Previous
Satire
Definition of Setting
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the city of New York, or it can be an imagined... read full definition
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the city of New York, or... read full definition
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the... read full definition
Setting
Explanation and Analysis:
Brave New World is a dystopian novel, set in London and New Mexico in the year 2450 (over 500 years after the novel was published). Time is a key aspect of the setting: instead of using B.C. (before Christ) as a means of measuring time, the society of the novel uses A.F. (after Ford), replacing God with Henry Ford to reflect the dystopian society's worship of industry.
In Brave New World, the entire globe is controlled by an all-powerful, totalitarian World State that subjugates and brainwashes population using propaganda and mind-altering drugs. People are divided into an arbitrary social hierarchy in which the lower castes are mistreated, and individuality of any kind is heavily discouraged. Living under the World State, people are made artificially happy and complacent. But they are not truly content, because they've been stripped of their full emotional complexity. The World State essentially eliminates love and beauty—which form the essence of the human experience—and suppresses any new thoughts, ideas, or interests that could potentially threaten the regime's influence.
Related Themes:
