Perfil
Nombre: Leticia Badía Torrente
Edad: 21 años
Carrera: Filología Inglesa, 4º
año
E-mail: lele@alumni.uv.es
First Paper
Subject: #14206 Literatura Anglesa i Discurs Polític – grup A
Student's name: Badía Torrente, Leticia
Title of the paper: The exploitation of man by man (and the other way around)
Author: George Orwell, Aldous Huxley
Abstract: “Nineteen Eighty-four” and “Brave New World” often come together in the genre of dystopian literature. Naturally, they are similar in its end but very different in its means, to the point that one of them might be labeled as utopian literature. Huxley’s “A Brave New World” takes the Great Depression of 1929 as its starting point, whereas Orwell’s “Nineteen Eighty-Four” is based on the totalitarian movement that fueled WWII. Thus, Huxley’s society lays its foundations on happiness as a tool for controlling a comatose community shaped by reproductive technology and behaviorist techniques, while Orwell disregards all social innovations in favor of censorship, double standards, manufactured nationalism, fear and punishment controlled by the state and a loving figure called Big Brother. Fortunately, our society has not grown into either of their civilizations, although some of their elements are currently craftily employed.
Table of contents:
1. Introduction
2. Comparison
2.1. Historical Past
2.2. Social Classes
2.3. Perpetuation of society
2.4. Family Ties
2.5. Technology
2.6. Love and Sex
2.7. Death
2.8. Art
2.9. Diversity
2.10. Language
Bibliography
Auto-evaluation: 8 to 9 points out of 10. Because I have been able to choose the authors I wanted to work on, I have devoted great effort into this paper. I think I have provided an useful comparison between these two fascinating novels.
1. Introduction
1.1. Utopian and Dystopian Literature
Utopian literature
The word "utopia" is of Greek origin and can be derived from the prefix "εὐ" ("good") or "οὐ" ("no"), and τόπος, "place". Thus, an utopia is a good place that does not exist.
The utopian genre is said to have been born in 1516 with the publication of Thomas More’s "Utopia", a work of fiction that describes the ideal society as envisioned by the writer — classless, communal, pacifist, with full education and employment and freedom of religion.
All of these characteristics contrast greatly with those present in More’s time: poverty, absolutism, feudalism, etc. Utopian works act as a protest against the society in which their author lives and propose specific solutions to its problems.
The first utopian narratives were set in isolated places like More’s island of Utopia, but later novels such as "The Modern Utopia" by H.G. Wells expand the system worldwide. However, utopian worlds rely on exhaustive government control to keep society as flawless as possible, so that means that sacrifices must be suffered for the utopia to keep functioning (e.g., elitism in Plato’s Republic).
Dystopian literature
"Dystopian" and "utopian" are considered opposites, but the line that separates both ideas can be very thin to the point that most works labelled as either are a mixture of the two concepts.
Taking once again More’s Utopia as a base, one can find several flaws in his society: atheists are not tolerated, the ill are repudiated and there’s no place for diversity or individualism.
From Plato’s Greece to the start of the Industrial Age, utopian writers thought men to be capable and willing to improve the world by mastering a wide range of fields such as science, politics and social theories.
However, when the scientific progress that followed the Industrial Revolution gave them the opportunity to do so, those means were used to plan new social orders that far from seeking fairness and equality produced totalitarian regimes such as Nazism or Soviet Communism. The utopia had already taken place in the form of those two approaches and the outcome had been a nightmarish failure.
These downfalls increased the production of narratives that parodied utopian ideas and in the first half of the 20th century three novels laid the modern foundations for the dystopian genre: Yevgeny Zamyatin’s "We" (1921), Aldous Huxley’s "Brave New World" (1932) and George Orwell’s "Nineteen Eighty-four".
Dystopian novels can also be called social science fiction because they speculate with a plausible future in which an intentional community has deteriorated into an authoritarian regime that uses technology to control their citizens. Such is the case of the two works that I will analyze for this first paper: Orwell’s "Nineteen Eighty-four" and Huxley’s "Brave New World".
