Brave New World & Brave New World Revisited

A travelogue through an imagined future dys-/u-topia.

From what we are told in the story there was a long war that led to a strong desire to reform everything about society and eliminate every possible source of disruption and discomfort. Thus there is no more parenthood; people are bred in specific tiers (alpha through gamma) to participate in society at various levels and are trained to do specific kinds of work. They are given drugs to make them feel happy and entertainment to satisfy them. Science is exalted, and Ford is apparently the materialist god of these people; but even then all in moderation, and knowledge is heavily controlled.

We meet certain individuals who happen to go on a trip to see some "savages" in New Mexico, USA. show more While there they come upon a woman who had lived among them but had been abandoned; in the meantime, she has given birth to a son, named John, also known as "the Savage." Permission is granted to bring them back to London and to the "civilized" world. He is paraded around; he is desired; he ends up having a long discourse with the head honcho which ultimately is really the point of the book: a frank discussion of why knowledge, literature, etc. has been so circumscribed, and what happens when security is always chosen over autonomy. The System is maintained; the Savage eventually runs off and becomes a greater spectacle. He ends himself in a fit of violence while those watching him mimic the violence.

If you're expecting a great story, you will find this book disappointing: the narrative isn't great. The text screams the late 1920s and early 1930s: cynical and despondent as after 1918, yet before the horrors of the mid-1930s and afterward, set in a bourgeoisie world in which Marxism remained an acceptable liberal fantasy.

But the reason for the perseverance of the work is certainly valid: a secure utopia is really an individual dystopia. One can compare and contrast Huxley and Orwell, and one will likely realize that we're already realizing a synthesized version. So come and read for the depressing legitimacy of the fictive endeavor, but not because the story is that great. show less

Novel: I first read the novel in high school and liked it then. On a second reading as a 40something, it has a certain piquancy. Of course our society is sex-obsessed, drug-obsessed, entertainment-obsessed, and supremely shallow. We are on the verge of designer babies, a la Huxley. We are slowly moving to such a society in a Fabian slowness. A lot of the book is odd, of course, 1930s technology and obsessions morphed into the future. We can't imagine a future now without computers and DNA and other such advances, and to not see them here lends an art-deco steampunkishness to the technology and story. But, the story still sparkles. The plight of the "Savage" still is ours. A good book that should always be read as part of the trilogy of show more Fahrenheit 451, 1984, and Brave New World.

Foreword by Christopher Hitchens: I always liked the Hitch. The foreword is interesting, though he poo-poos the Revisited section a bit too off-handedly.

Brave New World Revisited: A standalone work later added to printings of the novel. Non-fiction, Huxley tries to "justify" and explain his novel, especially how it is superior to 1984, a work which came out after his but caught fire as well. Huxley explains the workings of his dystopian state and its connection to the real world. Some interesting insights from circa 1950, but, wholly unnecessary to enjoying the novel. Not as inconsequential as Hitchens think, it makes one worry about our current society and our current behemoth/leviathan of a government. show less

Necessario come un pugno nello stomaco

C'è chi si sveglia e chi dorme tutta la vita. A volte il risveglio è un'emozione forte, uno scherzo del destino, l'incontro con una persona, qualcosa che finisce, uno sguardo innocente irrimediabilmente perduto. "Il mondo nuovo" è tutto questo e molto di più. C'è stato un tempo in cui era profetico. Oggi è esattamente lo sguardo presente sul mondo, quello che siamo diventati, quello che non abbiamo saputo evitare. Perchè non siamo inermi. E finiamola di raccontarci questa balla. Da imporre nei programmi scolatici, altro che Manzoni (a costo di essere impopolare!). Se potete, procuratevi la versione che include il saggio dell'autore "Ritorno al mondo nuovo". Fulminante.

In my opinion, this is just a different (and poorly executed) take on Orwell's 1984 where instead of everyone living in a kind of abject misery the majority of the populace live in ignorant bliss. In this universe, there are no parents or siblings because everyone is created through a complicated stem cell process wherein the entire operation is almost entirely executed via test tubes. (There's also entire underclasses of 'subhuman' beings purposefully made malformed and possessing low intelligence to complete tasks of drudgery. Yes, it's horrible.) The upper echelons are afforded every privilege including a drug called soma which acts as a mind-altering substance to keep the populace compliant and happy. (And let's not forget to show more mention the rampant promiscuity that is encouraged from childhood in the form of 'erotic play'.)

