A very disturbing read!
n  n
I was very upset by this book on many levels, but was intrigued by the structure Huxley used. Every different line was a different plot following many chracters.

Recensione pubblicata originariamente sul mio blog Arte della Lettura
Il mondo nuovo di Aldous Huxley è uno di quei libri distopici che viene sempre consigliato insieme a 1984 di George Orwell, ma che per qualche motivo non mi ero mai deciso di leggere, seppur presente nella mia libreria da anni.
n  Distopia o Utopia?n
Il futuro de Il mondo nuovo si presenta quasi come un'utopia. Tutti gli uomini sono sempre felici, tutte le malattie sono state debellate, rendendo possibile solo una morte naturale per vecchiaia. L'elemento distopico del romanzo consiste proprio in questa perenne felicità, ottenuta tramite un condizionamento che inizia sin da quando le persone sono ancora degli embrioni fino all'età adulta. A seconda dei geni da cui viene prodotto l'embrione, esso sarà classificato da Alfa Plus Plus a Epsilon, definendo il suo condizionamento e il suo futuro. Una persona Alfa Plus Plus sarà meno condizionata e più libera di pensare e di fare attività non produttive secondo gli standard del governo basato sull'ideologia di Ford. Le persone Epsilon faranno i lavori più umili e saranno fortemente condizionate ad apprezzare questi lavori.

Il sistema politico e di condizionamento, base della distopia di questo romanzo, sono spiegati in modo dettagliato e approfondito, cosa che ho apprezzato parecchio.
n  Traman
Il mondo nuovo non si limita a costruire un ottimo mondo distopico, ma gli affianca una buona storia a supporto. La trama non è nulla di eccezionale e serve il solo scopo di approfondire ancor di più il worldbuilding, ma questo non è necessariamente un punto a sfavore. Il libro alla fine risulta essere una lettura scorrevole e piacere.
n  Ritorno al Mondo Nuovon
Ormai sempre insieme al romanzo principale troviamo Ritorno al Mondo Nuovo, una serie di prolissi saggi su vari aspetti del romanzo. Qui Huxley approfondisce elementi come la sovrappopolazione, l'uso e l'evoluzione della politica, il controllo del pensiero tramite propaganda.

Con questi saggi Huxley confronta spesso la sua opera con quella di Orwell, paragonando i diversi tipi di governo e spiegando perché, secondo lui, la sua visione sarà più plausibile.

Non ho letto tutti i capitoli, ma mi sono limitato ai primi due perché sono piuttosto prolissi e non ero particolarmente interessato.
n  Conclusionin
Lettura d'obbligo se si è appassionati del genere. La trama non è assolutamente memorabile, ma viene compensata dagli elementi distopici.
Altre recensioni sul mio blog Arte della Lettura

outdated and kinda mid compared to all the other great dystopian authors. it felt very … thrown together characters wise. like what even happened to lenina? idk. replacing ford with god was hilarious. this novel is a lot more funny than it is disgusting. i also didn’t love huxley’s “revisit” as it was just icky. little racist, little sexist, little antisemitic, you feel me?

Overall: disappointed. I wanted to like this book, as it had such an interesting futuristic concept, but it fell short in so many ways.
First of all, I realize this book was written in 1931 and society as a whole was much different... however, Huxley, in my opinion, should have had the foresight when writing a futuristic novel to realize that black people would gain equal rights, and would not remain servants until the end of time. Science has progressed so far as to make test-tube babies, but social justice hasn't advanced -- at all?? Ok. Another problem I found was that Brave New World focused way too much on sexuality. Just about every chapter mentioned some people "having" each other, and it got stale real fast.
There are sooo many aspects of futuristic life that Huxley could have focused on and explored in this groundbreaking novel, but he focused on the same few aspects throughout the novel, and kept mentioning them over and over, without any new information being added. (See, groups of twins, sexuality, conditioning). Don't get me wrong: these topics were interesting and though-provoking, but there are countless things that a novel of this size could have explored, but were simply ignored. Also, the ending sucked; predictable, lazy.
Despite the shortcomings, the story was, for the most part, interesting, and I very much enjoyed the character of the Savage.
I did not read Brave New World Revisited, as I didn't particularly enjoy BNW.

