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A Brief introduction to Brave New World
A Brief introduction to Brave New World
A Brief introduction to Brave New World
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Brave New World CART Conformity and personal desire can take many different meanings. Huxley’s dystopia develops conformity as happiness, and personal desire as meaning. Happiness, in this society, is defined as constant contentment: stability, instant gratification, promiscuity and trivialization. Meaning, in the society, takes many different forms: art, beauty, truth, disease, sin, and anguish. Through the juxtaposition of the characters, Huxley develops the idea that conformity and personal desire cannot be independently maintained. Rather, a balance has to occur between the two. Huxley develops that many individuals strive for a balance between conformity and personal desire, and that the conflict arises when polarization takes place. The juxtaposition is between Bernard and Helmholtz. At the beginning of the novel, Bernard is an individual. Freed from being another “cell in the social body”, Bernard displays traits of a meaningful life. Bernard resents soma, the feel happy drug. His …show more content…
resentment of soma is iterated in these lines: “‘Not someone else, no matter how jolly.’” He feels that soma is an attack on his individuality. On top of this, Bernard also defies many of the parties values. In this society of polyamorous relationships, Bernard believes in monogamy. Despite the warnings against being alone, Bernard values his time alone. During his romantic interest with Lenina, Bernard romanticizes nature. Bernard clearly values being an individual. Nonetheless, he is coined odd. As such, rumours circulate that he was given too much alcohol in his blood-surrogate. His ill-formed body and his eccentricity, segregate him from the rest of society. His individuality comes into conflict when Bernard meets John the Savage. John the Savage is the son of the director, Thomas. During Bernard’s encounter with John, he realizes that if he brings John back to the Brave New World, he can blackmail Thomas. Additionally, he would be granted fame and power. When Bernard carries through his plan, with the permission of Mustapha Mond, he changes as an individual. In bringing back John, Bernard is welcomed as a member of society. His confidence grows, and so does his love towards the society: “Success went fizzily to Bernard’s head, and in the process reconciled him to a world which, up till then, he found unsatisfactory.” Bernard is a different person. He makes sexual advances on the Head Mistress of the school. It is revealed that he is sleeping with many women. On top of this, in a letter to Mustapha Mond, Bernard criticizes John abstaining from soma. This implies that Bernard is taking soma himself. Ultimately, his happiness is short lived. When John refuses to display himself to the Arch-Songster of Canterbury, Bernard’s fame is ruined. He describes his situation as “punctured, utterly deflated.” Bernard reveals to John that he is once again “unhappy”. At the beginning of the book, when Bernard is an individual, it is not because of choice. The reality is that Bernard longs to conform to society. His unhappiness stems from his longing for conformity. Bernard, through his deformities, is not accepted into society. He forms meaning in his life, as a result. When he sees an opportunity to finally be accepted into society, he takes it. Helmholtz is a juxtaposition to Bernard. Initially, Helmholtz conforms to society. He is the ideal Alpha male in the society. He is a “powerfully built man, deep chested, broad shouldered, massive...” He engages in promiscuity; girls are seen trying to court him. He builds a life creating hypnopaedic slogans: “A gramme is better than a damn.”. Everything about him appears to conform to the society. Yet, Helmholtz believes there is something more to life. In a powerful line he mentions: “Can you say something about nothing?” This lines shows that Helmholtz is unsatisfied with his hypnopaedic writings. He believes that he is writing about nothing, and that there are things that are worth writing about. He mentions that he has an “extra power that he isn’t using.” Helmholtz is longing to make meaning out of his work. Soon after, Helmholtz writes about something that he values; it is a short poem romanticizing the notion of being alone. His poem sparks setback, and he is almost fired as a result. Nonetheless, Helmholtz is invigorated by the experience. He mentions that he is “beginning to use the power inside of myself.” It is apparent that what Helmholtz is striving for is meaning in his works. He is pursuing his personal desire to make meaning out of his life. Nearing the end of the novel, Mustapha Mond announces that Bernard and Helmholtz will be moving to Iceland. Iceland is a place where differently-minded individuals are able to share ideas, and bask in individuality. Bernard is mortified, and Helmholtz is thrilled. Helmholtz realizes that he will be able to produce meaningful literature in Iceland. The juxtaposition of Bernard and Helmholtz is in the conflict that they are experiencing.
