What are three elements that Faber feels are missing from his life?

In Part Two of Fahrenheit 451, Montag meets with Faber, a former English professor. Faber explains to Montag that there are three things missing from modern society due to the absence of books: quality, leisure, and what people learn from the interaction of the two.

By "quality," Faber means that books have the ability to look at the "pores" of society, or, in other words, literature sees human imperfection. The "fourwalled televisors" do not,...

In Part Two of Fahrenheit 451, Montag meets with Faber, a former English professor. Faber explains to Montag that there are three things missing from modern society due to the absence of books: quality, leisure, and what people learn from the interaction of the two.

By "quality," Faber means that books have the ability to look at the "pores" of society, or, in other words, literature sees human imperfection. The "fourwalled televisors" do not, according to Faber, allow humans to look at their flaws. In this society, "the comfortable people only want wax moon faces, poreless, hairless, expressionless."

The second quality missing, according to Faber, is "leisure," or time to digest information in a book. In this world, the mass media of the televisors and movies "tells you what to think and blasts it in" and does not give the viewer time to say "What nonsense!" He says sitting with a book allows the reader to "play God to it." The reader has the ability to argue with the book and has the ability to agree with it as well.

Finally, the third quality is not as clear-cut as the previous two. Faber says that the third quality missing from society is "the right to carry out actions based on what we learn from the inter-action of the first two." Perhaps the easiest way to explain this is by looking at Montag and Beatty, two characters both read and made time to read. Each reacted differently. While Montag sets out to change the world, Beatty seems to feel justified in the laws of the land that prohibit reading. According to Faber's theory, both are justified in reacting the way they do. However, in this society, people do not have the option to react to a book.