Brave new world Chapters 10-12

Chapters 10-12

The Director had summoned Bernard to the fertilizing room because it had the most people from the highest castes, and he explained this to Henry Foster, who tries to defend Bernard merely for optics. Soon, Bernard walks into the room, and the Director lays out the accusations and judgment against Bernard. He believes that Bernard had threatened society with his unorthodox behavior outside of the workplace, his attitude towards Soma, his odd sexual conduct, and his attitude towards sports. He asks Bernard if he had anything to say in his defense, and Bernard happily calls to Linda. The fat and middle-aged woman stands out starkly in the clean and tidy fertilizing room. She recognizes the Director, and calls him Tomakin, and tries to remind him about their time together. When he doesn't engage with her, she runs to him and embraces him. When she tells him that she had born his son, a quiet descends on the crowd, and then John walks in. He goes to his knees in front of the Director and calls him his father, and the people around the director began to laugh uncontrollably.

The director resigns in shame, and the world for Bernard, Lenina, John, and Linda completely changes. Linda is delighted to be back in a civilized society and for her, this return means a return to Soma. Linda indulges in Soma greedily, and the doctor who visits to observe her, informs Bernard that the amount of Soma she was consuming would shorten her life span to a few months. But he also felt that it was a mercy since they were incapable of restoring her to any semblance of her old civilized self. John is reluctant at first to allow her to be drugged so thoroughly with Soma but he bears it for he feels that it is what Linda desires.

Fate completely turns around for Bernard as well, he is the assigned guardian of John the savage, and since everyone in the city wants to meet John, Bernard becomes an instant celebrity. People seek him out during work, girls positively throw themselves at him, and he reports his engagements with John to Mustapha Mond. Helmholtz finds Bernard's boastful behavior shameful and informs him so, but Bernard resolves to never again speak to Helmholtz. The world Controller is amused by the opinions that Bernard himself expresses about their society in his reports about John. He is to be given a bird's eye view of civilized society, but John is disgusted by the conditions of the lower castes and how they work in factories, and retches with disgust. His visit at Eton is a little more educational, and there he discovers that the rites the natives on the reservation had practiced so sacredly were seen as comical in the civilized society.

Lenina likes John and she wants to be with him, but his behavior is erratic, he always looks away, but she has caught him staring at her sometimes in the way men eye women they desire. Upon Bernard's request, Lenina takes John to the feelies to watch a movie, and she is hopeful that she might be able to make love to John that night. The movie is not a completely pleasant experience for John, for whom sex has always been a private and emotional matter, and he believes the movie depicts it in a truly base way. Lenina tries to have him spend the night at her home, but John leaves and returns to his room. There he fishes out the carefully hidden book with the complete works of Shakespeare and turns to read Othello. Lenina on the other hand, disappointed and sad, doses herself for another Soma holiday.

John refuses to visit one of the parties that Bernard organizes for all the people who want to get to know the savage. Bernard is very disappointed and extremely worried about the reaction of his guests, who are very indignant at being refused a meeting with John. They vent their frustration by loudly complaining about Bernard, who moves through the party offering apologies that aren't received graciously. One of the important guests at the party is the Arch-Community-Songster, who leaves with Lenina after loudly warning Bernard to mend his ways. Lenina had been looking forward to meeting John, she had wanted to meet him to tell him that she had liked him more than anyone else in the past, and when she found out that John would not be attending the party, she automatically assumes that it was because he didn't want to see her.

Mustapha Mond reads a book written by a scientist about human purpose, and though he believes it to be a masterful work, he still decides to prevent it from publication. He feels that the book would introduce a different way of thinking that could cause havoc in the social order.

Bernard's social capital is spent and he finds himself unable to bear his fallen fortune, and he returns to Helmholtz, who accepts him readily. Bernard introduces Helmholtz to John, and the both of them take to one another warmly. Bernard is surprised to learn that Helmholtz had faced problems in his work after he had shared with his students a rhyme about solitude. Solitude is thoroughly discouraged in society through Hypnopaedia. John and Helmholtz are more closely connected than Bernard. John often read passages from Shakespeare for the benefit of Helmholtz, who is mesmerized by the prose of Shakespeare. Although the things that Shakespeare talked about, seem comical to Helmholtz, John thinks of them as sacred.

Analysis

In this section of the book, we begin to see the characters transform. Bernard is corrupted by the instant fame that is brought to him with the introduction of John the Savage, and the things he had once criticized, he now embraces uncaringly. Bernard is later forced to humble himself in front of his friends when his star fades, and society has once again rejected him. Helmholtz evolves further into his individual self, his poem about solitude is a marker of his advance towards a better understanding of the angst he experiences. Lenina begins to experience love for John, although she isn't actively aware of it. Her desire to be with only him and her reluctance to be with the Arch-Community-Songster indicate her developing feelings.

John is left rudderless in the new world, earlier his connections to this world had been his mother, Linda, and the works of Shakespeare. Since Linda, has decided to indulge continuously in Soma, John turns often to Shakespeare for guidance. This is ironic because modern civilization has no room for the passions and emotions that are so thoroughly interwoven into the work of Shakespeare.