While they both experience the conflict between conformity and personal desire, they experience it in opposite ways. Bernard longs to conform to society. Constantly being viewed as an outcast, when Bernard is finally accepted into society, he loves his situation. Helmholtz, is the opposite. He found little satisfaction conforming to society, and wished to pursue meaning instead. Through the juxtaposition, Huxley is trying to emphasize that individuals cannot independently maintain conformity or personal desire. Bernard and Helmholtz experience the conflict between the two, because they are polarized. Bernard is polarized to lead a meaningful life. He longs for the happiness that his peers have, but is constantly rejected. Helmholtz is polarized to lead a happy life. Yet, he longs for meaning in his life. Both Helmholtz and Bernard are striving to find a balance between the
two. The dystopian qualities of the society are seen in the ways that the society avoids the conflict between conformity and personal desire. The society avoids the conflict through the usage of soma, promiscuity, orgy-porgies, hypnopaedia, and many other mind-altering sensations. The society engineers humans to avoid striving for meaning. Meaning is a fantastical idea in this society. People are merely supposed to conform, and not have any higher thoughts about it. Mustapha Mond mentions that when people are unruly, “there’s soma for that.” The society has been built to avoid instability by avoiding personal desire. “Truth and beauty versus happiness and stability” is the lasting conflict. While some individuals are able to recognize the conflict - ie. Helmholtz -, most are not. Therefore, while Huxley develops the idea that individuals strive for a balance between the two, he has created a society in which individuals are brainwashed to accept only one. Brave New World is a terrifying projection, of a society, in which individuals are deprived of a chance for meaning.
In Brave New World, Huxley introduces multiple characters and problems to explore both internal and external conflicts throughout the story. One character we see in depth is Bernard. An alpha in society, Bernard struggles with inner conflict that separates him from the rest of his peers. Unlike others he sees the world he lives in as flawed. He questions everything and as a result of this, feels isolated and different. He struggles with his inner feelings as others start to judge him. He has the option to go against the part of him that says to act like every other Alpha, or to go with the part of him that wants to stand up for what he believes to be morally right.
Bernard is a misfit who is constantly mocked by his peers for his physical defects, which is the primary cause of his dislike of the World State’s society. He is an Alpha male, and yet his physical flaws and insecurities lead him to feel lonely and self-conscious. In a world of tall, handsome, and broad-shouldered Alphas, Bernard is short, slender, and ugly, and prejudice in favor of size is universal. “The mockery made him feel an outsider; and feeling an outsider he behaved like one, which increased the prejudice against him and intensified the contempt and hostility aroused by his physical defects (Huxley 56).” From this quote it becomes evident that Bernard is angry at the world for not accepting him and claims to be an individual. But in reality, he accepts this prejudice and he supports it because he knows that if he had a better physique, he would not be a subject of mockery of the society. He himself is prejudiced against people based on their...
...ped forward again; then again thought better of it, and was standing in an agony of humiliated indecision.” This is when the readers realize how truly hollow he is inside. Bernard has become a coward. All the things he seemed to stand for, he only stood for to compensate for the fact that he didn’t truly fit in with society. It seemed as if he didn’t care about not fitting in, but when he finally does become accepted we see his little act of rebellion was a façade to cover his desire to be accepted. Huxley is trying to show how a person can be changed by achieving something they desire. People hope they would be able to maintain their values when they attain their desires. But, sadly, values are forgotten all too often in the midst of a person’s “success”.
