Arts: Literary Reviews

LITERARY REVIEW 14

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

VIKTORIA PRACZKO | LITERARY REVIEW EDITOR

“But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.”

Aldous Huxley’s 1932 dystopian novel, Brave New World, is set in AD 2540, depicting an artificially manufactured futuristic World State. Huxley’s version of the world presents a reality of a scientifically controlled environment that is governed by carefully crafted reproductive technology, classical conditioning, and various forms of psychological manipulation. Using sleeplearning and other types of invasive technological methods, Brave New World displays the possibility of an oddly terrifying world in which individuality and genuine empathy cease to exist.

Huxley’s dystopia utilises two greatly contrasting populations to distinguish between the new world and the remains of the old one. By labelling members of the original world as “savages”, he illustrates them as alienated and with characteristics that modern society deems animalistic.Ironically, it is the “civilized” population that rejects human conventions and adheres to rules controlled by technological advancements. Huxley’s “civilised” characters regularly use drugs called “soma” to transform their unpleasant emotions into positive ones, consequentially eliminating all forms of individual thinking. Brave New World presents the reader both with a social critique and a moral debate, questioning whether comfort truly overrules one’s natural perceptions. While constant happiness may appear appealing, Huxley’s novel demonstrates that without a variety of emotions one could simultaneously lose their humanity and live in a form of selfinflicted vegetative state.

The novel also offers an insight into the functioning of a stable and balanced society, something that readers could have imagined but never experienced. Huxley’s presentation of the new world resembles a dream-like state of perfection, with each person having a fixed position and contribution towards a flourishing economy.

While that may sound inviting, those living in the “civilised” community are born into a certain class of the social hierarchy that they can never escape from. What is truly terrifying is that due to their “conditioning”, each member is content with their way of life despite it being unfair and inhumane.

Through John’s character (a “savage”), Huxley showcases how by valuing traditional ways of life, one is neglected and seen as an outcast of “civilised” society.

Source: Amazon

After encountering a “conditioned” psychologist, Bernard Marx, on his expedition, John is brought to the technology-dominated land where he is endlessly confronted by disgusted faces after revealing that he has a birth mother. While being at the modern facility, apart from Bernard, who recurrently fantasizes about a freer life, no one seems to understand John’s refusal to take “soma” and why he wants to preserve his own emotions. Bernard’s character reinforces how despite being “conditioned”, natural human impulses are stronger than any form of medication or technology.

Brave New World is a page-turner that both makes you wonder of future possibilities and reminds you of the freedom and control you have over your life.

An unsettling “fly over the cuckoo’s nest”

ANNIKA SWANSBURY | CONTENT WRITER

Source: Louise Fletcher as Nurse Ratchet in the 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Getty Images

Ratchet is undeniably scary, and Kesey purposely dehumanises her; emphasised through the Chief’s descriptions of her body and mannerisms. By likening Ratchet to a machine with wires and cogs hidden under her stiffly starched uniform, you could be forgiven for forgetting that she is simply a nurse trying to treat her patients. She may be domineering and strict, but she believes it is what is best for these men. An outsider to the hospital may see her methods as perfectly logical, as these men were considered ill by 1960s standards. However, as Kesey places us under the somewhat unreliable guidance of Chief Bromden, we have no choice but to see her every move as evil and calculated. By using Chief Bromden as his narrative voice, Kesey shows us the extent of Ratchet’s regime in a more metaphorical way. Chief suffers from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and frequently goes into “fog”, something that leaves the reader as unsure of their surroundings as he is. He also recalls delusions or visual hallucinations, such as Ratchet swelling in size as a projection of her rage and a physical reminder of the power she holds over the ward.

