Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Brave New World: the conversation
In the final chapters of the novel, John the Savage has a powerful and revealing conversation with Mustapha Mond (aka Must Staff a World) about the choice between freedom and happiness in life. John says, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy." Mustapha Mond believes man's happiness is more powerful than the freedom of choice. One of the either-or dilemmas that Huxley invites us to consider is how much are we willing to surrender of our lives in order to receive protection, security, and stability? What drove Huxley to this choice seems to be the very air of 1932, ripe with Pavlovian conditioning and sullied with a grave economic depression. I wonder if the book resonates with our world; how much control do we surrender for comfort? Is happiness the goal?
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I prefer referring to the discussing as being between passion and happiness. I think it gets more at the issue at hand of good with the bad so long as it means more. The people of the World State are free to go about their day pretty much however they want, but they are happy living within the guide lines.
ReplyDeleteGood point, I think they are not interested in passion unless it is the VPS injection they get to rev them up.... What does Huxley say about this idea in Ape and Essence?
ReplyDeleteHaven't read Ape and Essence yet, but in Time Must Have A Stop the uncle that the main character stays with embodies worldly desires and possessions and ends up getting killed by them.
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