CHAPTER 16

CHARACTERIZITION:

Mustapha Mond is the protagonist of this chapter. In the dialogue with John he explains his story and the moral of this society. He reveals himself very different from the description of the first chapters.

John represents the rebel of this society.

He refuses the thoughts of Mustapha Mond, the society, Lenina….

Helmotz Watson is, for me the anti-Mustapha Mond . He is an outsider for his big intelligence and for this reason he can know the limits of this society. He is very similar to the young Mond.      

Bernard Marx, The main character in the first part of ``Brave New World``. He is an outsider in his world. But he wnats to be one of them. This is shown in this chapter when he does not want to go on the island. He even betrays his friends by telling Mond that he was not introduced in their acting

SHORT REPORT
In this chapter there is a very interesting dialogue between Mustapha Mond and John. The controller explains to the group composed of John, Helmotz and Bernard ,the moral of this society. But John and Helmotz don’t agree with him and say their personal observations about god, religion  and death….Bernard, Helmholtz and John are brought to Mond´s room. Bernard is upset and scared. When John sees Mond he decides to tell the truth. They find Mond reading one of the censored books. But he says as he makes the rules he is allowed to break them. A conversation about old literature starts. Mond says it must be forbidden because the world is so different now and nobody would understand the problems people in old literature had to deal with. The modern world had to choose between happiness and art. Helmholtz says that happiness is a very easy feeling though. John asks about some aspects of the modern world. He wonders why there are those twins, not only the perfect A+. Mond responds that only intelligent beings would revolt if they had to do some simple and monotonous work. They would not be happy. But the lower classes do not have the mental capacity to criticise and revolt. The conversation turns to science. The modern society gets conditioned to think of science as something important. But the science they believe in cannot be questioned and changed because most of the people cannot understand it. Bernard and Helmholtz are going to be sent to an island. This shocks Bernard. He starts revolting and gets carried out. Mond sees the island as something positive and sometimes he regrets that he has chosen to be a controller over the island himself.

THEMES PRESENTED:

In this chapter Mustapha Mond and John represent two types of different mentalities, but at the same time two very similar individuals.

When Mustapha Mond speaks with John and his friend Helmotz Watson, we can deduce the real mentality of this "strange" character.

He says that when he was young he liked science, religion, art (as John the Savage), but after Ford, he refused this type of thoughts and became one of the ten controllers of the BNW.

After that he explains to  Helmotz the bases of this society with some meaningful sentences.

RELEVANT QUOTATIONS:

" Our Ford himself did a great deal to shift the emphasis from truth and beauty to comfort and happiness" Mustapha Mond.

"           Mass production demanded the shift. Universal happiness keeps the wheels steadily turning; truth and beauty can't ", the danger of the truth " But truth's a menace, science is a public danger", moreover criticizes the past world." Mustapha Mond

" What's the point of truth or beauty or knowledge when anthrax bombs are popping all around you ? That was when science first began to be controlled, after Nine Year's War" and "Happiness had got to be paid for ".Mustapha Mond

OBSERVATIONS ABOUT THE STYLE:

We can say that in this chapter there are mostly dialogues, between Mond and John, Mond and Helmotz, John and Helmotz and consequently there aren't  psychological descriptions or descriptions of the environment. 

WHAT THE CHAPTER REPRESENTS IN THE WHOLE STORY AND PERSONAL COMMENTS:

This story represents a fundamental part in the story, because after 15 chapters we can know the true origin of this terrifying society!!!! We know the true Mond, the true Helmotz, after too much description Huxley does a  (indirect) psychological description of these characters with the use of dialogue. The different parts of this dialogue represent the different types of mentalities of two different societies. ( anti-utopic and utopic , because I think that John is a naïve person and also his imaginary society is utopian).

For this reason I think that the XVI chapter is the most important in the story.

I think this chapter is very important to understand the conflict between John and BNW but also the missunderstanding of Helmholtz and Bernard. Mond is the person who explauins the structure of the world to the reader. It shows BNW is a lot more than technology and science and that especially Mond is in an inner conflict with himself.

MAURIZIO AND KATHARINA F..