My A2 coursework which earned 29/30. My essay explored the effect of dehumanization within dystopian literature, primarily focusing on Margaret Atwood's "Handmaid's Tale" and Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World". (I'm broke so sorry for the price!)
“More power leads to more dehumanization.”1 Explore the ways in which Atwood and Huxley portray the idea
of dehumanisation in “The Handmaid’s Tale” and “Brave New World”.
To the average citizen of the 1900s, the deprivation of rudimentary human characteristics would be a notion
unheard of in a Western society. Yet both Aldous Huxley and Margaret Atwood use the idea of
dehumanization as a pivotal focus for their novels. Despite being written almost 60 years apart, both “Brave
New World” and “The Handmaid’s Tale” depict a tumultuous journey of human strife, whereby the hegemony
of a totalitarian government is potent enough to almost completely eradicate the traces of human sentiment
so familiar to their readers; the cost of stability is one remunerated at the price of human freedoms. Whilst it is
evident that the indoctrination of governmental mantras have resulted in a monotonous, homogenized
society, perhaps it could be perceived that the decay of traditional societal constructs are not solely down to a
despotic government; perhaps the pathway to dehumanization these novels travel is not definitive.
From the outset of the novel, Huxley’s satirises the contemporary life of the 1930s through his eradication of
traditional family constructs. Humans are no longer born in a natural manner, but “decanted” as “socialized
human beings.” The notion of ‘decanting’ humans from a tube decouples the idea of childbirth with the
naturalistic evocations of an amorous sense of bonding between child and parent, alluding more so to a cold
robotic concept; a practice unheard of in the 1930s. It is in this manner that Huxley establishes the sterile
atmosphere of the novel through his blunt and clinical language; a tone that parallels the disposition of the
novel in presenting dehumanisation. Alongside this, Huxley reduces the notions of love, sex and relationships
down to a simple maxim: “Everybody belongs to everyone else,” in which monogamy has been abandoned in
favour for promiscuity. It is likely that in the 1930s, Huxley’s satirical promotion of promiscuity would be seen a
somewhat controversial; although many people had become more open in talking about sex, Britain, for the
most part, remained quite austere. This controversial approach that Huxley takes enables him to establish and
fortify the idea of dehumanisation, much like the portrayal paralleled in Atwood’s ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’
thorough ‘The Ceremony,’ whereby the concept of marital, loving sexual relationships is subverted and
displayed as a practice atypical to its time. Huxley then introduces the reader to the current situation of the
State “Through the eyes of “newly arrived students,” whereby the “World Controllers” mass produce humans
of their country through the “Bokanovsky Process” on an ‘assembly line,’ which allows for “one egg, one
embryo” to proliferate and divide into “Ninety-six identical twins working ninety-six identical machines!” It
could be said that the repetition of the phrase “ninety-six” in conjunction with the interchange between
“identical twins” and “identical machines” reinforces the alarming extent to which dehumanization within
society has already occurred; not only are humans denied a true sense of individuality, but even from their
embryonic state, humans are deemed as cogs in an extensive societal machine. Huxley uses the parallels
between an ‘assembly line’ to produce humans and the assembly line used in Henry Ford’s production of the
famous ‘T-model’ to further depict the notion of dehumanization. It could be argued, however, that it is
difficult to label the subjugation of societal structures as ‘dehumanisation’ in “Brave New World”, because,
unlike in “The Handmaid’s Tale” - where the choice of the people is either compliance or death - Huxley
portrays the notions of love and sex in a seemingly harmless manner; it is not a deprivation of rights to the
characters - to them it is simply their way of life.
The subversion of traditional societal values, however, can also be seen in Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” in
depicting the dehumanization of its characters. Through the eyes of Offred, the novel’s protagonist, Atwood
debunks the traditional conventions of conception through her portrayal of “The Ceremony” in which the
Handmaids assume the role of a subservient concubine. Offred’s experience of the Commander “fucking the
lower part of [her] body” allows the reader to view the sexual ritual from a first-hand perspective. It could be
interpreted that perhaps the use of profane language and contempt in Offred’s tone alludes to the idea that
the act of which Offred is subjected to makes her feel dehumanized, or perhaps even more so, that Offred
detaches herself from the events in order to prevent herself from feeling dehumanized. The title itself of ‘The
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1. Colorado University boulder Study (http://www.colorado.edu/news/releases/2013/03/06/more-power-leads-more-dehumanization-says-cu-
boulder-study)
Word Count: 745
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