Brave New World has its share of unconventional ideas. Some of those ideas are so eerily close to reality. It talks about hatcheries for human reproduction. Compare that with the science of cloning,and the very real apprehension,that human beings could actually be cloned.

It emphasizes stability,at the expense of individual freedom. It is a vision of all encompassing state control over the individual. Reading it,I was reminded of the similarities with Singapore,"the nanny state".

Singapore has been an experiment in social engineering,with the state tightly controlling so many aspects of individual behaviour. It has succeeded in providing prosperity at the cost of freedom. Some ideas depicted in the book have thus come true in the real world.

The mass produced humans are content,in their artificially induced state. It takes a savage,to tell them about the importance of freedom. He would rather take that,and risk unhappiness,pain and old age,in the process.

This book is big on ideas,but not so great as far as the writing style,and story is concerned. Despite liking it to a certain degree,I found my attention wandering.

2nd time reading this
Enjoyed it much more the 2nd time

Hedonist Nihilism: Orgy Porgy and the Centrifugal Bumblepuppy

"O brave new world, that has such people in it!"
Shakespeare's The Tempest

I was enraptured by 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.

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:

n  What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. 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. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egotism. ... Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy.n

N. Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business.

I found this novel quite frightening in the longer view (compared to 1984) considering, as Christopher Hitchens so rightly pointed out, that 1984's "house of horrors" showed its weakness with the downfall of the Soviet Union, whereas Huxley's type of Brave New World "still beckons toward a painless, amusement-sodden, and stress-free consensus," a "true blissed-out and vacant servitude" for which "you need an otherwise sophisticated society where no serious history is taught." C. Hitchens, "Goodbye to All That: Why Americans Are Not Taught History." Harper's Magazine, Nov. 1998.*


*Gosh I still miss Hitchens.

Dystopian Happiness.

In a distant utopian future, society reaches its maximum ideal. Advanced technology, limitless overabundance, poverty disappearance, end of violence. Well-being at the reach of a pill. Everyone is happy. Everyone gets what they want, when and how they want it. Everybody belongs to everyone. "Community, Identity, Stability", the society's motto.

Genetically altered from birth, each person learns to live under certain conditionings. And they are perfectly happy, within those parameters and capacities. But when a variable goes wrong, stability becomes hard to achieve. In this perfect world, Bernard Max tries to find a place in a society he does not feel he belongs, Lenina Crowne tries to overcome feelings she should not have, and John Savage struggles with his desire... to understand.

Interesting from time to time, but sometimes, not so much. Mixed feelings. Overall an enjoyable read. An all-time classic, and a pillar of dystopian fiction.

Still remaining, two movies based on the book (1980 and 1998).

-----------------------------------------------
n  PERSONAL NOTEn:
[1932] [268p] [Dystopia] [Conditional Recommendable]
-----------------------------------------------

★★★☆☆  Brave New World.
★★★☆☆  Fard.

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Felicidad Distópica.

En un futuro utópico distante, la sociedad alcanza su máximo ideal. Tecnología avanzada, sobreabundancia ilimitada, desaparición de la pobreza, fin de la violencia. Bienestar al alcance de una píldora. Todos son felices. Todos tienen lo que quieren, cuando quieren, cuanto quieren. Todos pertenecen a todos. "Comunidad, Identidad, Estabilidad" es el lema de la sociedad.

Alterados genéticamente desde nacimiento, cada persona aprende a vivir bajo ciertos condicionamientos. Y son perfectamente felices, dentro de esos parámetros y capacidades. Pero cuando una variable sale mal, la estabilidad se vuelve difícil de alcanzar. En este mundo perfecto, Bernard Marx trata de encontrar su lugar en un mundo al cual siente no pertenecer, Lenina Crowne por sobrellevar sentimientos que no debería tener, y John Savage lucha por su deseo de... entender.

Interesante de a ratos, a veces no tanto. Sentimientos cruzados. Dentro de todo una lectura pasable. Clásico de clásicos y un pilar de la distopía.

Quedan pendientes ver las dos películas basadas en el libro (1980 y 1998).

