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Topic Closed1984 VS Brave New World

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Poll Question: Which book do you like most?
Poll Choice Votes Poll Statistics
34 [73.91%]
12 [26.09%]
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CinemaZebra View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 24 2010 at 13:41
Originally posted by UndercoverBoy UndercoverBoy wrote:

Originally posted by CinemaZebra CinemaZebra wrote:

Brazil.
Well, considering Brazil was inspired by Nineteen Eighty-Four, I guess your vote goes there.
Yup.
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UndercoverBoy View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 24 2010 at 22:49
Speaking of cinema, CinemaZebra, I recently discovered what your avatar came from while surfing Cracked:
Loved that article.LOL
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 26 2010 at 08:41
I'm surprised this quote of Neil Postman, from his book Amusing Ourselves To Death, hasn't appeared in this thread yet.  He makes the case that Brave New World is far more likely to actually happen than 1984:
 
"We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn't, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell's dark vision, there was another - slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley's vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions". In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right."
 
 
"Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." -- H.L. Mencken
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 26 2010 at 09:10
Originally posted by zappaholic zappaholic wrote:

I'm surprised this quote of Neil Postman, from his book Amusing Ourselves To Death, hasn't appeared in this thread yet.  He makes the case that Brave New World is far more likely to actually happen than 1984:
 
"We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn't, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell's dark vision, there was another - slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley's vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions". In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right."
 
 
Interesting.  I find it annoying when some people assume that dystopias are always about an oppressive government (usually a Socialist government, which is ironic considering where Orwell came from), when forms of oppression come from other places as well.
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Ronnie Pilgrim View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 26 2010 at 10:21
Brave New World. Now, if I could just get my hands on some soma...

Edited by Ronnie Pilgrim - June 26 2010 at 10:30
"The pointy birds are pointy pointy
Anoint my head anointy nointy"
Steve Martin The Man With Two Brains
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motrhead View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 26 2010 at 11:44
 Huxley may have been more accurate....but his writing still sucked.  1984 was a much better story. 
 I still say this poll should have included Fahrenheit 451, which is much better than both.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 26 2010 at 11:54

Or A Clockwork Orange Approve

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UndercoverBoy View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 26 2010 at 12:21
Originally posted by motrhead motrhead wrote:

 Huxley may have been more accurate....but his writing still sucked.  1984 was a much better story. 
 I still say this poll should have included Fahrenheit 451, which is much better than both.
I loved Fahrenheit 451!  One of my all-time favorite books, and Ray Bradbury is one of my all-time favorite authors.  Not as descriptive of a dystopia with a real sense of evil, but a beautiful tribute to the wonders of knowledge and the horrors of anti-intellectualism.  If it was on this poll, that's where my vote would go to.Thumbs Up
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