Brave New World And Fahrenheit 451 Analysis

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The dystopian societies in Aldous Huxley’s novel Brave New World and Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 are fairly different, but oddly similar in many ways. Both books incorporate ideas of behavioral conditioning, as well as twisted ideas of happiness and totalitarian government control. Brave New World shows a future so radically cold and unfeeling that it will send chills up any reader’s spine. The once affectionate term of “parent,” “mother,” or “father,” have now become curse words. Children are created in test tubes, some with ninety identical twins. Also, the international pastime of their day is sex. Fortunately, Bradbury’s society still keeps some major moral values in line with those of the world today. Unfortunately, Fahrenheit 451’s firemen bring an end to many’s happiness by burning all books. Books are completely illegal and are even considered to be dangerous. The once cute and loving dogs have been replaced by the creepy, spider-like Mechanical Hounds. Cars are now beetles, but it is finally completely legal to drive at one hundred and twenty miles per hour. These two alternate futures may seem drastically different, but they are quite the same at the core. Behavioral conditioning appears to be much more prominent in Brave New World than in Fahrenheit 451, but both worlds certainly integrate the process and ideas into their societies. In Huxley’s novel, the process of behavioral conditioning happens before the first breath can be taken. Their various oxygen processes and alcohol injections ensure that the victims never have the opportunity to defy their caste (Huxley 6-15). Outside of the physical aspect, the children in Brave New World are conditioned using little rhymes and jingles that are played to them while they sleep. Lenina knows all of hers by heart, and is not afraid to recite them when needed (Huxley 90). From that young age, the children of their world are already being taught not to defy the status quo set by means of the government. Individuality is completely abandoned and certainly frowned upon. The society in Fahrenheit 451 uses their firemen to ensure the lack of heightened intelligence and individuality. Beatty explains how the people in their world slowly began to believe that diversity was destroying them. Their society was so sensitive to offence that they decided it was safer to eliminate (and burn) the problem instead of facing it. Beatty explains on page 57, “The bigger your market, Montag, the less you handle controversy, remember that!” By burning all of the books, they essentially kissed individuality goodbye. People could no longer think for themselves, nor did they really want to. Without the presence of books, there was no flow of ideas, or creation, for that matter. People were content to live their sedentary lives because that is all they had ever known. Even curiosity was illegal to an extent. Firemen can keep books for twenty-four hours. However, in the event that they keep them for any longer, the consequences can be deadly, and curiosity may literally kill the cat (Bradbury 62). The ideas …show more content…
Mildred was completely obsessed with them, alongside every other housewife in their society. The parlors were rooms consisting of television screens that took up an entire wall. Mildred sent in box tops in order to place herself into one of the programs. She is given small lines to speak out loud as the actors wait for her. It is a clever tactic that makes her feel more involved, and therefore more attached to this “family” of hers (Bradbury 20). Another way that the people could achieve happiness is by means of ignorance. Everybody knows that “ignorance is bliss,” but Fahrenheit 451 takes it to a whole new level. People would rather be safe than free to think whatever thoughts they wanted to. Poor Mildred was positively miserable when she was attempting to help Montag end his own ignorance. To some extent, Montag ended his happiness by trying to end his ignorance. They had set out to decipher the meanings behind all of the books that he had kept piled up in secret (Bradbury 73). She was also afraid of what would happen if the firemen discovered. She goes so far as to call in the alarm on her own husband to end her misery with the

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