The Future Beckons. . .

**Spoilers Ahead**

Yesterday, after a long and eventful escape to Renaissance Italy, I exacted revenge as Ezio Auditore. Taken as a whole, my adventure this time gave me a satisfaction far beyond the first Assassin's Creed, which saw me put it down before completing the game. This time around though I clocked almost twenty five hours in the Animus with plans on returning to search through the final Assassin's tomb and the rest of the glyphs.

Personally, I did not find Ezio's story extremely interesting. In fact, I found it lacking intrigue and originality. Denis Farr discusses the evolution of Ezio, which I agree with because I did not really feel a staked interest in this evolution. Instead, I saw my progress through the game as a means to an end, exacting revenge for the death on my father and brothers. However, unlike Farr, I did feel invested in finding the truth that encompasses Desmond's life. This angle drew me in. The glyphs, the codex, and the tombs. Going in to Ezio's, or Altair's, mind, I knew that I essentially became a puppeteer controlling another puppeteer (Desmond) who controlled Ezio.Farr says,

I would like to argue that Ezio is a compelling character, full of flaws, triumphs, an arc, but it means very little in this game. Even the ending sequence when Ezio reaches Minerva, he is succinctly told to shut up after he expresses confusion--this is not meant for him. At this point I actually frowned because I felt sorry for Ezio. This could have been his story, but really, it wasn't.

When I reached the end of Ezio's adventure and entered the vault, I expected an encounter with something or someone beyond the Renaissance or the present day. What I received didn't necessarily floor me, but it did peak my interest. Minerva's words served to remind me of my role in the game. I, in essence, control Desmond. The game doesn't necessarily present itself in this way totally, but the fact remains. If we go through the game taking this view, does it change the way we feel about Ezio and the other character? Right now, I cannot answer that question, but I would love to try to through discussion

The other part that grabbed me dealt with the fact that Minerva resides in the future or outside of space and time. The thought that future human incarnations (I am referencing Stapledon's Last and First Men)traversing the temporal/spatial plane to assist themselves and aid the past reminded me of Stapledon's Eighteenth Men. One of these men telepathically embodies the writer of the novel, relaying the future of mankind in all its various incarnations because the Eighteenth Men may be the last. Along with this, I feel that the messenger feels that history can be changed in order to save the final Men and continue their existence on Earth.

Listening to Minerva speak with Ezio (or really to Desmond which creates another interesting twist in player mechanics), I returned again and again to this book. The "gods" fear imminent doom for civilization, granted it's ours, and they want to try and advert it. However, instead of the disaster of war that we find in Stapledon';s book, Lucy suggests geomagnetic reversal (which I do not know much about). Interestingly enough, both of these works work with the idea that history moves in cycles. I plan to explore this further in the future. As for now, I wish to return to Renaissance Italy for a few more hours of exploration.

Insects in Brave New World

In the “Preface” for J. H. Burns’ A Vision of Education, Being an Imaginary Verbatim Report of the First Interplanetary Conference, published in 1929, Aldous Huxley begins to show the genesis of his ideas that appear in Brave New World. Jerome Meckier, in “A Neglected Huxley ‘preface’: his Early Synopsis of Brave New World,” traces Huxley’s ideas back to Helvetius’ educational philosophy. Within his philosophy, Helvetius thought that “[a]ny man [. . . ] could be made into a genius, for intellectually superior individuals are made, not born” (Meckier, 3). Huxley does not uphold this belief; instead, he presents us, in Brave New World, with the “iceberg” model. In this model, a small percentage of the society would be “genius” while the rest would consists of workers. In this arrangement, every individual would have a specific role that works for the betterment of society.

