362 RüdigerKunow
tranquillizer. In this way, the world is ordered and everybody is free
fromillnessandhappy(179).^57
Ofcourse,BraveNewWorldwouldnotbeanovelifthiswerereally
the case. Brian Marx, a brilliant scientist and an alpha person is one of
this world's discontents. His disgruntled disaffection sets in motion the
novel's major plot which is designed to prove that a fully controlled,
anesthetic society is a misconceived technological utopia because
human identity, also dignity, can only be won if people have choices
(Gurnham 205-06). Aside from being a fictional representation of the
social role of science, Huxley's novel is also a manifestation of the
anxieties of control and its loss. Over against this perspective, more
recent critics have insisted on what Huxley's anti-democratic leanings
neglected to see: "as we begin the twenty-first century, the greater
danger, I believe, is a highly individualized marketplace fueled by an
entrepreneurialspirit...Thediscoveriesofgeneticsarenotimposedon
us.Rather,theywillbesoldtousbythemarketassomethingwecannot
livewithout"(Frankel32).
Marx is a misfit, and misfit is also the subject position from which
the blockbuster movieGattaca(1997; Andrew Niccol dir.) presents the
brave new world of molecular eugenics.Gattacatakes us to a world in
which the genetic makeup of human beings has become fully
"manageable"; PGD and enhancements are routine. Accordingly (as in
Brave New World), a biology-based class system is in place where the
geneticinheritanceofapersonbyandlargedetermineshisandherplace
in life. People with a defective or otherwise non-normative genetic
endowment are relegated to the margins. Vincent Freeman (played by
Ethan Hawke) is a member of the genetic underclass, an in-valid who
has no chance of realizing the dream of his life, namely becoming an
astronaut and thus attaining all the perks offered by the consumer
society of the future. All this changes when he gets the chance of using
blood and other material from Jerome E. Morrow, a "valid," even an
athlete who, however, is paralyzed due to a swimming accident. With
this genetic identity switch, Vincent's new career is off to a fast start;
and he is likely to be the navigator on an upcoming trip to deep outer
(^57) The anti-democratic and eugenicist overtones of this arrangement are
discussedatsomelengthinWoiak(118-25)andGurnham(204-10).