The brilliant social satirist Aldous Huxley shocked the world in 1932 with the publication of his science fiction masterpiece Brave New World. The novel takes place in the cities of London and New Mexico during the year of 632 A.F. (After Ford).
It is a future world of absolute stability and total sterility with one concern- happiness for all (Wright 84).
In his foreword to the New Harper edition of Brave New World, Huxley states its theme as œthe advancement of science as it affects human individuals. While these advances are universally thought to be tremendous progress in our growth as human beings, Huxley feelings towards this evolution are of danger, caution, and concern ( Monarch 6).
The novel starts out in the heart of the new society, the Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Center, where babies are chemically and genetically engineered in test-tubes, decanted, and then conditioned by hypnopaedia (teaching societal ethics during sleep) to be unquestionably œhappy (Macdonald 1).
To ensure social stability, a five-tiered caste system ruled by Alphas and Betas was created. The lower castes, the Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons, identical in genetic makeup, are responsible for the essential manual labor necessary to maintain the safety of their betters. The drug soma, rationed out to members of all classes, ensures total sexual liberation and no pain or sorrow (Wright 85 ).
The Term Paper on Brave New World Huxley Society Book
... of social responsibility. These themes reached their peak in Huxley's Brave New World, published in 1932.His most enduring work imagined a fictional ... to complete social stability. Brave New World marked a step in a new direction for Huxley, combining his skill for satire with ...
Bernard Marx, an Alpha believed to have accidentally received a dose of alcohol as a fetus, has a crush on Lenina Crowne and decides to take a trip with her to the Native American Reservations. There they meet Linda, a woman originally from the Utopian world who had been left on the Reservation twenty-five years earlier, and her son John. John father was the prestigious Director of the Hatchery who, in order to avoid the embarrassment and disgust of a conceived child born with a live birth, returned home without Linda. Bernard invites Linda and John to return with him to London ( ClassicNotes 4).
Enchanted by the prospect of meeting others like Lenina, John exultantly quotes from Shakespeare The Tempest: œO brave new world that has such people in it ( Wright 85 ).
The impact of their arrival was colossal resulting in instant celebrity for Bernard as the keeper of the Savage (John).
Reveling in his sudden popularity, Bernard starts to date numerous women and become extremely arrogant. At this time John and Helmholtz, an intellectually superior Alpha who has become disillusioned with the society, have become very good friends.
Linda, John mother, dies from an overdose of soma. John then confronts those waiting in line for their daily ration of soma telling them it is poisoning their minds. An uproar breaks out and John, Bernard, and Helmholtz are sent to see Mustapha Mond, The World Controller of Western Europe, entitled His Fordship. It is then that John and Mustapha engage in a long debate over why society is the way it is. John is upset that history, religion, and science are all regulated and banned. Mustapha tells him that the society is designed to maximize each person happiness. John keeps protesting and Mustapha retorts, œYou are claiming the right to be unhappy. He then mentions a long list of mankind ills and evils. John replies, œI claim them all.( SparkNotes 2).
Helmholtz finds happiness in exile to an island colony of misfits and helps Bernard adjust to the lifestyle too. Lenina tries to return to her old life, and John the Savage is forced to stay and be studied like a human guinea pig. Tormented by sightseers, fascinated and repelled by the sexual license around him, he beats himself and, in a frenzy at the appearance of Lenina, beats her and then sleeps with her. Having finally yielded to the sexual temptations of a world he has tried hard to reject, John commits suicide. Some compare him to a Hamlet-like figure, betrayed by mother and girlfriend, beset by illusion, and unable to grasp reality ( Macdonald 2 ).
The Essay on Brave New World Huxley Utopia Science
Criticism of Practical Application of Utopia in 'Brave New World " Debra Ackerman Mrs. Eileen Waite Criticism of Practical Application of Utopia in Brave New World AldousHuxley's Brave New World illustrates the loss of morality when established standards are replaced by amoral criteria. In his novel, Huxley criticizes the practical applications of Utopia in actual society. Huxley's depiction of ...
Due to the originality of its ideas and exuberant style Brave New World was an immediate success. Extremely entertaining with a morbid message, the novel attained instant popularity and is still being used today to express concern or disdain for the direction society has taken, or for its lack of direction ( Monarch 6 ).
All in all, since its publication in 1932, Brave New World and its author has been the subject of muchcommentary and much criticism. This novel, a source of controversy and a subject for sermons, has been praised and condemned, vilified and glorified ( ClassicNotes 3 ).
