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wingedbeastThis is an entire chapter of more show-don't-tell in exposition. None of it directly serves the story. All it does is inform us of the world and a bit of how two of our major players fit into it. Still, I enjoy reading it and, were this translated into a television series, I would enjoy watching it.
I'm not just giving credit where credit is due. I do like all three of the books that I'm deconstructing. I find them to be engaging reads, such that I could quickly read through any of them in a couple days. I'm trying to remind you (and myself) that, even though I sometimes make very loud objection, they're still valuable elements of our public discourse.
So, let's go over this example of exposition done well... and then get to the part where I get a little angry with Bernard.
This chapter starts out with Lenina Crowne and Henry Foster on their date. They play a game of Obstacle Golf. By context, I'm going to guess that to be some kind of open-air, roof-top mini-golf. It's not just one of the games people play. It's one of the games you're required to play, hense Bernard being considered controversial for not playing.
On the way back, on an otherwise uneventful date, Lenina notices and Henry explains something that I think is supposed to be chilling to us.
I think I get what Huxley is going for. But, this matter-of-fact handling of dead bodies is... well... appropriate.
Huxley, like many of his time and today, conflates the treatment of the dead body with the treatment of the dead person. We have an entire industry built around that conflation. We buy expensive coffins for the comfort of a body that can no longer feel anything. We purchase expensive cemetary plots for the vistas and views of eyes that no longer work, assuming that they weren't donated elsewhere.
Sure, there are some religions that operate on the notion that the body will be restored at some point after death. But, even those will acknowledge that the body has to be restored from quite a bit, making cremation a minor concern.
One thing that comes of note is that Lenina finds it odd ("queer" is her language, but this is a book written far before that became a word for non-hetero-normative sexuality and a story set far enough in the future that the word might regain this use) that Alphas and Betas don't make more plants grow than, in her words, "those nasty little Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons."
Henry Foster reminds her that everybody is biochemically equal. That which is collected isn't a person, it's some chemicals that happened to be inside a body that was a person.
And, here we get a moment of contradiction in the Fordian society. This isn't a mistake of Huxley's, but a common contradiction found in any and all societies. Lenina has her views of "those nasty little Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons" from her conditioning. She is conditioned to not want to play with or socialize with them and feel herself better than them.
At the same time, she's conditioned to remember that they are, in fact, useful. She's conditioned to remember that they are, as much as everybody else, the point of all of this. "Everybody works for everybody else."
That leads to another note of conversation. Epsilons don't mind being Epsilons, because they are conditioned to like where they are. (Rather, the conditioning that we see would suggest people are conditioned to not like where they are not.) If she were an Epsilon, she'd be glad not to be of a higher caste. This makes me wonder as to the necessity of the class divisions, but this book was written in the 1930s and in England.
In so far as this is all just an extension of the world-building that we've seen thus far, I get the attempt, but I'm not chilled, yet. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't want to live in that society. I'd likely be in a Bernard Marx style situation, which isn't fun. It's High School extended for my entire life. Ugh. But, as the bare bones of a society, eh... it is what it is.
But, an odd element does chill me. I don't know how this impacts others, but here's where I get thoughtful.
Noticing the balcony-like things on the smoke-stacks and the conversation happened while in something of a flying car. It's either a small plane or a helicopter style situation. Or, it's just a flying car. While over the Crematorium, a bit of hot air shot up, giving them some turbulence, which gave another point of discussion in response to Lenina's amusement.
Here's the thing. Not everybody's happy, now. We know that to be true in both the cases of Bernard Marx and Helmholtz Watson. In fact, Bernard Marx is in the second part of this chapter just to give lie to that line.
Was the person who's last physical presence was that gust of hot air happy in life? It's impossible to know. What's chilling is that it's impossible to even ask the question.
For the rest of the night, Henry Foster and Lenina Crowne are going to enjoy some more of a date, including going to a dance club. But, they're going to do so while on a soma holiday. Contraceptive precautions will be taken even under what amounts to heavy sedation, because they were drilled into Lenina Crowne since she was thirteen. (A note on the sex-mandating purity culture, that's still put all on the woman.) But, that's a side issue, that's life of those who fit in.
