Harrison Bergeron PDF

Harrison Bergeron- Overview Kurt Vonnegut Author Biography Born on November 11, 1922, in Indianapolis, Indiana, Kurt Vonnegut is considered one of the most influential American novelists of the twentieth century. He blended literature with science fiction and humor, the absurd with pointed social co...

Harrison Bergeron- Overview Kurt Vonnegut Author Biography Born on November 11, 1922, in Indianapolis, Indiana, Kurt Vonnegut is considered one of the most influential American novelists of the twentieth century. He blended literature with science fiction and humor, the absurd with pointed social commentary. Vonnegut created his own unique world in each of his novels and filled them with unusual characters, such as the alien race known as the Tralfamadorians in Slaughterhouse-Five (1969). He is known for his satirical literary style, as well as the science-fiction elements in much of his work. Vonnegut died in New York City on April 11, 2007. Setting and Background “Harrison Bergeron” is a short story written by Kurt Vonnegut in 1961. It is told by an omniscient third-person narrator. It is a cautionary tale that focuses on the idea that true equality is impossible to achieve. “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. is dystopian science fiction, which means it is a piece of fiction based in a futuristic, but degraded or broken society. This story is based on a society whose attempt to create a perfect world has gone horribly wrong. Vonnegut wrote the story in 1961 in the middle of the Cold War and at the beginning of the anti-establishment 1960s. The story begins in 2081, a time when the government of the United States has finally established equality for all its citizens. This concept seems noble, but has actually caused complete chaos. Instead of finding a way to improve the intelligence, or strength of weaker members of society, the government handicaps the stronger members. The story is set in April of 2081, a gloomy, clammy month that Vonnegut describes as annoying for not being spring. What is most significant, though, is what is not described in the setting. Much of the story takes place in the Bergerons' house, but Vonnegut doesn't describe the home at all, except to say they have a television. Vonnegut offers no other details, no décor, no colors, no furniture. None of the personal touches that make a house a home. Similarly, the television station where the other part of the story takes place is equally nondescript. This starkness highlights the idea that society's obsessive focus on equality has stamped out any individuality or personality. Summary of the Plot The story opens with Hazel and George Bergeron in their living room watching ballerinas on television. The ballerinas aren't very good because they are weighted down with heavy bags of birdshot to make them as gawky and awkward as other members of society. This doesn't matter since Hazel and George can't concentrate on the dancers for long anyway. Hazel: Because she is mentally slow. George: Because although he's highly intelligent, he is handicapped by an ear radio that plays painfully loud, distracting sounds at random intervals. In the middle of the dance, Hazel and George's son, Harrison Bergeron, bursts into the television studio where the ballerinas are performing. He has broken out of jail where he was being held for plotting to overthrow the government. He is seven feet tall, highly intelligent and according to the government, under- handicapped. Instead of continuing his rebellion or attempting to physically fight the government, he rips off his handicaps and dances around the studio with one of the ballerinas. Eventually, he is shot by a government official known as the Handicapper General, and equality is restored. The irony of the newscaster is that he can't do his job. He has a speech impediment that makes it impossible for him to report the news. He ends up handing the news bulletin to a ballerina who had been dancing on the show before the news bulletin that interrupts programming. The author goes on to describe that it took the announcer so long to stutter out "Ladies and Gentleman" that he just gave up. So, if you have a serious speech impediment, like stuttering, you were given the job of announcer. Characters 1. George Bergeron Harrison Bergeron's father and Hazel Bergeron's husband in "Harrison Bergeron." He must wear mental "handicap" radios in his ears in order to prevent him from thinking critically, as well as weights around his neck to handicap his physical strength. Despite his mandated handicaps, he believes that the present situation in 2081 is preferable to the days when there was still competition among members of society. In this way, he reflects conformity. 2. Hazel Bergeron Harrison Bergeron's mother and George Bergeron's wife in "Harrison Bergeron." She is of exactly average intelligence, and has good intentions. 3. Diana Moon Glampers The Handicapper General in "Harrison Bergeron," representing the oppressive and manipulative government. She is harsh and violent in enforcing the strictures on society, which require everyone to wear 'handicaps' for the sake of equality. 3. Ballerina In "Harrison Bergeron," the title character takes this beautiful ballerina, initially handicapped by a hideous mask and heavy weights, as his Empress. Once her handicaps are removed, she dances beautifully. 