"'Fine to think we can go on being socially useful even after we're dead.'" (pg. 73)
Between Never Let Me Go and Brave New World, I'd have to say I'm enjoying reading BNW much more, although the ending of NLMG was mind blowing, so I won't make my final decision until then.
The biggest similarity between the two books (and what my quote relates to) is that the characters are seen not as people, but as objects to be used for the "greater good." In NLMG, it was for organs, and this is for production. There whole life is about being beneficial to someone else, and they don't have any real freedom. Then, of course, is the acceptance. Despite the way they're treated and controlled by outside forces, that's just the way life is.
The biggest difference between the two is that in NLMG, people are still produced naturally, while in BNW, the word mother is taboo-it could even be considered a cuss word.
However, in NLMG, the characters got to grow up and live their own (limited) lives. They weren't conditioned to think one way or have some kind of personality. BNW is much more scientific and detailed, and there isn't one absolute main character, like NLMG. I think it't interesting to see the way two others took the idea of cloning in such different directions.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Brave New World-6
"What the two men shared was the knowledge that they were individuals." (pg. 67)
Mostly up until this point, it seemed that this creation of human beings and their conditioning worked well to create a uniform society. Lenina was a bit different (she was with only Henry for four months-who does that?), and so was Bernard, but I just assumed they were main characters, no big deal. However, with the introduction of Helmholtz Watson (what kind of name is that?), I'm starting to think it's more than just coincidence that Lenina and Bernard aren't stereotypical. Maybe this society isn't as uniform as it seems. Maybe its possible that individuals around the world weren't quite created or conditioned perfectly. Bernard, Helmholtz, and Lenina are individuals, who are, well, individual. None of them want their "peculiarities" to show, so I think it's more than possible that there are others who are like this. My prediction is for a rebellion. Or at least, after Never Let Me Go ended with nothing of the sort, that's my hope.
Mostly up until this point, it seemed that this creation of human beings and their conditioning worked well to create a uniform society. Lenina was a bit different (she was with only Henry for four months-who does that?), and so was Bernard, but I just assumed they were main characters, no big deal. However, with the introduction of Helmholtz Watson (what kind of name is that?), I'm starting to think it's more than just coincidence that Lenina and Bernard aren't stereotypical. Maybe this society isn't as uniform as it seems. Maybe its possible that individuals around the world weren't quite created or conditioned perfectly. Bernard, Helmholtz, and Lenina are individuals, who are, well, individual. None of them want their "peculiarities" to show, so I think it's more than possible that there are others who are like this. My prediction is for a rebellion. Or at least, after Never Let Me Go ended with nothing of the sort, that's my hope.
Brave New World-5-Characterization
"'And then he spends most of his time by himself-alone.'" (pg. 45)
A lot of this section is focused on Bernard Marx. Everyone except for Lenina thinks he's strange, and if I were them, so would I. For whatever reason, he isn't like the rest of his caste physically, and that has messed with his mind a lot. He gets mad that the other men are talking about Lenina like "meat," and he doesn't use soma. I would say that he's more like people of our time than of his. I think that so far, he's the most relatable character in the book, but I'm unsure of what Lenina sees in him.
Huxley uses both direct and indirect characterization to describe Bernard. Huxley tells the reader that Bernard is short and unlike his peers. On the other hand, Marx's personality is depicted by how Henry Foster treats him and how Fanny and Lenina talk about him. In this case, the indirect characterization is much more helpful in creating an image of what kind of person Bernard Marx is.
A lot of this section is focused on Bernard Marx. Everyone except for Lenina thinks he's strange, and if I were them, so would I. For whatever reason, he isn't like the rest of his caste physically, and that has messed with his mind a lot. He gets mad that the other men are talking about Lenina like "meat," and he doesn't use soma. I would say that he's more like people of our time than of his. I think that so far, he's the most relatable character in the book, but I'm unsure of what Lenina sees in him.
Huxley uses both direct and indirect characterization to describe Bernard. Huxley tells the reader that Bernard is short and unlike his peers. On the other hand, Marx's personality is depicted by how Henry Foster treats him and how Fanny and Lenina talk about him. In this case, the indirect characterization is much more helpful in creating an image of what kind of person Bernard Marx is.
