The Power of Storytelling-3

"While the child was asleep , a broadcast programme from London suddenly started to come through; and the next morning, to the astonishment of his crash...Little Reuben woke up repeating word for word a long lecture by the curious old writer...George Bernard Shaw, who was speaking, according to a well-authenticated tradition, about his own genius." (Brave New World, page 34)

The Director is conveying an anecdote to his students to help them comprehend how hypnopaedia (sleep teaching) is instituted. As a reader, I think the author's use of this anecdote is helpful in understanding not only what sleep teaching is but also why people thought it was necessary. Another anecdote follows in which a child repeats facts about the Nile river in his sleep but can not regurgitate the material while awake. Again I feel like anecdotes are very powerful in literature because they create a more interesting atmosphere to a sometimes dull read. A lot of the futuristic and scientific terms the author uses are hard to take in but these short anecdotes allow the reader to say "ahhh now i understand".

Anecdotes also play a important role in the movie Big Fish. A son tells numerous anecdotes in order to explain his father's life. These short stories bring out the theme of adventure and forgiveness in the movie. I think Aldous Huxley uses anecdotes in Brave New World also to emphasis the various themes of the novel.