Many other elements along with these examples may leave a reader a little unsettled; this is, after all, considered a psychological thriller to some. Besides, if the illustrations Kesey includes to go alongside the novel are anything to go by, Cuckoo’s Nest is no walk in the park. Instead, it is a heartbreaking look into what fear and control can do to the human mind, especially when it is already unstable. With the recent passing of Louise Fletcher, it feels only right to look back at her iconic role as Ken Kesey’s antagonist, Nurse Ratchet, from his 1962 novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Fletcher brought to life a literary villain whose influence can be seen in many other formidable female characters who hold authority over the world they inhabit. For Nurse Ratchet, this is the ward of an Oregon mental hospital, a microcosm of society, and a place where she is in complete control. Kesey repeatedly places her behind a glass window, where she is both safe from physical harm (until the glass is smashed) and can keep watch over her patients. Ratchet’s positioning also encapsulates her role as creator and perpetrator of fear and control. The men cannot always see her but are aware of her presence and that they are under her thumb. Ratchet is an unjust, omnipresent God to these men, administering medications and encouraging them to report each other’s wrongdoings. She then utilises this information for discussions in talk therapy, sometimes even sending them to electroshock therapy should they step too far out of line. Her moment of triumph is sending the novel’s morally grey hero, Randal Patrick McMurphy, to receive a dose of electroshock therapy, an act that brings him down from his Christlike pedestal to a vegetative state.

The Sandman by E. T. A. Hoffmann

EMILIE WILLIAMS | CONTENT WRITER

With Halloween drawing closer, spooky stories and gothic fiction become popular reading options as the mythical tales and folklore within them are deeply rooted in this time of year. Whilst scary stories and Halloween traditions are often perceived as childish activities, the history of these tales and the stories behind them are more shocking and gorier than the already juvenile presentation of Halloween seen today.

The Sandman is a perfect example of a short story that explores the darker side of children’s tales and folklore. Published in 1816 by German author E. T. A. Hoffmann, The Sandman is told through a series of letters between the protagonist Nathanael, his fiancée Clara, and the narrator Lothar.

These letters follow the origins of Nathanael’s obsession and fear of the Sandman and describe the aftermath of its climax. As a child, Nathanael was told that the Sandman is a “wicked” monster that creeps into houses and throws sand into the eyes of children who refuse to go to bed, taking their bloody eyes and feeding them to his offspring who dwell on the moon.

This version of the fairy-tale is much more sinister than later adaptations which claim that the Sandman sprinkles magical dust into children’s eyes if they do not go to sleep.

Nathanael associates the frightening figure of the Sandman with his father’s mysterious friend Coppelius, who conducts experiments with his father once he has gone to bed. One night, Nathanael witnesses his father dying in one of the experiments and believes that it is Coppelius’ fault, ultimately strengthening his fear and belief in the Sandman. Unlike the expected progression of maturity, Nathanael fails to grow out of his childhood fear of the Sandman, resulting in problems in his relationships with Clara and Lothar. Nathanael later transfers this fear onto a professor at his university named Coppola, believing that Coppelius and Coppola are the same person. Hoffmann intentionally gives these characters similar names to mimic Nathanael’s transferred fear and obsession with the Sandman. Readers may come across a similar difficulty as the characters become hard to differentiate throughout the story.

Hoffmann later introduces the subplot of Nathanael’s fascination for Olimpia, the humanoid doll created by Coppola. Her character represents elements of “the uncanny”, a psychological theory studied by Sigmund Freud. Through Olimpia’s docility and odd human characteristics, Freud’s theory explains the experience of witnessing something strangely familiar yet creepy. When Nathanael learns that Olimpia is a doll, his madness increases and manifests in fits of violence.

Hoffmann’s version of the folklore tale is unanimously unique for its descriptive gore and violence, which is shocking for a story written in the early nineteenth century. His writing style is innovative and creepy, which plays on the readers’ own fears and discomforts. With repetitive symbolism of the eyes, shadowy figures, and the fear of the unknown, The Sandman is the perfect short story to read near Halloween.

