Description

The book opens in a Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre.  The director of Hactchery, or DOH, and his assistant Henry Foster are giving a group of young boys a tour of the Centre.  However, this Centre is unlike any other, as you can tell from the title.  These boys are taken to the Centre to observe how the Bokanvosky Process allows the factory to produce thousands of embryos that are identical to one and other.  Here the embyos are transported in a container through many series of conveyors until the nine months has arrived.  There are five levels of the embyos and they are ranked (from the highest to the lowest) Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon.  Each caste is assigned different jobs and task in a day to day world.  Alpha's have extremely important jobs such as World leaders and Epsilons the "not so intelligent of the bunch" are choosen to do daily tasks like push buttons on an elevator.  All is fair because each person is pleased doing what they are assigned, however, there are always exceptions. As we follow the book, we learn that many of our modern day struggles are eliminated.  Struggles such as poverty and warfare.  Not only are struggles elimated but family, art, philosophy, science, literature, religion and culture as well.  Although all of this was eliminated, there are questionable replacements such as sex and the use of the drug soma as a daily routine.  As the book continues, the reader learns how much Huxley has changed the world to be more advanced in technology and the worlds quetionable alternatives compared to our modern day.

Aldous Huxley was born in Surrey England on July 26, 1894.  He spent most of his years in Los Angeles from 1937 until his death in November of 1963.  Huxley's father was a writer, poet,  and a biographer named Leonard Huxley.  His mother was Julia Arnold who was related to Matthew Arnold, the great humanist.  Julia Arnold died of cancer when Aldous was only fourteen.  he studied at Eton College Berkshire.  When he was sixteen he suffered from a disease called keratitis punctata.  For 18 months Huxley was completely blind in both eyes.  One eye recoverd well and he was able to read and write again.  Huxley could not be a scientist or fight in World War because of his condition, so he turned to writing.   Huxley wrote his first unpublished novel when he was seventeen.  It wasn't until his late twenties that he considered to write seriously.  This was when he wrote Brave New World.

Primary and secondary sources

What was your initial reation when you first started reading the book?

What is the birth term that is used in the Hatchery?  How do you feel about this word?

Do you feel what they do to the newborn infants in necessary in their training process?

Who is Lenina and what does she do?

Why did Fanny try to convince Lenina to be more promiscuous?

Who is Bernard?  Explain your first impression of him.

Expain who Hemholtz Watson is and why he is signifigant in the book.

Even though most of the new world is so different, is it really different when it comes to who is in charge in this new world?  Think about the roles that the women have versus the men.

What is your idea of the quote "Everyone belongs to Everone else?"

What do you think of drugs being a part of everyday life?  Do you think it is necessary in what they are trying to persue?

How do you feel about Mustapha Mond and the Model T's?

Why do you think that Bernard is the way he is?  Do you feel that they did infact made a mistake when creating him or do you believe that it is something completely different?

 How does Lenina react to the reservation?

Where you shocked to learn that the woman the Director lost when on vaction at the reservation was still alive?

Why did other women attack Linda?

What is the signifigance of John choosing to read the book that he did as a child?

Explain your first reation towards John.

How did you react when you found out who John's father was? 

Why didn't Linda go back afterward?

 Why was Bernard almost banished?

Do you think that Lenina realizes how much John truely loves her?

Do you think that Lenina wanted to have sex with John because she had feelings for him or because it is what they are trained to do?

Do you think that Bernard made the right decision?

How do you feel about what John does at the end?

Write two paragraphs on how the people in this world distinguish the different castes?  Explain the purpose of each.