2. Comparison
2.1. Historical Past
Real history is distorted in both novels by the government so it can be used as an irrefutable argument to justify the current state of affairs.
In "Nineteen Eighty-four", the main character works in the Records Department of the Ministry of Truth. His work consists of rewriting all kind of documents (news, articles, editorials, statistics, etc.) that do not match the present situation and contradict the government’s discourse.
Most of his modifications have to do with the ever-changing enemy of Oceania — sometimes Eurasia, sometimes Eastasia — and with people that the government has erased, the unpersons. Once the final product is ready, the old copies are thrown into the memory hole, a system of pipes that destroys documents.
This way, the Party alters history according to its interests and, since there is no evidence left of the true account of events, those people who claim otherwise are considered mentally ill:
"You are mentally deranged. You suffer from a defective memory. You are unable to remember real events and you persuade yourself that you remember other events which never happened. Fortunately it is curable. You have never cured yourself of it, because you did not choose to. There was a small effort of the will that you were not ready to make. Even now, I am well aware, you are clinging to your disease under the impression that it is a virtue." (Part 3, chapter 2)
Talking about the real past is a crime and those who dare do so are tortured until they believe the official version or master the doublethink:
To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again: and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself. That was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word ’doublethink’ involved the use of doublethink. (Part 1, chapter 3)
In the novel, Winston meets an old man in a bar frequented by proles and asks him about the times before the Revolution that brought the Party to power, but the old man is unable to remember and does not care. Most people had been born after the Revolution, but Winston, who was a child during that period, remembers vaguely the existence of planes, which the Party claimed to have invented themselves. The true events that brought about the Revolution are presented in Goldstein’s book: Socialism transformed from the utopian society it was supposed to produce into a totalitarian regime not different than the absolutisms it condemned.
Three movements sprung out from Socialism: "Ingsoc in Oceania, Neo-Bolshevism in Eurasia, Death-Worship, as it is commonly called, in Eastasia, had the conscious aim of perpetuating unfreedom and inequality." As Goldstein explains, those three powers pretend to be in war with each other but are actually in league to use war as an excuse to perpetuate their power by "using up the products of the machine without raising the general standard of living". People are told from time to time that their nation has won a battle and that the end of the war is near, but the truth is that none of the tree powers could actually attain victory.
Naturally, Goldstein is the most hated enemy of the state and the target of the Two Minutes Hate, although Orwell doesn’t clarify if he is a real character or if he is an invention of the Party.
In "Brave New World" history is simply cast aside. The new society is too happy to care about the ramblings of the old world, depicted by authorities as an unstable place because human feelings got in the way of the State concerns. In this novel history is not discussed as much as in Orwell’s work, but there are direct clashes between the civilized and the savage world (John’s mother vs the savages) and vice versa (John vs civilized society).
The part that best sums up the idea of history in Huxley’s futuristic world is the following:
"You all remember," said the Controller, in his strong deep voice, "you all remember, I suppose, that beautiful and inspired saying of Our Ford’s: History is bunk. History," he repeated slowly, "is bunk."
He waved his hand; and it was as though, with an invisible feather wisk, he had brushed away a little dust, and the dust was Harappa, was Ur of the Chaldees; some spider-webs, and they were Thebes and Babylon and Cnossos and Mycenae. Whisk. Whisk–and where was Odysseus, where was Job, where were Jupiter and Gotama and Jesus? Whisk–and those specks of antique dirt called Athens and Rome, Jerusalem and the Middle Kingdom–all were gone. Whisk–the place where Italy had been was empty. Whisk, the cathedrals; whisk, whisk, King Lear and the Thoughts of Pascal. Whisk, Passion; whisk, Requiem; whisk, Symphony; whisk …(Chapter 3)
2.2. Social Classes
The idea of a classless society has failed in both novels.
Orwell’s society is divided into three classes: Inner Party, Outer Party and proles. The Inner Party is made up of less than 2% of the population and their standard of living is the highest out of the three. The Outer Party represents about the 13% of the society, they work for the Inner Party as bureaucrats and, even though they are the middle class, their situation is actually worse than that of the proles. The proles, which make up the remaining 85% of society, do all the physical work but are not as controlled as the Outer Party, for one of the Party sayings reads, "Proles and animals are free". Proles are free to wear whatever they want (unlike the members of the Outer Party, who are obliged to wear blue jumpsuits), and they can use cosmetics, have sex and buy pornography.
