review by andreas p.

A REVIEW OF:

Brave New World (1932) by Aldous Huxley

“'O brave new world,' […] 'O brave new world that has such people in it. Let's start at once.'"
(p. 120, ll. 5-6)

Did you ever imagine a picture of a perfect world? And did you also realize that even the most perfect imagination will not make everyone happy?

Aldous Huxley imagined such a picture of a “perfect” world: The 'Brave New World' is set some hundred years after our time. Observed by ten world controllers, that set the measures for the World State, all of the citizens follow the World State's principles, which are: COMMUNITY, IDENTITY, STABILITY. The people in the world are genetically modified, divided into five certain castes and then get conditioned according to the things the world controllers want them to do later on.

A horrible vision! Isn't it?

Turn the coin: The people get everything to be happy with their life. Sex, drugs, you can have whatever you want in case of not getting unsatisfied with your existence in the World State. This is the thing they get for the price that they pay.
You want to have non-emotional and non-binding sex? No problem, just take your favour. It is said:“Everyone belongs to everyone else” (p. 40, l. 3).
You want to take a holiday from workaday life? No problem, just take your soma. This stuff is kind of the unique drug of the 'Brave New World'. Whenever you seem to get unsatisfied or confused, you just take your soma. It helps you to get distracted if you feel so. “You do look glum! What you need is a gramme of soma” (p. 52, l. 31). The soma is one very important instrument to keep the stability of the World State.
Under the aim of the total satisfaction of desires goes also a thing called Orgy-Porgy. Synthetic music, taking soma, singing with one voice. And at the end, they are all having sex with each other.

You must have easily recognized that we are dealing here with a system of totalitarianism, a system where everything is controlled elaborately.

But what happens if the plan doesn't work out properly? What happens if there is one man who breaks ranks? This is the story of John, the Savage. The story of a man, grown up in the Savage Reservation, educated by a women who actually got conditioned in the World State. May a man like him manage to live in the World State? How will two absolutely different philosophies develop if they clash against each other? This is the story of the 'Brave New World'!

Be curious!!

Yet, this image is fiction. Yet, this image is utopian. But who knows, if we look on our world, many aspects of the 'Brave New World' already became reality. Just take the aspect of SEXUALITY. There have so many changes in the past times. We are already getting very close to the dystopia describes in his novel 'Brave New World'. You are meant to get your satisfaction in our world. There are things like pornography and prostitution; serious relationships lose their meaning more and more. In case to name another transmission from the novel to our time now, the importance of the MEDIA. We are influenced in a very intense way, one could also say: We are the conditioned.

In order to come to a conclusion, I think the novel 'Brave New World' is absolutely worth reading, it implies several important topics with current significance. Huxley convinces with his objective, past tense-written piece of work. It takes you really into the story. 'Brave New World', as a masterpiece of utopian literature, will take you into an excursion of a yet fictional world with a deep story behind it. A story, that raises some serious questions, questions that concern your daily life. So don't miss reading it!

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