4. Harrison Bergeron The title character of "Harrison Bergeron," a fourteen-year-old who has been jailed for refusing to abide by his mental and physical handicaps. Harrison Bergeron, the protagonist of the story, has exceptional intelligence, height, strength and beauty, and as a result he has to bear enormous handicaps. These include distracting noises, three hundred pounds of excess weight, eyeglasses to give him headaches and cosmetic changes to make him ugly. Harrison has escaped from prison. A photo of Harrison appears on the screen. He is wearing the handicaps meant to counteract his strength, intelligence, and good looks. Themes 1. Equality In "Harrison Bergeron" Vonnegut imagines a world in which equality is taken to an absurd extreme, but he is also critical of what many conservative Americans feared such efforts at equality would mean—an effort to erase difference in natural ability. The story begins by asserting that everyone was "equal every which way." No one is permitted to have an advantage of any kind over anyone else. Rather than enabling everyone with equal opportunity and aid, the dystopian government has reduced everyone to the lowest common denominator. In fact, the government in the story actually rewards and promotes lack of talent. It is dull, oblivious people, such as Hazel who are privileged. The result is anything, but true equality. For one thing, the characters are not equal in suffering. The embodiment of average, Hazel has no handicaps, but George must carry heavy weights to hinder him and endure sounds so painful they make him wince and his eyes water. 2. Authority In this dystopia the American ideal of equality has become a tool to control people. The government determines what is average and allowable, and anyone exceeding that standard is judged to have unfair advantage and must be handicapped. With his strength and intelligence, Harrison Bergeron is deemed "under- handicapped" and dangerous. Interestingly, the only person who seems to be unencumbered by handicaps and at the same time efficient and good at her job is Diana Moon Glampers. There is no mention of handicaps that interfere with her ability to ruthlessly enforce the rules that do not appear to apply to her or, apparently, the "H-G men" who come up with the handicap devices. Some citizens, therefore, are not equal. They are allowed advantages, and the government decides who those exceptions are, a principle that is true of authoritarian regimes, not democratic ones. Under such comprehensive government control, people grow accustomed to oppression. George says he hardly notices the bags of weight chained around his neck anymore. The threat of fines and imprisonment may have been necessary at first to force society to submit to being handicapped, but by the time in which the story is set, people such as George have adopted and rationalized their own defeat. He even accepts his handicaps as inevitable and fair, telling Hazel that they are necessary to keep society from returning to the "dark ages" of competition. Neither of them would want that they assure each other. Harrison Bergeron, the tragic hero who rejects authoritarian equality, does so not in favor of democracy, but in order to become a dictator. The teen declares himself emperor, which is just another form of authority. He promises to give the right of empress to a woman and to make his musicians dukes and earls. Having known nothing, but authoritarian control, the ballerina and musicians in the short story seem to welcome yet another form of it in Harrison Bergeron's promises, likely as their only chance to be one of the ruling class. 3. Technology as Control The explosive growth of technological advances in the 20th century prompted many writers to imagine technology's impact on society, with effects ranging from utopias without disease or war to dystopias, such as "Harrison Bergeron," in which technology is applied to control and torture humanity. In this story the government uses radio transmissions of deafening noises into earpieces smart citizens are forced to wear, crippling their ability to think. Dystopias like the one in this short story portray the dire consequences of human technological progress gone terribly wrong. When technology is used to handicap an entire society, it stops the advancement of human abilities. Instead of being used to benefit humanity and make lives easier, as most technology was originally designed to do, technology, such as the radio-transmitting earpieces in the story causes suffering and disrupts normal human activities and abilities. The theme of technology is linked to those of government control and suppression of individuality to the citizens. What technology and government have in common is a focus on bureaucratic efficiency over self-expression. Symbolism 1. Television The plot of "Harrison Bergeron" unfolds through events that play out on the television and the watchers' responses to it. Vonnegut was critical of television as one example of a technology that hindered intelligent thought. In the short story, television has exactly that effect. The fact that neither Hazel, nor George can recall what they've seen on the television, even something as traumatic and memorable as the murder of their own son, is evidence of the mind-numbing capability of television. The story suggests the frightening impact of television on the family. Rather than bringing them together around its glow as it might in a 1950s commercial, the television seems to have erased all memory of their son and broken the family bonds that had once been instinctive. Television thus represents the ways in which technology can hinder human intelligence and corrupt family ties, with an overall detrimental effect on society. The link to government control over television in the story also makes it a symbol of authoritarian invasion and mind control. 2. Radio Transmitters Although radio technology was created to aid communication, in the dystopia of "Harrison Bergeron" radio transmitters small enough to fit in the ear are used by the authoritarian government to disrupt thought and forcibly subdue citizens of above-average intelligence. The earpieces symbolize technology twisted into a tool of government control. The result is a community incapable of questioning or rebelling against a government with absolute power. 3. Masks To ensure that no one feels inferior, beautiful people in "Harrison Bergeron" are forced to wear masks. There seems to be an inverse relationship between the attractiveness of the person and the mask they must wear, in a ridiculous effort to equalize everything in society, including how people look and perceive each other and themselves. The narrator explains that the ballerina reading the news bulletin "must have been extraordinarily beautiful because the mask she wore was hideous."