(Crossposted from my blog: daariga.wordpress.com/2006/09/24/brave-new-world/)

Brave New World and 1984 are 2 books which I’ve been wanting to read for a long time. One is in an Utopian world and the other in dystopia. I finally got around to reading Brave New World written by Aldous Huxley. This sci-fi work is set in an Utopian future of Earth in the 26th century.

Family as an entity no longer exists. All babies are decanted artificially by fusing ovules and sperms and growing them. Eugenics is used to create 5 castes of humans known as Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Epsilon, ranging respectively from intelligent beings to morons. Each class is imbibed with the characteristics required for their future work by conditioning them (thinking for the Alphas, manual labour for the Epsilons and so on). Hypnopædia (sleep-learning) is extensively used while rearing children to ensure that they think in a predestined way all their life. Since they’re all artificially grown, the concept of parents or siblings doesn’t exist. Every person is a cell in the social body. Everyone takes artificial agents to ensure youthful beauty until their dying breath. Everyone belongs to everyone else, i.e. sex is promiscuous. Living with a single person for life is unheard of. There are no politics, war, family, literature or religions. Soma (a drug) is used by everyone to stay blissful all day. Everyone is happy.

In this world is Bernard Marx, an Alpha who is dating a beautiful Beta named Lenina. He is tired of the artificial life and takes her on a trip to a savage reservation in New Mexico. These are inhospitable parts of the planet where uncivilized people have been allowed to stay as they had centuries ago. Here, Marx runs into a savage child named John, who is actually a child of a civilized mom. He takes him back to London. Meanwhile, Lenina is feeling love towards this savage. In the New World, John observes how his life in the forests differs so much from the controlled life in London. He has feelings towards Lenina too, but is turned off by her behaviour. Everything comes to a head when he causes a ruckus at a hospital. He is taken to meet Mustapha Mond, the Resident World Controller (think Architect from Matrix Reloaded) along with Marx and his fellow thinker Helmholtz. In his office, John and Mond confront each other and it leads to an enthralling discussion about the gains and losses by living like they are in this controlled artificial society. In the end, Marx and Helmholtz are transferred to distant islands and John moves back to a solitary life in the wild.

Written in 1932, Brave New World is a surprisingly good read even today. (The book is available online here.) The pace is quick, the flavour is light. Huxley is brilliant in recreating his Utopian world. The book can be roughly divided into 3 parts. The 1st introduces the new world in rich detail. The 2nd introduces the protagonists and the last part deals with the debate between Mond and John. The last part is what makes delightful reading. The reader finally learns how this world came to be, how humanity slowly gave up its freedom in exchange for happiness. This is a thrilling and brilliant work brimming with ideas.