Brave New World, written by Aldous Huxley, was originally published in 1932. The Industrial Revolution happened not long before the book’s publishing. The Industrial Revolution is marked by big events such as the railroad system, cars, and mass production of many other materials within the confines of a workshop. Knowing this, most of the population would have had a low paying factory job. When Henry Ford initiated the idea of the assembly line, it made many United States citizens crave speed and efficiency. The producers have to meet consumers’ expectations; so many other factories adapted this idea. By doing so, it made it easier to replace workers if one falls ill or is an unreliable worker. America had a very strong focus in technology …show more content…
and science because people soon learned that humans are much more mistake prone and slower than machines. By prioritizing science and technology, the United States had truly great advances in an exceptionally short period of time. Despite all of this, Aldous Huxley saw the way America and other countries had changed their ideals and decided to make a satire in order to show how their attention could lead to a potential utopia.
This utopia, though, would not promote any of America’s capitalistic views and remove so much of nature’s flaws that citizens would become practically inhuman. In “Brave New World,” Aldous Huxley shows how society’s current focus on advancing science and technology could create a seemingly perfect world. Although this sounds wonderful in theory, such things can only be possible through the loss of past ideologies and unethical means of creating a safe and happy environment.
Huxley proves in Brave New World that society will become distorted and untrue if it places too much emphasis on science and technology. The powerful World Leaders use science and technology to suppress the castes. The ideal pharmaceutical, soma, pacifies any pain; thus, no one is miserable or uneasy with any unfavorable feelings (McQuail). Soma is vital to every level of the caste system. It makes Epsilons happy with their basic, low level jobs. It keeps them from feeling as though they are just tools being used. Conversely, it keeps the Alphas content the terrible, unethical duties they perform. The saying “a gramme is better than a damn” keeps any real depth of human emotion
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out of sight (Huxley 67). Unfortunately, in the case of the Savage’s mother, the user will die if used in excess. She returns from the reservation, finally back in her own world, and takes soma until she reaches the point where she is in a near comatose state every day until she dies from it. Although they cannot prevent death from an overdose of soma, the World Leaders have made it so that all the citizens are so insensitive to death that it is seen as a final stepping stone in life that happens and not an event to sulk and morn over. Making citizens emotionally detached is very important when shaping the perfect worker because they will not miss work due to a death of someone close to them. Science and technology is used to make society efficient. The World Leaders abuse the susceptibility of the human mind to make it functionally effective (Thody). Each human mind, in our society, is different and will therefore react differently to events. The leaders of Brave New World have found a way to avoid this. Huxley takes Henry Ford’s goal to its analytical maximum by not only creating human beings biologically engineered to satisfy the bodily prerequisite of the occupation they are preordained to operate, but also the lower levels are precisely constructed to suit the apparatus they will work with every day (Pollerd). These people are created and molded to enjoy their jobs and placement in society. By doing this, it eliminates the lower castes from feeling abused and overused and therefore eliminating any chance of political uprisings. However, because everyone is exactly like everyone else, there are very few differences in that society. In Brave New World, individuality is rare.