Favorite quote:
"He would have liked to speak; but there were no words. Not even in Shakespeare."

This is another difficult book to review, because it's more of a historical document than a novel. Plus, it's hard not to compare it to 1984, which I just read.

I'll say this: I like this book more than 1984. 1984 is as subtle as a sledgehammer to the face. While Brave New World does its share of preaching, its vision of the world is much less horrific. On the surface, it seems like a great place to live. Sure, there are horrible caste systems, but it's not like they *know* there are horrible caste systems, right? Everyone's a promiscuous drug user and no one is all that unhappy. It sounds like the 1960s minus Vietnam.

The ending with the whip led me to compare this book to the Lars Von Trier film Manderlay. In Manderlay, Bryce Dallas Howard ends up on a plantation in Georgia (I think) in the 20s. No one told them that slavery had been abolished. Yet, it's that uncanny utopia/dytopia that leads you to believe that /this works/. Von Trier does the unthinkable: he makes you think that abolishing slavery was a bad idea. Huxley does the same thing in Brave New World: he makes you think that this society is a good idea.

That achievement makes this novel complex and thought-provoking, unlike 1984 which just beats you over the head with BIG BROTHER IS BAD over and over and over again.

E se tutti noi fossimo stati concepiti e prodotti industrialmente in provetta vorremmo davvero saperlo?
E se ci fosse un regime totalitario che ci manovra come burattini pianificando ogni nostra azione vorremmo davvero che qualcuno ci informasse di ciò?
E se ci fosse data la possibilità di mettere fine alla fame nel mondo, alle guerre, alle malattie saremmo disposti a sacrificare ogni emozione e sentimento in cambio del progresso evolutivo?
Il destino dell'umanità in mano a chi ha avuto la forza di cambiarlo rinunciando alla sua di umanità, anzi a quella di tutti.

"Ma la gente non è mai sola al giorno d'oggi(...)noi facciamo sì che gli uomini detestino la solitudine e disponiamo la loro vita in tal modo che sia loro quasi impossibile conoscerla mai"

4.5 ⭐️

Wow. Wow. Se “Il mondo nuovo” mi è piaciuto, “Ritorno al mondo nuovo” raggiunge un altro livello. Vi consiglio tantissimo di leggerli entrambi, si completano davvero bene.

IL MONDO NUOVO: “Il mondo nuovo” è un distopico, uscito nel 1931, che ci parla di una società futura decisamente diversa dalla nostra. Se dico “distopia” sicuramente vi verranno in mente governi opprimenti, controllo 24/7, un’atmosfera di paura, violenza e repressione. Invece, questo “mondo nuovo” controlla la popolazione non con il dolore o il terrore, ma bensì tramite il piacere. Tutti hanno quello che desiderano, subito. Le persone nascono in laboratorio, sono programmate e condizionate fin da piccolissime. Ognuno ha un ruolo ben preciso, ci sono diverse caste, ma ognuno è perfettamente soddisfatto del proprio posto nella società (appunto perché sono stati condizionati in questo modo). L’individualità non esiste più, così come il tempo libero, passato magari a riflettere. C’è un costante bisogno di stare con gli altri, di giocare, ballare, e...

Nice world building, very inventive for the time that this was written in. I do wish we would have seen more of a protagonist, and what happened to Bernard and Lenina at the end, but what was there was pretty satisfactory.
(As for the Brave New World Revisited part, I must admit that I glossed over most of it because 1) it’s rather philosophical/theoretical, and 2) I’m tired.)

Il primo letto quest’anno e anche il primo distopico dopo un po’ di assenza dal genere. Una lettura travagliata in un periodo travagliato. Arrivo con un bagaglio di altri libri del genere letti e con ormai anche un po’ di aspettative. Un modo diverso di raccontare alcune cose, che per tutta la sua stesura mi ha lasciato un senso di incompletezza. Tante idee interessanti a cui mancava sempre quel qualcosa per essere memorabili.
L’abbandono di valori e principi a favore del benessere fittizio dell’uomo, ma anche a che prezzo? La perdita stessa dell’essere uomo. La creazione del mondo utopico perfetto, senza malattie, senza guerre, ma senza la forza che valorizza l’essere umano, ciò che lo distingue, finzione e non sentimenti veri, false illusioni, in mondo voluto da qualcuno e non da tutti, dove si è persa le debolezze delle persone che nel loro lo rendono tanto unico e diverso l’uno dagli altri.

Brave New World is a classic in dystopian fiction. It shows the world circa 700 AF (After Ford). The world is seemingly ruled by one central authority, which can be looked at in two ways. In one way, the central authority is the Alphas, individuals raised to be the intellectuals and social organizers who keep society running peacefully and efficiently. Part of the efficiency managing the production of all classes of people--Alphas, Betas, Gammas, etc. They are grown in special "Hatchery and Conditioning Centres." Every person is conceived in a test tube. The lower classes's eggs are split as many times as possible (called "Bokanovsky's Process") typically resulting in 96 identical people. They all do the same grunt work, so why have them different? All these people are carefully conditioned as they grow to accept their state in life. The main condition is through "hypnopaedia," where a speaker is put under each child's pillow at night and a constant stream of jingoistic ideas are implanted in their minds. As adults, they are kept in line with "soma," a drug that puts the users in an ecstatic state, and with promiscuity, so people are constantly trying to sleep with each other and no one minds. Marriage has been abolished and part of the youthful conditioning is to take contraceptives regularly. The very idea of motherhood or fatherhood is offensive and embarrassing.

In a second, subtler way, the central authority is science. Science rules the development of new people, what class they are put into, how they develop, and what they do as adults. The society is carefully managed so everyone is happy and contented in their state in life. The main risk is with the Alphas, who are smart enough to think other ways of life might be possible if they can escape the distractions.

Enter Bernard, a physically scrawny Alpha who works for the propaganda machine but isn't too happy in life. He can't get the girls he wants and rumors float around that he was accidentally given some of the conditioning for a lower class during his youth. Since he's in the top tier of society, he can go on vacations. One destination is an Indian reservation in New Mexico, where people still live according to the old ways. People from the Brave New World go there like they are going on safari, to see wild life in its natural habitat. Bernard gets a girl to go with him. She is horrified by what she sees (it's all dirty and they practice religion and they have children the shocking old fashioned way!) but he is fascinated, especially when he discovers a woman who had been abandoned by one of his bosses. She's had a child by the boss, named the child John, and raised him on the reservation. John has some very different ideas about life and society because of his upbringing and the only book he's ever had--The Complete Works of Shakespeare (which is of course banned in the "civilized" world). Bernard brings John and his mother back to civilization to humiliate the boss and become a celebrity. Things don't work out too well for anyone.

The story is very interesting if very bleak. The scientifically-run society is fascinating and horrifying at the same time. The natural family is completely destroyed and all substantive bonds between people are so weakened that it is easy for the powers that be to run things smoothly and efficiently. The substitutes provided (soma and sex) stifle everyone's imaginations and creativity. Science isn't about discovering new things but about maintaining the status quo as much as possible. Many ideas are explored and satirized in the novel.

Brave New World Revisited was written by Huxley twenty-seven years later and is a philosophical and scientific exposition on the ideas in the novel. Huxley goes through the various predictions he has made and is quite discouraged to see that things are moving much more quickly towards a real Brave New World than he thought back in 1931. His analysis is thought-provoking but it's fairly clear that his pessimistic predictions haven't turned out true yet. The essay isn't as good as the novel but it is still worth reading. I'll probably reread the novel but not the essay.

4.5 stars for the novel, 3.5 for the essay.