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n  NOTA PERSONALn:
[1932] [268p] [Distopía] [Recomendable Condicional]
-----------------------------------------------

I would like to be an intellectual.

In an ideal world, I wear a monocle, and I have a pocket watch on a chain, and all of my sweaters have elbow patches. In this world, I consume exclusively classics at a very slow pace (so as to examine every word), but somehow simultaneously I have read everything that's ever been called worth reading by any person who's ever been called pretentious.

But that is not this world.

To be fair, I AM trying. I read literary fiction the most of any genre. I used to have a quest where I would have to read at least one classic every month, but I retired it because I typically read more than that. (Last year, for example, I read 46. And granted I have a loose definition of "classic," but still.) I tend to rate books from those two categories higher than others.

But still, we find ourselves here.

I didn't like this book. I can say there are a lot of reasons, and I can even tell the truth: I can say that the depiction of women in this was so offensive it turned around and became funny and absurd, or that this dystopian world is not nearly as prescient as 1984's, or the Handmaid's Tale's, or even goddamn The Hunger Games', and both of those would be fairly respectable criticisms that I do have.

But that isn't completely accurate.

I didn't like this because it felt silly and boring.

That's really all.

Bottom line: I'll try to be smart next time.

------------------
pre-review

either i did not care for this or i was being intellectually stimulated.

i'll figure it out later.

review to come / 2.5 stars

------------------
tbr review

personally being very brave by adding classics to my to read list

clear ur sh*t book 49
quest 22: free space

Μου αρέσουν πολύ τα δυστοπικά μυθιστορήματα. Το 1984 είναι ένα βιβλίο που με συγκλόνισε οπότε κάποια στιγμή ήθελα να διαβάσω και τα άλλα δυο πιο κλασικά μυθιστορήματα αυτού του είδους. Άλλωστε πολλοί λένε ότι το 1984 του Όργουελ μαζί με και το Θαυμαστό Νέο Κόσμο του Χάξλεϊ και το Φαρενάιτ 451 αποτελούν μία άτυπη τριλογία, που αναφέρεται στον ολοκληρωτισμό ενός μέλλοντος ελεγχόμενου από τα τηλεοπτικά μέσα και μια κατασταλτική πολιτική στο όνομα του «κοινού καλού».

Δεν ξέρω πώς να το χαρακτηρίσω αυτό το βιβλίο.Να το πω προφητικό; Να το πω επίκαιρο; Να το πω διαχρονικό;Να το πω το πιο σκοτεινό και καταθλιπτικό βιβλίο που έχω διαβάσει ;
Ο συγγραφέας παρουσιάζει επιτυχώς έναν εντελώς διαφορετικό κόσμο στον οποίο ο άνθρωπος είναι απαλλαγμένος από τα φορτία της σημερινής κοινωνίας, οικογένεια,άγχος για δουλειά,συναισθηματικούς δεσμούς αλλά και την ποινικοποίηση κάθε συναισθήματος.
Ένα ακόμα θέμα που έχει ιδιαίτερο ενδιαφέρον είναι και το θέμα της ευτυχίας του ανθρώπου,που σαν πρόσχημα οι έχοντες την εξουσία το χρησιμοποιούν για να χειραγωγήσουν τις μάζες.

Στο θαυμαστό καινούργιο ευτυχία είναι αυτή που ακρωτηριάζει κάθε συναίσθημα και την ελεύθερη ανάπτυξη του πνεύματος για να μην ανατραπεί το κατεστημένο ή που εκφυλίζεται σε εγωισμό αποβλέποντας αποκλειστικά στην προσωπική ευτυχία αδιαφορώντας και βλάπτοντας το κοινωνικό σύνολο ή αυτή με τη χρήση υποκατάστατων χαπιών.Οι άνθρωποι φαινομενικά μπορεί να έχουν τα πάντα,σεξουαλική ελευθεριότητα,χρήση ναρκωτικών ως ένα φυσιολογικό και σύνηθες μέσον φυγής από τα προβλήματα της ζωής, τα χαπάκια, τα αισθησιακά θεάματα,δεν γερνάνε όχι εμφανισιακά τουλάχιστον,δεν υπάρχουν αρρώστιες κτλ. αλλά έχουν μια κάλπικη,ψεύτικη ευτυχία,ζούνε μια αισιόδοξη ουτοπία.Σε μια κοινωνία που θέλει όλοι να είναι ίδιοι χωρίς προσωπικά θέλω και ιδιαιτερότητες γιατί έτσι οι άνθρωποι είναι πιο διαχειρίσιμοι.