This is because science has removed the opportunity for individuality. The Bokanovsky Process is the mass production of humans in a test tube (Huxley 19-20). There is no way to distinguish one embryo from the other ninety-five. This is an attempt to achieve a successful Marxist society. To get rid of the alienation of certain groups, the World Leaders have removed the idea of private property and class differences. When people in Brave New World say “everyone belongs to everyone else,” it is not just a sexual scheme. It is literal. There is no private property, no physical difference between one Epislon and another, and no sense of individuality. Horowitz says that “alienation is the driveshaft of revolution” (qtd. in McQuail). As mentioned earlier, each class feels as though it is important and there are no political problems at hand. Yet, because there is no difference within the classes and there are no political or social problems, there is no idolization of other humans. The exception to that is Henry Ford. Because there is no social or political inefficaciousness, society does not require any form of heroism or nobility. When John the Savage becomes angry and acts out about the soma the Deltas are unthinkingly ingesting is a strike of heroism. His individuality brings him popularity. The only reason he is popular, though, is because the people turn him into a spectacle for his differences. John, in search of decency, turns
to whipping himself as they did in Medieval times to cleanse themselves of sin. The people of Brave New World catch on to what he is doing and come to watch him at the lighthouse. Lenina comes to talk to him, and he ends up whipping her. Phillip Thody writes how “John’s search for purity has turned into a sado-masochistic sexual orgy; … [the man who] would have represented triumphant sanity, hangs himself in despair.” John the Savage, the character who the audience can relate to most, ends up dying because there is truly no hope in a world that values science and technology over human nature and individuality. Without past ideologies, art and literature have little to no purpose in Brave New World unless it is for the advancement of science. The only forms of literature that are read are writings such as manuals, lab reports, and other science related writings. There are a few Alphas that are able to grasp the idea of more emotional writing, but it is just out of reach for them due to their training or background. Helmholtz and John the Savage are two of these characters. Helmholtz is a writer, and has an inkling of the bigger picture. Unfortunately, because of the training he unconsciously underwent as he matured and the way the World Leaders keep a watchful eye for those who are too close to uncovering the truth will keep him from ever reaching his potential of understanding literature and art. John the Savage constantly quotes the works of Shakespeare and other things he had picked up when he was a child. Although he quotes and tries to live by the lines, there are hints throughout the novel that he does not fully understand what he is saying and is just reciting it blindly. He mixes Native American religion, the Bible, and what he had heard from Linda of the Brave New World into his thoughts after Pope had whipped him and Linda, sending hints to the readers that John cannot tell the difference between what is real and what are just religious beliefs (Huxley 137). As an adult, he still is unable to differentiate between reality and text from a book. When asked about the speed of transportation in Brave New World, John disregards it by saying “Ariel could put a girdle round the earth in fourty minutes” (164-165). The World Leaders are completely aware of how the literature, or the lack thereof, has and is effecting the Brave New World. Mustapha admits that although the literature is a good read, it had to be sacrificed for what he called the greater good of society. “Since only unhappy people produce literature, and unhappiness itself is so intense, certain and widespread, might it not be a good idea to accept that literature will disappear if suffering is abolished?” To achieve a world without war within Brave New World, ethical boundaries had to be crossed. For example, science overrules nearly every aspect of nature. Everything is observed and recorded down to the minute detail. Ovas are kept at a two degree temperature difference than the sperm (Huxley 18-19). To many readers, two degrees may seem insignificant. However, Brave New World’s society values science to the point where two degrees is fundamental. Furthermore, oxygen will be deprived of the embryos according to what caste they will go in; the Brave New World scientists have deprived enough embryos of oxygen to know that at seventy percent they will get dwarfs, and any less than that eyeless monsters will result (Huxley 27-28). For the scientists to have toyed around with humans lives so much to know that, for a fact, if over a certain percentage of oxygen is deprived from an embryo something inhuman will result, is really cruel and unethical. In our current society, we have laws to stop madmen from doing such an act. Shockingly, in Brave New World, depriving embryos of oxygen is normality. The reason for keeping oxygen from embryos is to ensure that the caste system is as faultless as possible. The caste system is used to keeps the citizens in line. As mentioned before, the lower castes like the Deltas are deprived of oxygen in embryonic stages while the Alphas get little to no oxygen deprivation. As toddlers,to instill fear in objects and ideas that could potentially cause problems, the children are nearly tortured with electric shocks. At the level of the Deltas, the children have books and flowers displayed in front of them (Huxley 34). With this therapy, the children will no longer have any desire to learn or associate with books. They will also be deterred from daydreaming out the windows during their time in their factory jobs or wanting to wander into the forest to explore nature. Even as an adult, the training of the mind is not halted. There are tapes that play on repeat to ingrain the idea that even Epsilons are indispensable. As Jake Pollerd states in “State Versus the Individual: Civil Disobedience in Brave New World”, “In an inhumane world such as the dystopia Huxley creates, we find little chance of exercising foundational human rights and little toleration of the attempts made at civil disobedience. Huxley wrote his novel, Brave New World, to be a strong, persuasive satirical writing in hopes of making people realize that although Marxist ideas may look idealistic and flawless in writing, society will degrade to inhuman beings because the scientists will push the citizens through so many procedures to be efficient. Society will no longer have ethical boundaries, cherish the works of literature and greatness of art, or have any aspect of nature left in their minds after the training and pharmaceuticals. The thirst for technology and science will overrule, leaving very few people, if any, as a true human with their own thoughts, opinions, and ambitions. Huxley wrote Brave New World to shock the public into realizing how quickly their good intentions could turn sour. Huxley may have made an impact, but our current world is still delving into the many expansions technology and science can create.