The other part of this chapter is Bernard Marx. Bernard Marx, after a friendly dinner with Helmholtz (homosexuality doesn't seem to be even considered as a thing for this story, and I'd be curious to know how this sex-mandating purity culture would have handled it), has to go to Solidarity Service at the Fordson Community Singery.
As far as I can tell, this is a religious observance in the Fordly religion of this state. They're small religious observances. And... well...
Remember when I told you that I was going to be angry with Bernard? Yeah, here we are. Bernard, not being the very latest, will escape the scolding, but he's still late enough that he just slips into the nearest seat and tries to avoid notice.
He's immediately questioned, by the woman to his left, if he was playing Obstacle Golf or Electro-Magnetic. To her astonishment, he answers that he was playing neither. That gets, from her, a judgmental silence, followed by pointedly turning to ask the man to her left. Sheesh, this is a world without good manners.
Okay, I know what it's like to not be into sports in a world that turns to the right, looks at you, then subjects you to an impromptu test that you can't possibly pass, because it's about sports. It's annoying at best. It can be quite frustrating. It can feel like the world doesn't believe you exist.
It doesn't justify Bernard Marx's thoughts about her, though. He immediately judges his seat to be a bad choice because that woman to his left, Morgana Rothschild, has a unibrow. On the other side, he internally judges Clara Deterding to be "really too pneumatic." (Maybe that word doesn't refer to sexual performance?)
For all that Bernard will think of himself as being able to access more depth than the average citizen, he's still shallow. In fact, under other circumstances, he should be well aware that he isn't as physically ideal as Morgana.
Bernard, Dude, sometimes you just have to appreciate the people right next to you and not be so judgy about it.
I should be kinder and, in fact, will be kinder to Bernard about this. He's not judging because he's judgy. This is something of an act of psychological self-defense. He's aware that he's not the physical ideal and he's aware that this ritual isn't going to work for him the way that it works for everybody else. So, he gets nervous and that expresses itself as finding reasons why it won't work and that expresses itself as focus on whatever flaw he can find.
Like I said in the comments of the previous part. Where Bernard Marx goes, I have gone. It's not a good place to go, neither moral nor healthy. The better option would be to, internally, acknowledge that this just isn't for him and accept that as it is. Then again, he doesn't have the option to do that externally, does he?
So, either way, he's stuck. I'd just prefer that he'd be healthier with how he's stuck.
The religious ritual involves twelve people in a circle, alternating genders, passing around a "Loving Cup" full of strawberry ice-cream soma. Each of the twelve drinks from the Loving Cup, then there's a hymn sung. Another pass around with each of the twelve drinking more soma and another hymn sung. The Song is about the Greater Being which, I guess, is the greater society once the individuals are, if only in the ritual itself, annihilated.
People proclaim when they feel that "he", the Greater Being, is coming. They work to a dance, spank each other's butts in a line, then dance some more and the whole thing devolves into an "Orgy Porgy" to give release.
It's... uh... eh... Let me say this. I see the appeal. Let me also say this. I see why it doesn't work for Bernard.
It's about anybody's physical imperfections. It's that some people can be comfortable and really get into this and some people... can't. For Bernard (or it would be for me and I read Bernard as very like myself) this is another case of mental disquiet. Too many people involved brings up the nervousness. Strangers one only knows from previous religious observances.
Yeah, I'm a little angry with Bernard. But, once again, it's too easy for me to be Bernard for me to be angry for long. This world just isn't set up to allow for him. Yet, here is.
I'm not just giving credit where credit is due. I do like all three of the books that I'm deconstructing. I find them to be engaging reads, such that I could quickly read through any of them in a couple days. I'm trying to remind you (and myself) that, even though I sometimes make very loud objection, they're still valuable elements of our public discourse.
So, let's go over this example of exposition done well... and then get to the part where I get a little angry with Bernard.
This chapter starts out with Lenina Crowne and Henry Foster on their date. They play a game of Obstacle Golf. By context, I'm going to guess that to be some kind of open-air, roof-top mini-golf. It's not just one of the games people play. It's one of the games you're required to play, hense Bernard being considered controversial for not playing.
On the way back, on an otherwise uneventful date, Lenina notices and Henry explains something that I think is supposed to be chilling to us.
"Why do the smoke-stacks have those things like balconies around them?" enquired Lenina.
