who becomes disillusioned with his role of censoring literature and destroying knowledge, eventually quits his job and commits himself to the preservation of literary and cultural writings.

After the death of Stalin, there were major changes in the translation of foreign literature in the USSR. At this time, the processes of liberalization began in domestic and foreign policy, so this period went down in history under the name of the Khrushchev thaw. The ideological pressure on the work of cultural figures was eased, and this also had a positive impact on the translation field. Thanks to the strengthening of cultural ties between the USSR and foreign countries, a huge number of foreign classical and modern works were translated, and the circle of translated authors expanded. An important role in this was played by the Publishing House of Foreign Literature, established in 1946. Since 1955, the magazine "Foreign Literature" began to be published, in which many translations were published.

The anti-utopian novel "Fahrenheit 451" is considered a classic of science fiction. Its translation, made by Tatiana Shinkar, was published by the Publishing House of Foreign Literature. Why did the publisher choose this novel for the first translation, and not the Martian Chronicles? After all, it condemns the totalitarian regime, very similar to the one that prevailed in the Soviet Union. The author himself said in an interview: "In the end, the story "Fahrenheit 451" is all about Russia and China. It is all about any adherents of totalitarianism, whoever they are and wherever they live: both about the left and the right... " [Prashkevich 2014, p. 168]. A reasonable question arises, why publish such a "seditious" book? Probably, the situation of the Cold War played its role, when anti-American propaganda in the USSR (as well as anti-Soviet propaganda in the United States) became the leading direction in politics. Bradbury's book was recognized in this context as another evidence of cruelty and lack of spirituality of the American way of life.

Immediately after the publication of Ray Bradbury's first book in Russian, he became a very popular author in the Soviet Union. Some of his stories were translated, as were "The Martian Chronicles" (1965) and "Dandelion Wine" (1967).

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