Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Brave New World: 7

"Linda had come from the Other Place long ago, before he was born with a man who was his father. She had gone walking alone in those mountains over there to the North, had fallen down a steep place and hurt her head. Some hunters from Malpais had found her and brough her to the pueblo" (118).

The above quote is the anecdote that John tells to Lenina and Bernard. The purpose of the anecdote is for John to explain his origins. The anecdote relates to the Director's anecdote in chapter six. It is basically telling the same anecdote from the perspective of the person who knows what happened in the end. The anecdote is effective because it explains the end of the story that the Director started. It is an interesting anecdote because it continues to explain that John is the son of Linda and Thomas (the Director). This is strictly against the rules when it comes to the civilized society that Linda grew up in. It begs the question, Did Linda know she was pregnant when she wandered off into the unknown? Also, the anecdotes that are further in the chapter have the purpose of showing that the conditioning in the "Other Place" (116) is effective and life-long because Linda still sees the Indians as lunatics despite having lived in their culture for some time. She still believes in the things that were embedded into her mind as she slept and has tried to condition John to believe the same.

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