Jett Phillips 07.02.2017 Dearing AP Lit & Comp A.3 Aldous Huxley’s Satirical Ironic World There is no novel more synonymous with irony and satire than Aldous Huxley’s 1932 novel Brave New World. Throughout the novel, Huxley takes advantage of irony and satire to bring about his message, in an attempt to criticize those who would like to see the expansion of the state and proliferation of promiscuity, by showing those how such a world would look like, through his depiction of the “World State.” As presented in the novel, the World State’s citizens are designated by birth into genetically engineered classes, controlled throughout life through drugs and endless promiscuity, and pushing the never-ending production line forward in the satirically stated year of 632 “After Ford.” However, Huxley’s use of irony shines brightest through the names of his characters, such as Lenina Crowne, Bernard Marx, and John the Savage. The former two names are in reference to Vladimir Lenin and Karl Marx, and the latter being an ironic name based on how, essentially,
Social stability can be the cause of problems. After reading Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, we are informed that “Bokanovsky’s Process is one of the major instruments of social stability!” Now is it worth it? Is it worth the sacrifice? Questions like those are addressed throughout the book. Huxley wants to warn us of many things, for example the birth control pill, the way that we can colon ourselves and many other things. He wanted us to know that many of the experiments that they do to the caste in Brave New World, we were later going to do investigate more ourselves or start doing them to others. We have all, at a point; come to a point to the question where we ask ourselves “is it worth it? Is it worth the sacrifice?”
Throughout the novel, Huxley uses Bernard Marx, a young man who is “deformed by the government” (Huxley, page #) to underline the idea that a Utopian Society cannot exist. The advancement of technology has enabled this “Utopian Society” to create human life. Although the entire society is based on technology, it remains supervised by humans. No matter how “advanced” this technology may be, if humans are directing it, mistakes will be made “They say somebody made a mistake when he was still in the bottle... and put alcohol into his blood- surrogate. That’s why he’s so stunted” (Huxley, 46).
In his novel Brave New World, Aldous Huxley illustrates ways in which government and advanced science control society. Through actual visualization of this Utopian society, the reader is able to see how this state affects Huxley’s characters. Throughout the book, the author deals with many different aspects of control. Whether it is of his subjects’ feelings and emotions or of the society’s restraint of population growth, Huxley depicts government’s and science’s role in the brave new world of tomorrow.
Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley, while fictitiously showing the future possible advances of science and technology, is actually warning people of what science could become. In the Foreword of Brave New World, Huxley states: “The theme of Brave New World is not the advancement of science as such; it is the advancement of science as it affects human individuals” (xi). He is not suggesting that this is how science should advance, but that science will advance the way that people allow it to. The novel is not supposed to depict a “utopian” society by any means, but it is supposed to disturb the reader and warn him not to fall into this social decay. Huxley uses satire to exploit both communism and American capitalism created by Ford.
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.
