science fictions

Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World to illustrate how society can go wrong. It was a very good book, and pretty well written. I believe that it deserves four stars. In the book, everyone was pre-conditioned to think what the leaders of society wanted them to think, and to work unconditionally. They are kept happy with drugs and entertainment. It is, in essence, a journey back to the dark ages, where slaves and serfs are plentiful, disguised as the glorious advancement of society.
When Huxley wrote the book in 1932, it was seen as a far-sighted prediction. Now, this horrible future could be awaiting us just around the corner. This book contains many parallels to modern life. Just as in the book, religion has almost been eliminated from public life, and replaced with total materialism. Now, everyone in the industrialized world worships themselves. In the book, every human baby is cloned, grown in bottles, and sleep-conditioned in the ways of society. We have already started down that perilous path. We may have already cloned the first human baby, and DNA engineering is not far off. Will this be the fate of our future? Only time will tell.
Overall, my impression of Huxley's book is that it is a very good work. It is very accurate and reasonably well written, although I believe he stressed unimportant things at times. On the whole, it was a very thought-provoking novel. I had a hard time putting it down.

Despite its existence since the early 20th Century, this novel remarkably continues to unravel a future that contains progressively disturbing similarities to that of ours. Such conflicts as science and religion, beauty and flaws, society and solidarity, love and lust, indulgence and morality, life and death... are all questioned in this quest for happiness and meaning of life. I found this book thought-provoking by the end.

The book introduces several characters, the first one being Bernard Marx who didn't quite fit into this perfected and almost mechanical civilised society; later on he visits a 'Savage' camp that is part of the 'old' world, which hadn't been modernised and still remained cultural, uncivilised and 'flawed'. Throughout these journeys, comparisons between the two worlds are evident, and the book explores the conflicts as well as the connections between the individuals that struggle to live in them.

You would need to read the book through to the end in order to really appreciate its entirety; I personally found it a little bit of a struggle to get through sections sometimes because of the elements and concepts that you had to grasp, but once you've accustomed to it and reach the end of the book, it really is worth the read.

I see that some reviewers are saying the threat of a world similar to that in this novel is farther away than ever. That would be nice. Increasingly, I'm interpreting sci-fi dystopian/utopian novels not as warnings of a dire future but condemnations of a nasty present. And though this book was written in 1932, as civilization increases its messages only become more pertinent. I just finished reading this book today, and it would probably be wise to wait longer before reviewing it, but what the hell. Huxley's "brave new world" can be read as a brilliant satire of consumer society and civilization itself, in which people avoid feelings, pain, and confusion through drugs, work, and a tunnel vision that is reinforced by societal "conditioning" (though I would argue it's part of human nature as well). I was troubled by the Savage's masochistic tendencies, and confused at times as to what Huxley really thought of the Savage's over the top behavior, in the pursuit of sensation and actual feeling. Because the Savage goes so far over the top by the end, I can only assume that Huxley feels he's gone too far in the opposite direction, pursuing pain and denial simply because they are values opposed to the society he hates. Though the book is a brilliant critique, not just of society but of the way the human mind strives to shut out anything unfamiliar and uncomfortable (this is where the book's true greatness lies, I think), I'd consider deducting a star simply because it's more of an essay told in novel form than a full-fledged story. Many pages are devoted to pure description of the society, albiet cloaked in the dialogue of characters rather than in the narration, and sometimes this overshadows the characterization and story development. But the opening chapter uses an interesting, almost "cinematic" technique of "crosscutting", which can be exasperating to read but is original at least. And the characters are actually quite convincing and recognizable, especially Bernard...it's as if George Costanza from Seinfeld wound up in a future society (see Woody Allen's Sleeper). It's brimming with fantastic ideas, but I don't think it's fantastic storytelling. Nonetheless, that a minor quibble, because it's very readable and extremely insightful. Pick it up right away. 5/6