"Phosphorous recovery," explained Henry telegraphically. "On their way up the chimney the gasses go through four separate treatments. P2O5 used to go right out of circulation every time they creamated some one. Now they recover over ninety-eight per cent of it. More than a kilo and a half per adult corpse. Which makes the best part of four hundred tons of phosphorous every year from England alone." Henry spoke with a happy pride, rejoicing wholeheartedly in the achievement, as though it had been his own. "Fine to think we can go on being socially useful even after we're dead. Making plants grow."
I think I get what Huxley is going for. But, this matter-of-fact handling of dead bodies is... well... appropriate.
Huxley, like many of his time and today, conflates the treatment of the dead body with the treatment of the dead person. We have an entire industry built around that conflation. We buy expensive coffins for the comfort of a body that can no longer feel anything. We purchase expensive cemetary plots for the vistas and views of eyes that no longer work, assuming that they weren't donated elsewhere.
Sure, there are some religions that operate on the notion that the body will be restored at some point after death. But, even those will acknowledge that the body has to be restored from quite a bit, making cremation a minor concern.
One thing that comes of note is that Lenina finds it odd ("queer" is her language, but this is a book written far before that became a word for non-hetero-normative sexuality and a story set far enough in the future that the word might regain this use) that Alphas and Betas don't make more plants grow than, in her words, "those nasty little Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons."
Henry Foster reminds her that everybody is biochemically equal. That which is collected isn't a person, it's some chemicals that happened to be inside a body that was a person.
And, here we get a moment of contradiction in the Fordian society. This isn't a mistake of Huxley's, but a common contradiction found in any and all societies. Lenina has her views of "those nasty little Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons" from her conditioning. She is conditioned to not want to play with or socialize with them and feel herself better than them.
At the same time, she's conditioned to remember that they are, in fact, useful. She's conditioned to remember that they are, as much as everybody else, the point of all of this. "Everybody works for everybody else."
That leads to another note of conversation. Epsilons don't mind being Epsilons, because they are conditioned to like where they are. (Rather, the conditioning that we see would suggest people are conditioned to not like where they are not.) If she were an Epsilon, she'd be glad not to be of a higher caste. This makes me wonder as to the necessity of the class divisions, but this book was written in the 1930s and in England.
In so far as this is all just an extension of the world-building that we've seen thus far, I get the attempt, but I'm not chilled, yet. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't want to live in that society. I'd likely be in a Bernard Marx style situation, which isn't fun. It's High School extended for my entire life. Ugh. But, as the bare bones of a society, eh... it is what it is.
But, an odd element does chill me. I don't know how this impacts others, but here's where I get thoughtful.
Noticing the balcony-like things on the smoke-stacks and the conversation happened while in something of a flying car. It's either a small plane or a helicopter style situation. Or, it's just a flying car. While over the Crematorium, a bit of hot air shot up, giving them some turbulence, which gave another point of discussion in response to Lenina's amusement.
But Henry's tone was almost, for a moment, melancholy. "Do you know what that switchback was?" he said. "It was some human being finally and definitely disappearing. Going up in a squirt of hot gas. It would be curious to know who it was-a man or a woman, anAlpha or an Epsilon..." He sighed. Then, in a resolutely cheerful voice, "Anyhow," he concluded, "there's one thing we can be certain of; whoever he may have been, he was happy when he was alive. Everybody's happy now."
Here's the thing. Not everybody's happy, now. We know that to be true in both the cases of Bernard Marx and Helmholtz Watson. In fact, Bernard Marx is in the second part of this chapter just to give lie to that line.
Was the person who's last physical presence was that gust of hot air happy in life? It's impossible to know. What's chilling is that it's impossible to even ask the question.
For the rest of the night, Henry Foster and Lenina Crowne are going to enjoy some more of a date, including going to a dance club. But, they're going to do so while on a soma holiday. Contraceptive precautions will be taken even under what amounts to heavy sedation, because they were drilled into Lenina Crowne since she was thirteen. (A note on the sex-mandating purity culture, that's still put all on the woman.) But, that's a side issue, that's life of those who fit in.
