Brave New World

1. Brave New World

2. Themes in the novel • Real freedom is the freedom to think one’s own thoughts. • When comfort and convenience take the place of genuine thoughts and emotions, a person is no longer fully human.

3. Themes • Humanity must learn to control technology before technology controls humanity. • Sex without spiritual intimacy is crude and dehumanizing. • Science, when used to subjugate the individual, becomes an instrument of evil.

4. Themes • All human beings possess an innate desire for belonging. • Excessive consumerism can cause humans to be wasteful and shallow. • Although social stability may be necessary, individual freedom is paramount.

5. Themes • Science can never take the place of art and religion, those purest expressions of the human soul.

6. Literary Terms • Irony- when author presents statements or situations contrary to what is expected in order to create a shock or jolt of understanding. • Satire – form of literature which ridicules human follies or vices in order to reform them

7. Literary terms • Utopia – perfect world • Dystopian novel – novel set in an imaginary world, usually futuristic, in which present problems are carried to their horrifying & extreme results. • Genre: Anti-utopian novel, or dystopian novel • Noble savage– the idea that primitive human beings are naturally good and that any evil is a product of the corrupting influence of civilization. (John in BNW; Queequeg in Moby Dick)

8. Society in London, A.F. 632 • Conditioning / Hypnopaedia • Caste system (Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas, Epsilons) • Bokanovsky’s Process • Bokanovsky Group

9. Society in London, A.F. 622 • Freemartins • Corpus Luteum

10. Allusions in the novel • Freud – Late 1800’s psychiatrist who pioneered “the talking cure.” He asserted that human beings are largely controlled by their unconscious mind, or subconscious, over which we ourselves have no control. • “Oh, brave new world!” In The Tempest by William Shakespeare, Miranda says, “Oh, brave new world, that has such people in it!”

11. Allusions in the novel • Neo-Pavlovian : Allusion to Pavlov, early scientist who proved conditioning by teaching dogs to salivate when a bell was rung. • Malthusian Belt - belt with compartments filled with birth control devices. Girls from a young age are taught to perform the “Malthusian drill” (allusion to Malthus, an early proponent of contraception).

12. Allusions in the novel • “Our Ford” - Saying referring to Henry Ford, whose assembly line production of automobiles is the model for the production of human babies in the novel . • A.F.- Anno Ford instead of Anno Domini (the year of our Ford)

13. Vocabulary • Pneumatic – a female body that is curvaceous and sexually appealing. It actually means “filled with air,” so it is a double entendre. • Ectogenesis – conception outside of the mother’s body

14. Vocabulary • Community Singery – a churchlike setting in which members of the community take soma and sing to enter an ecstatic state in substitution for religion. The ceremony encourages unity among members of society, provided that they are from the same or nearly the same social caste.

15. Vocabulary • Viviparous -- refers to an animal that gives birth to live young • surrogates –The World State is replete with substitutes: blood surrogate, violent passion surrogate, pregnancy surrogate, caffeine surrogate.

16. Pastimes in the World State • Pastimes • Sports (centrifugal bumble-puppy, obstacle golf) • Vibro-vacuum massage machine • Casual sex • “feelies” • soma-holiday

17. Slogans • “Community, Identity, Stability” • “Ending is better than mending.” • “A gramme is better than a damn.” • “Orgy Porgy.” • “The more stitches, the less riches.” • “When the individual feels, the community reels.”

18. Slogans • “Everybody belongs to everyone else.” • “Was and will will make me ill. I take a gramme and only am.”