Winston sees proles as the only hope to overthrown the Party, but that revolution is not likely to happen because "until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious". Goldstein’s book develops this idea with an explanation of how society has always worked:
The aims of these three groups are entirely irreconcilable. The aim of the High is to remain where they are. The aim of the Middle is to change places with the High. The aim of the Low, when they have an aim — for it is an abiding characteristic of the Low that they are too much crushed by drudgery to be more than intermittently conscious of anything outside their daily lives — is to abolish all distinctions and create a society in which all men shall be equal. Thus throughout history a struggle which is the same in its main outlines recurs over and over again. For long periods the High seem to be securely in power, but sooner or later there always comes a moment when they lose either their belief in themselves or their capacity to govern efficiently, or both. They are then overthrown by the Middle, who enlist the Low on their side by pretending to them that they are fighting for liberty and justice. As soon as they have reached their objective, the Middle thrust the Low back into their old position of servitude, and themselves become the High. (Part 2, Chapter 9)
Huxley’s society doesn’t have any problem with social classes because they are created and conditioned to accept and enjoy that order.
There are five social classes: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Epsilon, and each class is split into "Plus" and "Minus". Even though lower classes serve high classes, their early conditioning makes them believe that higher classes work too hard and that lower classes are stupid:
"Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because they’re so frightfully clever. I’m awfully glad I’m a Beta, because I don’t work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I don’t want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They’re too stupid to be able to read or write. Besides they wear black, which is such a beastly color. I’m so glad I’m a Beta." (Chapter 2)
Alphas enjoy their superiority and Epsilons are occupied with easy work, childish musings, sex and soma. Orwell’s and Huxley’s lower classes are kept ignorant to lessen the chances of a revolt.
2.3. Perpetuation of Society
One of the opening paragraphs of "Amusing Ourselves to Death" by Neil Postman summarizes perfectly how each government controls their people:
What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions". In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.
This fragment has been illustrated by Stuart McMillan in the following cartoon:
 (click to see the whole image) |
Orwell’s stability was based on fear and censorship and faced the problem of dissidents like Wilson. His system benefited only the high class, but they had to work hard to keep people in control by following all their movements and feeding them with lies.
Huxley’s system was more effective — everyone was happy so there was no need for spying their citizens. When they felt angry, a Violent Passion Surrogate treatment was enough to cool down any rebellious feelings, and the addicting soma erased any negative feelings and threw them into a blissful state.
2.4. Social Classes
Family still exists in Orwell’s society, but it might be better for its citizens if it didn’t. Children are conceived naturally and live with their parents, but their education is at the hands of the government, who brainwashes them so that they don’t grow too emotionally attached to their parents. For children, Big Brother is ultimately the most important figure and mentor of their lives and they are taught how to spy their parents and neighbors, whom they will report without second thoughts if the moment comes.
This is the fate of Winston’s neighbor, Mr. Parsons, who is sent to prison after being denounced by one of his children. Instead of feeling betrayed and even though he is about to suffer punishment, Parsons takes pride on his children for being so loyal to the Party, for being a carbon copy of the dreadful telescreens that inundate his home.
’Who denounced you?’ said Winston.
’It was my little daughter,’ said Parsons with a sort of doleful pride. ’She listened at the keyhole. Heard what I was saying, and nipped off to the patrols the very next day. Pretty smart for a nipper of seven, eh? I don’t bear her any grudge for it. In fact I’m proud of her. It shows I brought her up in the right spirit, anyway.’ (Part 3, Chapter 1)
The World State has abolished family completely because it coveys old moral values that contradict its interests. In a world where human engineering has made possible the creation of tailor-made human beings, the random results that produces natural breeding are an expendable risk.
To justify the artificial creation of pieces of society, the idea of parenthood is constructed as a grotesque image meant to scandalize everyone.
