The Individual and the Community: A Structuralist View of Brave New World

The modern classic, Brave New World, opened reader's eyes to the disturbing and an all too possible future based on psychological control, genetic and technological manipulation, and the dominant feature of the community throughout society. On a deeper lever of analysis, Aldous Huxley's masterpiece conveys one important binary oppositions hard at work to establish root conflicts that propel the plot and its narrative functions forward.

The struggle of the individual among the herd of the community, is a binary opposition prevalent throughout Brave New World. In this society, the individual is all but abolished, discarded for the importance of the community, either psychological manipulated at an early age to accept this fate, or placed into a drug-induced state (incorporating the notorious soma) as a way of cooperating. The remaining individuals, if there are truly any, lie within the highest castes of the society, the Alphas and Betas, and are intellectually superior then the rest of their fellow citizens. Even so, these "individuals" must fight against the grip of his community, they must find a way to speak out as a voice in the crowd without being crushed underfoot. One man brought to mind in this struggle of opposite concepts, Bernard Marx, a brilliant Alpha Plus, retains his individuality and does not conform to the community's standards. As a result of his individuality and nonconformist status, he is constantly alienated, ostracized, rumored to have blood-alcohol in his surrogate, unaccepted by his society and his peers. He spends most of the entire novel searching for a way of acceptance in the eyes of his contemporaries, some way to fit in without destroying his individuality. When he finally discovers such an opportunity into the communal fold with the discovery of "The Savage", Bernard's popularity skyrockets, and he is finally somewhat accepted by the members of his community. Here, the binary opposition in direct conflict makes itself known, as Bernard is pulled into the lure of his popularity, he begins to conform to their standards, completing certain actions just so that they will accept and like him further. During this time, he gives up a touch of his individuality, and begins to conform to the standards of a large group of his peers, finally motivated by the feeling of acceptance. As the novel comes to a close, however, and Bernard's scientific discovery runs amuck throughout London, he loses that popularity and conformity to the community that he earlier possessed, and is exiled to Iceland. Bernard is never able to fully abandon his individuality, or cover it up in a fog of drugs, as his difference in ideas and opinions still separate him from his "community" at the end of the novel.  Thus, the binary opposition of the individual and the community, two concepts in direct conflict, cannot function equally in Brave New World. Either the individual is overridden by the community, swallowed up whole to live a conformist and shared life, or removed from society completely. The individual causes instability in a world that strives for COMMUNITY, IDENTITY, AND STABILITY, his difference in ideas, opinions, and values, creates a rift, a variable in the community that could produce, if not dealt with, chaos and an end to the society itself.