Last night I finished the dystopian classic, Brave New World, written by English author Aldous Huxley in 1932. Because I've been quite busy recently it took a little longer than I originally anticipated to finish; but after two weeks of reading a chapter here and there I finally finished it. And I'm very glad that I did!
First of all I wish to recommend the edition of the book which I purchased, the Independent's Banned Books series, which can be bought from Play.com in the store: "Good4Books" This particular edition is in hardcover format and comes with a high-quality dust jacket; number 4 in the series of 25 novels and novellas that were highly-controverisal, (I have just bought Anthony Burgess' "A Clockwork Orange" from the same store in fact!)
But enough of the aesthetics, let's move onto the meat of the story! First of all I should note some similarities between both this novel and the novel published 17 years later in 1949 by George Orwell: Nineteen Eighty-Four. Aside from tackling the same genre, they also have similar characteristics in terms of their execution of what a dystopian society would look like. The trademark conditioning of oppression as normality is embedded within the world's of both stories, yet the two authors tackle the subject very differently. The main way in which this is implemented is in the methods in which oppression is applied to society, and the breadth of scale (don't worry I'll not spoil any plot details!) Namely, Huxley focuses on the scientific perspective of how humans would be 'manufactured' and innately stunted to a certain caste of society via biological engineering on a world-wide scale, whereas Orwell on the other hand, decides to confine us to a single country that is entirely regressive in its technology and focuses on the socio-political issues of censorship, taking info and rewriting it a la doublethink.
Linguistically, the novel is not as innovative as Orwell's seminal work, lacking in concepts such as "Newspeak" and "Doublethink," but does some interesting things with common language, taking expressions with "God" in them and replacing them with "Ford," because (Henry) Ford has been elevated into a god-like status in this Shakespearean "Brave New World" e.g. "cleanliness is next to Fordliness." This idea was borne of Huxley's view that science and technology was ultimately a dehumanising process, taking us down a materialist and consumerist path to being subdued by our own consumption. Looking at the world today he, like Orwell, may have been right!
I will not go into detail about the protagonists, but what do I think of the antagonist? Personally, I thought that all the characters were quite strong though I don't see the novel as character-driven, more world-driven (as it should be in this particular genre, perhaps?) And it is because of this, that one of my favourite scenes in the novel occurs towards the end where, like in 1984, the antagonist attempts to persuade the protagonists that the world is better the way it is under his control in that way. On this particular ground, I think that Huxley was more successful in making the character more likeable/empathetic than Orwell. I won't spoil why though!
So overall, what do I think? Huxley's writing style is simple enough, easy to understand and even the scientific concepts are easy to grasp. If you want me to judge this novel against Nineteen Eighty-Four however, then I'm afraid I must disappoint. It's hard to compare the two because of the ways in which they implement a similar idea; it's just a matter of which story you prefer personally due to individual tastes. There really isn't anything about one or the other that could be deemed as 'superior' in any way. In closing this review however, I would definitely recommend the book to absolutely anyone. It's easy to get into, it's a good, page-turning read and a much more fun world to inhabit -it seemed to me- than the darkness that pervades Nineteen Eighty-Four, as much as I like both novels' settings for different reasons. So if you read Orwell's work and didn't like the world in which it was set, then I would also recommend this on those grounds because despite the fact that Brave New World is dystopian, the methodology of its application is much brighter and high-key, making things seem at least a little less bleak!
The Banned Books Edition
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