The other part of this chapter is Bernard Marx. Bernard Marx, after a friendly dinner with Helmholtz (homosexuality doesn't seem to be even considered as a thing for this story, and I'd be curious to know how this sex-mandating purity culture would have handled it), has to go to Solidarity Service at the Fordson Community Singery.
As far as I can tell, this is a religious observance in the Fordly religion of this state. They're small religious observances. And... well...
Remember when I told you that I was going to be angry with Bernard? Yeah, here we are. Bernard, not being the very latest, will escape the scolding, but he's still late enough that he just slips into the nearest seat and tries to avoid notice.
He's immediately questioned, by the woman to his left, if he was playing Obstacle Golf or Electro-Magnetic. To her astonishment, he answers that he was playing neither. That gets, from her, a judgmental silence, followed by pointedly turning to ask the man to her left. Sheesh, this is a world without good manners.
Okay, I know what it's like to not be into sports in a world that turns to the right, looks at you, then subjects you to an impromptu test that you can't possibly pass, because it's about sports. It's annoying at best. It can be quite frustrating. It can feel like the world doesn't believe you exist.
It doesn't justify Bernard Marx's thoughts about her, though. He immediately judges his seat to be a bad choice because that woman to his left, Morgana Rothschild, has a unibrow. On the other side, he internally judges Clara Deterding to be "really too pneumatic." (Maybe that word doesn't refer to sexual performance?)
For all that Bernard will think of himself as being able to access more depth than the average citizen, he's still shallow. In fact, under other circumstances, he should be well aware that he isn't as physically ideal as Morgana.
Bernard, Dude, sometimes you just have to appreciate the people right next to you and not be so judgy about it.
I should be kinder and, in fact, will be kinder to Bernard about this. He's not judging because he's judgy. This is something of an act of psychological self-defense. He's aware that he's not the physical ideal and he's aware that this ritual isn't going to work for him the way that it works for everybody else. So, he gets nervous and that expresses itself as finding reasons why it won't work and that expresses itself as focus on whatever flaw he can find.
Like I said in the comments of the previous part. Where Bernard Marx goes, I have gone. It's not a good place to go, neither moral nor healthy. The better option would be to, internally, acknowledge that this just isn't for him and accept that as it is. Then again, he doesn't have the option to do that externally, does he?
So, either way, he's stuck. I'd just prefer that he'd be healthier with how he's stuck.
The religious ritual involves twelve people in a circle, alternating genders, passing around a "Loving Cup" full of strawberry ice-cream soma. Each of the twelve drinks from the Loving Cup, then there's a hymn sung. Another pass around with each of the twelve drinking more soma and another hymn sung. The Song is about the Greater Being which, I guess, is the greater society once the individuals are, if only in the ritual itself, annihilated.
People proclaim when they feel that "he", the Greater Being, is coming. They work to a dance, spank each other's butts in a line, then dance some more and the whole thing devolves into an "Orgy Porgy" to give release.
It's... uh... eh... Let me say this. I see the appeal. Let me also say this. I see why it doesn't work for Bernard.
It's about anybody's physical imperfections. It's that some people can be comfortable and really get into this and some people... can't. For Bernard (or it would be for me and I read Bernard as very like myself) this is another case of mental disquiet. Too many people involved brings up the nervousness. Strangers one only knows from previous religious observances.
Yeah, I'm a little angry with Bernard. But, once again, it's too easy for me to be Bernard for me to be angry for long. This world just isn't set up to allow for him. Yet, here is.
no subject
Date: 2017-10-02 03:08 pm (UTC)Oh, it is distressing to judge a person's life based on the appearance of the body and the fineness of the grave goods - this is neither a condemnation of 'pneumatic' or an endorsement of local practices, just a statement of how I reacted to the two items in context.
I don't actually have a way of passing final judgement that /isn't/ distressing. It's a distressing thing to do, and thus I try to avoid it. People are complex and messy, and summing a life - of which I can only ever have been a small part - up in a few sentences isn't a practice I find useful.
no subject
Date: 2017-10-02 04:14 pm (UTC)Regardless of all details, the life is worth contemplating and, in final expression, equal in said value to all others.
There are other points wherein we see how this society makes people replaceable and cogs in a machine, where they are at their most worthy of contemplation when one wonders about the life they had, rather than the life they have.
"In death, a member of Project Mayhem has a name. His name is Robert Paulson."