A 'savage' raised on Shakespeare confronts a world engineered for happiness — and hangs himself.
Who drives the story
Illicit son of the Director and Linda, raised on a New Mexico reservation with only Shakespeare and shame for company. He wants love, sin, and meaning — and after an orgy he participates in, he hangs himself from the lighthouse archway.
An Alpha-Plus psychologist, stunted by an alcohol accident in his blood-surrogate, angry and jealous in a world built for contentment. He brings John back as a celebrity drawcard, collapses when the novelty fails, and panics and pleads when sentenced to exile in Iceland.
A popular, desirable hatchery worker who cannot comprehend monogamy or John's Shakespearean idea of courtship. She strips to seduce him, is nearly strangled, and finally emerges from a helicopter crowd; John whips her (or at her) and then himself.
One of the ten World Controllers, who keeps forbidden books — Shakespeare and the Bible — in his safe. He argues happiness must outrank truth and beauty, and refuses John's request to join the exiles because he wants to see how John's experiment in self-torment continues.
A handsome, brilliant Emotional Engineering lecturer who feels there is something he wants to write but cannot express. Reported for a heretical poem about solitude, he accepts exile and requests an island with a bad climate, choosing the Falkland Islands.
The Director's lost lover, left behind on the Reservation twenty years ago, ashamed of her pregnancy and never found. Back in London she spends her days in a soma haze and dies in a hospital bed, mistaking her son for Popé.
Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning, who threatens Bernard with exile to Iceland and tells the story of losing Linda. John's public 'father' destroys him; he flees in humiliation and later resigns.
How they are connected
Illicit son of the Director and Linda, raised on a New Mexico reservation with only Shakespeare and shame for company.
John the SavageThe Director (Thomas)
Illicit son of the Director and Linda, raised on a New Mexico reservation with only Shakespeare and shame for company.
He brings John back as a celebrity drawcard, collapses when the novelty fails, and panics and pleads when sentenced to exile in Iceland.
A popular, desirable hatchery worker who cannot comprehend monogamy or John's Shakespearean idea of courtship.
He argues happiness must outrank truth and beauty, and refuses John's request to join the exiles because he wants to see how John's experiment in self-torment continues.
The Director's lost lover, left behind on the Reservation twenty years ago, ashamed of her pregnancy and never found.
The Director (Thomas)Bernard Marx
Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning, who threatens Bernard with exile to Iceland and tells the story of losing Linda.
Go deeper
Engineered happiness as control · Shakespeare versus the machine · The cost of stability · Outsiders everywhere
Themes explainedThe full story act by act, the ending explained and a quick quiz.
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