Brave New World Essays Essay, Research Paper
Brave New World Essay Test
Q: How does life in Brave New World change John?
A: Life in The Brave New World changes John in an unusual way. Being a child from the savage reservation, John was taught that morality, rather than conditioned by the Controller. John learned his rights and wrongs from his mother, and his own experiences. John knew a personal relationship was valued, and everyone loved one another. He learned that religion was a major part of his morals. Sex was something done with a mate that is loved.
When John was brought to the Brave New World, his inhibitions were happening by other people right in front of him. He saw sex as a common occurrence, and nobody really had any emotion toward it. Everyone enjoyed it, but not spiritually. In sense, sex did not light an eternal flame for the Brave New World like it did in the savage reservation. A piece of a mother and father could be put together for a child in the savage society, but in the Brave New World, everyone had their own life. There were no personal relationships, and there was no love. Also, drugs were looked down upon by the reservation, and yet, in the Brave New World, drugs, specifically soma, are the food for life. Instead of living through rough situations, society went on soma holidays for their problems.
All these wrongs to John, were making him upset. John tried to give the hospital workers freedom. He threw away their soma, and made them more upset. The workers rioted against John, and he realized he could not change society. John argued with the Mustapha Mond about the way society was, but it seemed Mond had a response to everything. John decided to indulge himself in the Brave New World s lifestyle. John tried sex, and soma, and enjoyed it. John knew he had sinned to his own religion, and he felt so wrong, that he murdered himself.
The change that John went through was simple. John actually committed his inhibitions. John normally, and in theory, would never do those things. John would only have sex with his soul mate for life, and would absolutely not do soma. Society turned John around so much, that he did all of this, and did what society called happiness. He committed suicide.
Q: What faults does John find with the philosophy of happiness, identity, and social stability.
A: John finds many things wrong with the happiness, identity, and social stability theories set in the Brave New World. They are all screwed up!
John finds that the happiness philosophy is based on things that shouldn t show true happiness. In the savage reservation, and in our society today, there are many things that mean true happiness. Family, personal relationships, and nature all represent happiness to us. Our family is whom we love, and who we are. We value our family greatly. John does as well. The savages and our society value personal relationships as well. We care about our mates, and our friends. If they have a problem, we try to feel their pain, and console them. Nature is truly our natural habitat, and when a child is born, it means the world is growing with the standards set by the parents. We enjoy nature s entire environment because it is our home. I think the perfect metaphor to use would be Home Sweet Home.
In the Brave New World, there is no family. People may come from the same embryo, but they do not value each other s love. How can they be happy when they do not have love? Sex is something taken for granted in Brave New World. They have it without caring how the emotions are doing. They do not care how old they are. They do not care if others know they are having it. Is this really showing any value of importance? Sex is a game in the Brave New World. Sex should be a valued gift from God!
John finds that there is only identity through castes. The Epsilons are obviously lower socially than Gammas, the Gammas are lower than the Deltas, the Deltas lower than Betas, and of course, Betas lower than the all power Alphas. Alphas are conditioned to make some decisions. The government does not want too much of this, so everyone is programmed like a robot. Nobody does anything they want to do, they do what they are conditioned to do. Who is anyone? In today s society, we can say, What s in a name? as a sarcastic comment showing that it s a personality that matters. In Brave New World, everything is in a name. This is the only identity that they have!
John also sees that there is a major fault with social stability. There are no problems among the castes themselves, but from caste to caste, they hate each other. Alphas despise Epsilons, but know they need them. Epsilons don t like Alphas because they are too powerful and bossy. There is no stability. I would even venture to guess today s society is more stable than Brave New World s. We may have countries against one another, but it s all political. There are not as many cases of one person truly hating another person of another country for their personality. They just hate the government for attacking their country, or another religion for attacking their religion. Stability is a theory that would happen, in a true perfect world, however with the different castes in Brave New World, it leads to instability, proving it is not as Utopian as it may seem.
Q: In what ways are Linda and Lenina similar?
A: Linda and Lenina are very similar. Both would like to be monogamous, but are controlled by sex. Lenina is conditioned to be away from it, but from the way she reaches out to people, and tries to steal their heart and emotions, I can see she wants to be loved. Desire is a powerful thing that drives her to sex with other men. Condition brainwashed her into this sexual desire. Linda is also controlled by sex because of her history as a beta. The standards set by the savage reservation after she got lost there, changed her into a person who could be monogamous, and expected to be. The sexual desire made her an outcast to the savages. She was a slut to them. Dress her up, put her on the street, and she could be the perfect savage prostitute. These things are shown in both characters. They are hard to discover, but go much deeper than their names both starting with an L .