Τι να πω και για τη διορατικότητα του συγγραφέα, πίσω από την οποία πρέπει να κρύβεται η βαθιά γνώση του για τις αλλαγές που έφερνε η νέα βιομηχανική εποχή. Διαβλέπει ότι η μαζική παραγωγή υλικών προϊόντων θα αλλάξει τον προσανατολισμό της κοινωνίας σε μαζική καταναλωτική και μαζί θα συμπαρασύρει και τις παλαιότερες αστικές αξίες.
Σαν συγγραφέα (επειδή η σύγκριση είναι αναπόφευκτη )προτιμώ τον Όργουελ (του έχω αδυναμία)αν και για να είμαι δίκαιη ναι ο Χάξλεϋ βρίσκεται πιο κοντά στο πνεύμα της εποχής μας σε σχέση με τον Όργουελ.
Δεν το απόλαυσα όσο το 1984 και δεν ξέρω το γιατί.Έφταιγε η γραφή ; δεν θα το μάθω γιατί δεν ξέρω καλά αγγλικά για να διαβάσω το πρωτότυπο,έφταιγε η μετάφραση ; μήπως η γραφή ήταν τέτοια που δεν γινόταν καλύτερη μετάφραση.Τι να σας πω.

Παρόλα αυτά πέντε αστεράκια για τη διορατικότητα και γιατί με προβλημάτισε τα μάλα.

Αξίζει να προσθέσω και ένα κείμενο που κυκλοφορεί,για τις διαφορετικές απόψεις που είχαν αυτοί οι δυο.

Τον Όργουελ τον φόβιζαν οι άνθρωποι που θα απαγόρευαν τα βιβλία. Το Χάξλεϊ τον φόβιζε το γεγονός ότι δεν θα υπήρχε λόγος να απαγορευτεί ένα βιβλίο γιατί δεν θα βρισκόταν άνθρωπος πρόθυμος να διαβάσει. Ο Όργουελ φοβόταν εκείνους που θα μας στερούσαν την πληροφόρηση. Ο Χάξλεϊ φοβόταν εκείνους που θα μας υπερπληροφορούσαν τόσο ώστε να καταντήσουμε πλάσματα παθητικά και εγωιστικά.Ο Όργουελ φοβόταν ότι η αλήθεια θα φυλασσόταν μυστική. Ο Χάξλεϊ φοβόταν ότι η αλήθεια θα πνιγόταν σε έναν ωκεανό σύγχυσης. Ο Όργουελ φοβόταν ότι θα αναπτύσσαμε πολιτισμό υποτέλειας. Ο Χάξλεϊ φοβόταν ότι θα αναπτύσσαμε πολιτισμό κοινοτοπίας ασχολούμενοι μόνο με δραστηριότ��τες αντίστοιχες του όργκυ-πόργκυ, του φυγόκεντρου αγριοκουταβιού και των αισθησιακών ταινιών.

Όπως επισήμανε ο Χάξλεϊ στο βιβλίο του "Θαυμαστός Καινούργιος Κόσμος", οι υπέρμαχοι της ελευθερίας της σκέψης και οι ορθολογιστές που πάντα γρηγορούσαν και αντιμάχονταν κάθε μορφή τυραννίας "παρέλειψαν να εκτιμήσουν την ακόρεστη δίψα του ανθρώπου για ψυχαγωγία". Στο "1984", σημείωνε ο Χάξλεϊ, "οι άνθρωποι ελέγχονταν μέσω της οδύνης". Με λίγα λόγια, ο Όργουελ φοβόταν ότι θα μας καταστρέψουν αυτά που μισούμε. Ο Χάξλεϊ φοβόταν ότι θα μας καταστρέψουν αυτά που αγαπάμε.

