Web Quest: Aldous Huxley and Brave New World
Source 1: Don your earbuds, and listen to Mike Wallace interviewing Aldous Huxley. Stop when you
have heard the answers to all of the questions—around halfway through. Email yourself a link if you
would like to listen to the rest later.
http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/huxley_aldous.html
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What are the two main “impersonal forces” that are the greatest threats to freedom?
Why are technological devices particularly insidious when used by unscrupulous people?
“We musn’t be caught by ____________________by our advancing technology,” says Huxley.
How does Huxley believe that future dictatorships will subjugate the masses?
What is the price of freedom?
What is Huxley’s view of American political candidates, and do you agree with it?
Source 2: Visit the Banned Book Awareness site.
http://world.edu/worldedu_posts/banned-books-awareness-brave-world/
7. What is Brave New World’s purpose, besides just being an interesting novel? List all that apply.
8. What have been some of the grounds for banning the novel?
Source 3: Visit Bartleby.com and read lines 174-205 of The Tempest.
http://www.bartleby.com/70/1151.html
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Copy V.1.202-205 from The Tempest.
Source 4: “Preventing a Brave New World” by Leon Kass, The New Republic, 2011
http://www.stanford.edu/~mvr2j/sfsu09/extra/Kass3.pdf
10. List five of the “transforming powers” that Kass mentions.
Source 5: Biography of Aldous Huxley on European Graduate School website.
http://www.egs.edu/library/aldous-huxley/biography/
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To what can you attribute Huxley’s fascination with science?
What was his father’s nickname?
What happened to forestall Huxley’s scientific aspirations?
What famous author’s (and friend’s) biography did Huxley write?
Why is 1931, the year of the writing of Brave New World, historically significant to the work?
What job did Huxley take in America?
What historically significant figure died on the same day as Huxley?
Source 6: View my Brave New World Power Point presentation that is on my website.
18. List three themes of the novel.
19. What is the specific genre of the novel?
20. Name one historical allusion from the novel.
Source 7: Listen to Igor Stravinsky’s modernist musical composition, “Aldous Huxley in Memoriam,”
which he wrote in honor of Huxley upon his death.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oeoV5X1Ha0