Riassunto libro letteratura inglese, prof. Casella, libro Brave New World di Aldous Huxley, Appunti di Letteratura Inglese

Scarica Riassunto libro letteratura inglese, prof. Casella, libro Brave New World di Aldous Huxley e più Appunti in PDF di Letteratura Inglese solo su Docsity! Brave New World (1932) - Aldous Huxley Title: A very important aspect of this book is in the title itself. In fact it derives from Shakespeare’s play “The Tempest”. Miranda, the main character, daughter of Prospero, the magician who lives on the island, sees a ship of human beings being carried towards the island. Act V, Scene I, ll. 203–20, Miranda when seeing human beings on her island: “O wonder! / How many goodly creatures are there here! / How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, / That has such people in’t.” Miranda was finally rescued from her loneliness. The words “Brave New World” are also said by one of the main characters in Huxley’s book, John the Savage, when he is brought from the reservation to London, now called World State City of London. Plot: The action takes place in London, now called World State city of London, AF 632 (Anno Ford), which corresponds to AD 2540. The society of World State is rigidly predetermined; men and woman are conceived and engineered through artificial hatching; childhood indoctrination programs into pre-determined classes (castes, caste) based on intelligence and labour, but the intelligence doesn't belong to individuals, it was predetermined before their birth. There are 5 classes in total, corresponds to the first 5 letters of the greek alphabet (alfa, beta, gamma, delta, epsilon). Lenina Crown: works in the hatchery, she's very popular and she's sexually very desirable. Bernard Marx: alfa male, psychologist, short and rather ugly (during his hatching there was a mistake, instead of blood they accidentally put alcohol in his cocoon) so he suffers from an inferiority complex and sometimes criticizes the society he lives in, at his own risk. Criticism is not accepted. Expert in sleep-learning = awareness (and despise) of the methods employed to keep citizens peaceful/ tranquil through constant consumption of “soma”, a soothing drug. Bernard is impulsive, rash, expresses his criticism so his boss thinks of exiling to him to Iceland. Helmholtz Watson: talented writer, also critical about social order but more courageous. Bernard invites Lenina for a holiday in the savage reservation, called Malpais/New Mexico. Here the people are not subjected to the laws of the World State. The “Savages” belong to the “past”: they are born naturally, live in families, suffer from diseases and aging, have a language, culture and religion of their own (a mix between pagan belief and Christian rituals), kind of like Native Americans living in “pueblos”. During their holiday they witness religious rituals, and meet an old, ugly and sick woman, Linda. She once lived in the World State but something bad happened and she was forced to remain in the Reservation because of a natural pregnancy. She has a son, John, and so she was prevented to return to London (she became a sort of prostitute for all the men of the Reservation, in World State there was a lot of sexual promiscuity). Linda tells her story: while visiting the Savage Reservation several years before, lost her group and was left alone. She accidentally become pregnant by a man of the group (still unknown…), thus could not return back home because of that fault/shame. Her son, John, was refused by the villagers; she taught him to read (from 2 books: Shakespeare and Science). John is deeply influenced by Shakespeare (“Othello”, “Hamlet”, “Romeo and Juliet”). In the World State people do not read, books are considered useless, so John represents a special exception to this. After a few days of being at the reservation, Lenina wants to return to World State because she is disgusted by the habits of the savages. Also Linda wishes to return to London, she has been exiled for almost 20 years, her son is eager to see the "brave new world". Bernard thinks to take advantage of his “discovery” (young man born naturally in a particular context), sees it as a weapon to avoid being exiled: so is allowed to take Linda and John with him. Back in London, John addresses the Director as “father": violent reaction of the bystanders/onlookers, and discovery of the truth: the Director is the man who had impregnated Linda in the Savage Reservations several years before. The Director, humiliated, resigns (and cannot exile Bernard…). Bernard becomes the "custodian" of John; "the Savage", now become a “star” and is visited/invited by influent people of the leading class. Bernard becomes famous too, but he is envious of the sympathy between John and Helmholtz, the writer. Linda is refused because she is old and ugly, and takes refuge in soma. John is not interested in the continuous social meetings organized by Bernard, disgusted by the general superficiality. He likes Lenina, but his