Brave New World:
…And Does the Life
I Knew Still Remain?
Feraco
Myth to Science Fiction
26 April 2013
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Our last six bullets from the original list –
not quite unaddressed, but not focused on
explicitly – are as follows:
The need for heritage, cultural relativism, and
the value of a legacy
The argument for experience: the search for
control vs.“living dangerously”
Lust, love, and lies: human cruelty and the
usefulness of relationships
The interplay between suggestion and
decisions
The process of belief: the fears and events that
define us
The desire for a place to belong and the
formation of philosophy and society
We’ll cover them as we go forward, covering
each chapter via a bunch of quotes and points.
Chapter Four finds Bernard and Lenina
finalize plans to go to the Reservation, much to
Bernard’s public chagrin.
That chagrin reminds us of what
constitutes “shocking” and “acceptable” here –
“mother” is an unspeakable obscenity, but
public innuendo is encouraged.
He was still wretched…[upset] that she
should have trotted away to join Henry Foster,
that she should have found him funny for not
wanting to talk of their most private affairs in
public. Wretched, in a word, because she had
behaved as any healthy and virtuous English
girl ought to behave and not in some other,
abnormal, extraordinary way.
We get shades of Winston and Julia here;
1984 remains a vitally original work, but its
similarities to Brave New World are
unmistakable.
As we pan over the athletic action, we notice
the beginning of a recurring pattern in the
book: Huxley’s descriptions of the masses as
insectoid.
The “societal body” is in many ways like a
hive, or at least a hive mind.
If we consider ants, which are conditioned
to automatically respond to a queen in a
certain way, we can’t help but notice that
Lenina is equally unconscious when she voices
her dislike for khaki or her gratitude over not
being born a Gamma.
A rogue ant within the hive – an ant that
resists its assigned purpose – threatens the
hive, and all unorthodoxy is treated the same
way in the World State.
That’s why Bernard invites such scorn: it’s
not just that he’s breaking the mold, but that
he’s introducing danger by doing so.
Bernard has a personal reason to be
distressed by his interactions with lower-caste
members – he looks like them, and the
associations conjure up a lot of inadequacies for
someone who’s already fairly insecure.
However, it opens up a self-reinforcing cycle:
…Mockery made him feel an outsider; and
feeling an outsider he behaved like one, which
increased the prejudice against him and
intensified the contempt and hostility aroused
by his physical defects. Which in turn increased
his sense of being alien and alone. A chronic fear
of being slighted made him avoid his equals,
made him stand, where his inferiors were
concerned, self-consciously on his dignity. How
bitterly he envied men like Henry Foster and
Benito Hoover! Men who never had to shout at an
Epsilon to get an order obeyed; men who took
their position for granted; men who moved
through the caste system as a fish through
water–so utterly at home as to be unaware either
of themselves or of the beneficent and
comfortable element in which they had their
being.
In Chapter Five, we get our first brush with the
World State’s treatment of death.
Bodies are burned, and the gasses are
collected and recovered over the course of four
stages within giant chimneys.
Henry voices pride over the idea that people
can continue contributing to the societal body
even after they expire.
In the World State, death is just something
that happens – another automatic process.
As we’ll later discover, children are “deathconditioned” – exposed to death at an early age
in order to demystify it (which, in turn, prevents
socially unacceptable reactions like grief or
longing).
Having seen The Fountain – and, for some of
you, having experienced loss yourself – is this
something we should do with our children,
preparing them for the inevitable so they don’t
waste their time fearing it? Or is the grief
instinct, that longing for someone who’s passed,
something we should guard/preserve?
“[It’s] queer that Alphas and Betas won’t
make any more plants grow than those nasty
little Gammas and Deltas and Epsilons down
there.”
“All men are physico-chemically equal,”
said Henry sententiously.“Besides, even
Epsilons perform indispensable services.”
…“I suppose Epsilons don’t really mind
being Epsilons,” she said aloud.
“Of course they don’t. How can they? They
don’t know what it's like being anything else.
We’d mind, of course. But then we’ve been
differently conditioned. Besides, we start
with a different heredity.”
“I’m glad I’m not an Epsilon,” said Lenina,
with conviction.
“And if you were an Epsilon,” said Henry,
“your conditioning would have made you no
less thankful that you weren’t a Beta or an
Alpha.”
In Chapter Six, we see “isolation” blended with
“solitude” until the two terms become
interchangeable, stripped of the connotation we’ve
given them.
For Lenina, any sort of loneliness – voluntary or
not – is unacceptable or disturbing, whereas
Bernard has a uniformly positive response.
It’s here – even more so than in the last chapter –
that we realize how crippled Lenina is by her
conditioning; she’s incapable of carrying on an
actual conversation, falling back on hypnopædic
slogans when she’s not able to respond to what’s
actually being said.
In many ways, Lenina’s actions here are perfect
crimestop, and trying to talk to Bernard about
doing things in public vs. alone or taking soma vs.
being “yourself, but miserable” proves impossible:
just count the number of times she says “I don’t
know,” taking comfort in her cocoon of ignorance.