La frase attribuita al padre del comportamentismo John Watson riassume bene il principio su cui si basa Il mondo nuovo: "Datemi una dozzina di bambini normali, ben fatti, e un ambiente opportuno per allevarli e vi garantisco di prenderne qualcuno a caso e di farlo diventare qualsiasi tipo di specialista, che io volessi selezionare: dottore, avvocato, artista, commerciante e perfino accattone e ladro, indipendentemente dalle sue attitudini, simpatie, tendenze, capacità, vocazioni". Huxley, come altri autori distopici, attinge a idee di scienziati e filosofi del suo tempo, richiamandoli sia esplicitamente sia velatamente, ad esempio attraverso i nomi dei personaggi (impossibile leggere "Lenina" senza pensare ad un Lenin con la parrucca, per quanto il romanzo la descriva come attraente e "pneumatica").
Tuttavia, la densità di riferimenti esterni, a mio parere, penalizza la trama. Huxley si concentra sulla critica sociale ma lascia i personaggi poco sviluppati: Lenina stessa sparisce quasi del tutto nell'arco finale del libro, nonostante la sua iniziale centralità. I personaggi sembrano più strumenti per inoculare il messaggio dell’autore che figure credibili, tanto che alcune situazioni risultano forzate (come John, che comprende la prosa e il simbolismo di Shakespeare anche se nessuno ha gli strumenti per comprendere un libro del genere, né i 'selvaggi' del villaggio in cui è cresciuto, né i 'moderni' londinesi, a cui è vietato avere conoscenze sul passato).
Ovviamente, le previsioni di Huxley vanno contestualizzate alla sua epoca, e lui stesso le ha riviste in Ritorno al mondo nuovo, scritto 27 anni dopo. Interessante notare anche il suo velato fastidio per il successo di 1984!

In definitiva, avrei dato 5 stelle al libro se i personaggi e le loro vicende fossero stati approfonditi meglio. Ma il suo obiettivo era un altro: costruire un mondo distopico credibile, e in questo riesce benissimo.

Ora non mi resta che leggere Noi di Zamyatin e Piano meccanico di Vonnegut per completare la “trilogia del plagio distopico” :)

What I like most about Brave New World is that it centers on the disease of human passivity as it's controlled by the higher-ups in society. With 1984 there is the possibility for consciousness of the inherent evil of the subversive intolerance of the government, and therefore the possibility for revolution. If only the people would realize their situation! If only the proles could unite against totalitarian tyranny!

With Huxley's fable, however, this consciousness is completely undermined through the fulfillment of the base drives of the majority. There is no reason to rebel, and society can change only through an impossible systematic negation of all the techniques espoused that clamor to fulfill these drives. Anyone who comes to realize the true state of affairs isn't filled with a Herculean wish to revamp it, but can only sigh to himself while secretly saying, "ah, that's just society getting what it wants," and make plans for voluntary exile. This is the cynicism of Huxley given literary flesh. He echoes the Dostoevskian lament through the Grand Inquisitor (alluded to in Brave New World Revisited) that human beings want to be taken care of and provided for, not free. Freedom is too hard, it takes work, and to be human is to take the easy way out.

The grandeur of Huxley is that he wasn't just a novelist, as seems to be the case with creative writers for the last fifty years -- Walker Percy, Anthony Burgess, and a handful of others exempt. "Brave New World Revisited" attests to this fact, as well as other minor philosophical gems, like "The Perennial Philosophy", where he stretches to mysticism, and "The Doors of Perception", where he journals the psychedelic flavor of mescaline. His ruminations are perfectly commensurate with our state today -- where education is in decline, where neohedonism is the game, where it's all about money and fulfillment of drives over truth, etc. --, and the points that shine the most are on propaganda and, well, the distractability of human beings:

"In regard to propaganda the early advocates of universal literacy and a free press envisaged only two possibilities: the propaganda might be true, or it might be false. They did not foresee what in fact has happened, above all in our Western capitalist democracies -- the development of a vast mass communications industry, concerned in the main neither with the true nor the false, but with the unreal, the more or less totally irrelevant. In a word, they failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions."

This is the basis of society in Brave New World, and scientific and technological advances (eugenics, hypnopaedia, classical conditioning) are a means to this end. Huxley saw, like Chomsky after him, that you don't need to bludgeon the population in order to coerce it to your preferences. Rather, you manipulate minds. Things are less messy this way.