Review: A Brave New World

In my summer "vacation" of language review and theological reading, I have managed time to squeeze in some fiction. I started with Victor Hugo's classic Les Miserables, a book I had always wanted to read (some of you may remember a previous post). This was a wonderful read, well worth the time (even for the unabridged version, which I highly recommend), though be prepared to grow a sudden interest in 19th century French history. Or maybe that was just me.

I moved onto another classic, a bit shorter as I needed a little break from the pages and pages of Jean Valjean's moral reasoning. The following is a review of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. (Note to reader: reviews typically end in assessments of the books. I have purposely left this out for two reasons: 1. Brave New World is a time honored classic and anything that I can say has already been said and probably much more eloquently; 2. I find that assessments can often discouraged readers from following through and reading the book, and I mean with this review to encourage reading.)

Brave New World falls under the broad genre of science fiction, though not in the Star Wars/Trek, black metallic masks and Jar Jar Binks variety. It is rather a frightening depiction of the future, in step with Orwell's 1984, Bradbury's Farenheit 451, or even Burgess' A Clockwork Orange. Though written in 1932, Brave New World precedes all of them.

This future is a place where happiness and harmony is the highest good. In this future there are no wars, no famines, no diseases (in fact relatively little need for doctors), no food shortages, and none of the common discomforts we experience on a daily basis. There is instant gratification for every desire. One might think that this describes a Utopia and one would probably be right; yet the means by which this happiness and harmony is achieved is disturbing.

Genetic engineering is the arbitrator of this world happiness. Babies are no longer birthed naturally - in fact, the idea of a family has become pornographic in this society. "Mother" is the foulest curse word. Babies are born in test tubes in production factories. The powers that be divide the test tubes into five classes, Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon, and develop them at different rates. The Deltas and the Epsilons are given alcohol to stunt there growth and intellectual abilities. As children they are taught through sleep teaching (a form of hypnosis) to accept the given class they are in and to hate those in classes lower than them. So it is that Alphas and Betas work the scientific jobs and the lower three classes work the menial factory jobs.

Another fascinating and terrifying truth in this projected future is the idea that "everyone belongs to everyone else," conditioned in the babies. Thus, there are no marriages, no families. In fact, everyone is encouraged to "have" everyone else. Sexual intercourse is on the level of having a leisurely game of tennis. There is no commitment, no feelings involved. In fact, at one point in the book, there is a "scandalous" affair in which a man wants to be with only one woman. Unfortunately this grim 1932 prediction seems truer than not in the minds of many people.

There is no God in Brave New World. For it was discovered by the philosophers that God was needed only in times of trouble and discomfort. But in this new society, there is no trouble or discomfort, so the concept of God is no longer needed. At one point, the World Director says: "God isn't compatible with machinery and scientific medicine and universal happiness. Our civilization has chosen machinery and medicine and happiness" (234). While you may disagree with the sentiment, how many people view God in just that manner; how many times have we in practice believed this?

The book reaches conflict when one of the "savages" (living in areas not fully "civilized") is introduced into this culture and finds it repulsive. He has read Shakespeare and has rather seen that conflict and suffering and monogamous love are values of truth and beauty. It is explained to him that these things had to be sacrificed for the sake of happiness. He says in one place: "But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin." "In fact," said the Controller, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy." "All right then," said the Savage defiantly, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy" (240).

Brave New World raises many scientific, bioethic, and theological issues. I will not get into them here because I hope that some of my readers will be intrigued enough at this point to read it. You can read it in a few days, but you will be thinking about it for weeks afterwards.