![]() This novel also tries to be a fierce satire of hedonism too. Likewise, there’s also a lot of darkly comedic satire of Pavlovian conditioning, subliminal messaging and the pharmaceutical industry too. Characters exclaim things like “Oh, Ford!” ( rather than “Oh, Lord!”) – and there are even sign of the cross -like gestures that mimic the “T” of the Model T Ford. Not only are people quite literally cloned and raised in a mechanical fashion, but the religion of the novel is based on Henry Ford‘s production lines. One of the central themes in the novel is the horror of mass production. In both cases, the novel brilliantly criticises how these ideologies promote unthinking conformity. It contains bitterly satirical depictions of advertising, fame, commercialism, class systems etc… Yet, at the same time, the novel is also sharply critical of many of the hallmarks of communist regimes ( eg: propaganda, brainwashing, ideological censorship etc…), and the utopia’s motto of “everyone belongs to everyone else” is also used to critique communism too. In other words, it rises above simplistic political categories.įor example, the novel is both strongly anti-capitalist and strongly anti-communist at the same time. It was written during a more nuanced age ( in Britain at least) and thus can be both left and right wing at the same time. If you try to break the novel’s opinions down into polarised modern categories, then you’ll end up confused. This is the only real way to look at this novel. In short, it is a novel about individuality versus conformity. This novel is both the literal opposite of George Orwell’s “ Nineteen Eighty-Four” and yet also very similar to it too. Yet, there’s no denying that it has earned it’s reputation as a classic. ![]() Yet, at the same time, it’s also a book I found myself strongly disagreeing with at times and rolling my eyes at occasionally. It is a novel that can both amuse and horrify you with expert ease. It is a brilliantly clever, thought-provoking and unique novel that is filled with quotable moments. One of the first things that I will say about this novel is that I both loved and hated it at the same time. Out of curiosity, he decides to take the young man back to the utopia to see what he makes of it…. Whilst visiting there, Bernard meets the son of a former citizen of the utopia ( who was accidentally abandoned there during another expedition). However, one member of this world’s upper class – Bernard Marx – is having subversive thoughts of solitude and monogamy and other such things.Īfter convincing his occasional girlfriend Lenina to join him, he sets out on a “research” expedition to one of the few parts of Earth that isn’t controlled by the utopia. It is a world where a type of heavily-controlled community-based hedonism is used to maintain order and conformity. “Brave New World” is set in a distant future “utopia”, where people are cloned and organised into a hierarchical structure. This is the 2001 Voyager Classics (UK) paperback reprint of “Brave New World” (1932) that I read.
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