Brave New World-4-Imagery
"Home, home-a few small rooms, stiflingly over-inhabited by a man, by a periodically teeming woman, by a rabble of boys and girls of all ages. No air, no space; an understerilized prison; darkness, disease, and smells." (pg. 37)
Everyone has had those moments where we wish we could just get away from our family. We just want to pull our hair out sometimes when we're around them. This imagery makes us feel what the students are feeling, which is pretty much disgust that people live this way. Honestly, if I had no previous experience with what a family really is, and this is all I'd ever been told, then yes, I would definitely think the way they do. However, this description is mostly inaccurate. Sure, there are times when we feel this way about our families, but the way the Controller explains the family relationship is that experience times infinity. It doesn't include any of the positive aspects. This makes me wonder what details of the past our society has shut away. This is about 500 years in the future, so looking back 500 years to the Middle Ages and the arranged marriages and everything from that time, we consider all of that crazy. We probably consider their way of living and thinking as illogical as the people of Brave New World consider ours.
Everyone has had those moments where we wish we could just get away from our family. We just want to pull our hair out sometimes when we're around them. This imagery makes us feel what the students are feeling, which is pretty much disgust that people live this way. Honestly, if I had no previous experience with what a family really is, and this is all I'd ever been told, then yes, I would definitely think the way they do. However, this description is mostly inaccurate. Sure, there are times when we feel this way about our families, but the way the Controller explains the family relationship is that experience times infinity. It doesn't include any of the positive aspects. This makes me wonder what details of the past our society has shut away. This is about 500 years in the future, so looking back 500 years to the Middle Ages and the arranged marriages and everything from that time, we consider all of that crazy. We probably consider their way of living and thinking as illogical as the people of Brave New World consider ours.
Monday, August 8, 2011
Brave New World-3-Allusion
"'...Our Ford's first T-Model was put on the market.' (Here the Director made a sign of the T on his stomach and all the students reverently followed suit.)" (pg. 25)
The Director has mentioned Our Ford several times now, and I finally think I may have figured it out. The model T was the the first automobile produced by Henry Ford. So, I'm assuming that every time a character mentions Ford, he or she is alluding to this guy. I mean, yeah, he's obviously extremely important, but these people seem to consider him to be a god (or maybe THE God?). Maybe it was the technology from the automobile, or maybe it's something else entirely. When the Director mentioned the T-Model, everyone made a T on their chest, which I bet is more than coincidentally similar to how Christians make the sign of the cross. Following that line of thinking, I'm gonna guess that A.F. stands for After Ford. If it is Henry Ford (and I really do think it is), then he was born in 1863 and died in 1947, but they could be using any number of dates from between those two years (like the T-Model was produced in 1908), so I'm going to say this is probably set between 2495 and 2579. I obviously still think they're crazy, but if someone from five or six hundred years ago, read about our society, they would think we're crazy too.
(Sidenote: This may very well be the weirdest book I've ever read. Seriously? "...gross viviparous reproduction..." (pg. 24)? French, German, and Polish (and probably most other languages) are dead? My only response is: what the heck happened between now and then?)
The Director has mentioned Our Ford several times now, and I finally think I may have figured it out. The model T was the the first automobile produced by Henry Ford. So, I'm assuming that every time a character mentions Ford, he or she is alluding to this guy. I mean, yeah, he's obviously extremely important, but these people seem to consider him to be a god (or maybe THE God?). Maybe it was the technology from the automobile, or maybe it's something else entirely. When the Director mentioned the T-Model, everyone made a T on their chest, which I bet is more than coincidentally similar to how Christians make the sign of the cross. Following that line of thinking, I'm gonna guess that A.F. stands for After Ford. If it is Henry Ford (and I really do think it is), then he was born in 1863 and died in 1947, but they could be using any number of dates from between those two years (like the T-Model was produced in 1908), so I'm going to say this is probably set between 2495 and 2579. I obviously still think they're crazy, but if someone from five or six hundred years ago, read about our society, they would think we're crazy too.