Mustapha Mond leaned forward, shook a finger at them. "Just try to realize it," he said, and his voice sent a strange thrill quivering along their diaphragms. "Try to realize what it was like to have a viviparous mother."
That smutty word again. But none of them dreamed, this time, of smiling.
"Try to imagine what ’living with one’s family’ meant."
They tried; but obviously without the smallest success.
"And do you know what a ’home’ was?"
They shook their heads. (Chapter 3)
The arrival of John and Linda excites curiosity and aversion in everyone, from nurses to children. It is an element of ancient societies, of obscurity, a source of conflicts at odds with the idea of collectivism.
Red in the face, he tried to disengage himself from her embrace. Desperately she clung. "But I’m Linda, I’m Linda."’ The laughter drowned her voice. "You made me have a baby," she screamed above the uproar. There was a sudden and appalling hush; eyes floated uncomfortably, not knowing where to look. The Director went suddenly pale, stopped struggling and stood, his hands on her wrists, staring down at her, horrified. "Yes, a baby–and I was its mother." She flung the obscenity like a challenge into the outraged silence; then, suddenly breaking away from him, ashamed, ashamed, covered her face with her hands, sobbing. "It wasn’t my fault, Tomakin. Because I always did my drill, didn’t I? Didn’t I? Always … I don’t know how … If you knew how awful, Tomakin … But he was a comfort to me, all the same." Turning towards the door, "John!" she called. "John!"
He came in at once, paused for a moment just inside the door, looked round, then soft on his moccasined feet strode quickly across the room, fell on his knees in front of the Director, and said in a clear voice: "My father!"
The word (for "father" was not so much obscene as–with its connotation of something at one remove from the loathsomeness and moral obliquity of child-bearing–merely gross, a scatological rather than a pornographic impropriety); the comically smutty word relieved what had become a quite intolerable tension. Laughter broke out, enormous, almost hysterical, peal after peal, as though it would never stop. My father–and it was the Director! My father! Oh Ford, oh Ford! That was really too good. The whooping and the roaring renewed themselves, faces seemed on the point of disintegration, tears were streaming. Six more test-tubes of spermatozoa were upset. My father! (Chapter 10)
2.5. Technology
The main reason Huxley’s society is more stable than Orwell’s is technology.
In "Nineteen Eighty-four" technological progress came to a halt when the government considered that it was more dangerous than benefitting for their own survival. The reasons are explained by Goldstein:
Science and technology were developing at a prodigious speed, and it seemed natural to assume that they would go on developing. This failed to happen, partly because of the impoverishment caused by a long series of wars and revolutions, partly because scientific and technical progress depended on the empirical habit of thought, which could not survive in a strictly regimented society. As a whole the world is more primitive today than it was fifty years ago. (Part 2, Chapter 9)
This is the first reason; scientific progress requires bright minds, which are potentially subversive unless they’re completely brainwashed. Orwell’s citizens are not happy, and a dissenter could pose great danger. Therefore, instead of being used to make people’s lives easier, technology becomes a stool-pigeon that follows citizens everywhere to monitor their behavior and activities. The punishment inflicted to Winston by O’Brien involves machinery as well.
Certain backward areas have advanced, and various devices, always in some way connected with warfare and police espionage, have been developed, but experiment and invention have largely stopped. (Part 2, Chapter 9)
The society of "Nineteen Eighty-four" is a pre-industrial society in which every invention intended for the welfare of its citizens has been discarded. Actually, the situation is worse than during the pre-industrial age since telescreens, microphones and torture devices closes all avenues to a revolution.
Nevertheless the dangers inherent in the machine are still there. From the moment when the machine first made its appearance it was clear to all thinking people that the need for human drudgery, and therefore to a great extent for human inequality, had disappeared. If the machine were used deliberately for that end, hunger, overwork, dirt, illiteracy, and disease could be eliminated within a few generations. (Part 2, Chapter 9)
The second reason is that technology, in democracy, leads to social equality. Before the inrush of technology, the government could justify their acts as a collective sacrifice to fight against the conditions that plague human life, but once technology was able to solve most of those problems, society was bound to become more free.
