Literature Analysis

Brave New World
by: Aldous Huxley

1.  The plot of this novel starts with the introduction of society in a new way. A place where drugs are praised, sex is everywhere and basically things "after ford" are the complete opposite of what we know today.  Human life has been almost entirely industrialized — controlled by a few people at the top of a World State.The first scene, offering a tour of a lab where human beings are created and conditioned according to the society's strict caste system, establishes the antiseptic tone and the theme of dehumanized life. The natural processes of birth, aging, and death represent horrors in this world.Bernard Marx, an Alpha-Plus (or high-caste) psychologist, emerges as the single discontented person in a world where material comfort and physical pleasure — provided by the drug soma and recreational sex — are the only concerns. Scorned by women, Bernard nevertheless manages to engage the attention of Lenina Crowne, a "pneumatic" beauty who agrees to spend a vacation week with him at the remote Savage Reservation in New Mexico, a place far from the controlled, technological world of London.In the Savage Reservation with Lenina, Bernard meets a woman from London who gave birth to a son about 20 years before. Seeing his opportunity to gain power over the D.H.C. — the father of the child — Bernard brings Linda and John back to London and presents them publicly to the D.H.C., who is about to banish Bernard. Shocked and humiliated by the proof of his horrifying connection with natural birth, the D.H.C. flees in terror. Once a social outcast, Bernard now enjoys great success, because of his association with the new celebrity — John, called "the Savage."Reared on the traditional ways of the Reservation and an old volume of the poetry of Shakespeare, John finds London strange, confusing, and finally repellent. His quotation of Miranda's line from The Tempest— "O brave new world / That has such people in it" — at first expresses his awe of the "Other Place" his mother told him of as a child. But the quotation becomes ironic as John becomes more and more disgusted by the recreational sex, soma, and identical human beings of London.The three face the judgment of World Controller Mustapha Mond, who acknowledges the flaws of this brave new world, but pronounces the loss of freedom and individuality a small price to pay for stability. Mond banishes Bernard and Helmholtz to the Falkland Islands and rules that John must stay in London. Lenina's attempted seduction provokes John's anger and violence, and, later, the death of Linda further arouses his fury. At last, John's attempt to keep a crowd of Deltas from their ration of soma results in a riot and his arrest, along with Bernard and Helmholtz Watson, an "emotional engineer" who wishes to be a poet. When his two friends leave for their exile, John determines to make a retreat for himself in a remote, secluded lighthouse outside the city. There he tries to purify himself of civilization with ritual whippings and vomiting. Drawn by the spectacle of his wild penances, reporters and crowds press in on John, who becomes a public curiosity — a kind of human animal in a zoo. When Lenina appears in the crowd, John furiously attacks her with the whip. John's frenzy inflames the crowd, and, in accordance with their social training, the violence turns into a sexual orgy, with John drawn in more or less unwillingly. The next day, when John awakes from the effects of the soma, he realizes in horror what he has done. The novel closes on an image of John's body, hanging lifeless from a wooden beam in his lighthouse retreat.

2. The theme of "Brave New World" is that of Freedom and Confinement, seen as one.  The citizens of Brave New World's futuristic society are in a constant state of imprisonment. But because they've been conditioned to love their servitude, no one seems to have any problem with this. Well, almost no one. As one character so deftly points out, being happy all the time is its own sort of prison; being a human is about having the right to be unhappy. The prison bars are made of brainwashing sayings, of drugs and promiscuity, and not of iron or steel. Because confinement happens in the mind, so too is freedom a mental state.

3. The author's tone in "Brave New World" is very serious. The authors tone was serious.  It had a sort of humor to it, but overall the idea of the novel was almost depressing.  He spoke very straight forward and made it seem like things were horrible, the promiscuous people, the sex, the drugs all made it clear that the authors tone was a very serious one. The tone was also very satirical, do to the fact that it is like our society backwards. Also because of how he uses "ford" in place of a god or christ figure.

4. Five literary elements I was able to see in this novel are diction/ syntax, satire, setting, symbols, and imagery.

Diction/ syntax: Example, "Just to give you a general idea," he would explain to them. For of course some sort of general idea they must have, if they were to do their work intelligently – though as little of one, if they were to be good and happy members of society, as possible. For particulars, as every one knows, make for virtue and happiness; generalities are intellectually necessary evils. Not philosophers but fret-sawyers and stamp collectors compose the backbone of society." The author writes colloquial, but in a sophisticated manner. You can tell he wants to appeal to many readers, but at the same time he wants to portray what's going on in a very serious way.

Satire: Brave New World is a satire because it is today's society, backwards. Sex is glorified and celebrated, and monogamy, where in today's society is seen as the "best" way, is laughed at and tossed aside. Another satire in the book is the class and race system being simplified into colors of clothes, ("I hate khaki"), I personally think that this is hilarious, simplifying it so a moron can understand it. Another satire is the use of drugs. Throughout the book the characters indulger (or over-indulge) in the taking of "soma", which takes them on a relaxing high of some sort that is referred to as a "soma holiday". This is satire because in today's society drug use is strongly frowned upon, wherein Brave New World, not using the drug is frowned upon and considered not "normal". Yet another satirical bit in Brave New World is the people that live on the reservation in New Mexico, and how they do things much in the way that we do today, and they are referred to as "savages" and primitive beings. One of the things that disgusts people of the New World the most is natural child birth, opposed to the popular "jar birth" of the New World. Those are four of the biggest satires on modern society in the book. Everything is backwards.

Setting: England, Savage Reservation in New Mexico.  2540 a.d., referred to in the novel as 632 years, "After Ford", meaning 632 after the first model T car was produced.  The setting gives the novel suspense because it's hot and dangerous in the reservation. Also it allows the reader to have an imagination because this is all happening so far in the future.

Symbols: The drug soma is a symbol of the use of instant gratification to control the World State’s populace. It is also a symbol of the powerful influence of science and technology on society.

Imagery:  There is use of "animal imagery", the author uses unique description of animals and their actions to convey a point with in the novel for example, "straight from the horses mouth."