I only read it to completion because I was buddy reading this with my friend Katie.
It was horrible, dreadful, boring, uneventful, pointless, and useless.
That's it for this review, I refuse to waste any more time on this book.

Disappointing Dystopian Novela

Much of the future world that Huxley envisioned has happened, such as consumerism, cloning, and government controlled societies which are terrible. But he also decries developments in things such as anti-depressants and birth control which are wonderful.

Huxley is not forward thinking either in his main characters who are all men, because a man writing in the 1930s could only assume that white men would be in charge forever and forever, of course. The only female character with any thing to do with the story is Lenina who enjoys sex and has it often with various men and Huxley has his virtuous character, John Savage, call her a whore at every opportunity and also beats her in one scene and whips her with a knotted rope in another.

I believe his argument is that enjoyment or happiness can not be out greatest goal, that there has to be a life of the mind which I think is true. His manner of presenting this idea is not a good story, it is a very dry and self-flagellating polemic on how rotten our push towards a better world is.

I always try to finish books once I’ve started. I got through a very painfully boring 50%. I’m done torturing myself! Moving on!!

Note: this book is listed as one of the most popular books to be banned, over the past decade, from both schools and private libraries. Support freedom of expression by reading and buying banned books! ❤️

Una de las distopías clásicas que no le pueden faltar al lector. Disfruté mucho de esta historia, y a la vez me detuve varias veces a reflexionar sobre el panorama que se plantea en la misma (sobre todo su final). Es una novela excelente para leer con tiempo y ganas para no perderse de nada, la trama en sí puede resultar sencilla de explicar a grandes rasgos. Sin embargo tiene especificaciones que son un poco más complejas y a las que hay que seguirle bien el ritmo. Más allá de eso, esta novela es icónica.

There are two standard ways of reading ideological science-fiction – to go looking for subtle nuances that characterize standard literary fiction, stressing upon characterization and plot as an integral part of writing; and to seek ideas that interrogate our narrow notions and overlook standard literary conventions in case the work is wanting in literary finesse. Often, the one with the best ideas is not blessed with the best writing, and the ideas, rather than the execution is what is appealing. A third way is to seek into that allegory its own weaknesses, where it fails its own arguments, to open up a discourse that instead of concretely taking sides points out ruptures in the text itself.

Along with a conventional review, it is also my first attempt at applying deconstruction as a method to see where the text contradicts itself in the Derridean sense.

Brave New World - the title itself is beautiful, borrowed from Shakespeare’s The Tempest, which was a story reeking of colonialism beneath its enchanting poetry and romance. And so is the future Huxley envisions for us. A merry land where science has conquered reason, comfort has defeated struggle and addiction has replaced the zest to live. The addiction to science, addiction to happiness, addiction to indolence overcoming the fear of ‘living’.

What a beautiful life! None of the plagues that so profoundly disturb the one single life we’ve got – the freedom from strife, the freedom from life-long sorrow. The happiness of all. Contentment for all. No envy, no failed ambitions. A peaceful world, in every imaginable way.

n  Isn’t that what we are all striving for?n Don’t we wish everybody was happy, everybody was justly treated? Would you rather lead a blissful life or a life where you met with trouble, pain and a crippling grief that would haunt you for the rest of your life? What would you choose?

Honestly, I don’t know the answer.

Brave New World is a technological dystopia that has flushed out every trace of struggle from human-life. Doing away with every kind of moral, social and political structure, it also does away with the capacity to think and form opinions, reducing humankind to a drug-induced infantile state, a haze of brief happiness brought on by SOMA pills to be swallowed at the slightest sign of emotional trouble. A stable and tranquil world conceived on the ruins of all that we value – opinions, ethics, learning, struggles and individuality.

This brave, new world mass-produces castes of identical twins with distinctive conditioning to enable them to happily exist in the futures earmarked for them, with Soma to take care of brief spells of departure from expected behavior. It is this loss of individuality, this horror of being replicated endlessly, in a state worse than that of being cloned, which appalls the reader than the notion of not being able to experience life at its fullest, combined with the inability to conceive of a social structure without parents, family and marriage.

