Aldous Huxley

Huxley's classic prophetic novel describes the socialized horrors of a futuristic utopia devoid of individual freedom

Brave New World

lucy p

But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I Want freedom, want goodness. I want sin, "In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy." “AII right then," said the Savage defiantly, “I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

Well, he manifests himself as an absence; as though he weren't there at all."

Margaret Atwood

morgan

We don't. We prefer to do things comfortably.

But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.

In fact, you're claiming the right to be unhappy.

All right then. I'm claiming the right to be unhappy.

Not to mention the right to grow old and ugly and impotent; the right to have syphilis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to be lousy; the right to live in constant apprehension of what may happen tomorrow; the right to catch typhoid; the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind.

What's the point of truth or beauty or knowledge when the anthrax bombs are popping all around you? That was when science first began to be controlled--after the Nine Years' War. People were ready to have even their appetites controlled then. Anything for a quiet life. We've gone on controlling ever since. It hasn't been very good for truth, of course. But it's been very good for happiness. One can't have something for nothing. Happiness has to be paid for. You're paying for it, Mr. Watson--paying because you happen to be too much interested in beauty. I was too much interested in truth; I paid too.

Some of Lenina's quotes I liked, for no articulable reason

"Why should you think it necessary..." Lenina began, but left the sentence unfinished.

"Then why on earth didn't you say so?" [...] "If I didn't like you so much, I'd be furious with you."

No, it won't do. We need some other kind of madness and violence. But what? What? Where can one find it? I don't know. I don't know.

His heart seemed to have disappeared and left a hole. He was empty. Empty, and cold, and rather sick, and giddy. He leaned against the wall to steady himself. Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous...Like drums, like the men singing for the corn, like magic, the words repeated and repeated themselves in his head. From being cold he was suddenly hot. His cheeks burnt with the rush of blood, the room swam and darkened before his eyes. He ground his teeth. "I'll kill him, I'll kill him, I'll kill him," he kept saying. And suddenly there were more words.

When he is drunk asleep, or in his rage Or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed ....

Huxley's story shows a futuristic World State where all emotion, love, art, and human individuality have been replaced by social stability. An ominous warning to the world's population, this literary classic is a must-read.

tara  (she/her)

van de Pythia, de priesteres van Apollo, luidde: 'Niemand is wijzer dan Socrates. Aanvankelijk wist Socrates zich met deze uitspraak geen raad. Enerzijds moest het orakel wel waar zijn, want het was afkomstig van een god. Anderzijds was Socrates ervan overtuigd dat hij geen wijs man was. Om te achterhalen wat de god met de uitspraak eigenlijk bedoelde, ging hij naar mensen in Athene, die voor geleerd en kundig doorgingen, zoals politici en dichters en voelde hen aan de tand. Maar steeds bleek, dat zij meenden iets te weten, maar in feite niets wisten. Tenslotte wendde Socrates zich tot de handarbeiders. Zij kwamen er nog het beste af. Zij beschikten namelijk wel over een zekere vakbekwaamheid, maar leden aan het euvel, dat zij op grond van hun kennis dachten ook andere dingen te weten. Na dit onderzoek moest Socrates concluderen, dat het orakel gelijk had. Zijn wijsheid bestaat er in, dat hij weet dat hij ten aanzien van kennis niets voorstelt, terwijl anderen ervan overtuigd zijn iets te weten, ook al weten zij niets. Hij wil dit inzicht, dat het weten van de mens zo goed als niets betekent, onder de mensen uitdragen, zowel onder burgers als vreemdelingen.

Socrates nam weinig deel aan het openbare en politieke leven van zijn stad. Hij had andere, in zijn ogen belangrijkere dingen te doen. In de Apologia van Plato, de redevoering die Socrates volgens Plato ten overstaan van de jury heeft gehouden om zichzelf te verdedigen, vertelt Socrates welke gebeurtenis zo'n beslissende invloed op zijn leven heeft gehad. Een nogal fanatieke aanhanger van Socrates vroeg eens het orakel van Delphi of er iemand wijzer was dan Socrates. Het antwoord

The astonishing novel Brave New World, originally published in 1932, presents Aldous Huxley's vision of the future -- of a world utterly transformed. Through the most efficient scientific and psychological engineering, people are genetically designed to be passive and therefore consistently useful to the ruling class. This powerful work of speculative fiction sheds a blazing critical light on the present and is considered to be Huxley's most enduring masterpiece. Following Brave New World is the nonfiction work Brave New World Revisited, first published in 1958. It is a fascinating work in which Huxley uses his tremendous knowledge of human relations to compare the modern-day world with the prophetic fantasy envisioned in Brave New World, including threats to humanity, such as overpopulation, propaganda, and chemical persuasion.