“I want to look at the sea in
peace,” he said.“One can’t even
look with that beastly noise going
on.”
“But it’s lovely. And I don’t want
to look.”
“But I do,” he insisted.“It makes
me feel as though…” he hesitated,
searching for words with which to
express himself,“as though I were
more me, if you see what I mean.
More on my own, not so completely
a part of something else. Not just a
cell in the social body. Doesn’t it
make you feel like that, Lenina?”
But Lenina was crying.“It’s horrible,
it’s horrible,” she kept repeating.“And
how can you talk like that about not
wanting to be a part of the social body?
After all, every one works for every one
else. We can’t do without any one. Even
Epsilons…”
“Yes, I know,” said Bernard derisively.
“‘Even Epsilons are useful!’ So am I. And
I damned well wish I weren’t!”
Lenina was shocked by his
blasphemy.“Bernard!” She protested in
a voice of amazed distress.“How can
you?”
In a different key,“How can I?” he
repeated meditatively.“No, the real
problem is: How is it that I can’t, or
rather – because, after all, I know quite
well why I can’t – what would it be like if
I could, if I were free – not enslaved by
my conditioning.”
“But, Bernard, you’re saying the most
awful things.”
“Don’t you wish you were free,
Lenina?”
“I don’t know what you mean. I am
free. Free to have the most wonderful
time. Everybody’s happy nowadays.”
He laughed,“Yes,‘Everybody’s
happy nowadays.’ We begin giving the
children that at five. But wouldn’t you
like to be free to be happy in some
other way, Lenina? In your own way, for
example; not in everybody else’s way.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” she
repeated. Then, turning to him,“Oh, do
let’s go back, Bernard,” she besought;
“I do so hate it here.”
“Don’t you like being with me?”
“But of course, Bernard. It’s this
horrible place.”
“I thought we’d be more…more
together here – with nothing but the sea
and moon. More together than in that
crowd, or even in my rooms. Don’t you
understand that?”
“I don’t understand anything,” she
said with decision, determined to
preserve her incomprehension intact.
“Nothing. Least of all,” she continued in
another tone “why you don’t take soma
when you have these dreadful ideas of
yours.You’d forget all about them. And
instead of feeling miserable, you’d be
jolly. So jolly,” she repeated and smiled,
for all the puzzled anxiety in her eyes,
with what was meant to be an inviting
and voluptuous cajolery.
He looked at her in silence, his
face unresponsive and very grave –
looked at her intently. After a few
seconds Lenina’s eyes flinched
away; she uttered a nervous little
laugh, tried to think of something
to say and couldn’t. The silence
prolonged itself.
When Bernard spoke at last, it
was in a small tired voice.“All right
then,” he said,“we’ll go back.” And
stepping hard on the accelerator,
he sent the machine rocketing up
into the sky.
He began to talk a lot of
incomprehensible and dangerous
nonsense. Lenina did her best to stop
the ears of her mind; but every now and
then a phrase would insist on becoming
audible.“…to try the effect of arresting
my impulses,” she heard him say. The
words seemed to touch a spring in her
mind.
“Never put off till to-morrow the fun
you can have to-day,” she said gravely.
“Two hundred repetitions, twice a
week from fourteen to sixteen and a
half,” was all his comment. The mad bad
talk rambled on.“I want to know what
passion is,” she heard him saying.“I
want to feel something strongly.”
“When the individual feels, the
community reels,” Lenina pronounced.
“Well, why shouldn’t it reel a bit?”
“Bernard!”
But Bernard remained unabashed.
“Adults intellectually and during
working hours,” he went on.“Infants
where feeling and desire are
concerned.”
“Our Ford loved infants.”
Ignoring the interruption.“It
suddenly struck me the other day,”
continued Bernard,“that it might be
possible to be an adult all the time.”
“I don’t understand.” Lenina's tone
was firm.
“I know you don’t.”
Bernard proves to be an incredibly
frustrating character; he feels like such a missed
opportunity, although (again) this is an
intentional decision on Huxley’s part.
Whether we realize it or not, we seek a
Winston-esque, clear-eyed perspective on this
world from someone living in it, and at first blush
Bernard seems like our only hope of finding
someone who fits the bill; Helmholtz, for all his
intelligence, doesn’t seem that motivated to shift
his society’s general state of being.
Bernard totally understands the
ramifications of his conditioning, and while it’s
fair to point out that everyone else does as well
(unlike the Oceanians), he’s the only one who
really has a problem with those ramifications.
And when he’s talking with – talking at –
Lenina, you want so badly for him to get through
to her – to win these battles, to beat back the
stupidity and venality choking the World State,
even just at an individual level.
To later find that he’s just as contemptible and
pitiful as so many of the people he decries doesn’t
just feel hypocritical – we feel foolish for aligning
ourselves with him.
If Orwell’s total destruction of Winston feels like
watching a child dismember his action figure after
playing with it lovingly for days – jarring, upsetting,
difficult to fully accept – Huxley’s treatment of
Bernard is just another way to break a toy.