sentimental/ emotional approach is romantically shaped on Shakespeare’s imagery and language, unlike Lenina who has a mechanical unsentimental behavior (complete misunderstanding between the two). He thinks he’s Romeo and Lenina Juliet, but she’s completely ignorant of the idea of feelings and love, she react from a purely physical point of view. Important episode: John is informed that his mother Linda is dying: he rushes to the hospital, scandalizing everybody with his behavior (“politically un-correct”), especially a group of children who are being taught "death-conditioning" without any “traditional” respect for the painful situation, very typical to teach not to care about death (while Linda dies the children are laughing). John attacks them, then tries to stop a distribution of soma to inferior class people, vainly trying to awake their conscience. John, Bernard and Helmholtz are brought before the highest authority, the "Resident World Controller for Western Europe", Mustapha Mond. Bernard and Helmholtz will be exiled to a remote island for their antisocial behavior. Bernard behaves cowardly, while Helmholtz is glad at the chance (the islands are the destination of people exiled for their anti-social behavior against the laws of World State). Mond illustrates to John the “story” of the World State society and its have gills and lose them, they have tails and lose them... Intelligent classes aren’t shown, it is more important to concentrate on how the lower classes are being fertilized. P. 13 — We are in the conditioning rooms. “They were...” - they are putting down roses, particular protocol. “Set out the books” - Children’s books. P. 14 — “Between the rose bowls...” - There was a kind of trolley that brings out all the children from the same class, Delta. “Put them...” - children are being unloaded. “Turn them...” - They are doing a kind of experiment. The kids go towards the books all happy, they almost seem human. They are attracted by the flowers and by the images on the books. They crawl towards them and look at them, then the director gives the signal and loud alarm bells go off. P. 15 — “The children...” - Their are completely terrified, start screaming. At last to reinforce the lesson they are given a mild electric shock. Children are completely shocked, terrified! They give them again the choice of books and flowers and the kids run away with horror and terror. “Books and loud...” - they link books to loud noises and flowers to electric shocks in order to keep them away. They create reflexes against books and botany. P. 16 — “One of the students...” - Understood why the conditioning interested the books since books are a waste of time but couldn’t understand botany. Director patiently explains why. In the past they were thought to like nature in order to consume transport, so consumerism and artificial needs.. it was an imperfect consumerism because they had to consume more. They didn’t keep the factory busies, but for the transport business it was made that they hate the country but to love country sports and transport. P. 17 — “Once upon a time...” - Talks about a little boy, Reuben Rabinovitch, explains another conditioning step of the various social classes. Polish is now a dead language, like French and German (Greek and Latin are supposed to be the dead languages, but these are considered dead to eradicate any tradition, epics, philosophy and so on). He also explains the meaning of parent, back in the days when babies were born; unpleasant fact, human beings were viviparous and born. “He returned to...” - Parents forgot to shut off the radio, children were brought up by parents and not in conditioning centers. P. 18 — “the child was asleep...” - Reuben was asleep with the radio on listening to a transmission by George Bernards Shaw, a socialist writer in the 19th century. When he woke up he repeated word by word the transmission, parents thought he had become crazy. This introduces sleep-teaching or hypnopaedia. “The case of...” - Director makes a sign of the T on the body, no more the sign of the cross. “These early experimenters...” - explains why these first experiments were a failure, they hadn’t yet fully developed all the possibilities that hypnopaedia had to offer. P. 20 — In this kind of described genesis all the various steps are being explored, the creation, incubation, fertilization; conditioning through the Pavlovian method; and now other classes. “Elementary Sex...” - Sex is something completely detached from emotions, feelings, passions, it has transformed into a mechanical performance. “Elementary Class Consciousness...” - is much more important because it’s the basis of stability. This class is a practical simplification of a t hypnopaedic lesson, children are thought to love their own class and condition and to despise all other classes. They have to be happy to be Betas. “They’ll have that...” - Makes the children repeat this so many times a week for 30 months. P. 21 — “Roses and electric shocks...” - In