This review was written by Sarah Tang of Poolesville High School.
Brave New World, a futuristic dystopian novel published by Aldous Huxley in 1932, has become one of the most influential yet controversial pieces of literature in the world. Banned on its release by Ireland and Australia in 1932, Brave New World has also made its way to the #3 on the American Library Association’s list of most challenged books of 2010. Furthermore, multiple states have censored the book on several accounts. However, the calls for restriction on this book by schools are justified; there are certain scenes in Brave New World which touch on vulgar content. But the bans from Ireland and Australia cite the book for being anti-religion and anti-family, which are certainly present, however, not actively promoted in the novel. Instead, this novel is commonly seen as a possible warning to future society.
“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.” -Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
Huxley’s purpose for writing the novel was simply based on his own fears for the future ruling structure, mainly from the ruling class growing too powerful, and the saying “be careful what you wish for.” Brave New World is set in an extremely advanced technological society known as the World State, where all freedom appears to have been stripped in exchange for infinite human desires. If a perfect world meant everyone living in the world could be happy at all times, then the World State would be this perfect world. A lack of freedom, engineered society, and synthetic happiness through drugs‒ what perfection!
The novel opens with a glimpse into the world from the perspective of a person in power giving a tour to school children about how infants are born in a place known as the Hatchery. Almost immediately, what would be considered unthinkable horrors in our world, are depicted in the novel as normal as a school trip to the aquarium for us; rows and rows of incubators with identical babies, being engineered with suspicious substances and chemicals to develop certain traits in them. As the novel progresses, more concerning details come to light, such as electric shocking babies, the lack of human morality and the casual use of hallucination drugs, all of which are perceived as ordinary in this world.
Brave New World mainly takes readers on a journey through power-wielding characters in a dystopian society, starting with the central character, Bernard Marx, along with an all-knowing narrator. In this ideal world, people are separated by a caste system consisting of Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons. These classes are created through genetic engineering; the lower the class, the dumber and uglier they are. Members of each class also have to wear a specific color. This allows the upper classes to look down upon lower classes and create a form of societal balance. However, in the end, these classes only exist to create balance. Each class has access to infinite happiness anyway through soma, a happiness drug which creates pleasant hallucinations and the feeling of timelessness. Whenever a citizen feels negative emotions, they take soma to get rid of this feeling. Or rather, a more appropriate term, distract them from the negativity.
“A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude.” -Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
Each character in Brave New World is crafted wisely and represents parts of humanity in some way. Bernard Marx, the central character in the novel, is considered an outcast because of his physical deformations and odd thinking process. He represents the precarious, distrustful nature of humans. Marx is one of the few characters who appear to still have a bit of humanity left in him, due to his emotions of lust, and how he challenges the ideas of the World.
Similar to Marx, Lenina Crowne, a vaccination worker of the World State, retains the human traits of and desire, but at a much higher, irrational level. Lenina’s behavior is also perceived as irrational; humanlike, by defying societal norms such as exclusively dating one person. While Marx keeps all of his emotions to himself, Lenina outwardly attempts to curb her emotions through soma, a happiness drug, machines which give her instantaneous joy, and shows her lust for other men in the novel. In particular, she was attracted to Marx, however, she was unable to properly converse with him since her mind was overcome by lust and unable to relate to him any other way. Lenina represents how desire can end up breaking someone mentally and affect their world.
The third most well-known character is John, who does not grow up in the World State, but rather, outside of it on a Savage Reservation. John represents humans’ judgemental natures and the belief that their point of view is right. Although he is not introduced in the beginning, John ends up becoming the central character later in the novel to represent the clash between contrasting human ideas, and ultimately how this society, despite the supposed elimination of human grief, is a dystopia.
However, the enjoyment of Brave New World is also the reason for its downfall. Those who have not been acquainted with other utopian, dystopian, satirical, or futuristic novels such as The Giver by Lois Lowry, Animal Farm by George Orwell, Lord of the Flies by William Golding, or Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, may find themselves in a maze while reading Brave New World. To those who are familiar with or have an interest in similar novels, Brave New World’s message takes center stage, while those with little interest typically will find the book meaningless, impossible and a waste of time. The language used in the novel is not easily understood or forgiving, while the pacing is rather slow and detail-oriented. As a result, Brave New World is often underappreciated for how well-written it is. Simply put, this book is a hit or miss in terms of enjoyment, due to the complex nature of its topic.
“That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach.” -Aldous Huxley, Collected Essays
For a book published in the 1930s, where this form of society wouldn’t even be a thought in the world, it still remains relevant in the present day. The complexity of the society is often dismissed as impossible and fictional, rather than revered for its realistic idea of a possible future society. Being a novel in high school curriculums, teenagers often feel forced to read these novels, and as a result, dismiss it as nothing but a crazy sci-fi story. A ban on this novel for being anti-religion and anti-family doesn’t help its case either, as its contents are then minimized as worthless fiction. The immense amount of detail and thought put into this work is worth the time to fully understand the novel, its message, and relation to society.
In my ninth grade English class, Brave New World was a required novel. We had no other choices, unlike some curriculums, where you could choose the novel you read. I felt the frustration of struggling to make sense of the language. I dreaded reading this novel - ask any one of my friends. They’ll tell you that I constantly complained about how Huxley didn’t have to rename every object, like the happiness drug could have just been named “dopamine” instead of “soma,” and me screaming “What is going on in this novel?!”
But there were reasons for these complexities, and I slowly began to understand them. Having read and enjoyed Animal Farm in eighth grade because of its creative satirical elements, I realized how much Brave New World had slowly begun to feed into the side of me that craves dark, speculative fiction, I saw the way our society could become similar the book’s, and it would be our society’s for wanting nothing but happiness; resulting in demanding the government for selfish human desires, which in turn, allows the government to slowly claim more power in the name of “what the people want.”
Although the novel was incredibly slow, which frankly, tested my patience, my growing understanding of the novel allowed me to continue, which was totally worth it. The later interactions with another society in the same world known as the Savage Reservation threw on more clever interactions and perspectives in this futuristic society.
This book is totally worth the read if you think in-depth about books, even though it is a little painful to immerse yourself into. I loved this novel not just because of its underlying message, but also with how cleverly crafted it was. Every little detail ended up being significant to the novel, and how we could be headed towards this society. Seriously though, it’s so difficult to read at first but literally if you can stick through it, the details will amaze you. And the second half of the book brings real conflict, which throws you for a spin, and well, more perspectives! It’s super cool for me trying to see through everyone’s perspectives.
“The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human.” -Aldous Huxley,
Now what does a book about a dystopian society have to offer to our present society? Brave New World is simply a glimpse into a future that we may be speeding towards; a society where everyone is the same, with every technology to cure any form of negative human emotion, and a lack of free-thinking. Maybe that’s not possible at the moment, but this novel serves as a fair warning to not participate in excessive desire. Furthermore, especially in the current political climate of the United States, our freedoms appear to be slowly diminishing day by day, starting with the ban on popular social media apps. Brave New World may just be an extreme warning, but who knows what the world will hold in the future with all these technological advances… right?
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