chapter six

So far in the book, there has been only one person to question the way of life that they all live. Bernard is a psychologist at the Conditioning Centre, who is not willing to just except everything that he is told. He wants to be an individual, and be happy in his own way, and for that he is an outcast. Lenina and Bernard go on a date, and while he wants to be alone with her, and talk with her, all she wants to do is go out like everyone else. Bernard also does not take the soma like everyone else. He says that he would rather be himself and miserable then someone else and jolly. Lenina finds Bernard so odd but she makes herself keep dating him because she does not want anyone to find out about Henry, the man that she feels committed to.

The next day Bernard is sent to get a signature for a New Mexico Reservation (I'm not really sure what that means) from the Director. They refer o the people of New Mexico as savages so I think maybe in the United States, at this time, they had not become part of the European's way of life. While he is talking to the Director, the Director begins to tell a story about when he went to New Mexico on a holiday. He talks about the girl that he brought with him, that disappeared, and it still haunts his dreams. He makes it very clear that he had absolutely no emotional attachment to the girl, because that would be wrong.

I'm pretty curious to see if Bernard is going to do anything about the way he feels or if he's just all talk. I think the Director has a little bit of emotion in him too but he is just too afraid to admit it, because he would not want to be considered an outcast.