BNW Literary Lens Essay- Marxist Since the primitive civilizations of Mesopotamia and the classical kingdoms of Greece and Rome, people have always been divided. Up to the status quo, society has naturally categorized people into various ranks and statuses. With the Marxist literary lens, readers can explore this social phenomenon by analyzing depictions of class structure in literature. In Aldous Huxley’s novel Brave New World, readers are introduced to a dystopian society with a distinctive caste system. The Marxist perspective reveals Huxley’s underlying message that the drawbacks of a ubiquitous class structure outweigh its benefits. Despite the wary tone of the novel, Huxley ultimately acknowledges that the class system brings about …show more content…
For example, to decant the lower caste embryos, “the surrogate goes round slower; therefore passes through the lung at longer intervals; therefore, gives the embryo less oxygen. Nothing like oxygen-shortage for keeping an embryo below par” (14). Instead of strengthening embryos, the State intentionally weakens many embryos to uphold their hierarchy. Here, readers see the dark side of the New World’s caste arrangement. To conserve its structure, society is forced to abandon all values of equality and create people that are inferior and weaker than others. Another drawback of the caste system is the compromise of individual freedom. Mond describes the municipal state of the New World when he says, “People never are alone now… We make them hate solitude; and we arrange their lives so that’s almost impossible for them ever to have it” (235). In the New World, the idea of individuality is forgotten; to pay for happiness and stability, people must give up their private identity and morals. This creates a dehumanizing community where citizens are treated more like robots than individual humans. In the end, readers realize the high price society must pay for an absolute caste
Merriam Webster’s definition of satire is a type of literary work used to ridicule human vices and follies. This type of work is presented in Aldous Huxley’s, Brave New World, when criticizing the power and control of the World State through the use of advanced technology towards the members of the World State. Throughout the novel the World State is portrayed as a totalitarian government controlling every aspect of its citizens lives. This controlling is made possible through all the advanced technology available within the World State. Set hundreds of years after Henry Ford, the renowned auto maker, the government’s technology is highly advanced, a folly Huxley is trying to expose in order to prevent a technological takeover in the life of people in the real world. Conditioning is one technological method used by the government in order to establish individuals to participate in a variety of tasks. Also entertainment is another factor used by theWorld State to keep power. Censorship is also illustrated in the novel presenting the governments ability to control, what is released in the World State.
There were quite a few changes made from Aldous Huxley’s, Brave New World to turn it into a “made for TV” movie. The first major change most people noticed was Bernard Marx’s attitude. In the book he was very shy and timid toward the opposite sex, he was also very cynical about their utopian lifestyle. In the movie Bernard was a regular Casanova. He had no shyness towards anyone. A second major deviation the movie made form the book was when Bernard exposed the existing director of Hatcheries and Conditioning, Bernard himself was moved up to this position. In the book the author doesn’t even mention who takes over the position. The biggest change between the two was Lenina, Bernard’s girlfriend becomes pregnant and has the baby. The screenwriters must have made this up because the author doesn’t even mention it. The differences between the book and the movie both helped it and hurt it.
In Brave New World, Aldous Huxley deftly creates a society that is indeed quite stable. Although they are being mentally manipulated, the members of this world are content with their lives, and the presence of serious conflict is minimal, if not nonexistent. For the most part, the members of this society have complete respect and trust in their superiors, and those who don’t are dealt with in a peaceful manner as to keep both society and the heretic happy. Maintained by cultural values, mental conditioning, and segregation, the idea of social stability as demonstrated in Brave New World is, in my opinion, both insightful and intriguing.
The characters in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World represent certain political and social ideas. Huxley used what he saw in the world in which he lived to form his book. From what he saw, he imagined that life was heading in a direction of a utopian government control. Huxley did not imagine this as a good thing. He uses the characters of Brave New World to express his view of utopia being impossible and detrimental. One such character he uses to represent the idealogy behind this is Bernard Marx.
The caste system of this brave new world is equally ingenious. Free from the burdens and tensions of a capitalistic system, which separates people into social classes by natural selection, this dictatorship government is only required to determine the correct number of Alphas, Betas, all the way down the line. Class warfare does not exist because greed, the basic ingredient of capitalism, has been eliminated. Even Deltas and Epsilons are content to do their manual labor. This contentment arises both from the genetic engineering and the extensive conditioning each individual goes through in childhood. In this society, freedom, such as art and religion, in this society has been sacrificed for what Mustapha Mond calls happiness. Indeed almost all of Huxley's characters, save Bernard and the Savage, are content to take their soma ration, go to the feelies, and live their mindless, grey lives.