But it was also clear that an all-round increase in wealth threatened the [...] of a hierarchical society [...] If it once became general, wealth would confer no distinction [...] But in practice such a society could not long remain stable. For if leisure and security were enjoyed by all alike, the great mass of human beings who are normally stupefied by poverty would become literate and would learn to think for themselves; and when once they had done this, they would sooner or later realize that the privileged minority had no function, and they would sweep it away. In the long run, a hierarchical society was only possible on a basis of poverty and ignorance. (Part 2, Chapter 9)
In "Brave New World", technology is deeply rooted into the social system and daily life, to the point that people are born by means of a long and tedious scientific process that decides the rest of their lives. Unlike Orwell, who uses technology and science to contain nonconformists, Huxley eradicates revolutionary feelings root and branch with the assistance of psychological methods like hypnopaedia, and biological substances and therapies such as soma and Violent Passion Surrogates, even if the price to pay is the loss of human nature.
What "Nineteen Eighty-four" and "Brave New World" have in common is that scientific progress has been limited after the revolts that led to the creation of its totalitarian regimes. Goldstein argued that it was due to the inevitable socialization of power, while Mustapha Mond related it to the supremacy of stability and security over true happiness and individualism.
I’m interested in truth, I like science. But truth’s a menace, science is a public danger. As dangerous as it’s been beneficent. It has given us the stablest equilibrium in history [...] But we can’t allow science to undo its own good work. That’s why we so carefully limit the scope of its researches [...] We don’t allow it to deal with any but the most immediate problems of the moment. All other enquiries are most sedulously discouraged. (Chapter 16)
Previous to the Nine Years’ War, technology was contemplated as an independent, unstoppable force at the service of mankind. It was those lack of restrictions that transformed technology into a dangerous weapon that put into question if progress was worth the risks.
It’s curious, to read what people in the time of Our Ford used to write about scientific progress. They seemed to have imagined that it could be allowed to go on indefinitely, regardless of everything else. Knowledge was the highest good, truth the supreme value; all the rest was secondary and subordinate. True, ideas were beginning to change even then. Our Ford himself did a great deal to shift the emphasis from truth and beauty to comfort and happiness. Mass production demanded the shift. Universal happiness keeps the wheels steadily turning; truth and beauty can’t. And, of course, whenever the masses seized political power, then it was happiness rather than truth and beauty that mattered. Still, in spite of everything, unrestricted scientific research was still permitted. People still went on talking about truth and beauty as though they were the sovereign goods. Right up to the time of the Nine Years’ War. That made them change their tune all right. What’s the point of truth or beauty or knowledge when the anthrax bombs are popping all around you? That was when science first began to be controlled–after the Nine Years’ War. People were ready to have even their appetites controlled then. Anything for a quiet life. We’ve gone on controlling ever since. It hasn’t been very good for truth, of course. But it’s been very good for happiness. One can’t have something for nothing. Happiness has got to be paid for. (Chapter 16)
2.6. Love and Sex
Love and sex are a source of physical and psychological gratification that prevent the inhabitants of Oceania from devoting themselves to the Party. More than their children or their spouses, people must give their hearts to the Big Brother and love him above everything else. Still, there are many prostitutes among the proles, and although extramarital sex is not tolerated, it’s not punishable if done discreetly.
Technology in Orwell’s society hasn’t advanced so much as to eradicate natural reproduction, so sex is still necessary for breeding. It must not be understood as something pleasurable but as an act of duty towards the Party. That was the way by which Winston’s wife referred to sexual activities:
’I could have stood it if it hadn’t been for one thing,’ he said. He told her about the frigid little ceremony that Katharine had forced him to go through on the same night every week. ’She hated it, but nothing would make her stop doing it. She used to call it — but you’ll never guess.’
’Our duty to the Party,’ said Julia promptly.
’How did you know that?’
