Friday, January 6, 2012

In Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, why is John disappointed in the library at Eton?

As they pass the library at Eton, an exclusive private school, John the Savage asks if the students read Shakespeare. He is told they certainly do not:

“Our library,” said Dr. Gaffney, “contains only books of reference. If our young people need distraction, they can get it at the feelies. We don’t encourage them to indulge in any solitary amusements.”

This is disappointing to John because he loves to read and was deeply influenced by a volume of Shakespeare's works he found while growing up on the Savage Reservation. He enjoys solitude and reading, so it must be strange to him that these activities are not encouraged, even at a school.
John is beginning to understand that the brave new world of the World State that Linda described to him as paradise when he was growing up has more than a little bit of nightmare to it. He is encountering the multitudes of identical twins produced by cloning, learning about the intensive conditioning, realizing that people are routinely drugged on soma, and coming to understand that they are denied the intellectual and spiritual activities he finds vital to life.

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