Browsing by Subject "Huxley, Aldous, 1894-1963. Brave new world"

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    Dismantling Utopia for the Reader: John the Savage as a Central Mediator of Utopian Discourse Proposed in The Tempest and Realized in Brave New World
    (2015) Brower, Jenna; Riebling, Barbara
    In this essay, I explore the fragility of the utopian structure through the lens of Brave New World and The Tempest. The exploration starts with the essential notion that Brave New World is an ironic continuation of The Tempest. The Savage Reservation in Brave New World is the embodiment of Miranda’s utopian ideals while the Fordian Society is the realization of Gonzalo’s utopian ideals. This notion is perpetuated by the recognition of Miranda’s utopian ideals defined as a utopia of “presence” while Gonzalo’s utopia perpetuates a utopia of “absence”. With these utopian foundations, the centralized focus of the paper is the intermediary role of John the Savage in Brave New World. The main argument regards John the Savage as the central mediator in exposing the “falseness” of two utopian societies outlined above to the modern reader in a way that could not be realized in The Tempest. I will draw parallels between the outsider nature of Caliban the Savage and Miranda in the two proposed utopias and John the Savage in both utopias. The finalizing notion is that John the Savage through his resistant nature surpasses the knowledge of both of these characters, ultimately requiring his exit from both societies. By demonstrating John’s similarity to both characters of The Tempest as well as the modern reader, I will propose that the existence of John as a relatable character who spans two opposing worlds is the only way readers can evaluate a utopia as false or undesirable, a capability readers could not have in The Tempest.
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    Fearing an Inhuman(e) Future: The Unliterary or Illiterate Dystopia of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World
    (2009) Burgmann, Mark J.; Finley, C. Stephen
    Though not necessarily recognized as a major canonical work of English literature, Aldous Huxley’s 1932 novel Brave New World is the paradigm of the modern social satire. The novel, a combination of dystopia, satire, science fiction and perhaps more, is set in the distant yet horrifyingly familiar future of A.F. 632 (Year of our Ford). In this time, Huxley depicts a supposed utopian world free of problems. Nevertheless, the novel also shows how this modern human society’s elimination of problems eliminates its humanity. My thesis specifically focuses on the elimination of humanity as manifested in the lack of literature and literacy throughout the novel. Huxley’s use of allusion and parody, almost Joycean, to other great literature of the past sets his novel apart from others like it and makes the work truly universal and lasting.
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    Passion, Power, and Politics in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World
    (2017) Rafsol, Shannon; Parris, Benjamin
    My Senior Essay explores how power, passion and politics interact with one another in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. I argue that Huxley's novel imagines a dystopian society wherein biopower operates as the primary mode of power with sovereignty serving as a supplemental and emergency reservoir of power. Additionally, Huxley's novel suggests that passion cannot exist in such a society. The biopolitical modes performed in this society attempt to eradicate passion in order to maintain societal stability; however, these mechanisms occasionally fall short. Characters such as John Savage, Bernard Marx and Helmholtz Watson present as individuals who are unable to be suppressed via the normalized modes of biopower in Huxley’s fictitious World State. As a result, in order to control such characters the leader of the World State, Mustapha Mond, must employ sovereign power. Interestingly, in the moments where sovereign power is unleashed, allusions to Shakespeare’s The Tempest appear, indicating the possibility that the connection between these texts aims at performing a commentary regarding the power dynamics present in both the novel and play. Overall, I argue that the novel serves as a commentary regarding human passion that presses the reader to ask him or herself what do human beings lose when they sacrifice the experience of being human for political stability?