We identify much more passionately with
Winston, and Huxley “reveals” Bernard’s true
nature – and brings about his downfall – well before
the final credits roll.
In the end, our reaction to him somewhat
resembles our complicated opinion of O’Brien,
with the difference that we’re not so much betrayed
when he falls short of our hopes as disappointed.
And it’s this sequence that gives us the
strongest reason to identify with Bernard and his
plight, regardless of Huxley’s decision to use our
(automatic!) sympathies against us.
We also discover that the DHC doesn’t
like Bernard, which (at this point in the
book) gives us yet another reason to
root against him.
However, he makes a mistake in
Bernard’s presence – ruminating on his
last visit to the same Savage Reservation
Bernard plans to visit, which ended
unpleasantly for him.
He was lost and suffered injuries,
while the young woman who had
accompanied him there was never
found. (We’ll meet that woman – Linda –
when Lenina and Bernard reach the
Savage Reservation.)
It’s here that the DHC sows the seeds
of his own downfall, although this
thread won’t pay off for another four
chapters.
This extended vocalized flashback is
considered extremely improper, and when
the DHC realizes what he’s done in Bernard’s
presence, his tone suddenly turns vicious as
he threatens to send the latter to Iceland if he
hears any more reports of socially
unacceptable behavior.
Bernard reacts at first with excitement,
the seemingly empty threat serving to
reinvigorate him by reminding him that he
stands alone within the social body; it makes
him feel strong.
When the DHC follows through on the
threat, banishing him to Iceland while he’s at
the Reservation, Bernard reacts in an
entirely different (and far more pathetic) way
– the first sign that our faith in him is likely
misplaced.
When we enter the Savage Reservation in
Chapter Seven – having been told repeatedly
that there’s “no escape,” which sounds a bit
ominous – we’re entering a very different
world.
“Civilization is sterilization,” according to
the World State; everything here is earthy,
dusty, subject to decay.
You get the sense that the feelies are so
popular because nothing else in the World
State (save soma) stimulates the citizens’
senses.
The Savage Reservation, on the other hand,
is pure sensory stimulus – the smell of
unwashed bodies, the throbbing of distant
drums, the ragged edges of primitive
structures reaching to the heavens.
The World State’s stability – its fauxcryogenic preservation – contrasts with the
inherent instabilities of uncontrolled lives;
people even get old here.
An almost naked Indian was very slowly
climbing down the ladder from the first-floor
terrace of a neighboring house – rung after
rung, with the tremulous caution of extreme
old age. His face was profoundly wrinkled and
black, like a mask of obsidian. The toothless
mouth had fallen in. At the corners of the lips,
and on each side of the chin, a few long bristles
gleamed almost white against the dark skin.
The long unbraided hair hung down in grey
wisps round his face. His body was bent and
emaciated to the bone, almost fleshless.Very
slowly he came down, pausing at each rung
before he ventured another step.
“What’s the matter with him?” whispered
Lenina. Her eyes were wide with horror and
amazement.
“He’s old, that’s all,” Bernard answered as
carelessly as he could. He too was startled; but
he made an effort to seem unmoved.
“Old?” she repeated.“But the Director’s old;
lots of people are old; they’re not like that.”
“That’s because we don’t allow them to be
like that. We preserve them from diseases. We
keep their internal secretions artificially
balanced at a youthful equilibrium. We don’t
permit their magnesium-calcium ratio to fall
below what it was at thirty. We give them
transfusions of young blood. We keep their
metabolism permanently stimulated. So, of
course, they don’t look like that. Partly,” he
added,“because most of them die long before
they reach this old creature’s age.Youth almost
unimpaired ‘til sixty, and then, crack! The end.”
But Lenina was not listening. She was
watching the old man. Slowly, slowly he came
down. His feet touched the ground. He turned.
In their deep-sunken orbits his eyes were still
extraordinarily bright.
No sooner do we witness the
punishing religious rituals of the
Reservation – the experience
heightened by Lenina’s horrified
discovery that neither she nor Bernard
brought soma with them – than we meet
our “Savage,” John.
Both Bernard and Lenina are
shocked by his speech, which is
formalized almost to the point of
parody; that can happen when you
practice your reading skills in The
Complete Works of Shakespeare!
This hint of civilization fascinates
them, and they begin conversing with
the young man, who uses
Shakespearean quotes as readily as
Lenina falls back on her hypnopædic
teachings.
As it turns out, John wishes that he had been
at the center of the ritual the World Staters had
observed with such horror.
He’s prevented from doing so because the
others keep him at arm’s length (a parallel to
Bernard’s perception of his own treatment).
You see, he looks like Bernard and Lenina
do…because he’s actually a child of the World
State, born in exile to the woman (Linda) the
DHC lost during his original trip to the
Reservation.
His physical appearance sets him apart,
much as Bernard’s looks mark him as an
outcast back in civilization; indeed, it’s his
physical appearance that Lenina instantly
finds attractive.
Upon discovering the Savage’s backstory,
the wheels start turning behind Bernard’s
eyes; the Savage, with his scandalous natural
birth, will become his means of avenging his
exile at the hands of the DHC!
To be continued…