In most countries in our world, society has experienced technological advances to the point of being able to accomplish what Huxley envisioned. In contrast to Huxley’s vision, the moral standards of most nations allow all humans to enjoy basic human rights that embrace family, personal relationships, and individualism. Today’s society is able to comprehend how with the technological advances Huxley’s world could be a reality, but with the privilege of a democratic society, civilization would not allow the medical intervention for reproduction, the conditioning for happiness and consumerism. Work Cited "Brave New World by Aldous Huxley : Barron's Notes" Brave New World by Aldous Huxley: Barron's Notes. N.p., n.d. Web.
Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World portrays a utopian society that has no flaw. Although many new precedents are portrayed, when studied in depth, many similarities between this perfect world and our modern society outweigh the few differences. This utopia of a society is paralleled with our society that is nowhere near perfection. Drug usage, individualism, and relationships will be the basis of comparison in this analysis, and we will see if the society presented in Brave New World will one day become our own.
In the novel Brave New World written by Aldous Huxley, a dystopia is presented of a Utopian society where happiness is brought through a drug and your predestined life follows. Aldous Huxley conveys different conflicts with characters being isolated from the society they are being forced to live within. In which, these characters, are brought about by reliance on soma, a drug, to stabilize their lives. As well as this , the novel expresses the ongoing battles of having a society that is "perfect".
In the story "Brave New World" the author, Aldous Huxley argues that there is a better society in the world that's in the book rather than the world in real life. He does this by using juxtaposition. The world state that is in his book seems to be much more organized than ours. There seems to be better education, depending on what social level you are in. Lastly there are less issues with the society. He has shown us his vision of a perfect world.
.... The Savage could see that it was nothing but valueless vice, and when he accidentally succumbs to that which he so detested, he commits suicide after waking from his 'soma holiday.' Aldous Huxley is also sending us many warning messages with his novel. If we spend too much of our lives pursuing happiness through physical fulfillment, we will miss out on what is truly important, our relationships with other people and with God. He is also telling us to be careful with our science, or we may end up like the Utopians, mass producing identical citizens, then brainwashing them to think alike, and to think exactly what the government mandates. Huxley tells us not to cheapen sex through promiscuity, because it is supposed to be something to express a deep and undying love to someone, not a simple carnal pleasure. These were just some of the mistakes the Utopians made, all of which contributed to their lives being shallow and meaningless. They were not truly happy, because they misplaced their values and failed to see what brings true joy and peace in one's life. The apparent blissfulness in which they lived turned out to be nothing, their Utopia was not worth the high price they paid.
Have you ever known someone who you think is a good person, but then turns out to be two-faced? If so, you will recognize that Bernard Marx clearly displays those qualities. In Aldous Huxley’s novel, Brave New World, Bernard Marx, in the beginning, shows heroic qualities by thinking against his conditioning, but then as people start to think highly of him, he shows anti-heroic qualities as he brags about his change in status, and goes against his original thinking. In the beginning Bernard is the protagonist of the novel. He thinks against his conditioning which makes him different and heroic. He displays heroic traits by telling Lenina that he wouldn't like to be enslaved by his conditioning, when he states, “ ‘No, the real problem is: How
Helmholtz begins his rebellion in the idea that “ [he’s] got something important to say” to the world. (Huxley80). He is infatuated with the want to put his individualistic mind down on paper. The concept of self-expression is shunned in the commutative nature of the world state culture leaving no chance for one person to put themselves out there for the world to see. John the Savage is able to share with a world state member his sense of entitlement to “freedom.. goodness… and sin” because he feels as though that is what makes him human (Huxley242). He is able to be passionate in his endeavors because of freedom and good to others because of the morals he was raised with. He wants to ability to think for himself even if he isn't happy in his own thoughts and actions. Bernard finally believes that he wants to be “more on [his] own, not so completely apart of something else” and have the ability to find his passions (Huxley100). He begins to learn about the manipulative nature of the world state and how they force the idea of happiness. Many characters begin to develop their own ideas on happiness and have their opinions about what happiness really means. Therefore, many characters are able to believe that happiness is not the only thing that matters in
For years, authors and philosophers have satirized the “perfect” society to incite change. In Brave New World, Aldous Huxley describes a so-called utopian society in which everyone is happy. This society is a “controlled environment where technology has essentially [expunged] suffering” (“Brave New World”). A member of this society never needs to be inconvenienced by emotion, “And if anything should go wrong, there's soma” (Huxley 220). Citizens spend their lives sleeping with as many people as they please, taking soma to dull any unpleasant thoughts that arise, and happily working in the jobs they were conditioned to want. They are genetically altered and conditioned to be averse to socially destructive things, like nature and families. They are trained to enjoy things that are socially beneficial: “'That is the secret of happiness and virtue – liking what you've got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their inescapable social destiny'” (Huxley 16). Citizens operate more like machinery, and less like humans. Humanity is defined as “the quality of being human” (“Humanity”). To some, humanity refers to the aspects that define a human: love, compassion and emotions. Huxley satirizes humanity by dehumanizing the citizens in the Brave New World society.