’I’ve been at school too, dear. Sex talks once a month for the over-sixteens. And in the Youth Movement. They rub it into you for years. I dare say it works in a lot of cases. But of course you can never tell; people are such hypocrites.’ (Part 2, Chapter 3)
In this fragment, Winston is discussing with Julia about sex. Julia represents sexual freedom, and explains to Winston how chastity makes people more gullible:
Unlike Winston, she had grasped the inner meaning of the Party’s sexual puritanism. It was not merely that the sex instinct created a world of its own which was outside the Party’s control and which therefore had to be destroyed if possible. What was more important was that sexual privation induced hysteria, which was desirable because it could be transformed into war-fever and leader-worship. The way she put it was:
’When you make love you’re using up energy; and afterwards you feel happy and don’t give a damn for anything. They can’t bear you to feel like that. They want you to be bursting with energy all the time. All this marching up and down and cheering and waving flags is simply sex gone sour. If you’re happy inside yourself, why should you get excited about Big Brother and the Three-Year Plans and the Two Minutes Hate and all the rest of their bloody rot?’. (Part 2, Chapter 3)
That was very true, he thought. There was a direct intimate connexion between chastity and political orthodoxy. For how could the fear, the hatred, and the lunatic credulity which the Party needed in its members be kept at the right pitch, except by bottling down some powerful instinct and using it as a driving force?
Thus, the sexual activities performed by Winston and Julia are seen as a form of rebellion against the regime.
"Brave New World" shares the lack of commitment but differs very much in the treatment of sex. Since the basis of society is happiness, human sexuality cannot be ignored, not even by children, who participate in "erotic games" as another way of having fun.
He let out the amazing truth. For a very long period before the time of Our Ford, and even for some generations afterwards, erotic play between children had been regarded as abnormal (there was a roar of laughter); and not only abnormal, actually immoral (no!): and had therefore been rigorously suppressed.
A look of astonished incredulity appeared on the faces of his listeners. Poor little kids not allowed to amuse themselves? They could not believe it.
"Even adolescents," the D.H.C. was saying, "even adolescents like yourselves …"
"Not possible!"
"Barring a little surreptitious auto-erotism and homosexuality–absolutely nothing."
"Nothing?"
"In most cases, till they were over twenty years old."
"Twenty years old?" echoed the students in a chorus of loud disbelief.
"Twenty," the Director repeated. "I told you that you’d find it incredible." (Chapter 3)
To eliminate the risk of pregnancy, most of the population is sterilized and the rest is given contraceptives. Promiscuity is encouraged instead of the traditional monogamy characteristic of ancient societies. The reason for treating sex as a cheap, non-committing leisure activity is to prevent violent feelings such as jealously or love.
When individuals grow distant of Huxley’s society, feelings of love and possession arise and give sadness to its owner (e.g. Bernard laments that Lenina is treated like an object). These feelings are described clearer by John, whose love for Lenina reminds him of Shakespearean tragedies. Lenina herself feels lost and anguished when she starts falling in love with John.
2.7. Death
Death itself isn’t much different from our world if it arrives in natural circumstances. In Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia people die everyday as a result of illnesses or military attacks. Watching people die might be everyday fare for the inhabitants of Orwell’s world, judging from how Winston reacts to a bombing early in the novel:
"There was a little pile of plaster lying on the pavement ahead of him, and in the middle of it he could see a bright red streak. When he got up to it he saw that it was a human hand severed at the wrist. Apart from the bloody stump, the hand was so completely whitened as to resemble a plaster cast.
He kicked the thing into the gutter, and then, to avoid the crowd, turned down a side-street to the right" (Part 1, Chapter 8)
Each death is treated differently. Those who die from an illness are more or less ignored by society; those who die in war are venerated as martyrs; and those who die at the hands of the Party are barred from history. Such is the case of Winston’s colleague, Syme, who was too intelligent for his own good. In less than a day, anything that proved Syme had once existed had been erased.
In the same way that political enemies are eliminated, political heroes might be fabricated if a gap in history requires to do so.
Death for Huxley’s citizens is a matter as trivial as sex. Children are conditioned to accept death by visiting the Hospital for the Dying and being given chocolate éclairs afterwards. Citizens of the World State live on average sixty years, though they do not age outwardly and do not suffer from any serious illness.
