Aldous Huxley - Brave New World

The role of science fiction, for better or for worse, is to get us to imagine the possibilities that lie in store for humanity's future. Indeed, many scientific discoveries and applications have become realities only after being the product of the imaginations and musings of sci-fi authors. Jules Verne's credit for the nuclear submarine is just one example. Science fiction can also provide look at the possibilities for social institutions and cultural evolution. Writers of this sort almost always seem to paint dark and foreboding images of society's future, such as Orwell's 1984 or Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Dystopia, it would seem, sells.

Brave New World is one of the defining novels of this genre. Set in some unspecified future, human beings are no longer "born" in a conventional sense. Human embryos are manufactured in industrial cloning centers, engineered by biologists to fit pre-established social castes. "Alphas", for instance, are humans designed to be intelligent, mentally and emotionally superior beings who will become the future managers of society. The purpose is to establish an orderly society with each individual bred to fit harmoniously into the role they have been assigned. Lower castes, like "epsilons", are bred to not be ambitious, creative, or otherwise anything but perfectly happy doing mundane, "grunt" work.

To keep the population placated, a drug called "Soma" is dispensed in generous amounts. The drug is used by the citizens to escape reality, and live in a chemically-induced, side-effect-free, state of euphoria. The drug keeps them content and makes the more difficult aspects of life easier to bear. After their work shifts, they march off to get their doses of soma, and it off to la-la land. It's all part of the grand social plan of the brave, new world – bread and circuses, so to speak.

It's all about the collective. Individual relationships are not significant. "Everyone belongs to everyone", is the mantra. And this includes in sexual relations as well. In fact, it's almost thought to be bad taste to not put out when someone else of an equal or higher station than you wants to have sex. In this sense, by loving everyone, they love no one. Collectivists often like to make an appeal to the "needs of the community" and such, and Huxley takes this to its logical ends. Individuals have no motivation, nor inclination, to improve themselves intellectually or spiritually, as they are merely part of a whole, and derive their personal value from that basis, existing to fulfill their assigned roles in production, and then getting enough soma after that.

I read this book because its always been hailed as a classic novel depicting some of the more ominous trends of "progress". Like the aforementioned 1984, one often hears references to concepts and themes depicted in this book, and when one looks at policies that are being pursued by our government - for example, the rampant Ritalin fetish the education system has to drug kids into a pliant, sheeplike state of submission - the themes in the book come starkly into focus. The actual reading of it, however, is a different story. It's incredibly disjointed and random. There is no real "plot" per se. As the book progresses, the book shifts focus to different characters, places and storyline in a seemingly haphazard way. The characters just seem to be vagued disguised caricatures. Perhaps there is a certain irony here, as the Brave New World is rather chaotic and disjointed. The book, however, comes off as nihilistic.

I often wonder what kind of statement that Huxley was trying to make? Its obvious that he's raising the spectre of a dark future when industrialization takes full hold on society. The fear is that if science can produce better and better technology, perhaps science can be employed to produce a better, engineered society. Huxley was well known as a humanist, and free-thinker, who often wrote and commented on society, religion, and other topics. In my opinion, if this book was meant to be some sort of profound commentary, then it would take a more astute literary critic than me to explain it in its fullest sense.

Upon completion of this book, I felt a little gypped. Perhaps there was something I missed, but there didn't seem to be much substance in the book that kept me enthralled. Brave New World, it would seem, is "classic" more by reputation than by any real literary merit. It was an easy read, which was fortunate. I would probably be a lot grumpier if I spent more time than I did reading a book that was so disappointing. But, in the end, my final recommendation would be to only read it if you have nothing better to do. Two and one-half stars.