brief, hypnopaedia, the greatest moralizing and socializing force of all time. Moralizing and grotesque ending from the Director, there is no ethics or morality in this society. P. 22 — “Outside, in the garden...” - Starts with a pleasant picture of a spring day (ironic scene). Children are playing a game of Centrifugal Bumble-puppy, games and sports shouldn’t be complicated, it’s an unnatural game. Describes how games were during the Ford’s days, like football. These games are strange to them, because they don’t increase consumption like nowadays. P. 23 — “It’s madness...” - New games need to have a lot of apparatus. Kind of frenzy to invent and create even more forms of entertainment, games. “Two children...” - describes a strange episode, two children are playing a rudimental sexual game. Little children were compelled to this kind of erotic place, in order to diminish or neutralize all aspects connected with sex and eroticism. One little boy is reluctant to participate in this game, so the nurse takes him to see the Assistant Superintendent of Psychology; upsetting scene. P. 24 — “Polly Trotsky..” - Trotsky, Marx and Lenin were all revolutionaries linked to socialism. Before Ford erotic play was considered abnormal, immoral and so it was suppressed. This was suppressed even in adolescents! Students are shocked by this, Director explains that this was allowed after 20 years of age. P. 25 — “what happened?...” - The results were terrible, explains why the results of morality were terrible. “Controller...” - All of a sudden a new character appears, Mustapha Mond, one of the most important controllers (there are 10 in total). “In the four...” - Shows the mechanical course of the working day, a new shift begins. “Bernard Marx...” - Another protagonist is being introduced, works in the Psychology Bureau, and again Lenina Crowne. “His fordship...” - Notice this new title, not anymore his highness or his lordship. P. 26 — “You all remember...” - The lesson is being held by the Controller himself. Talks about an inspiring saying “history is bunk”, bunk means “fesseria”. “Brushed away a little dust...” - Culture, literature, art and philosophy, everything is swept away. “Going to the Feelies...” - Feelies which is translated as a sort of cinema, a multi-sensorial experience. Nobody cares about the love scene but about the tactile effects of the bearskin. “There were those...” - People thought the Controller had ancient books about poetry and the Bible in a safe locked away. Ford knew what, a way of saying “and God knows what else”, but there is no more god, there is only Ford. P. 27 — “Try to realize...” - Goes back to history lesson, talks about living with your mother, what is the meaning of home, etc. “Lenina...” - In the meanwhile we have a dialogue between Lenina and Fanny about their sexual habits and promiscuity. They cannot have family names, because there is no family. P. 28 — “Home, home...” - Home is a bad place, like a prison. In the meantime Lenina gets out of the bath. “And home...” - Gives a very negative idea of family and home; a grotesque caricature of human feelings and mother’s love for her baby. P. 29 — “SYRUP...” - Chemicals to prevent pregnancies. “Our Ford...” - Ford compared to Freud in psychological matters, had explained the dangers of family life; connecting to Freud thesis of Edipo, ecc. “And yet...” - In these places such customs are still existing, like in the Savage Reservation in New Mexico. P. 30 — “I shall spend...” - It is not enough to just play bridge, it must be musical for consumerism reasons. “Mothers and fathers...” - Traditional human soul is attracted by family, monogamy and romance but nowadays every one belongs to every one else. The two girls go on talking about their sexual habits and partners. P. 31. — “My baby...” - The Controller goes on with the lesson, madness is infectious for everything related to having a mother, monogamy and romance. How could they be stable? P. 32 — “Stability...” - Stresses the importance of stability. The machine must never be stopped, stopping the machine means death and the end of society. “My baby...” - Mother, old age, poverty, pain, all these were the inconveniences of the society before Ford. Stability repeated 3 times! 