Brave New World paints a nightmarish future in which science and technology, for the good of mankind, have destroyed mankind. This bleak view of the Utopian world was not really about the future, but a reflection of the present. Huxley began with an aspect of society that he disliked and demonstrated the likely consequences if it were to develop into an extreme (Neilson 2).
Examine the world in 1932; science had become an overwhelming social force for better or for worse. People had seen science prevent millions of deaths with vaccinations and kill millions with horrific, factory-produced weaponry in World War I. The World State in Brave New World uses science to justify and establish a eugenically designed society. Eugenics, the study of genes, was widely advocated and enthusiastically praised by the Nazi party who was forming in Germany at the time the novel was written. The œpromised land in Brave New World offers a life without old age, disease, poverty, unemployment, guilt, and racial discrimination but at a very high price- the sacrifice of freedom, individuality, truth, beauty, a sense of purpose, and the concept of God (SparkNotes 2).
Huxley meant Brave New World to be a warning- a warning that a World State is not only possible but probable if we do not protect the rights of the individual to be an individual: to be unique and free. Science and technology should be the servants of man- man should not be enslaved to them. Brave New World is the description of our lives in the future if the present obsessions persist for standardization according to the sciences: eugenics, philosophy, economics, and mechanics (Monarch 6 ).
The Essay on Brave New World Fears Of The Future a Seconadary Focus On The Impact Of Technology On Nature Both
... as probes into the aspects of society that the writer desires to explore. Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World during the late 20s and ... insecurities, most of which tend revolve around the future of society and the future of the individual. For the rich upper class ... not cry God, God, God.There was an accelerated development of science, especially in the biological field, during the middle periods ( ...
Aldous Huxley dynamic writing style has ranged from aristocratic and resumed to the negative yet reserved satire in his later works. In his Vulgarity in Literature he apologizes by saying that to œshock the stupid and morally reprehensible truth-haters into an acceptance of reality is not only the duty of a satirist, it is a rare pleasure ( Bakke 1 ).
Huxley strengths are the exuberance of his ideas, his use of wit and satire, his keen observations of mankind and its foibles, and combination of fact (scientific data) and fiction (future life on earth).
His weaknesses include the shallowness of his characters, his overriding concern with teaching a lesson or moral, and his over-elaborate framework ( ClassicNotes 2).
In Brave New World Huxley wants to make the reader aware of the conflicts within society. He does this by stressing the contrast and conflict by giving a two-angled view of his characters and by considering an event in several aspects- emotional, religious, metaphysical, and scientific. This can be both a curse and a blessing for the reader. An example of this two-angled view is his many references to the influence of the physical on the mental; man is both body and spirit. Along with the spirit Huxley concerns the reader with descriptive physical functions, such as body odor, sickness, and references to bowels. Huxley discussed his œtwo-angled vision in an interview with Ross Parmenter ( Saturday Review, March 19, 1938).
He said,
I try to get a stereoscopic vision, to show my characters from two angles simultaneously. Either I try to show them both as they feel themselves to be; or else I try to give two rather similar characters to throw light on each other… (Monarch 3 ).
The first three chapters of Brave New World are masterfully composed in an indirect matter in which very little is heard; almost everything is overheard. Huxley also uses another technique called œcounterpoint that involves a simultaneous juxtaposition of different elements of the narrative which result in a subtle and brilliant cacophony of ironies ( Firchow 2)
The Essay on Aldous Huxleys Brave New World And George Orwells 1984
Neil Postman once stated; Huxleys vision is more relevant today than is Orwells, Neil was of course refering to Aldous Huxleys Brave New World and George Orwells 1984, both chilling prophecies of the future of humanity gone terribly wrong. Although one could agree with Neal's view of Huxleys Brave New World, where life is taken down to only the most trivial of entertainment, lack of family, love ...
Brave New World is a novel of multitudinous illusions- most referring to Shakespeare. The point of these illusions is to reveal ironically the inadequacies of the present by comparing it to the past. By merely hinting, for example, at the analogy between the Fordian state and Prospero island, Huxley manages to convey ironically a disapproval of that state without ever having to voice it ( Firchow 3 )
Aldous Huxley science fiction masterpiece, Brave New World, warns society of their possible horrific future. A future of extreme genetic engineering and soma induced œhappiness due to the terrifying advancement of science. Using brilliant satire with a plethora of illusions, Huxley is able to reveal his deepest concerns for mankind with an entertaining story that will be enjoyed for decades to come by all kinds of people.