Q: Why do you think the Epsilon caste is black?
A: The Epsilon caste is probably black for a historical reason. Throughout history, black people, and Afro-Americans were thought to be inferior to whites. Even though untrue, many white people felt as if they had control and power over the darker skin beings. Whether it is the thought of slavery or the immigration factor, whites felt superior. The colored people had no choice of their skin color, and knew that, but white people did not come to realize this. It wasn t until desegregation laws that people made an effort to see themselves as equal to others. Black people got equal rights. This was correct and how it should be. Henry Ford, probably the idea for the god of the story, lived during times of segregation. This book was written in 1932, in the heart of segregated times. Blacks were still inferior to people at this point, so for that time, it is easy to understand why the author, Huxley, decided to make the lowest caste, Black.
Q: What does the Reservation represent to the government and the citizens of Brave New World?
A: In the Brave New World, history is bunk to all. Citizens are conditioned to disregard history, and to steer away from it if any knowledge about it is learned. They do not know that their history is of love, religion, bad times, imperfection, opposite morality, and identity. When they hear about or see the reservation, they know that the savages practice religion, feel love, experience bad times and imperfection, that their morals are different, and that each person has a personality. The Brave New World is conditioned to dislike and do the opposite of what the savages do. Savagism is normal, but to the Brave New World, it is odd. The Brave New World doesn t see why their society is wrong, cause they are conditioned to like it, and brainwashed to have a wrong impression of freedom.
Sex is a major part to this story. Sex is valued by the Savages and shows reproduction, love, and personality. In the Brave New World, sex is like eating cake in our society. Sure, cake is a treat, but it s not hard to get if you really want it. The entire population of the Brave New World, really, really wanted it!
The basic to this thought is that the savage reservation represents the history of the Brave New World. If the Savage reservation did not exist, where would the world go if the hatchery were closed? All people are infertile, so the only people left after everyone dies are the savages, because they can reproduce. The Brave New World should greatly respect the savages for that.
Q: How accurate is Huxley s vision of the future?
A: The vision of the future predicted by Huxley is more accurate than it appears. America is a land with government. The government controls how everything happens, whether you want to admit it or not. If you want to murder, sorry, the government already banned that. I think Huxley is actually making a satire with Brave New World compared to our society. He s taking the basics, and exaggerating them to extreme proportions.
Huxley s thoughts of reproduction were not exact, but he did think there would be embryos growing in test tubes, which can happen today. He also thought the future would have cloning, and he was correct. It is now possible to clone mammals.
One thing that I did not quite understand was the idea of the Brave New World being a Utopian society. There would no differences in a perfect world. There would also be things that people wanted, like religion and love, proving that Brave New World is morally wrong. It is more Dystopian when you consider that the current society gets love, happiness, emotion, and identity.
I can understand why Huxley would choose the settings and conflicts in Brave New World. His grandfather, T.H. Huxley was a well-known scientist. Could it have been that Aldous was writing about an experiment his grandfather was trying to perform? Was his grandfather trying to reproduce through a test tube? The inspiration for the Ford of the book may have been Henry Ford, who was one of the wealthiest and most popular men of that time, after creating the first car. Ford may have been Huxley s role model, and the reason he made him the most powerful man in the story.
Huxley was a very satirical writer in his day, and his works were truly recognized. In fact, Huxley established his reputation before he was 30 and became a very prolific writer. He originally wanted to be a doctor, but was temporarily blinded in college, so he began journalism. In my own opinion, I believe the idea of Brave New World came while Huxley was in a satirical state of mind, during his blind period. He was blind to see how the world was, so he had to predict the future, for when his site came back. Is it possible Huxley was satirizing his thoughts, and came up with the idea of a Brave New World? I don t guess anyone really knows.
At the beginning of the book, Huxley mentions several new inventions, that seem very radical, and fool you into thinking it is a fantasy world. However, it s so quickly that Huxley changes your mind from a fantastic society to a horrendous one, that you really cannot help but to be pulled in to how this terrible society ends. The society does not end however, and it shows you that the future can be scary if the world does not do their part in keeping us more like the savage reservation. Keep love valued, and never take anything for granted!