Huxley begins the book by describing a cold and mechanical hatchery center where humans are made in test tubes in almost a robotic fashion in the civilized society of London. All of the humans in society are conditioned as children to act and behave uniformly, according to their social class; Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons. The government controls the citizens by keeping them happy on the surface encouraging the use of drugs and distracts them by nurturing a consumer culture. "Call it the fault of civilization. God isn 't compatible with machinery and scientific medicine and universal happiness. You must make your choice. Our civilization has chosen machinery and medicine and happiness. That 's why I have to keep these books locked up in the safe." (p. 234). Humans are programmed to accept society’s rules without question or individual thought. In doing so they take away freedoms, such as the freedom to think for
In today’s society a person is shaped by family, friends, and past events, but in Aldous Huxley’s classic novel, Brave New World, there is no such thing as family, history and “true” friends. The government controls every aspect of an individual from their creation in the hatcheries to their conditioning for their thoughts and careers. In this brave new world the ideas of stability and community reign supreme, and the concept of individualism is foreign and suppressed, “Everyone belongs to everyone else, after all,” (47). Huxley perverses contemporary morals and concepts in Brave New World, thus distorting the ideas of materialistic pleasures, savagery versus society, and human relationships. These distortions contribute to the effectiveness of Brave New World, consequently creating a novel that leaves the reader questioning how and why.
In every society there is always something that makes a person unique, something that identifies them from everyone else. It can be the way you dress, walk, or talk. Bernard was a man who was not very happy about the way he was in his life. In this utopian society, they did not know what feelings are, they did not know how it feels to be sad or
Much like the idea of community, identity takes on a new meaning under Huxley’s context; it is no longer based on a personal pursuit, rather it is the responsibility of the New World State to assign a predetermined identity. In short, these identities are divided into five groups: Alphas, Betas, Gammas , Deltas and Epsilons, each one of these castes represents an identical demographic. At birth, each member of this society joins a caste and more or less an inescapable social position. But how can the idea of permanent roles perpetuate in any human society? Although this reality may be hard for today’s world to accept, in the New World State, this is an irrefutable reality. The theory is simple, by conditioning the masses to excel in their preordained roles, people will become loyal to their position in society. As Mustapha Mond puts it. “that is the secret of happiness and virtue- liking what you’ve got to do. All conditioning aims at that : making people like their inescapable destiny.”(Huxley 26). The quote represents a cynical microcosm of our world today: we love to pursue endeavors of ease and assured success, however in the Brave New World these endeavors have been engineered in a macabre manner to maintain the status quo. In addition to loving their position, the public is also conditioned to hate the responsibilities and freedoms of the other castes. The combination of rigorous conditioning and prejudicial hate yields a ceasing loyalty towards one’s position in society as well as a responsibility to the greater