A Brave Story Essay Research Paper A

A Brave Story Essay, Research Paper A Brave Story Imagine a society so different from our own that it is completely shocking. This is the setting for Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. The satire takes place in the year 632 A.F., after Ford who has become a deity for this society. Civilization as we know it ended after a very destructive war, which left the human population decimated and exhausted. After another war, a dictatorship took control of the remaining population. This new government was able to bring stability by setting up a strict five layered caste system. Traditional institutions like marriage and religion were completely eliminated. The government strictly controls all facets of life. Children are born in test tubes independent of parents and raised and

conditioned by the government. Morals in this future setting are somewhat shocking even to someone of a very liberal nature. World peace is maintained by governmental conditioning of all people to think alike. Also, Soma, a soothing opiate like drug, is dispensed to all to quell any excess emotion. The action begins in the London Hatcheries where children are mass-produced and conditioned to the warped ideals of the Utopia. It’s a brutal image like animals being raised on a farm. One of the employees there, Lenina Crowne, has been dating employee Henry Foster with regularity, but courtship is discouraged by the State. Her friend Fanny Crowne begins to lecture her about this, so in turn Lenina begins to date another one of the employees. Bernard Marx, who is very smart but

somewhat deformed, becomes her newest object of infatuation. She decides to go on vacation with him to a reservation in New Mexico, where the so-called savages live. These were people that were deemed unworthy by the State to be assimilated into the Utopia. There at the reservation, Bernard and Lenina encounter John the savage and his mother Linda. In a surprising twist, Linda turns out to be a former Utopian, who actually bore the son of the DHC (the director of the Hatchery). Natural birth is considered obscene in Utopia, which is why Linda is in exile from the society. Bernard obtains permission from one of the ten supreme rulers, World Controller Mustapha Mond, to bring John and Linda back to the Utopia. Upon returning from the reservation, the DHC is about to send Bernard

into exile, but his secret relation to Linda and son John is exposed. Overwhelmed by humiliation, the DHC resigns. Bernard and his friend Helmholtz act as guardians to John. They show him off around the Utopia, and for the first time ever, Bernard becomes popular and something of a status symbol. John is at first impressed by the society, but begins to understand the depth of the materialism and lack of real humanity in Utopia. Becoming ever more moody, he begins to withdraw from the public. Meanwhile, Lenina has developed a strong infatuation with John. She makes several sexual advances, but John is completely disgusted by her blunt lustfulness and rejects her. Shortly after, John’s mother dies. The callousness of the Utopians at the hospital sends John into a fit of

passionate rage. Lecturing the Utopians about freedom, he causes a riot. After the riot is put down, the World Controller Mustapha Mond summons Bernard, John, and Helmholtz. At their meeting, Bernard and Helmholtz are exiled, but John remains behind with Mond for a long philosophical discussion about the Utopia. After this, John has decided to flee the Utopia. Outside of London, he hides and begins to start a new existence, but is discovered. Upon reaching the point of mental exhaustion, he breaks down and partakes in the Utopian practices, which he was so against. When he regains his composure, he is so overwhelmed by guilt that he commits suicide. Brave New World is a satire on modern day society. Huxley believed that if rampant consumerism and materialism remains unchecked and