His old-fashioned beliefs about God and right and wrong his beliefs closely duplicate Christian morality contrast sharply with the values and beliefs of the citizens of the Brave New World. It is this conflict between the two value systems that ultimately brings about his suicide. John the Savage is a typical character endowed with strange qualities that distinguish him from other characters in the novel.
Living on the reservation, he is also disease-ridden, unhappy, filthy, and masochistic. The Savage is thus a misfit in the society he has been brought to live in, and his longing to go back to his native place reveals his preference for the old world.
John the Savage , has two alternatives before him, i. The Savage has to choose between these two ways of life, and he seems to favour the life of sanity in a village, far away from the so-called brave new world. John has to suffer much humiliation at the hands of various persons and society as well as because of the situation in which he is placed.
Fatherless, he has been brought up by a drunken, sporadically-loving mother who is hated and has been assaulted before his eyes by her neighbours, whose sexual activities have often taken place within his earshot, and who has filled his head with mythologies which conflict with those of the Reservation.
Bernard's dissatisfaction with his society expresses itself most characteristically in sullen resentment and imagined heroism, but John lives out his ideals, however unwisely. In turning aside Lenina's advances, John rejects the society's values.
He acts boldly in calling the Deltas to rebellion and in throwing out the soma. Finally, he faces the powerful Mustapha Mond deliberately and intelligently and sets out on his own to create a life for himself, which ends in tragedy. If anyone, John should be the character to challenge and to bring down the Brave New World that is stifling humanity. In the end, John cannot change the society, because he is blocked within and without.
It also demonstrates the huge cultural divide between him and World State society, since Bernard and Lenina see the tribal ritual as disgusting. As an outsider, John takes his values from a more than -year-old author, William Shakespeare. Shakespeare embodies all of the human and humanitarian values that have been abandoned in the World State. He is himself a Shakespearean character in a world where any poetry that does not sell a product is prohibited.
Ace your assignments with our guide to Brave New World! How do the Solidarity Service and the Indian ceremony compare to each other? How does Bernard take advantage of John? What happens to John before and after the death of Linda? What issues does John debate with Helmholtz and Mustapha, the Controller? Literary Devices Setting. Previous section Antagonist Next section Genre.
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