Frankly, Huxley puts up a poor argument against what was supposedly a major horror in the new world order – the loss of ‘feeling’; genuine, individual feeling replaced by conditioned feeling. It somehow sounds more utopian with the opportunity it provides. Huxley further weakens his argument by bringing in the Savage with his tribal customs of ‘strong feelings’ that seem more repulsive, at least to me, than the soma-induced life of the new world.

The Indians, to which the Savage belongs, are the jungle tribe, impoverished, sick, a caricature of any tribe you take that is still untouched by our (apparently, allegedly) civilized life – I sure wouldn’t like to live in a world where you had to prove your worth to the person you loved by enduring stupid physical whipping – I’d rather forego it in favor of soma.

Huxley could have made it far more believable and effective had it been not so far-fetched, and had more to do with the traditions of our own world – now, I do not object to this representation on the grounds that the former is uncouth and the latter civil, but that it is counter-productive to Huxley’s own efforts.

However, if you’d prefer being flogged to near-death to prove your worth than simply declare your love sensibly and begin your relationship, I have nothing to defend my argument with.

I enjoyed 1984 - but I loved Brave New World - the world-building is more convincing, more natural, closer to my sense of what the future will be like. A technological future built on Nazi monitoring is less convincing than one in which the subject is always, already interpellated by psychological conditioning. I find the characterization here smoother, more credible.

To me, 1984 had an immediate impact which faded away gradually – it had an intense feeling of dread that went away with time. But this book is subtler – instead of being overtly chilling, it is closer to our world – it asks for a critical evaluation of our own world first in order to appreciate the tragedy of the fictional world.

I see immense parallels between our present world and the brave new world that might succeed ours, with the consumerist, numbing media drilled into us, a somatic equivalent of pills that we divert ourselves to at the slightest discomfort – the TV, the Internet, GR, the phone, the shopping, the music. How many times do we force ourselves to come to terms with the gnawing pain within instead of trying to divert our mind to something pleasant?

How many of us, while nodding in agreement with the Savage when he cries, “the right to have syphilis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to catch typhoid; the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind. I claim them all.”, really want it all? Do you look forward to having cancer? Are you excited at the prospect of starving? Would you enjoy those “unspeakable pains”?

We’re already living in a semi-Brave New World, taking enough Soma to remain happy, content and well-off to the best of our capabilities, taking pride in the mundane sorrows that continually plague our soft minds, venting our worries on GR, and for that added kick of Aristotelian catharsis, read something really horrible and thank our stars for escaping that fate.

No, I’m not accusing ourselves of shallowness or any indignation you feel for me right now – for there are many of us who suffer quietly, mourn our own fates silently, taking solace in the little joys that can never liberate us from our shackles of grief. I’m just pointing out that we’re already in a semi-Brave New World, an imperfect Brave New World.

Which is why this affects me far more than 1984. The Brave New World has almost arrived, and we have happily embraced much of it. Heaven forbid when we really have enough technology to perfect this semi-world. Of the numerous futures I’ve read, this one is quite credible. Maybe little details will vary – but in essence, well…

But this is also exactly my problem with the text - Huxley, in trying to drum in his point, over-reaches sometimes, unlike Orwell who remains strictly in line with the reality of our desires. While Bernard and his friend seem really grounded, realistic, the Savage is made to be a heroic figure, a larger-than-life persona. It only finely crosses the line, but towards the end, my sympathies lie less with the Savage. Or for the ‘real humans’ he belongs to. In his eagerness to return to the natural idyllic life of Nature (like many feminists calling for a return to Nature by discarding all technology), Huxley crosses the line by creating a clear ‘black or white/tech-dystopia or nature-utopia’ narrative, losing the subtlety in plot when he shows finesse in characterization.