While Huxley presents the “iceberg” model satirically in the novel, he appears to hold to the idea that neither this model nor Helvetius’ thoughts (as demonstrated in the “Cyprus Experiment”) constitute ideal ways to proceed. However, he feels that the future will incorporate the “iceberg” model into its educational practices. He writes, in Burns’ “Preface,”

[children] would be allowed to develop only so far as was compatible with the advantage of the race. Any signs of outstanding individuality would be ruthlessly suppressed, or at any rate canalized in radically useful channels. Every art or compulsion and suggestion would be used to enforce the ethics of total self-abnegation. The systemic breeding of useful individuals and the systematic suppression of he useless would form a natural complement to this system of more than Spartan education. Special sub-species would be bred (and having been bred, specially educated) for the purpose, for example, of working in hot climates, at high altitudes, in the dark, under great atmospheric pressure; while other varieties would be produced by selection to perform specialized intellectual functions. (qtd. in Meckier, 8)

This creation of “[s]pecial sub-species” would lead to what Huxley refers to as a “termite-ideal.” With this ideal in mind, we can examine how Huxley’s use of insect imagery correlates to the overt loss of individuality presented in Brave New World.

Throughout the novel, the “self-abnegation” of the individuals in the society becomes apparent. Within a two page section, when Henry and Lenina fly on their “date,” Huxley refers to the different speeds of the helicopter as insect sounds: hornet, wasp, mosquito, bumble-bee, cockchafer, and stag-beetle (66). Along with the speeds of the helicopter, Huxley also produces insect imagery when Lenina and Henry see the “Red Rocket.” It “suddenly dropped [from a cloud as] a small scarlet insect, buzzing as it fell” (66). As they fly along, Lenina observes that the “green [in Central London park] was maggoty with fore-shortened life” (67). These references, while apparently superficial, help to reinforce the “termite-ideal” that Huxley presented in his “Preface.” By setting up the imagery of insects with insignificant items such as the helicopter, rocket, and grass, Huxley ends the two page aerial trip with a view of the shift change at the Television Corporation’s factory. Here, Lenina and Henry observe workers “[l]like aphides and ants” (67) changing shifts. At this point, the imagery transfers from the society’s tools to the individuals that participate within it. Huxley continues to draw upon this insect imagery near the end of Lenina and Henry’s date. He says, as the two fly home, “[t]he approaches to the monorail station were black with the ant-like pullulation of lower-caste activity” (76). This aerial view adds even more to the imagery being presented. With an elevated, almost god-like view, Henry and Lenina see an image of the society working as a single organism, and they do not feel bothered by the “self-abnegation” of the individual at all. Instead, they condone its actions and peer upon it from on high.

On the other hand, John, as he visits Linda on her deathbed, encounters a group of eight-year-old twins. As the group continues to file in towards Lind’s bed, “the ward was maggoty with them. They swarmed between the beds [. . . ]” (183). Again, Huxley employs “maggoty” and “swarmed” in describing a group of individuals within the society. They act as one, think as one, and suppress “any signs of outstanding individuality.” They, in effect, act as ants or termites working for the betterment of the colony. After Linda dies, and John makes his way out of the hospital, he encounters 162 Deltas waiting in a soma distribution line. Here, he notices “the nightmare of swarming indistinguishable sameness” (189-90). This reminds him of the twins who appeared as “maggots” as they “swarmed” around Linda’s deathbed. However, the Deltas looked like “[m]aggots again, but larger, full grown, they now crawled across his grief and his repentance” (190). Again, John sees the complete lack of individuality that this educational system supports.

The end of the novel returns to the insect imagery. Here, as John becomes pestered by onlookers and inquirers, he sees “the arrival overhead of a great swarm of helicopters” (226). As the aerial machines get closer, they appear as “locusts” or “giant grasshoppers” descending upon him. Interestingly enough, the views that John sees, when the insect imagery appears, counters Lenina and Henry’s view. Instead of viewing the events from above, as a type of social superiority, John views the actions from ground level, looking up at descending insects and interacting with them on the ground. What importance, exactly, does this difference in views have? At this point, I do not have an answer.

Huxley, throughout Brave New World, satirizes the movement of the educational system towards “self-abnegation.” With his use of insect imagery, both overtly referring to insects and using verbs and adjectives that we relate to insects, Huxley shows us that if things move forward the way they appear to be going that the “termite-ideal” will be reached. The attainment of this ideal, as we can see in the novel, does not provide much hope for the future.

Works Cited

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. New York: Harper Perennial, 2005.

Meckier, Jerome. "A Neglected Huxley "Preface": His Earliest Synopsis of Brave New World." Twentieth-

Century Literature 25.1 (1979): 1-20.