Finding similarities between 1984 and Brave New World isn’t the hardest task in the world, but a notable one that appeared as an almost offhand comment in 1984’s chapter 8 part 1 was the concept of “ownlife”. “Ownlife”, as it is mentioned in the book, is merely the idea of someone spending time on their own (and even possibly embracing their individuality to some degree). There is a fairly obvious connection to this concept and the general attitudes in Brave New World that “everyone belongs to everyone else” which I thought was interesting.
Another connection I made between the two books was the classism that led to essentially abandoning a complete class of people. By this I mean that I think that there is a link to be made between the “proles” in 1984 and the reservation in Brave New World. Both groups of people were essentially intentionally forgotten about, but simultaneously carefully cordoned off from the party and world state respectively.
What is to be gleaned from these observations? Are we to believe that working with other people leads to totalitarianism? Or is it more along the lines of “all good things come in moderation”? And what other ways are the books’ points similar?
Intriguing questions. It does seem like these older dystopias lament the death of the individual pretty heavily. That does seem to overlook the fact that an individual can't exist on their own and communities are in fact necessary. After all, the flip side of this is people demanding "their rights" (to not wear a mask, for example) without seeing that they are part of a larger group.
ReplyDelete