What are the characteristics of Guy Montag?

Montag is this futuristic novel's central character and protagonist, a so-called "fireman".. As the narrative begins, he is portrayed as finding a similar, sadistic, socially and morally righteous pleasure in what he does, and then as having both that pleasure and that righteousness disturbed by an encounter with the mysterious, thoughtful, questioning Clarisse. As the narrative continues, however, it reveals that Montag has been troubled by his own questions about who he is, what he does, and why he does it for some time before the novel begins, a situation made evident by the fact that he has been collecting banned books for some time.

As the narrative progresses further, Montag questions himself, his situation, his world, and the societal conventions that shaped them all. As a result, he flees everything that defined his life to that point, starting on the road towards rebellion, not so much actively fighting as actively resisting the pervasive and alluring, but still somewhat insane, influences of those soul-and-identity destroying conventions (conventions embodied and manifested in his wife Mildred and his captain).