Contents
CHAPTER—XIV
Overview
John visits Linda at the Park Lane Hospital for the Dying and confronts the World State’s cheerful death-conditioning. Disturbed by intrusive Bokanovsky twins, John struggles to comfort Linda, who, lost in soma-dreams, mistakes him for Popé and dies. His grief and anger deepen his alienation from this society.
Summary
John arrives at the sixty-story Park Lane Hospital for the Dying and descends to a Galloping Senility ward to find Linda. The nurse explains there is no hope, and John, ashamed to admit it in this society, calls Linda his mother. He sits by her bed, recalling tender memories from Malpais while she dozes through televised games, music, and shifting perfumes.
A Bokanovsky group of identical eight-year-old twins enters for death-conditioning, swarming around the beds. When one boy peers at Linda, John angrily strikes him, prompting a confrontation with the Head Nurse, who defends the conditioning. John restrains himself and tries to recapture his earlier, loving memories, but uglier recollections intrude.
A scent change triggers Linda’s patchouli-soaked dream of Popé. John pleads for recognition; Linda intermittently responds but repeatedly murmurs “Popé,” inflaming John’s grief into rage. As he shakes her, Linda’s breathing fails; she gasps, turns blue, and, despite John’s frantic call for help, dies before the nurse returns.
Overcome, John sobs by the bed while the nurse, fearing deconditioning, distracts the children with éclairs. When a twin bluntly asks if Linda is dead, John leaves in stunned silence, pushing the child aside as he exits, repelled by the society’s sanitized indifference to death.
Who Appears
- John (the Savage)Visits his dying mother, clashes with death-conditioning, grieves as Linda dies, and recoils from the children and nurses.
- LindaDying in a soma haze; confuses John with Popé; suffers respiratory failure and dies in the ward.
- Head NurseDefends the children’s death-conditioning; confronts John for interfering; prioritizes conditioning over John’s grief.
- NurseGuides John to Linda, is embarrassed by his calling Linda ‘mother,’ and oversees the ward’s routines.
- Bokanovsky TwinsEight-year-old boys undergoing death-conditioning; crowd Linda’s bed and bluntly ask about her death.