whose literary lense was on Marxism. So during his presentation, I've learned about what the protagonist, Billy did throughout the book. Some of the things that he did was joining WWII as a soldier and going to Dresden to serve as a soldier and thought that Dresden was the safest place to serve because the chances of getting bombed is so low. Ironically, Dresden gets bombed. So through the Marxist lense, everyone on earth are equal; which could mean that there is no such things as social classes or social hierarchy. However, this is a total opposite in the book. There were social hierarchy in the book, as it could be seen through the position the aliens and humans are in. The aliens were seen as superior while the humans were seen as peasants. During Eric’s presentation, I've discovered that capitalism and Marxism are related since capitalism states that economics is before everything, and Marxism is a pre-constructed form of Communism, but specifically focusing on the economy. This can be seen in the novel as Billy married his wife for her money even though she is physically unappealing. I've also learned that Marxism says that unemployment equals to freedom which was quite interesting but it is also kind of true in the book as Billy loses his freedom and joy for money when he marries and unattractive yet rich
Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World portrays a society in which science has clearly taken over. This was an idea of what the future could hold for humankind. Is it true that Huxley’s prediction may be correct? Although there are many examples of Huxley’s theories in our society, there is reason to believe that his predictions will not hold true for the future of society.
Designing life from conception is an intriguing concept. Brave New World’s World State is in control of the reproduction of people by intervening medically. The Hatchery and Conditioning Centre is the factory that produces human beings. Ovaries are surgically removed, fertilized and then fetuses are kept incubated in specifically designed bottles. There are five castes which include: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon. Each caste is destined to have a different role; for example, an Epsilon, the lowest caste, is not capable of doing an Alpha’s job. This is because “the fetuses undergo different treatments depending on their castes. Oxygen deprivation and alcohol treatment ensure the lower intelligence and smaller size of members of the three lowers castes. Fetuses destined to work in the tropical climate are heat conditioned as embryos” (Sparknotes Editors). When producing ...
Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World demonstrates key principles of Marxist literary theory by creating a world where mass happiness is the tool used by positions of power known as the Alphas to control the masses known as the Epsilons at the cost of the people's freedom to choose. The social castes of Brave New World, Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons, draw parallels to the castes applied in Marxist literary theory, the Aristocracy, the Bourgeoisie and the Proletariat.
For instance, the way the social classes in the novel are being represented is an example of the presence of the Marxist theory in the novel.
One of the most important parts when using a Marxist perspective to examine a piece of literature is the investigation of the various social classes that exist within the writing. Doing so enables the reader to achieve a more globalized perspective on the story, with factors such as economic advantages and hierarchical relations being taken into consideration. The social classes that are represented in Kate Chopin’s The Awakening are the Bourgeoisie, who control every aspect of society, and the Proletariat, whose oppression supports the lifestyles of the elite.
We are lucky, today, that the majority of the world’s nations are democracies. This has only been the case in very recent times. For the greater part of human history, society has subscribed to the belief that birth is the most important determinant of one’s future. In Elizabethan England, this was especially true. Those born into the nobility enjoyed a lifetime of privilege, while those born outside of their ranks mainly existed to serve them. A century later, the British encountered an even stricter form of this belief when they conquered India. The Hindu caste system, which dictated one’s future based on birth just as British society did, was deemed even by the English to be excessively restrictive. After gaining control of the Subcontinent, the conquerors attempted to supplant the caste system with the semblance of a meritocracy. The new subjects of the Empire, instead of embracing this imposition of a foreign culture’s values, responded with general unrest and discontent, showing that no society, no matter how unfair or prejudiced, tolerates interference well. Shakespeare’s King Lear demonstrates the same concept: that any violation of society’s conception of the natural order brings chaos, and that the only way to restore harmony is to conform to the expectations of that society.
Literature is both shaped by our culture and shapes it. Because of this it is an effective representation of the culture of a time. One can tell how people were affected by the events of the times by how it comes through in their writing. Aldous Huxley's Brave New World is a prime example of this. The work was targeted at people in a post WWI world. This is a time between WWI and WWII where the world is still shocked by how rapidly the science of war had advanced. People also continue to be appalled with the mass death of a World War caused by such technology and therefore yearn for a more stable world. Because of this yearning, they attempt to create a more stable environment for themselves. Most people had lost faith in the institutions they came to know because those institutions caused the War. Therefore the League of Nations was founded in 1919 only 13 years before “Brave New World” was published in 1932.
In Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, the author depicts a collective society in which everyone has the same values and beliefs. From a young age, the people in the World State’s civilization are conditioned to believe in their motto of “Community, Identity, Stability.” Through hypnopaedia, the citizens of the World State learn their morals, values, and beliefs, which stay with them as they age. However, like any society, there are outsiders who alienate themselves from the rest of the population because they have different values and beliefs. Unfortunately, being an outsider in the World State is not ideal, and therefore there are consequences as a result. One such outsider is John. Brought from the Savage Reservation, John is lead to conform to the beliefs of the World State, thus losing his individuality, which ultimately leads him to commit suicide. Through John and the World State populace as an example, Huxley uses his novel to emphasize his disapproval of conformity over individuality.
The current manifestations of the caste system are now far more generalized across the Indian subcontinent than was the case in former times. Caste as we now recognize has been endangered, shaped and perpetuated by comparatively recent political and social developments. This is evident even i...