When people die, they are incinerated at the crematorium so that phosphorus can be recovered and recycled. This is the only moment in which everyone is equal because they all produce the same amount of phosphorus. Helicopters share airspace with the big chimneys from which the smoke of the incinerated emanates, but its passengers don’t seem to be affected by this:
But Henry’s tone was almost, for a moment, melancholy. "Do you know what that switchback was?" he said. "It was some human being finally and definitely disappearing. Going up in a squirt of hot gas. It would be curious to know who it was–a man or a woman, an Alpha or an Epsilon. …" He sighed. Then, in a resolutely cheerful voice, "Anyhow," he concluded, "there’s one thing we can be certain of; whoever he may have been, he was happy when he was alive. Everybody’s happy now."
"Yes, everybody’s happy now," echoed Lenina. They had heard the words repeated a hundred and fifty times every night for twelve years. (Chapter 5)
Linda’s death and the impassivity of the nurse and the students shook John profoundly, who was appalled after seeing the intoxicated, wretched state in which his mother had spent her last days.
2.8. Art
Art is heavily censored by the Party and the only forms of art that can be purchased are those that come from the Ministry of Truth. Novels and music are not produced by people but by machines. Despite the heavy censorship, there are actually many branches of art available in Oceania, divided into the art intended for the members of the Party and the low art meant for the proles:
And the Records Department, after all, was itself only a single branch of the Ministry of Truth, whose primary job was not to reconstruct the past but to supply the citizens of Oceania with newspapers, films, textbooks, telescreen programmes, plays, novels — with every conceivable kind of information, instruction, or entertainment, from a statue to a slogan, from a lyric poem to a biological treatise, and from a child’s spelling-book to a Newspeak dictionary. And the Ministry had not only to supply the multifarious needs of the party, but also to repeat the whole operation at a lower level for the benefit of the proletariat. There was a whole chain of separate departments dealing with proletarian literature, music, drama, and entertainment generally. Here were produced rubbishy newspapers containing almost nothing except sport, crime and astrology, sensational five-cent novelettes, films oozing with sex, and sentimental songs which were composed entirely by mechanical means on a special kind of kaleidoscope known as a versificator. There was even a whole sub-section — Pornosec, it was called in Newspeak — engaged in producing the lowest kind of pornography, which was sent out in sealed packets and which no Party member, other than those who worked on it, was permitted to look at. (Part 1, Chapter 4)
The inhabitants of "Brave New World" are not interested in ancient art because it talks about feelings and passions that they cannot understand. Even Helmholtz, who wants to break away from official canons, laughs at the dramatic reading of Romeo and Juliet performed by John:
The mother and father (grotesque obscenity) forcing the daughter to have someone she didn’t want! And the idiotic girl not saying that she was having someone else whom (for the moment, at any rate) she preferred! In its smutty absurdity the situation was irresistibly comical. He had managed, with a heroic effort, to hold down the mounting pressure of his hilarity; but "sweet mother" (in the Savage’s tremulous tone of anguish) and the reference to Tybalt lying dead, but evidently uncremated and wasting his phosphorus on a dim monument, were too much for him. He laughed and laughed till the tears streamed down his face–quenchlessly laughed while, pale with a sense of outrage, the Savage looked at him over the top of his book and then, as the laughter still continued, closed it indignantly, got up and, with the gesture of one who removes his pearl from before swine, locked it away in its drawer.
"And yet," said Helmholtz when, having recovered breath enough to apologize, he had mollified the Savage into listening to his explanations, "I know quite well that one needs ridiculous, mad situations like that; one can’t write really well about anything else. Why was that old fellow such a marvellous propaganda technician? Because he had so many insane, excruciating things to get excited about. You’ve got to be hurt and upset; otherwise you can’t think of the really good, penetrating, X-rayish phrases. But fathers and mothers!" He shook his head. "You can’t expect me to keep a straight face about fathers and mothers. And who’s going to get excited about a boy having a girl or not having her?" (The Savage winced; but Helmholtz, who was staring pensively at the floor, saw nothing.) "No." he concluded, with a sigh, "it won’t do. We need some other kind of madness and violence. But what? What? Where can one find it?" He was silent; then, shaking his head, "I don’t know," he said at last, "I don’t know." (Chapter 12)
High art has been abolished and substituted by cheap literature, music and cinema composed by the government that serve as propaganda. The most outstanding innovation are the "feelies", films that incorporate tactile sensations.