(Sidenote: This may very well be the weirdest book I've ever read. Seriously? "...gross viviparous reproduction..." (pg. 24)? French, German, and Polish (and probably most other languages) are dead? My only response is: what the heck happened between now and then?)
Brave New World-2-Diction
"Explained why it had to be stimulated with placentin and thyroxin. Told them of the corpus luteum extract. Showed them the jets through which at every twelfth metre from zero to 2040 it was automatically injected. Spoke of those gragually increasing doses of pituitary administered during the final ninety-six metres of their course..." (pg. 12)
The diction has been very scientific and impersonal up until this point. There's no emotion or feeling. While that may change as the main characters are introduced and the plot takes shape, I think this word choice sets a tone for the rest of the book, and for the society the author has created. People say first impressions are what stick in the mind, and the first thing we read about is a cold, scientific room with "frozen, dead" light (pg. 1). Then all the characters talk about humans very coldly, like they're machines. If they think like this, then there's a good chance the rest of society does too. However, I think the scientific diction is the most important to the story. I obviously know absolutely nothing about cloning, and so I have no clue whether or not Huxley's description of this process is accurate, but the point is that he makes it feel real. He acts like he knows exactly what he's talking about, like he's actually there, and that makes the book almost believable. My feeling about this book isn't "wow, this author is really creative." My reaction is "wow, this society is crazy," and I think that distinction does a lot to get the reader involved in the book.
The diction has been very scientific and impersonal up until this point. There's no emotion or feeling. While that may change as the main characters are introduced and the plot takes shape, I think this word choice sets a tone for the rest of the book, and for the society the author has created. People say first impressions are what stick in the mind, and the first thing we read about is a cold, scientific room with "frozen, dead" light (pg. 1). Then all the characters talk about humans very coldly, like they're machines. If they think like this, then there's a good chance the rest of society does too. However, I think the scientific diction is the most important to the story. I obviously know absolutely nothing about cloning, and so I have no clue whether or not Huxley's description of this process is accurate, but the point is that he makes it feel real. He acts like he knows exactly what he's talking about, like he's actually there, and that makes the book almost believable. My feeling about this book isn't "wow, this author is really creative." My reaction is "wow, this society is crazy," and I think that distinction does a lot to get the reader involved in the book.
Brave New World-1
"The principle of mass production at last applied to biology." (pg. 7)
What??? My reaction to this first chapter was disbelief and shock. Obviously there's some (a lot of) confusion mixed in there, but mostly I'm just dumbfounded that people would think this way. Yes, I know they're characters in a book, but still. They're talking about making the entire population made to order. We live in a society where there is quite a bit of emphasis on being oneself and not being afraid to be different, and this is the exact reversal of that. My mind is literally blown by how nonchalantly the Director and Mr. Foster talk about scientifically creating thousands of people. They're talking about this pretty much in the same way I talk about the weather. Mass production of people? Seriously? We're not talking about toasters or lawn chairs. These are living, breathing, thinking humans that may have thousands of identical clones. I'm assuming that this is supposed to be sometime in the future, but the series of events that led to this had to have been extreme. It could have been over a long period of time, but it could have been relatively short; I don't know, and I don't know that it really matters, but I cannot imagine what would have made people change their thinking so radically.
What??? My reaction to this first chapter was disbelief and shock. Obviously there's some (a lot of) confusion mixed in there, but mostly I'm just dumbfounded that people would think this way. Yes, I know they're characters in a book, but still. They're talking about making the entire population made to order. We live in a society where there is quite a bit of emphasis on being oneself and not being afraid to be different, and this is the exact reversal of that. My mind is literally blown by how nonchalantly the Director and Mr. Foster talk about scientifically creating thousands of people. They're talking about this pretty much in the same way I talk about the weather. Mass production of people? Seriously? We're not talking about toasters or lawn chairs. These are living, breathing, thinking humans that may have thousands of identical clones. I'm assuming that this is supposed to be sometime in the future, but the series of events that led to this had to have been extreme. It could have been over a long period of time, but it could have been relatively short; I don't know, and I don't know that it really matters, but I cannot imagine what would have made people change their thinking so radically.
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