Brave New World and Brave New World Revisited

A love of nature keeps no factories busy. It was decided to abolish the love of nature, at any rate among the lower classes; to abolish the love of nature, but not the tendency to consume transport.

Le meilleur des mondes

Victoria 

Widely regarded as one of the great classic examples of dystopian fiction (along with Orwell’s 1984), Brave New World is a chilling tale of a world where humanity has given up love, art, freedom, and even choice, all in the name of stability and happiness. This stability is rocked when the long-lost son of one of their highest caste is found living on a savage reservation. Devoid of the careful subliminal education that all people normally receive, the savage stands as a contradiction to everything that society values. His presence in their midst forces others to question these same values, and threatens to change their lives forever. Penguin Random House Canada is proud to bring you classic works of literature in e-book form, with the highest quality production values. Find more today and rediscover books you never knew you loved.

Elina Berzina

Patrick Book

Aldous Huxley's profoundly important classic of world literature, Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order—all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine” (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. 

Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as a thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New World likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites. 

Vince Hilahan

brave new world revisited included after the book reeled back in all my interest after reading it 

W copy tbh

lala

Finished this book last month but haven’t gotten around the chance to write the review. For a book from the 1930s it explores topic that are still relevant to this day. Reading this reminds me of Divergent or Hunger Games where people are split into different categories depending on their strong suits. I’d like to say that this is the Ur-dystopian social science fiction novel. What’s more interesting for me is the use of genetic engineering to guarantee that everyone in the society has a function that benefits the other; they are then conditioned to never regret their positions in society. Except for Bernard Marx, who find life within the stability in the society boring. He refuse to take the recreational drug, soma, which can make all your troubles go away in a soma vacation. We then see how his story unfolds. The peak of the novel is where Marx brings two savages or people who are not conditioned to the society from the Savage Reservation. Overall i think it was a pretty interesting read, but not one that I particularly enjoy very much. I think the message the book is trying to say is too on-the-nose. But if you like dystopian novels maybe this is your cup of tea.

Huxley's classic prophetic novel describes the socialized horrors of a futuristic utopia devoid of individual freedom.

Reiza H

Would you rather have cheap but fast entertainment that gives you instant joy, or some hard process but gives your life meaning?

In a world where there's no sadness and suffering, consumed by wonder drugs, instant gratification, physical engineering and sexual entertainments where there's no need to be physically and emotionally attached to someone else, could there be a meaning of life in a world like that? 

This book obviously goes deeper than that. However, for me, the main theme of the book is about having the meaning of life. In a life scored simply by effectivity and efficiency, how does someone gets a genuine and real meaning of their life? 

Of course, this book does not offer a solution, it offers a glimpse of an alternative, utopian world where everybody belongs to everyone else, where everybody could be happy instantly. It asks you a question, to make you think and reflects: It does sound like a weird, creepy world to live in. 

Where is God? Where is religion? If there aren't one, could we choose to be ignorant and do whatever we want? After all, people in this utopian world doesn't even bother to find out. They only care about stability, about their hunger for more happiness, about their needs, about their instant satisfaction. They don't care to give life meaning to themselves.

What is freedom after all? Is freedom means to do whatever we want? Or it is to do something that we found really necessary to fulfil our needs, dreams, and hopes? Of course in this world, freedom means claiming the right to be unhappy, and what a serious statement is that.

'But I like the inconveniences.' 
'We don't,' said the Controller. 'We prefer to do things comfortably.'

What will you choose?

Hanna Rybchynska

I liked this book! I am a big fan of science fiction and this one is a classic. It has an amazing world development however the story isn't really long nor special.

