Brave New World is a book that Aldous Huxley wrote in 1931 and it has very imaginatively portrayed the London of 2540 AD. The novel has very elaborately come out with the concepts of sleep-learning and reproductive technology that collectively contribute in changing the society. In this regard Huxley has reassessed the book in an essay he wrote in 1958 and titled as ‘Brave New World Revisited’ as also in his book titled ‘Island’ that was written in 1962. Huxley wrote the original book when he was residing in England and France before he shifted to California in 1937. The author was a known writer in satire and had been contributing regularly to magazines such as Vogue and Vanity Fair. He also wrote a few successful books on satire such as ‘Crome Yellow’, ‘Antic Hay’and ‘Those Barrren Leaves’ in 1921, 1923 and 1925 respectively and had established his identity as a writer of excellent repute. Notably, Huxley got the inspiration from the book ‘Men Like Gods’ which is a utopian novel by H G Wells. Brave New World is in fact a parody of this book by Huxley, whereby he aimed at portraying a rather frightening picture of the coming future in referring to the so called brave new world as ‘negative utopia’. Huxley has written in the introduction of his recent print of the book that much of the inspiration for the book was a result of his visit to the high technology Brunner and Mond plant of the Imperial Chemical Industries in Billingham, which impressed him a great deal by way of the processes used in the plant. The book is set in the future and portrays some contemporary issues pertaining to the earlier 20th century such as the effects of the Industrial revolution in bringing far reaching changes in the world of production techniques of several technologically advanced products. He also talks about the World War I and the Russian Revolution of 1917 as also uses the names of some contemporary leaders such as Bernard Marx and Benito Hoover in formulating his strategy in the book.
Huxley has very elegantly used the settings and characters in his futuristic fantasies in expressing popular opinions such as the fear one has in losing personal identities in the fast pace world in the futuristic environment. It is evident from the book that Huxley was much agitated by the youth culture, sexual promiscuity and commercial tendencies as also the self-centered attitude of the Americans. There is strong evidence to indicate that Huxley wrote “Brave New World’ due to his inherent fear that Europe would get Americanized, and it was America in his mind that was the biggest inspiration. The ‘feelies’ referred to in his book are in fact his way of expressing his opinion about the motion pictures of the time in America and the sex hormone chewing gum is a reference to the chewing gum in this regard which had become a symbol of America at that time. Huxley’s ideas of the book were very specificly a result in indication of his opinion about the ideas expressed by writers such as George Bernard Shaw and H G Wells who had during the time written about the world state and socialism. Huxley was criticized by critics of that time for his opinions as narrated in ‘Brave New World’ in being too far-fetched and extra imaginative without much relevance to reality.
Huxley has also been criticized for making people to interpret that the ‘brave new world’ would be highly unrealistic in creating a false utopia that promised happiness of a superficial nature, that too would be short lived. People were asking questions if the world portrayed by Huxley was indeed our post modern world because high levels of consumerism is driving people to eat in more unhealthy styles as also to spend more on this pattern despite the ill effects of the same. It is ironic that ideas such as that of people going to cinemas merely for getting distracted than for experiential entertainment and that the suburbs of cities are promoted as a compromise formula in lieu of country and city life, are indeed atrocious in the eyes of several people of literary achievements. The central question of ethical discipline raised in the book is about how a man should live his life; whether to experience the ups and downs that life offers or live a safe and secure life by compromising on the options. The civilized people in the book are portrayed as being happy in getting all that they wish to have and that the savages have a great time in life with the suffering and pain that goes with such people. It is observed that interestingly the book has raised more questions in regard to such problems than in solving them.
All in all, the ‘Brave New World’ has in recent times come to enjoy immense acceptability amongst several sections of the literary world in finding its contents to be very much relevant in regard to contemporary matters and issues which have been plaguing the capitalist structure of several countries. The book virtually instructs us to go back to the cultural assumptions of the past in deciding what is logical and reasonable to pursue for civilization in surging ahead towards the desired goals