Mad Magazine, The Simpsons, Saturday Night Live. In our society, satire is among the most prevalent of comedic forms. This was not always true, for before the 18th century, satire was not a fully developed form. Satire, however, rose out of necessity; writers and artists needed a way to ambiguously criticize their governments, their churches, and their aristocrats. By the 18th century, satire was hugely popular. Satire as an art form has its roots in the classics, especially in the Roman Horace's Satires. Satire as it was originally proposed was a form of literature using sarcasm, irony, and wit, to bring about a change in society, but in the eighteenth century Voltaire, Jonathan Swift and William Hogarth expanded satire to include politics, as well as art. The political climate of the time was one of tension. Any criticism of government would bring harsh punishments, sometimes exile or death. In order to voice opinions without fear of punishment, malcontented writers turned to Satire. Voltaire's Candide and Swift's Modest Proposal are two examples of this new genre. By creating a fictional world modeled after the world he hated, Voltaire was able to attack scientists, and theologians with impunity. Jonathan Swift created many fictional worlds in his great work, Gulliver's Travels, where he constantly drew parallels to the English government.
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.
Thomas More’s Utopia and Aldus Huxley’s Brave New World , are novels about societies that differ from our own. Though the two authors have chosen different approaches to create an alternate society, both books have similarities which represent the visions of men who were moved to great indignation by the societies in which they lived. Both novels have transcended contemporary problems in society , they both have a structured, work based civilization and both have separated themselves from the ways of past society. It is important when reading these novels to focus on the differences as well as the similarities. The two novels differ in their views of love, religion, and the way to eliminate social classes. These differences seem to suggest that if we do not come closer to More’s goal in Utopia, we will end up in a society much like that of Huxley’s Brave New World.
Satire is the most powerful democratical weapon in the arsenal of modern media. Sophia McClennen, the author of America According to Colbert: Satire as Public Pedagogy, describes it as the modern form of public pedagogy, as it helps to educate the masses about current issues (73). In fact, ”a Pew Research Center for the People & the Press survey in 2004 found that 61 percent of people under the age of thirty got some of their political 'news' from late-night comedy shows” (McClennen 73). This statistic shows how influential satirical shows such as The Colbert Report or South Park can be. Satire invites critical self introspection from us in a way that no other media can. It also acts as an unbiased mirror that reflects the mirror image of the flaws of our society. This beautiful process, when unhindered and uncensored, is the epitome of western freedom of speech, which is the single most significant right that deserves to be cherished and defended.
John Marwood Cleese, an English actor, comedian, writer and film producer said, “If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you more open to my ideas. And if I can persuade you to laugh at the particular point I make, by laughing at it you acknowledge its truth”. The point he brings up is the ideology of satire. Satire, by definition, is a technique utilized by writers to expose and criticize foolishness and corruption of an individual or a society. This can be done by using humor, irony, exaggeration or ridicule ("Satire - Definition and Examples", para.1). Often times, the humor used opens the audiences’ minds to the underlying problem that the writer is trying to reveal. By examining the purpose and methods of satire, dissecting literary works, and displaying examples in the media, satire is shown to be a valuable tool.
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.
Technology, which has brought mankind from the Stone Age to the 21st century, can also ruin the life of peoples. In the novel Brave New World, the author Aldous Huxley shows us what technology can do if we exercise it too much. From the novel we can see that humans can lose humanity if we rely on technology too much. In the novel, the author sets the world in the future where everything is being controlled by technology. This world seems to be a very perfectly working utopian society that does not have any disease, war, problems, crisis but it is also a sad society with no feelings, emotions or human characteristics. This is a very scary society because everything is being controlled even before someone is born, in test tube, where they determine of which class they are going to fall under, how they are going to look like and beyond. Therefore, the society of Brave New World is being controlled by society form the very start by using technology which affects how the people behave in this inhumane, unrealistic, society.
In Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, truth and happiness are falsely engineered to create a perfect society; the belief of the World Controllers that stability is the the key to a utopian society actually led to the creation of an anti-utopian society in which loose morals and artificial happiness exist. Huxley uses symbolism, metaphors, and imagery to satirize the possibiliy of an artificial society in the future as well as the “brave new world” itself.
Even though the novel, Brave New World was written quite some time ago, Huxley still makes points that are relevant today. By using satire, he warns us on issues such as science, technology and religion. We should slow down our uses of science and technology, especially when using them for abusive purposes. We also need to be careful about letting the government get too involved in aspects of our everyday lives. If we start letting simple freedoms go, we could lose some major ones.