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    Socratic Seminar Questions

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    tianaxbinoop
    This document contains questions and responses about the novel Brave New World. It discusses how John the Savage and Mustapha Mond differ in their views of suffering. It also compares how the relationship between Bernard and Lenina represents societal problems that are later represented by John and Mustapha. Finally, it discusses ways the novel can be seen as celebrating modernity and progress, such as through the use of the drug soma to eliminate suffering.

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    Socratic Seminar Questions

    Uploaded by

    tianaxbinoop
    69 views3 pages
    This document contains questions and responses about the novel Brave New World. It discusses how John the Savage and Mustapha Mond differ in their views of suffering. It also compares how the relationship between Bernard and Lenina represents societal problems that are later represented by John and Mustapha. Finally, it discusses ways the novel can be seen as celebrating modernity and progress, such as through the use of the drug soma to eliminate suffering.

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    This document contains questions and responses about the novel Brave New World. It discusses how John the Savage and Mustapha Mond differ in their views of suffering. It also compares how the relationship between Bernard and Lenina represents societal problems that are later represented by John and Mustapha. Finally, it discusses ways the novel can be seen as celebrating modernity and progress, such as through the use of the drug soma to eliminate suffering.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    69 views3 pages

    Socratic Seminar Questions

    Uploaded by

    tianaxbinoop
    This document contains questions and responses about the novel Brave New World. It discusses how John the Savage and Mustapha Mond differ in their views of suffering. It also compares how the relationship between Bernard and Lenina represents societal problems that are later represented by John and Mustapha. Finally, it discusses ways the novel can be seen as celebrating modernity and progress, such as through the use of the drug soma to eliminate suffering.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
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    Socratic Seminar Q&A

    John the Savage and Mustapha Mond’s conversation towards the end of the book gave the
    reader a view of what a civilized and an uncivilized population may or may not have in
    common. Although Mustapha Mond had shown he had understood John’s idea towards
    things and how he viewed them, he disagreed. One of these things was the role of suffering
    in life. How does John’s view of suffering differ from Mustapha’s view?

    In Chapter 17 of the book, John the Savage says, “I don’t want comfort. I want God, I want
    poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.” (pg. 163) However,
    towards the earlier parts of the book, in Chapter 16, we see Mustapha say, “Universal happiness
    keeps the wheels steadily turning; truth and beauty can’t,” (pg. 155). John embraces that
    suffering in life is a part of the human experience, put on earth by God. But Mustapha knows he
    has control in a civilized society, and any god he would know would be himself— he made the
    rules, he ended the suffering. In John’s society, everyone was equal, and there was no higher
    being besides the divine while the “divine” in Mustapha’s society would be Mustapha or,
    previously, the Director himself.

    Bernard and Lenina’s relationship had initially symbolized the difference between
    conformity and non-conformity. Towards the end of the book, we see this difference
    represented in John and Mustapha. What are some ways that Huxley transfers the societal
    problems from Bernard and Lenina’s relationship to John and Mustapha’s?

    Bernard and Lenina’s relationship provided a sharp contrast in terms of conformity. While
    Bernard was both physically and mentally different from those around him and those in his same
    class, Lenina preferred to blend in with societal norms and use soma while viewing Bernard
    rather odd for refusing to. We see this in Chapter 7, where Lenina felt rather disgusted with the
    Indians and John (as any regular civilian of the World State would feel), Bernard felt rather
    intrigued (pg. 74). In Chapter 8, it starts with Bernard’s interest in Linda’s stories, in which he
    seeks stories that oppose the ideal view of the World State (pg. 86). Similar to Bernard’s initial
    thought process, John mentions he “wants sin” in Chapter 17 (pg. 163). But in the same chapter,
    Mustapha Mond makes it clear that the idea of social stability requires that there be no problems
    and any and all problems should be suppressed, even if it means the truth.

    In Chapter 17, Mustapha Mond makes it evident that rebellion and the pursuit of truth are
    closely related by saying that happiness and truth are not compatible. What are some
    experiences in the book that made this evident?
    John the Savage was a character from an uncivilized society that was introduced to a civilized
    one. In Chapter 15, John sees the blindness that the Deltas suffer from, unable to see the truth of
    society and how they were forced to blend in. In a raging fit, John loses it and throws the soma
    rations out of a window, where we see his first act of rebellion (pg. 146). Since John was the only
    one who was raised outside of the World State, he was the only one who saw the difference in
    the two societies and the censorship that was formed. Later in the book, we find out that John
    ended his life and a huge part of it was due to his overwhelming gain of knowledge in the World
    State and his unwanted growth of fame.

    Martin Franzén’s literary criticism states that, “… The novel does contain many instances
    where modernity is celebrated rather than criticized.” According to Martin Franzén,
    calling the society in Brave New World an utopia is just as arguable as calling it a dystopia.
    What are some cases where calling the New World an utopia is considerable?

    The point of the World State was to solve all problems. An example of this is soma. Soma is a
    drug used to solve all problems of discontent. In Chapter 17, Mustapha states, “Christianity
    without tears— that’s what soma is,” (pg. 238) . What Mustapha means by that is that in the end,
    soma is what represents their religion and culture— they call to soma for any and all problems,
    and the second it’s taken, there is an end to all suffering. This is the opposite of dystopian since it
    keeps people’s emotions at bay, and keeps people structurally in control. This could even proceed
    to prove our current society as dystopian as we don’t have such easy access to drugs that could
    keep our moods afloat unless we are medically diagnosed, which requires a lengthy assessed
    procedure.

    Oftentimes, the reader tends to view a dystopian book as largely negative. However, Huxley
    sends more of a neutral message than he does a negative one regarding the path humanity.
    Relating back to Martin Franzén’s literary criticism, Huxley appears to celebrate some
    portions of “our progression of modernity towards the future.” When does Huxley appear
    to applaud the possible progression of society?

    Huxley applauds the progression of society in eliminating the suffering of the world. From the
    way that things appear to go, it appears as if disease was wiped from the population (unless
    specifically applied to the class). There happens to be no one among those who were made to be
    perfect that suffers from any sickness or aging with time. Chapter 17 of Brave New World reads,
    “Not more than a quarter of a gram a week. and a quarter of that half-gramme is a quarter of pure
    soma. It makes you feel very virtuous, I promise you… All the tonic effects of murdering
    despair, without any of the inconveniences,” (pg. 238). They have been able to form a drug that
    ends any and all pain an individual has, and it has had a tremendous effect on the progression of
    the society Huxley envisioned and created within the book.

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