Goal of
literary essay: "Looking at the text as a work of art, demonstrating clear
critical judgment and explaining to the reader of your essay how the enjoyment
of the text is assisted by literary devices, linguistic effects and
psychological insights; showing how the text relates to the time when it was
written and how it relates to our world today.
Scientific progress, truth and beauty,
happiness
" I
don’t want comfort. I want God, I want
poetry, I want real danger. I want
freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."
(John the Savage. 211)
- Huxley's answer to suffering is COMMUNITY/IDENTITY/STABILITY
- In BNW consumption leads to happiness
- Can truth and happiness co-exist?
- What is the effect of having no art (what would our life be like with no art?)
- Little emotion = stability = happiness
Chapter 16 - scientific progress can lead to unhappiness (BNW uses
scientific progress to create as much stability as possible) - the controllers essentially stop scientific progress
when they feel like they've reach the ultimate cost-benefit analysis
- Interesting how they keep farming because people need to work (studies in BNW show around 7 1/2 hours a day
- Could make some connections between Pleasantville and BNW also our world
- "freedom is only necessary where there's no happiness" (12)
SOMA - makes people "happy" but not really happy - hides
the truth and beauty
[The role of Soma and happiness in BNW]
CHARACTERS AND COMMUNITY, IDENTITY
AND STABILITY
- Mustapha Mond says the society is planned around keeping stability
- In some ways the different echelons give them identity - which leads to stability
-people who are against these three characteristics will be cast out
Bernard - doesn't
conform to society in looks
- thinks differently - likes to be alone - has a special interest in Lenina
- gets jealous (not stable)
Lenina - represents
stability - everyone wants her - she's
"pneumatic" - she goes along with BNW's main tenets - repeats the
hypnopaedia mantras throughout
- everything she says
represents the world state
John the Savage - how
does John contradict this motto? He would like to not have stability - would like his
own identity
- John is formed by two humans (vivaporous) - against BNW community - wants Lenina and he to be monogamous
- Has feelings - contradicts stability
- Doesn't take soma - contradicts motto
- Understands Shakespeare because understands emotion (love, jealousy, sadness)
- Starts a riot over soma
- Had to die because could not exist in this society
Helmholtz - thought Romeo and Juliet is hysterical, yet writes his
own poetry
Mustapha Mond "history
is bunk" -why is important that the BNW not know history
-if people are individuals - community will not be stable
*alpha pluses have individual thoughts because they have to deal
with unexpected problems - takes complex cognition
[Are people in BNW oppressed?]
- Individual
- "the greater a man talents, the greater his power to lead astray. It is better that one should suffer than that many should be corrupted." (128) - opposite of what we believe - although does our government believe this?
- History and religion - comparing history to BNW would make the population have thoughts (not stable)
-one character or three characters
(one of community, identity, stability)
3x3 2X3 1x1
- Bernard is a dynamic character (loves Lenina - becomes popular - goes back to normal)- at the start he rebels against the motto - succumbs to it - then goes back to individual thoughts
- At end does not want to leave
UTOPIA
- Relating our world to BNW
- Is a stable society the optimum set up for civilization?
- Not possible to have a stable society
- "without contraries, there's no progression" - William Blake
- People evolve and change - so does society
- At what point does it become too regulated
- "The Lottery" - stable society - but needed to progress - instability would help them
- Instability - is like change - we need to evolve (get rid of the worst parts of ourselves - we no longer sit in the city square to watch people hang)
To what
extent do we condition our youth?
Monogamy- much more
stable - for example - raising kids - taxation - more time and effort invested
in children
[Communists believed the group could parent the children - like
National Day Care]
What would the BNW think about our world - they could see us like
the way we see the savages
- How is stability maintained with 8 ninths are underwater (and why?)
-soma, conditioned to be happy, (manufactured that way) also the
final ninth are threatened with isolation
Calling it a utopia just because everyone is "happy" is
erroneous
- No truth, no authenticity,
No war, no one is hungry, everyone has shelter
Mustapha Mond isn't happy - runs the world - he chose to run the
world rather than continue with science
Religion, goals, art , passion
No greed in the BNW
-passion leads to dreams - leads to stability
"He had discovered time and love and death" - John the
Savage?
[An aspect of happiness and any character]
-are there any animals in BNW?
- Huxley suggests the cost is too high to have stability
-anything compromising stability is immoral
Our morals and values -same
or different?
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