14th of March 2018 Culture is revealed through the books (at the time, books were burned, physical elimination). In Brave New World, at the beginning of the novel, the theme of books does not seem to be the main theme but at the end it is the crucial topic of the book itself. Comparison between BNW e Fahrenheit 451 based on the importance of books. P. 33 — The society of the World State is founded on stability, whatever menaces stability must be eliminated; continuous interchange of voices between Lenina and her friend Fanny and on the other hand between the Controller and the students. Everybody belongs to everybody else. The teaching imparted by Mustafa to the class students and the Director, shows the first steps of human existence in the World State. P. 34 — “Do you know Bernard Marx?...” - Bernard is one of the leading figures in alpha plus class, the top class in the World State; he’s a dangerous person because of his behavior, he’s a kind of individualist, a lonely person, he does not join his peers. He’s quite suspicious, he will be menaced to be exiled, he’s able to avoid this at the beginning but he will be punished with exile because retained an heretic. Heretic groups: sects who do not comply with the maindoctrine of the dominant religion. There are heretics in every religion and therefore even in the New World society. In this non-religion or lay religion (laico) Bernard and his friends are heretics; they do not comply or obey to the regulations, the rules, the commandments of the World State. “They say...” - If one doesn’t participate in games or rituals he/she is a dangerous person (does not comply the stability). He might undermine the stability (Obstacle Golf) which has been proclaimed several times by Mustapha Mond. “He asked me to go to one...” - Bernard has invited Lenina to make a tour in the savage reservation —> Turning point of the story itself; the reservation is in New Mexico where there are those excluded from the New World society and live a traditional being provocative in order to shock his friend Lenina: being a mother, dead dogs, rubbish, dark, lice, smelling of smoke, dirty clothes. P. 85 — Finally the typical dance: sound of the drums are reassuring for Lenina, they evoke the traditional rituals made at the Solidarity Service. Priests, black snakes, all the rituals performed in order to get the benevolence of the gods. Man masked as the coyote —> Lenina was disgusted, she was sobbing “too awful, that blood”. P. 87 — Here’s finally the main character: this young man, John, speaks in Shakespearian English, why does he do so? Because it was the only book available to him. It’s double strange: people in his pueblo tribe don’t know anything about Shakespeare, he’s a kind of phenomenon, nobody knew Shakespeare except him, unhappy gentleman. P. 88 — John describes himself and then the aim of the ritual, and his hole story. Linda was the girl of the director who got lost in the reservation 20 years before. Bernard has already caught the meaning of the story. Then they go and meet Linda, she’s the mother of John; Lenina feels uncomfortable around her because she looks ugly and smells. P. 89/90 — Description of Linda’s suffering, it wasn’t her fault what happened. She used to work where Lenina works now, she was a Beta, she had to get used to her new situation. She became partly de-conditioned because of the experience she had to have. This is the first meeting between the couples. Chapter 8 Here we have the meeting between Bernard and John. John recollects some moments of his youth thanks to some flashbacks. He tries to kill the Popé out of his jealousy; Linda was considered a whore because she accepted any kind of man coming from outside (because of the promiscuity reigning in the World State). Violence against Linda. Linda talks about all the technological comforts of New World, considered a wonderful place. John explains the spiritual attitude of the natives and how he was introduced into reading “The Chemical and Bacteriological Conditioning of the Embryo”; but then he discovered Shakespeare “the complete world of William Shakespeare”. 21st of March 2018 Chapter 9 Bernard must ask permission to Mustapha Mond, one of the Controllers of the World State, to bring back these two savages discovered in the Indian reservation and bring them back to London. The director discovers the existence of his real natural son. In this chapter there is a connection between chapters 8 and 10. John the Savage expresses himself through the lines of Shakespeare’s plays. Chapter 10 The four return to London. There is a first meeting with the Director of the hatcheries and Bernard. The Director tries to have Bernard Exiled but he shows Linda to everybody. . Quite heavy accusation similar to Torquemada (leader of the ecclesiastical inquisition) cruel and sadistic. First historical echo. Political processes carried on in every time and under every regime against every form of dissidents, political enemies and intellectuals. Ex: Stalin against intellectuals. Any form of rebellion against society or religion. Bernard is not expected to be able to carry on his own defense. Witnesses: Linda and John in the room where they have been accused. Repugnant and horrific action. P. 113 — Linda says: “You made me have a baby” —> true revelation of the shameful secret. The situation has been completely reversed. The director who wanted to expel Bernard has been unmasked and he’s compelled to self-exile from this unbearable situation. John calls him “My father”, very serious accusation. Chapter 11 Recognition of the Director’s fault. John becomes the most appreciated person in London, the most searched. The savage, the son of a civilized influential person (Director) now returns