It is interesting to note how ‘freedom’ to him equates to ‘manhood’, the notion that being a slave to mood-controlling medicines made one less than ‘a man’. The implication, therefore, that suffering makes one a real man, an entity worthy of the life they had. Now, though this does not come across specifically as sexist, it does speak volumes about the absence/exclusion of women from debates about what makes one ‘human’ – clearly, Huxley’s emphasis is on the delicate threshold that defines where science will either question what makes us human, or with a misstep, make our own selves sub-human. But like much fiction of the early days, it is assumed that women function as objects, rather than subjects – invisible and unimportant.

Overall, despite everything, I really enjoyed it – it was far ahead of its time in its subtle treatment of dystopia, and its depiction of a credible new social order. It was a bit predictable, though, but given that it was written in the 1930s, it definitely deserves leeway in being judged. SF always carries within itself the guarantee of being outdated. Real science and later SF will invariably render it archaic, and early SF must be given consideration in that regard.

I was torn between 1984 and Brave New World’, they sort of complement each other – they both have failings that the other covers up. I quite agree when Huxley told Orwell that his book was better than 1984:

n  

Agreeing with all that the critics have written of it, I need not to tell you, yet once more, how fine and how profoundly important the book is [Orwell's:]. May I speak in stead of the thing with which the book deals -- the ultimate revolution? The first hints of a philosophy of the ultimate revolution -- the revolution which lies beyond politics and economics, and which aims at the total subversion of the individual's psychology and physiology -- are to be found in the Marquis de Sade, who regarded himself as the continuator, the consummator, of Robespierre and Babeuf. The philosophy of the ruling minority in Nineteen Eight-Four is a sadism which has been carried to its logical conclusion by going beyond sex and denying it. Whether in actual fact the policy of the boot-on-the-face can go on indefinitely seems doubtful. My own belief is that the ruling oligarchy will find less arduous and wasteful ways of governing and of satisfying its lust for power, and these ways will resemble those which I described in Brave New World.

n

Indeed, in these respects it is. But I wish they had written a book together.

Given that dystopian books are generally not my first choice ‘run-to-books-to-read’.... and I’m sure I didn’t understand the full depths of this book - which was written 21 years before I was born....even I can see Aldous Huxley had a brilliant mind.

I was trying to wrap my thinking around the conspiracies that it looked liked the author was trying to warn us were happening in the world —�trying to visualize the already futuristic setting —( was he thinking of 2017?)....and follow the story itself, trying to get inside the heads of the created characters.
See... I’m not very good at this. This type of reading is challenging for me. It hurts my brain!!!!

But.....here are a few things I think I got from this book:
.....thousands of little babies got born from one cell.....but not from a mothers womb....and these were the SORRY SUCKERS...( too bad for you Johnny - you’re pretty much a worthless bean- and you get to have all the shitty underpaid jobs in the world).
.....embryos were incubated in bottles in laboratories.
.....there were no traditional ‘Leave It To Beaver’ families in this society - there were no families at all - no sexual reproduction at all!
.....there is a REASON for all this. Embryos were divided by their social status. There were five castes: alpha, beta, (THE LUCKY SUCKERS).....and delta, gamma, and epsilon.....(the SORRY SUCKERS)......

Oh but wait the SORRY SUCKERS won’t feel sorry for themselves because this is utopia....where everybody is made to be happy - as all personal identity has vanished. DRUGS ARE COOL.... even encouraged! Everybody must get stoned.

So? How am I doing? Am I understanding this book somewhat?
...that what Aldous Huxley was saying is that the FUTURE LOOKS SCARY?/!....
It looked scary in 1931.... and it still looks scary in 2017.
One of Huxley’s predictions was spot on: Bombastic- pretentious -pompous RIDICULOUS senatorial entertainment! ( Huxley was more kind and didn’t use all those adjectives)....but he might have if he knew how right he’d really be!

Lots more in this slim-jim novel - we get enlightened on history - religion - consumerism- emotions ( not to worry - you won’t need to worry - it’s a no worry society).... we’ve become deadbeats!

PLEASE read other reviews- I have NO idea if I read this book right.
However ...seems like I shouldn’t worry about it all according to the brilliant man himself...Aldous Huxley! VERY WORTH READING! ( even for a girl who understands nothin)


Whew.... now I can start my day.... as all is well in the world.