Brave new world by Aldous Huxley was written in 1931 and published in 1932. It presents a futuristic dystopian world, where pain and sadness have been eradicated but at the price of freedom. There is no real human connections. Marriage, family, and procreation have all been eliminated, babies are genetically engineered and grown in hatcheries, anything to avoid the probability of feeling unhappy. They condition each human for a particular caste, programmed to be productive and complaisant through a combination of biological manipulation and psychological conditioning. There was no other option for them, even lower castes who worked as garbage man and all those jobs no one really wants to do were programmed to enjoy their jobs as it was their only purpose. They use electroshock to condition children to hate flowers and books. It feels obvious for them, just mass produce and condition everyone to do a specific part to contribute to the whole sistem, if you were programmed to work just happily work and if you were from a higher cast just enjoy that. Everyone grows up like this, it almost feels like everyone is just a robot. Until you start seeing the human and real aspect of it all. Through the entirety of the book everyone is extremely judging, there is no individuality and anyone who is slightly different is excluded, seen as a joke. You have to dress the same, think the same, act the same but everyone is happy this way. Woman are seen as a prize and its all they have ever known since they were girls at the hatchery. With this and more aspects, I think you can notice how it isn’t that different from our reality today.
Author: Isabella
Personal Writing #6
I’m not really sure what I want to do with my future yet, but I am sure that i want to travel. I love everything about traveling, I love roadtrips, getting a coffee at the airport, planning what I’m going to wear, which book im going to take, everything. I honetsly think it changes the way you see at some things. I want to know as much places as I can. I think I especially like traveling in summer, I want to make a really big trip one summer and visit different places.
I think part of all this is that my dad also loves to travel, he has been to so many different places. He has done solo trips as well as family ones and I love traveling with him. H e likes every kind of traveling. For example, he really likes hiking and nature, a lot of his trips have only have been based on that. We went on one of those trips to Costa Rica and I’ve been loving it too even since. So I want to take trips like him too, every kind of traveling.
IRJE #6
I am currently reading Near To The Wild Heart by Clarice Lispector. It is her first novel, written from March to November 1942 and published around her twenty-third birthday in December 1943. The novel centers on the childhood and early adulthood of a character named Joana, who bears strong resemblance to her author.
„At first she dreamed of sheep, of going to school, of cats drinking milk. Little by little she dreamed of blue sheep, of going to school in the middle of the woods, of cats drinking milk from golden saucers. And her dreams became increasingly dense and acquired colours that were difficult to dilute into words.“
Near to the Wild Heart (1943), p. 43
I really like this quote because I feel like it represents a part if her mind we can see in many parts of the book. She has a huge imagination, since she was a little girl she saw every single situation in a really unique way and as she thinks more about it she adds more to it. I really like the way that even when she grows up, she stills keeps that unique way of thinking, and this quote represents her.
Personal Writing #5
Last summer, I started reading Near to the wild heart by Clarice Lispector but didn’t finished it as it was difficult to read for me. It was completely different from what I usually read and It was hard for me to keep up, even If I did think it was beautiful writing. The first chapters I read were slow but really interesting, the main character, Joana, has a really has a unique way to look at things since she was a child. The writing makes you feel like you are close to her, makes you understand her way of thinking even if it is confusing and weird at times. I remember reading the introduction too. It talks about her, the author, and the time when she published this book. It is titled ‘Hurricane Clarice’ and it is written by Benjamin Moser. He talks about Clarice’s life, which wasn’t easy since the start. She published Near to the Wild Heart as a unknown twenty-three year old, in 1943. No one knew who she was when It was published, some people thought she was a man until she decided to clear up her name. Her writing style was new and brought much attention to her. He talks about how it reconnected language with reality and vice versa, how was a fundamentally different conception of art. This introduction also talks about a remark she made which was the heart of her entire artistic project, about how “vision consisted of surprising the symbol of the thing on the thing itself” which i still dont totally get, but it It explains that it has to do with how a world does not describe a pre existing thing but actually is that thing, or a word that creates the thing it describes. I think all of this sound really interesting and im excited to continue it, I just started it since the beginning this weekend.
Brave new world- IRJE
Brave new world tells us the story of a civilization where marriage, family, and procreation have been eliminated, and babies are genetically engineered and grown in factories. The story opens in the Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre in the year 732 a.f ( 632 years after ford) . In the first charapters, the director is giving some students a tour around the place, in which us too are able to learn about this world. The Hatchery conditions each fetus for a particular caste in the World State. Citizens are programmed to be productive and complaisant through a combination of biological manipulation, psychological conditioning, and a drug called soma. In this world, poverty, disease and wars are all gone. But it all prevents humans from achieving meaningful happiness or free will.
“And that,” put in the Director sententiously, “that is the secret of happiness and virtue — liking what you’ve got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their unescapable social destiny.” P.10
I think this passage of the book is significant because it is one of the real introductions we have to this new way of thinking. It leads us to understand how he really thinks this way and what is expected for people to believe.
Daniel Willingham’s Outsmart Your Brain- Ch. 5
This charapter is titled “How to read difficult books”, and I honestly think this is something we all have asked ourselves, but never really felt the need to think more in debt about it. Which is why I found this incredibly helpful and interesting. It really does gives us real tips and advise. First, the author introduced us to the concept of reading a hard book, and talks about how it really is difficult and most importantly, why. I liked how he later explained what happens in our brain and how we can “outsmart it”. He went in debt about the common errors, what we usually do, what and how to change it.
I do have to say that even if i did found it very helpful, and i will consider it in my future readings, I already did some of the stuff he talks about. Like highlighting and taking notes, but he did made me rethink how I do it and what information should I prioritize.
At the end, the thing i definitely founded the most interesting was the reading techniques. I feel like applying them will change the reading experience for me.
PW: Why summer is my favorite season.
I do really enjoy winter and fall. I like the holidays and warm drinks, I love fall colors and winter clothes and christmas is of course one of my favorite holidays. But I can’t help but miss summer every single day. It has always been my favorite season since I was younger and I think it always will be for so many reasons. First of all, going to the beach is definitely one of my favorite things in the world If not my favorite one. I love beach houses, the sky, summer clothes, the music, coconut water, going in the sea and just everything about it. All my favorite memories are from summer. Summer trips with my family or summers where we just stayed at my town. I can spend entire days with my friends, staying up late without having to worry. I love the weather and late nights. The sunsets and sunrises are beautiful. The snacks are amazing, mango and watermelon are definitely my favorite fruits. I feel like no matter what I change and grow so much every summer and i can’t wait for this one.
Introduction – Isabella
My name is Isabella. I am from Mexico. This is my first week at Brookes and I’ll like to tell you a little bit about myself.
I was born in Toluca, Mexico. But I moved out to Tamaulipas with my mom and one of my older sisters when I was young and grew up there. Since last year, I had been wanting to study in another country because it seemed like a really big experience to have, so I am really happy that I got the opportunity to come here. I plan to stay here for all my high school and I’ve been having a really good time so far.
I hope I can quickly get used to my classes and I’m excited for my future here.