This book is like if you took all the worst things you can think of, threw it into a blender, and ended up with a load of sludge that for some reason is touted as a delicious milkshake. (Yowza that metaphor got away from me.) I think what really got my goat the most (I was going to say frustrated me but if I'm honest I'm pissed I wasted my time with this one) was the ending. If you bother to read this (and why would you unless you have to for a class?) then please let me know what you thought of the ending because I swear I finished the book and said to myself, "Am I an idiot? Did I miss something here?"

To soothe my soul and remind me how a classic can truly earn its moniker I'm now rereading A Tale of Two Cities by my fave Charlie D. show less

Entertaining read yet so thought provoking. When you consider this was written pre world war III, it is even more amazing to consider the predictions of the future as real possibilities, which is exciting and terrifying. On the surface, the brave new world sounds great with happiness, peace and efficiency, however characters like Bernard and helmhotz show us how much this limits our freedoms and what a truly terrifying dictatorship that world would be. Reading Huxleys thoughts in Brave New World revisited several decades later provides another interesting view and better realization of how quickly some of the events he predicted came about. It would be amazing to see his reaction to things in the world today and how they relate to his show more thoughts then, such as widely available birth control, invitro fertilization, the Internet and social media show less

“It is rather alarming to find that only twenty-seven years [after writing Brave New World] quite a number of those forecasts have already come true, and come true with vengeance…Some of them were foreseen, and I think some of them I didn’t have the imagination to foresee, but I t think there is a whole armory at the disposal of potential dictators at the moment.”
– Aldous Huxley [1958]

Known for being one of the most influential dystopian authors of all time, Aldous Huxley, who was a jack of all trades, created his magnum opus, Brave New World in 1931, which was published a year later. Nigh nine decades later, many of his ominous and scholarly insights are manifesting right before our eyes. For these reasons, Brave New World show more should be read through rather carefully, for it serves as a severe warning not only about what might be coming, but what is already here.

This particular fusion of Brave New World and Brave New World Revisited by Aldous Huxley truly is as fascinating as it is disturbing in scope. The former offers his vision of what a dystopian world might be like, while the latter offers a trenchant examination of Brave New World.

While some may call some of Huxley’s ideas ‘prophetic’ in a sense, it’s more of a logical deduction given the available information that there was at a time. If one has a reasonable amount of quality information, one surely would be able to postulate a reasonable result given humanity’s penchant for falling for propaganda in droves historically. After all, most nations historically don’t operate under true freedom. What’s more, many ‘modern’ nations already implement many of the disturbing trends written about in this sobering, if intense account of could have happened, although in fiction, which is now turning into reality.

Brave New World has been compared to Orwell’s 1984 due to the engineered control grid – each of which carries different methods – and with good reason. Whilst 1984 is ruled with an iron fist, Brave New World is ruled with a velvet one. Endless arguments have ensued in many circles as to which one we are gravitating towards, and it’s definitely intriguing although distressing contemplating such facts.

Huxley does an outstanding job of painting a disturbing portrait within his fictional realm. The individuals within his society – who are essentially drones – have fallen over themselves for the ‘good of all’ – for the collective. The book is littered with countless examples of this.

The individual, who is the foundation of society, is thrown aside, by the wayside.

In respect to this troublesome and pernicious pervasive issue, which is seen more and more nowadays, Huxley noted the following words:

“Brave New World presents a fanciful and somewhat ribald picture of a society, in which the attempt to recreate human beings in the likeness of terminates has been pushed almost to the limits of the possible. That we are being propelled in the direction of Brave New World is obvious. But not less obvious is the fact that we can, if we so desire, refuse to co-operate with the blind forces that are compelling us. As Mr. William Whyte has shown in his remarkable book, The Organization Man, a new Social Ethic is replacing our traditional ethical system – the system in which the individual is primary. The key words in this Social Ethic are “adjustment,” “adaptation,” “socially oriented behavior,” “belongingness,” “acquisition of social skills,” “team work,” “group living,” “group loyalty,” “group dynamics,” “group thinking,” “group creativity.” Its basic assumption is that the social whole has greater worth and significant than its individual parts, that inborn biological differences should be sacrificed to cultural uniformity, that the rights of the collective take precedence over what the eighteenth century called the Rights of Man.”[1][Bold Emphasis Added]

Furthermore, as Huxley notes, the:

“…ideal man is the man who displays “dynamic conformity” (delicious phrase!) and an intense loyalty to the group, an unflagging desire to subordinate himself, to belong.”[2][Bold Emphasis Added]

Talk about a conformity crisis! That’s exactly where society is torpedoing to as we speak. And it all starts in youth, through the public schooling system.