"But why is it prohibited?" asked the Savage. In the excitement of meeting a man who had read Shakespeare he had momentarily forgotten everything else.
The Controller shrugged his shoulders. "Because it’s old; that’s the chief reason. We haven’t any use for old things here."
"Even when they’re beautiful?"
"Particularly when they’re beautiful. Beauty’s attractive, and we don’t want people to be attracted by old things. We want them to like the new ones."
"But the new ones are so stupid and horrible. Those plays, where there’s nothing but helicopters flying about and you feel the people kissing." He made a grimace. "Goats and monkeys!" Only in Othello’s word could he find an adequate vehicle for his contempt and hatred.
[...]
"I’ve told you; it’s old. Besides, they couldn’t understand it."
Yes, that was true. He remembered how Helmholtz had laughed at Romeo and Juliet. "Well then," he said, after a pause, "something new that’s like Othello, and that they could understand."
[...]
"Because our world is not the same as Othello’s world. You can’t make flivvers without steel–and you can’t make tragedies without social instability. The world’s stable now. People are happy; they get what they want, and they never want what they can’t get. They’re well off; they’re safe; they’re never ill; they’re not afraid of death; they’re blissfully ignorant of passion and old age; they’re plagued with no mothers or fathers; they’ve got no wives, or children, or lovers to feel strongly about; they’re so conditioned that they practically can’t help behaving as they ought to behave. And if anything should go wrong, there’s soma. Which you go and chuck out of the window in the name of liberty, Mr. Savage. Liberty!" He laughed. "Expecting Deltas to know what liberty is! And now expecting them to understand Othello! My good boy!" (Chapter 16)
2.9. Diversity
Not agreeing with the Party is not an option if you want to keep on living. The continent of Oceania is a big mass of mediocrity in which a single gesture that escapes normality is enough to send you to prison. That’s what happens to Winston at the end of the novel, not only is he kept jailed for a long period of time; he is also deprived of his identity by means of endless torturing sessions that involve electroshock, privation of food and the final stage, Room 101, where he is presented with his worst nightmare, rats.
The World State also meddles in the affairs of those who are against the government, but luckily for Bernard and Helmholtz, the punishment consists of being transferred to the island of their choosing, where they can meet other dissenters and enjoy ancient art.
Another option that could only result after an accident is living at the Reservations, as happened to Linda and to his son when he was born. This option means total alienation because you’re considered a savage by both the savages and the civilized people.
2.10. Language
Language plays a big role in "Nineteen Eighty-four". The Newspeak movement looks forward erasing words that suggest unconformity and replacing them with words that designate the ideas and morals that the Party wants to transmit. In this fashion, the word "bad" has been substituted by "ungood", which has a stronger negative connotation. However, people continue using old words and since waiting for them to become obsolete would take a long time, the Ministry of Truth writes dictionaries which forbid the use of those words.
The purpose of simplifying language is to erase from people’s minds all the words that might evoke negative feelings towards the regime, for if it cannot be thought, it cannot be done; that is what Thoughtcrime consists of.
Language conditions people from an early age in "Brave New World". Short after they are born, children withstand long sessions of hypnopaedia during their nap time which drill into their heads the morals and ethics of the government. This conditioning lasts for the rest of their lives, and it is often reinforced with catchy phrases and songs.
Lenina parrots those slogans several times through the novel and so does Bernard, but his tone is mocking:
"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.". (Chapter 6)
With the loss of human feelings, the words that designated them have also fallen into disuse. When John begins to read the books that her mother had brought from the civilized world, he is not able to understand the meaning of technical concepts that do not exist in his world, Malpais. He, however, understands Shakespeare because he can relate to the feelings described in his works, even though the inhabitants of the World State do not and hence he is often misunderstood.
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