In this world, the industrial revolution took a big step into human evolution, also technology is more important than emotions and reproduction. Humans are all made artificially and society gives them a classification accordingly to their job status. 

This book has a lot of interesting ethical questions and shows a world really similar to ours with some twists.

a novel

Brave new world

Get past the “gleep-glorp” sci-fi technobabble and there is some interesting bits and pieces. Interesting meditations on fake friends and what could be considered prescient stuff about reality tv celebrity (prodding mentally unwell people to be entertained by their reaction which only makes more people want to prod them which only further disregulates them), but as dystopian fiction it stinks. Authors getting twisted out of shape by imagining a world where people would rather watch tv or movies than read books always makes for lousy books. The greatest book of all time (Don Quixote) is about how books suck and people who take them seriously are deranged nut jobs, ruminate on that Aldous!

Dan Dugan

(Minor spoilers) 

This book is about two things: individuality and civilisation.

The characters are all caricatures of what it means to possess social individuality. In broader terms, to be different to those around you. 

Bernard is different because he’s on the bottom rung of his caste, a rung that no one knew existed until he showed up. He is rejected because his individualised traits do not cohere with the rest of the caste that a part of. 

Helmholtz’s difference is his superiority, an ubermensch amongst the elite. He’s above everyone else. For Helmholtz, success is trivial, women are trivial, life is trivial; his place in society means little to him and so he has become aloof, rejecting comformity to his caste in favour of radical misbehaviour. 

John is different because he has no caste at all. He’s and outsider to almost everyone’s social circle, a true pariah. He’s too white and civilised to be an Indian yet too emotional and unstable to be considered civilian. That same civilisation then took his mother from him, poisoned his moral purity and, in the end, refused to let him escape its grasp. 

Lenina, in fact, has no individuality at all. She is the perfect Alpha - beautiful, brainless, adamant in her pursuit of orthodoxy. Her suffering arises when John forces individuality upon her through his exclusive infatuation of her – and then rejects her scripted advances, undermining the stability upon which her conditioning rests. It is through Lenina that we glimpse the dire consequence of removing individuality in favour of stability, pruning the autoimmunity that individuality gives. 

Mustapha Mond parenthetically tells us that difference is suffering. Ironically, Mond is perhaps the most individualistic person in the book, and paradoxically its happiest. Why? Because Mond isn’t actually different; because he is his own caste, his own comparison, his own society. He reads what he likes, dictates what he likes, declares his own morality – by his own admittance, he makes the rules. In a sense, he is beyond society. 

The illustration Aldous Huxley has painted for us is one of status anxiety, a critical feature of our modern world. It is what drives consumerism. It is what makes us jealous and angry at the success of others, and ashamed of our own failures. But what is failure without a comparison to success? Alain de Botton’s  Status Anxiety deals with this topic better than I ever could. 

In 1930, Aldous Huxley would have been aware of the rise of communism and the future it could promise. This book is in many ways a critique of that communism. The Brave New World is pointedly similar to how many people at the time described the ultimate outcome of successful communism – both the detractors and pundits; utopia and dystopia. Everything is easy, everyone is happy; to each what they need, with needs regulated closely. What Huxley truly felt about communism is best illustrated in the Cyprus experiment, perhaps. 

Is this book really dystopian, or is it utopian? What would Bentham have to say about the satisfied Alpha-Socrates, alongside the satisfied Gamma-Pigs? 

In 2019, a lot of the world that Huxley envisioned seems right around the corner. Designer babies, powerful escapist drugs made ubiquitous, paternalistic governments, insatiable consumerism…the list goes on. But the real lesson on offer in this book has been seemingly ignored: do we really want a world where individualism and its instability, its sturm-und-drang and emotional labour, has been replaced with happiness, easiness, and perhaps most jarringly of all, equality?

The book is a classic, and it is a great book. Helps you understand how world runs. The only thing that I didn't like about the book is that during a chapter (especially in the early chapters) context switches happen a lot which can be hard to follow if you're not super focused. 

