Exile In Brave New World

During the 1930s, the times of World War II and the Great Depression, Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World. There were several issues going on in Huxley’s time that are still present in today's world . Huxley features some of these problems in his book, Brave New World. These problems include drug or medicine usage, women and gender inequality, and traditional marriage/homosexuality. Since this book was written during the times of the Great Depression and World War II, these factors also contributed to some of these issues. Since World War II and the Great Depression are over, these do not affect the problems today. Although some of these problems are still a problem in today's world and society, they are not as much of a problem as they were during Huxley's time.

Cursed to a life of isolation because of his appearance, values, and outrageous thoughts, John was alienated mentally, emotionally, and physically in both the Savage Culture and the World State Culture. Torn between keeping true to his virtues and conforming to society, the treatment of John highlights the values of both cultures in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World.

Exile is when a person is isolated from his/her native country or home. Sometimes it's considered to be a way of alienating someone but sometimes it could be considered to be enriching. In the book Brave New World by Aldous Huxley John the Savage experiences exile as both alienating and enriching. He was born on the Savage Reservation and his mother Linda was rejected and criticized because of her sexual freedom. Due to his mother’s isolation John did not feel as though he was accepted by other savages in the reservation. As an adolescent he was refused to participate in the Native American ritual, a ritual that would allow him to enter the adult Indian society. He asks, “why wouldn’t they let me be the sacrifice?”(pg.116). He asks this question not understanding why his own people were denying him. After his rejection he goes into the wilderness and tortures himself in order to enter adulthood. This is one of many ways his society kept him from being a normal kid.

It’s obvious John doesn’t like civilization. He even states this in Chapter 17 of Brave New World. He’s appalled by civilization’s methods and its lack of humanity. He’s “pissed off” when the World State tries to enforce their rules on him. He feels his only option is to fight back. It’s really an unfortunate situation for John the Savage. Their rules require you to “Be happy all the time,” so the only way he can fight back is to make himself miserable, and he does. He does this to show that he’s not under their rule. So it’s possible that he self-mutilates in rebellion to the World State’s

When John was led back into life in the futuristic society, he was mocked and treat as a strange attraction. He was at the awful end of a sick joke - people came from all over to understand this simple “savage” who has spent his life in curiously primitive manners. John was so poorly received, he went as far as wanting to commit

John's life seemed to be one major drama after another; he didn't have a good male role model as a kid, and it seems he never was able to get on track. What was amazing about his life was the number of problems that he seemed to get into and how he wriggled out of them (with the help of a friendly person who just happened to meet him) only to run into more problems.

To start off with, John travelled into a forbidden area and he started seeing much more then he was supposed to see and that is when he started losing fear. In the story it states, “The north and the west and the south are good hunting ground, but it is forbidden to go east. It is forbidden to go to any of the Dead Places except to search for metal […] These are the rules and the laws; they are well made. It is forbidden

The major development seen in John’s character takes place near the end of the story, as he seeks a more pure life in a remote location. John feels as though he’s been poisoned by this new civilization “I ate civilization. It poisoned me; I was defiled. And then, I ate my own wickedness.” (241). He wants to not only live a noble life, but to make this life on his own, so chooses an abandoned lighthouse, far enough away from the disaster of a community he views Brave New World as a negative place with negative ideas. This is a major change from the identity he showed before being poisoned by this civilization, but once again he stays true to his values by leading this new life on his own. John’s strong moral values prove to be the one constant in his character.

Having been a somewhat of an outsider in his life, physically and mentally, Aldous Huxley used what others thought as his oddities to create complex works. His large stature and creative individuality is expressed in the characters of his novel, Brave New World. In crafting such characters as Lenina, John, Linda, Bernard, and Helmholtz, not to mention the entire world he created in the text itself, Huxley incorporated some of his humanities into those of his characters. Contrastly, he removed the same humanities from the society as a whole to seem perfect. This, the essence and value of being human, is the great meaning of Brave New World. The presence and lack of human nature in the novel exemplifies the words of literary theorist Edward Said: “Exile is strangely compelling to think about but terrible to experience. It is the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place, between the self and its true home: its essential sadness can never be surmounted.” Huxley’s characters reflect the “rift” in their jarred reaction to new environments and lifestyles, as well as the remnant of individuality various characters maintain in a brave new world.

He believes heavily in religion and what it means in a man’s life. John also wishes to be apart of the traditions of his village such as the ritual for rain. He has a sense of sacrifice and individualism that the people of his world has but people of the new world do not

John experiences exile on three occasions during Aldous Huxley's novel Brave New World. During each exile, his lifestyle contradicts the morals, ideas, and behaviors of the Savage Reservation and the World State.

Brave New World takes place in a futuristic society that has a date system entirely based off Henry Ford. Huxley intentionally distorted the setting of Brave New World so distance was created between his audience and the reader. This distance allows the reader to cast judgment upon the society without instantly realizing that he is actually judging himself. Had Huxley not painted a futuristic society, he wouldn’t have been able to get away with as much criticism because it would be a direct insult to the reader.

Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New world” tells about a utopian society where people are stripped from being individuals or in turn exiled from themselves. People are conditioned to perform certain tasks and everyone is a part of each other in some way. Although, there are a few characters that become cut off from “home” and are distinct from other characters within their castes. An example is Bernard and Hemholtz that are a part of the Alphas.To be exiled is when a character or person becomes seperated from home, or their birth place, it can also mean that they are mentally cut off from the peple within their birth place or home. Although, Bernard experiences an exile without leaving home. Due to his differences it lead to him to be alienated from those who

When John was talking to Bernard about some of the events that occurred at the Savage Reservation, he mentioned that he stood out next to a rock all day because he felt that he, “’ought to. If Jesus could stand it… Besides, I was unhappy; that was another reason,’” (Huxley 138). John feels that he has to purge himself in order to find happiness, which is another reason that he is unorthodox because he thinks more about what it means to suffer. The previous quote connects to another unorthodox trait of John’s because it mentions Jesus.

Brave New World, written by Aldous Huxley, is one of his top and highly recognizable novels among many other works. It was a novel influenced by, like many of his previous and future novels, the very remarkable life Huxley led. Aldous Huxley was a Englishman born in 1894 to a upper class family, consisting of fellow novelists, educators, and well known biologists. In a family of high intellect, Aldous was noticeably one of the more gifted. With his gifts in the brainpower department came the unfortunate blindness that occurred in 1911, which ended many of his dreams including being a doctor or serving his country in WWI.