Fear of the known and the unknown: John Wyndham’s The Day of the Triffids

SEB GARDINER | CONTENT WRITER

Science fiction appeals to our curiosity about the John Wyndham was one of the best sci-fi-horror writers to the novel. Published in 1951, this was unknown. The idea that we may not be alone in the universe means that no story is offlimits, because there is no fact to correct it with – anything theoretically could be true. These ideas often manifest themselves in the darker side of extra-terrestrial life and play with our interest and fear of the unknown. Stories such as The War of The Worlds and Brave New World do not fall under our preconceived ideas of horror, rather they use our fascination with scientific possibility to make their stories as unsettling as any Stephen King novel. at playing with our curiosity. Much of his writing involves a supernatural being of some kind, though arguably none is more unsettling than The Day of the Triffids. The novel opens on a postapocalyptic Earth after a meteor has blinded the majority of the population. Bill, a biologist, has retained his eyesight as he was in hospital with a bandage over his eyes at the time of the strike. We follow him as he travels around dying London, everyone he comes across totally blind. The blind population is joined by the triffids, killer plants that have learned the ability to move and to stalk their blind prey. Bill meets Josella, a young woman who was sleeping during the meteor shower, and the pair gain a following throughout the course of the novel. Bill suspects that the creatures pursuing them were manufactured by the U.S.S.R, bringing a strong sense of realism Wyndham’s sixth novel, and the first published under his own name. At this point, proxy wars were leading to increased tension between America and the U.S.S.R, amid the Cold War. People worldwide were held by fear and threats of massdestruction. With nuclear arsenals being quickly developed, this threat could have easily become a reality. Wyndham’s novel appealed directly to this fear that the whole world felt. Reading this today, without the threat of war, Wyndham still manages to unsettle us with his descriptions of the triffids. With the breadth of scientific possibility, and our imaginations, it at first seems odd to notice that a lot of horror characters take a human-like form, though this is really what is so unsettling – it is ingrained in our nature to be afraid of what is similar to us.

Source: Wikipedia

Plants, unresponsive and motionless, are brought to life by Wyndham. They slide across the floor, react against movement, and respond to pain. Wyndham makes the “unknown” “known”, by making the triffids so human, and with the context of the Cold War, introduces his readers to a story that feels more real than any horror story they have read before.

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke – plotless poltergeists and superficial spectres

HARRISON PITTS | CONTENT WRITER

This October I was searching for my regular fix of horror in preparation for Halloween when I came across Eric LaRocca’s Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke. An interesting premise for three self-contained scary stories and the captivating phrase “what have you done today to deserve your eyes” had me immediately sat down by candlelight, prepared for some much-needed seasonal fear. I was, however, to be sorely disappointed.

The first and titular story starts strong: a couple meet on an online forum, and we follow their relationship as it rapidly blooms from a simple act of generosity into a nightmarish concoction of loneliness, coercion, and compulsion. While the heavy prose sometimes strays out of the constraints of a story told through email, its jarring depiction of a life spiralling into disfunction and isolation with enough body horror to make you nauseous was enjoyable and had me suitably horrified.

That, unfortunately, is where the positives of this book end. Like a particularly hubris-ridden character in a slasher movie, LaRocca’s writing skills hit the chopping block shortly before the halfway mark. While the story sets out with lofty goals to explore complex topics of crises of faith and purpose, desire and worthiness, loss and reconnection, it ultimately falls short of satisfyingly engaging with the themes it raises. The tale aims to tackle enough subject matter to fill perhaps three or more separate stories but the decision to include all of this in one, leaves it stumbling across the surface, never fully sinking its teeth into the potential terror of its more exciting concepts.

This overstuffed nature leaves the important passages of explicit horror vainly vying for enough space, resulting in a lack of clarity and tension throughout. This absence of closure feels less like the intentional, tantalising vagary of an M.R James story and more a result of biting off more than the word count can chew. LaRocca ultimately fails to earn any moments of tension that he strives for, often firing Chekov’s gun before it is even fully out of the holster.

The third tale, though not as badly written as the second, also fails to live up to the first. A possibly thought-provoking idea is hamstringed by an over-insistence to explain the relatively basic moral of the story. What could have been a disturbing extension of the all-too-common tendency to put up with discomfort and even abuse out of a perverse sense of keeping up appearances, is ruined by LaRocca’s failure to leave anything to the imagination. All in all, that is the problem with these stories. There is no space provided by the author for us to conjure the nightmarish details ourselves or to populate the night with the faces that terrify us the most. Instead, we are spoon-fed a story which LaRocca himself may find disconcerting but lacks the necessary ambiguity to be universal. True horror need only set our own imagination in motion to unnerve and terrorise, LaRocca, unfortunately, fails to trust us with that.

Source: Unsplash