Khalid B

jack

thought this would be another classic in the same vein as Fahrenheit that i would be relatively disappointed with. luckily that was not the case at all. this kicks soooo much ass, i’m glad i finally got to full this gap in my Essential Reading

Shalini Basu

meh. creative concept but took me a while

Farah Aisha Shabrina

it’s so eerie how the book blatantly reflects the irony of today’s society.. with a little imaginary yet familiar (to modern reality) twist, of course

y✦

✦ deciding ur dystopia would be a sad-free zone ft. magic pills is one way to hellscape
✦ 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘢 sounds like the cure to all my problems

couldn't finish 1984 (and we kinda... lost my interest) last time i tried but i breezed through this. maybe that says something. or maybe it's covid. i don't know. for some reason i really like lenina's lines??? despite them not being anything actually Romantic or Beautiful in or out of context. cool character. most of them are. 

i like it when the "right" answer isn't immediately obvious. to me it feels like huxley isn't necessarily forcing his opinion upon the reader. i like that. i don't think it should be an easy choice.

as a note im in a scifi (?) phase because i recently played i was a teenage exocolonist. tangent my beloved. it is probably time to reread time war... if anyone has any reccs for sufferers of exocolonist hmu.... 

couldn't finish 1984 (and we kinda... lost my interest) last time i tried but i breezed through this. maybe that says something. or maybe it's covid. i don't know. for some reason i really like lenina's lines??? despite them not being anything actually Romantic or Beautiful in or out of context. cool character. most of them are. 

i like it when the "right" answer isn't immediately obvious. to me it feels like huxley isn't necessarily forcing his opinion upon the reader. i like that. i don't think it should be an easy choice.

as a note im in a scifi (?) phase because i recently played i was a teenage exocolonist. tangent my beloved. it is probably time to reread time war... if anyone has any reccs for sufferers of exocolonist hmu.... 

Aamna

Lila R E

An almost polar opposite to 1984 while remaining an (arguably) dystopian nightmare.
The heavy influence of shakespear and Huxley's experience of drugs shows.

Jaden Nelson

This almost feels like one of those books that I can’t put a star rating on—not because I can’t decide where it falls but because I don’t think it can be rated/given a “star rating” I have so many thoughts and opinions on this book and I found so much meaning from it, but surprisingly, I don’t have much I want to say in this review. I marked up/slightly annotated my copy, so that sort of serves as a review from me, I guess. I can 99% see myself rereading this many times over and fining something new every time. For anyone interested in reading this book, try not to let the hype get to you because to be honest, the book is best read with no preconceptions, just an open mind and an open schedule to devour this story. (view spoiler)[ Also, I kind of HATE and love the ending—reminds me of Steinbeck a lot and many good books seem to have endings like this (sort of open-ended or (for lack of better words) “don’t give you what you want/expected” endings)  (hide spoiler)] Really glad I read this. P.S. My used copy I bought of this book was definitely used because there were a span of 30 pages or so in the middle of the book that had crappy underlining and highlighting that looked like some 6 year old had done it. This was much to my annoyance, but one a page in the middle of the book, there was a confusing but pretty cool ink doodle about something that was happening in the book. Seeing it actually made me like the crappy underlining, crappy highlighting, and even the scribbled spiral on the front cover because it made to book feel more like something that was passed on to me from someone else who was reading the same story I was reading, kind of like two people on opposite sides of the world admiring the same moon. Okay sorry, too deep. It’s a fun and interesting book, a classic that is timeless in that it is become increasingly relevant even as the story gets older and older...

Un mundo feliz / Brave New World

Elliot

Mae Erceg

I loved this but read this expecting satire and not taking it too literally. It’s a very complex futuristic, dystopian novel and the plot and characters were super interesting. The ending was such a slap in the face and I loved it. I can see why many people wouldn’t like it but I enjoyed it. 5/5 stars would recommend for lovers of Orwell as long as you’re not comparing the two.

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i think upon rereading i liked this book a little less? i dunno. i still really like it, but i also think i’d have liked to be- more? thoughts.

Dhruv Chopra

interesting thought experiment — what if we could ensure infinite and complete happiness? according to huxley, working towards a mission even if it comes with blood, sweat, and tears is integral for a fulfilled life. a bit dragged out at times, though 

Xin Ma

Michael Springer

This book strikes me as somewhat overrated. I was totally disappointed by the end.

Brave New World

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