This conformity crisis in public schooling has been spoken about at length by John Taylor Gatto in his books, Dumbing Us Down, A Different Kind Of Teacher and Weapons Of Mass Instruction.

In Dumbing Us Down – The Hidden Curriculum Of Compulsory Schooling, Gatto mentions the following explosive remarks:

“Mass education cannot work to produce a fair society because its daily practice is practice in rigged competition, suppression and intimidation. The schools we’ve allowed to develop can’t work to teach nonmaterial values, the values which give meaning to everyone’s life, rich or poor, because the structure of schooling is held together by a Byzantine tapestry of reward and threat, of carrots and sticks. Official favor, grades, and other trinkets of subordination have no connection with education; they are the paraphernalia of servitude, not of freedom.”[3][Bold Emphasis Added]

“Schools are intended to produce, through the application of formulas, formulaic human beings whose behavior can be predicted and controlled.”[4][Bold Emphasis Added]

“…schools and schooling are increasingly irrelevant to the great enterprises of the planet. No one believes anymore that scientists are trained in science classes or politicians in civics classes or poets in English classes. The truth is that schools don’t really teach anything except how to obey orders.”[5] [Bold Emphasis]

Gatto minces no words. If you wish to see what is happening, right from the start via the public indoctrination system, READ John Taylor Gatto’s work. It is HIGHLY recommended.

Returning to Huxley, the latter part of Brave New World & Brave New World Revisited also features Huxley’s letter to Orwell. Additionally, and arguably more importantly, the second book, Brave New World Revisited is absolutely mind bending.

Brave New World Revisited includes intriguing information at length that supplements droves of added substance for the reader to familiarize themselves with some of the deeper niches of everything Brave New World stands for. One could view it as a few different essays on many of the most disturbing components and trends, featured in Brave New World, which society is currently following.

Topics which are discussed include conformity, the collectivization of society, the attack on individuals, brainwashing, propaganda, social engineering, distractions within society, chemical persuasion, possible solutions and much more. Brave New World Revisited encompasses nigh 100 pages of additional information that should be essentially mandatory in education.

It would be interesting to see what Huxley would have thought about the precision condition that is currently taking place on a mass scale in society today. There are so many angles to this, that one could write many essays and analyze it in a myriad of ways. Many have, and rightly so.

With the recipes featured in Orwell and Huxley’s books, the system seems to be changing day by day, and not for the better. Propaganda, entrainment technology, social engineering, overmedication of the population, and more, are all being used to maliciously mold society to become not only uniform, but obedient to boot.

Incisive individuals who value freedom and have inquiring minds should not only make this part of their library, but should prepare for what’s already here and much of what’s coming soon.

Couple Brave New World with 1984, and you have the recipe of what the world is beginning to look like, which is a merger of those two ideals. And that’s a very, very disturbing proposition.

Be warned.

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Sources:

[1] Aldous Huxley, Brave New World & Brave New World Revisited, p. 257.
[2] Ibid., p. 257.
[3] John Taylor Gatto, Dumbing Us Down – The Hidden Curriculum Of Compulsory Schooling, pg. 69.
[4] Ibid., p. 23.
[5] Ibid., p. 21.
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If You are interested in the subject, the Book Reviews below follow as highly suggested reading:

1984 by George Orwell
Dumbing Us Down by John Taylor Gatto
A Different Kind Of Teacher by John Taylor Gatto
Weapons Of Mass Instruction by John Taylor Gatto
Rotten To The (Common) Core: Public Schooling, Standardized Tests & The Surveillance State by Dr. Joseph P. Farrell
The Tavickstock Institute: Social Engineering The Masses by Daniel Estulin
Technocracy Rising: The Trojan Horse Of Global Transformation by Patrick M. Wood
Propaganda by Edward Bernays show less

Was Huxley prophetically talking about the World of today when he imagined his "Brave New World"? Maybe the author had a strong intuition or maybe he was just a keen observer of humanity, but Huxley's insights in last century's early 30's resemble a lot the society of today: a society in which individual liberty, is replaced by an all-powerful-state, a surge of individualism and isolation in detriment of independent thinking and authenticity, the rise of authority, surveillance and control. The "Brave New World" depicted by Huxley does not look brave nor new anymore, but Huxley's message is still fresh and the words written almost 100 ago echo now as loud as ever.