Brave New World and the Island
The Need for a "Way Out" in Brave New World and the Island
The future looks grim for mankind in the dystopian novel Brave New World and the film The Island. In both works, a terrible dependency upon technology and "science" has caused mankind to lose its "soul" and forget the transcendental values that make life worth living. Both works are effective in displaying the negative aspects of this sort of dystopia. But neither offers an effective alternative to such a future: John the Savage hangs himself in despair, and the heroes of The Island merely go boating (on what appears to be a permanent holiday). This paper will explain the satirical points of both and show how each is only partially effective in communicating a moral/social message that can elicit people to think and change.
E. Michael Jones states that the only life worth living is the moral life that focuses on man's ultimate end goal. He calls that goal the exercise of the "free use of the will" in union with the divine source of all life (Jones 6). This message, although not explicitly...
The first way it is acknowledged is in the drive of the central characters to seek a way of life outside the "
status quo," self-centered, closed-off, non-transcendental mode of existence.
In Brave New World, the central character is John the Savage. He is an outsider to the world of soma and World State ideals. He has grown up under the guidance of the works of
Shakespeare, which contains real representations of humanity and divine assistance. John's problem is that he does not fit into the World State, when he is introduced into it. In this way, Huxley satirizes the emptiness of
modern society, which has rejected the old world values represented by Shakespeare. Lenina, whom John likes, thinks he "spoils everything" when he criticizes their "base" entertainments (Huxley 114). He tries to wake others up to the fact that they live shallow, superficial, self-centered lives. He throws their soma out the window. But he ultimately fails to do any good. Even he cannot
escape his desires, and in an act of puritanical despair, hangs himself. John the Savage represents the moral voice of the novel -- but all the voice can do is express its outrage at…
