Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egotism. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. In doing a bit of research about the novel after reading it, I found this candescent passage from the late Neil Postman, a social critic and distinguished professor, comparing 1984 with Brave New World: What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. "O brave new world, that has such people in it!" Shakespeare's The Tempest I was enraptured while reading this remarkable futuristic fable of a society somberly envisioned as one of hedonist nihilism in which humans are all hatched from incubators, graded, sorted, brainwashed and drugged to accept their position in the social order. Hedonist Nihilism and the Centrifugal Bumblepuppy I had never read this classic of dystopian science fiction, so I’m glad to have listened to this excellent audiobook, because it is entertaining and devastating in its depiction of human nature and modern civilization, especially timely in our own brave new Facebook world. Michael York does a great job reading the novel, his voice oozing satire for the long opening tour of the Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, and then modifying in timbre and dialect for the various characters, among them the self-centered brooder Bernard Marx, the budding intellectual poet Helmholtz Howard, the sexy, sensitive, and increasingly confused Lenina Crowne, the spookily understanding Resident World Controller of Western Europe Mustapha Mond, and especially the good-natured, sad, and conflicted Shakespearean quoting “savage” John. In a way it’s more horrible than the more obviously brutal and violent repression of individuals by totalitarian systems in dystopias like George Orwell’s 1984, because Huxley’s novel implies that people are happy being mindless cogs in the wheels of economic production as long as they get their entertainments and new goods. His far future world limits individual freedom in exchange for communal happiness via mass culture arts like “feelies” (movies with sensual immersion), the state-produced feel-good drug soma, sex-hormone gum, popular sports like “obstacle golf,” and the assembly line chemical manipulation of ova and fetuses so as to decant from their bottles babies perfectly suited for their destined castes and jobs, babies who are then mentally conditioned to become satisfied workers and consumers who believe that everyone belongs to everyone. His powerful novel is still as relevant as ever, both as a cautionary tale of the dangers of technology and as a provocative yet entertaining read.“Oh, Ford, Ford Ford, I Wish I Had My Soma!”īrave New World is a bitterly funny and humorously tragic dystopian novel in which Aldous Huxley satirizes modern civilization’s obsession with consumerism, sensual pleasure, popular culture entertainment, mass production, and eugenics. In his almost prophetic work of speculative fiction, Aldous Huxley predicted much of our current technology and social practices. Originally published in 1932, Brave New World presents a chilling imagining of a future in which humans are genetically designed and constantly drugged to be happy citizens who passively serve the ruling order.
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But his visit there will prompt dangerous questions and ignite a series of events with far-reaching consequences. It is with this goal in mind that he plans a visit to a Savage Reservation, where the past way of life is preserved. Shunning the shallow pleasures of promiscuity and mindless entertainment, Bernard longs to break free. In the Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, Bernard Max is unhappy, feeling that something is missing from his life. However, not everyone is satisfied with the system. Humans are bred to be completely content with their assigned roles in society. There is no violence, babies are created in laboratories, and everyone consumes daily medication to fight depression and spends their time constantly seeking bodily pleasure through “Feelies”-movies that stimulate sight, hearing and touch. Aldous Huxley’s most enduring masterpiece, Brave New World, presents a darkly satiric vision of a “utopian” future that has both captivated and shocked readers for generations In the far future, the utopian World State seems like the ideal society-through the use of genetic engineering, the human race has been perfected, and all citizens are well provided for.