Brave New World gives an interesting perspective on the futuristic methods of governmental control as well as its presence in dictating its citizens' destinies to follow in a consumerist conformity lifestyle. It's all about limiting freedom and enforcing control without anyone knowing it.
The society of the Brave New World keeps its citizens ignorant through determining their path in life and making them like whatever it is. There are sewage workers who get alcohol poured into their pre-life embryos to dumb them down into loving working in the wastes and gross disgusting depth of the cities. Conversely, they have the ability to make people superior and have a brain with the capacity of individual thought for few, enough intelligence to run a large portion of the World.
Thankfully, with all the differences in the people, there is harmony! The masses are always happy with their current situation due to their programming and all the propaganda ingrained into their synthetic minds. Everyone belongs to everybody and should anything bad ever happen; any bad feelings or resentful actions, there is always soma for you to take to ease your troubles away in a drug-like fantasy.
However, there is still no such thing as a perfect society and there are accidents that cause some people to break free from the cycle of the working social status. In the book we see three of these people. Bernard Marx, who was conditioned to be one of the smarter people in the society, however has a body type unlike his fellow geniuses and is subject to torment and laughter by those of lesser intelligence. This causes him to be depressed, submerged in melancholy and sadness, causing him to want to rebel and be different.
The other two who break free of the mould in the society are John and Helmholtz. Helmholtz is a writer for the things that the babies listen to while they are asleep. Like, Bernard, he is sad because he feels he is fulfilling his full purpose in life and is being limited to writing simple lies. Both him and Bernard take care of a young boy that grew up on an Native American Reservation but has spent his life reading Shakespeare. He is taken from the Reservation to society which incites many events that shapes John's view of this New World.
Throughout John's journey in the New World, he finds out that civilization is not much to his liking. Everything and everyone is superficial, materialistic, and ignoble. It all worries him and he acts on his judgement (with quite a bit of help from Shakespeare.) to try to make some difference by throwing soma out the window at a hospital, or refusing to go to a party so people can gaze upon him like a museum display, or throwing little kids across the room at a hospital.
All these things eventually boil down to the three characters being put on trial by the World Controller. They are too smart for this society and don't particularly like the values held by the 'fake' people. Bernard and Helmholtz are sentenced to exile on an a deserted island which is more of a reward than anything as it holds people with equal intelligence and morals to them. John however must stay in London to continue on with an experimente. John, already disgusted and angry with the workings of the system, will NOT be experimented on and runs away and creates his own exile in a deserted lighthouse outside the city.
Unfortunately, there is no escape from the people as they show up at the lighthouse and make a spectacle out of the native boy. His self-torture that is meant to purify himself and cleanse him from the New World is viewed as an act for them to watch, something to entertain them. It all comes down to John's breakdown and suicide in which the book ends and society goes on as if nothing happened...
Thankfully, with all the differences in the people, there is harmony! The masses are always happy with their current situation due to their programming and all the propaganda ingrained into their synthetic minds. Everyone belongs to everybody and should anything bad ever happen; any bad feelings or resentful actions, there is always soma for you to take to ease your troubles away in a drug-like fantasy.
However, there is still no such thing as a perfect society and there are accidents that cause some people to break free from the cycle of the working social status. In the book we see three of these people. Bernard Marx, who was conditioned to be one of the smarter people in the society, however has a body type unlike his fellow geniuses and is subject to torment and laughter by those of lesser intelligence. This causes him to be depressed, submerged in melancholy and sadness, causing him to want to rebel and be different.
The other two who break free of the mould in the society are John and Helmholtz. Helmholtz is a writer for the things that the babies listen to while they are asleep. Like, Bernard, he is sad because he feels he is fulfilling his full purpose in life and is being limited to writing simple lies. Both him and Bernard take care of a young boy that grew up on an Native American Reservation but has spent his life reading Shakespeare. He is taken from the Reservation to society which incites many events that shapes John's view of this New World.
Throughout John's journey in the New World, he finds out that civilization is not much to his liking. Everything and everyone is superficial, materialistic, and ignoble. It all worries him and he acts on his judgement (with quite a bit of help from Shakespeare.) to try to make some difference by throwing soma out the window at a hospital, or refusing to go to a party so people can gaze upon him like a museum display, or throwing little kids across the room at a hospital.
All these things eventually boil down to the three characters being put on trial by the World Controller. They are too smart for this society and don't particularly like the values held by the 'fake' people. Bernard and Helmholtz are sentenced to exile on an a deserted island which is more of a reward than anything as it holds people with equal intelligence and morals to them. John however must stay in London to continue on with an experimente. John, already disgusted and angry with the workings of the system, will NOT be experimented on and runs away and creates his own exile in a deserted lighthouse outside the city.
Unfortunately, there is no escape from the people as they show up at the lighthouse and make a spectacle out of the native boy. His self-torture that is meant to purify himself and cleanse him from the New World is viewed as an act for them to watch, something to entertain them. It all comes down to John's breakdown and suicide in which the book ends and society goes on as if nothing happened...
I actually enjoyed this book, it has quite a dark look into a possible future while having a light, humorous side due to it's satirical nature. It does have its fair share of confusing moments and points that might make you go "What the...?", but it all makes sense in such a weird, seemingly lifeless society.
I do like the books like Fahrenheit 451, Harrison Bergeron, and some of the other futuristic, governmental control books as well. While it holds a serious warning to a culture and world that is subject to possessing an absolute grip on every single citizen's life, the humor in the book reinforces the absurdity and pandemonium of such a future.
I would definitely recommend this book even to people who don't care too much about futuristic, controlling governmental books as it can still give a good laugh due to the silly ways human nature has been dumbed down to such an animalistic culture.
Shakespeare fans could also be able to recognize the extravagant amount of Shakespeare references in this book and could perhaps draw a larger meaning from the book through this.
Outstanding summary. Your recommendation is interesting. Do you think people need to be warned about governments? Is cultural becoming animalistic? Do you think Huxley was obsessed with Shakespeare or was this a comment on Shakespeare being the Bible of the literary world?
ReplyDelete