Point Counter Point Blog Post

The character from the novel Point Counter Point by Aldous Huxley which I would like to discuss with you today is Illidge.  Now for me, Illidge is a strange character.  He is described in the book as a red headed lower class individual, who uses his intellect to gain some sort of status in the eyes of his fellow compatriot for science, Edward Tantamount.  Illidge mainly remains close to Lord Tantamount, an has no real connection with the rest of the Tantamount family for he despises the upper class for their wealth.  Illidge also gets in a discussion with Walter about he he believes that the poor have a greater sense of neighborliness because they are all in the same situation, they all have very little money and hope to help each other achieve their goals of being successful one day.  He also states that the rich have no sense of neighborliness because their houses are so far away and they have literal physical separation between them and their neighbors.  "Neighbourlinesss is the touchstone that shows up the rich.  The rich haven't got any neighbours." (p. 53)  Base on this quotation from chapter 5 in the novel, I believe that Illidge is somewhat a pessimist.  He oaths the rich, probably because he isn't one of them.  He is envious of their wealth and how they treat people who are less economically stable than they are.  I feel that he hates whatever he can't have, and whatever he does have, he feels that he has a sort of entitlement to educate everybody about why his way is better.