to civilization. Bernard acquires a certain degree of fame and authority. A lot of girls offer sexual services to him because now he is an important person. Linda is completely excluded because ugly, old, repellent, she is confined to the hospital, taking soma, where she will spend the rest of her days, she becomes a type of moribund. It’s like she was dead inside, slow death inside. Bernard feels proud, important, full of honors and continues his secret criticism of society. In a sense he has not learned his lesson from his ephemeral success over the Director of the hatcheries. The savage is educated, he visits all the very important structures and institutions of the World State. He is shown the “Brave New World”, with hatcheries and conditioning; he cannot understand the way of life of this world, it’s too remote for him. His culture is completely different so he can’t accept this Brave New World in which he finds himself. Bernard asks him: What happened? Are you sick? John replies: “Yes, because I have eaten civilization, and it is too different from my culture” (a savage one). There is also a kind of subplot technically speaking, it means a series of specific and important episodes which represent a sort of secondary story which is related to the main story. Example: Lenina falling in love with John is the subplot —> ironical, a beautiful, free, emancipated girl from the Beta class falls in love with a savage. She repeats by heart all the slogans of her social class and discovers she has a kind of heart and she is not so conditioned or predetermined as we expected, she can’t escape human passions, feelings and in particular love. She assumed VPS (a kind of drug) to avoid these feelings, but they are too strong. Bernard makes it possible for her and John to go to the Feelies, to the cinema, she tries to attract John, he refuses her advances because his moral code is different from hers. He was brought up in respect of human passions and love and in particular that there must be a particular development, reciprocal faith, a traditional family. Chapter 12 John is the guest of honor at Bernard’s apartment. Bernard has organized a party to let people see John but John refuses to leave his room even when Bernard asks nicely. All the important people Bernard had invited felt outraged. Lenina thought it was her fault that he didn’t come out. Chapter 13 The second part of the “love story” between John and Lenina is in this chapter, with a seduction scene, with a kind of striptease from Lenina and a violent refusal from John; John is attracted by Lenina, he had never seen such behaviors in the reservation and his town Malpais. Even John is attracted by Lenina, but he’s super ego prevent him from having physical contacts with her. When he feels he is attracted by her, he flogs himself as personal punishment (si frusta per punirsi) —> impure desire. John has a moral rigidity. Four final chapters: conclusion of the plot and of the experiment of bringing back savages to the civilized world. Chapter 14 Dramatic chapter, it portrays the death of Linda, there is a strange discrepancy between the habits of people of the World State and John’s habits. P. 150 — Particular scene, John declares Linda is his mother. He walks by other dying people but their face is still fresh in comparison to Linda’s. It goes with saying to remark the omnipresence of the television in this particular situation, A kind of comfort for the dying, but lack human relationship, something mechanical, something impersonal, broadcasting sport, music. This is the last meeting between son and his mother shaped after the recognition of common memories, especially from John. He remembers the nursery rhymes and that Linda explained him when his was younger what medicine to take (vitamins and stuff like that). The mother had a repelling form, like an insect, she was completely different form the other patients. All of a sudden a nurse with a group of children comes in. They all look the same, they are alarmed by Linda. Death conditioning —> children were educated in order not to feel any kind of pity, mercy or pain in front of a dying person. John succeeds in eliminating and making children go away to respect his mother. She calls the name Popé (of Malpais), she is thinking of him in her mental agony. After this final step of her agony Linda was dead. Again, completely different attitudes towards death. Emotional pain and shock from the son who had lost his mother. Chapter 15 In this chapter we have a sort of continuation thematically speaking. Here we see a parody of the figure of the Prophet and the Political agitator. John is a kind of parody of John the Prophet (Giovanni Battista), the one who baptized him in the river Jordan. The savage became like a prophet. He finds himself in this particular place, another room of the hospital, and he witnesses a distribution of soma to another group of employees of the hospital. Soma pills are distributed as reward to the group of laborers.