Brave New World, and, Brave New World Revisited

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The scientific futurism in Brave New World is believed to be appropriated from Daedalus [21] by J. B. S. Haldane. [22]

The biological techniques used to control the populace in Brave New World do not include genetic engineering; Huxley wrote the book before the structure of DNA was known. However, Gregor Mendel's work with inheritance patterns in peas had been rediscovered in 1900 and the eugenics movement, based on artificial selection, was well established. Huxley's family included a number of prominent biologists including Thomas Huxley, half-brother and Nobel Laureate Andrew Huxley, and his brother Julian Huxley who was a biologist and involved in the eugenics movement. Nonetheless, Huxley emphasises conditioning over breeding ( nurture versus nature); human embryos and fetuses are conditioned through a carefully designed regimen of chemical (such as exposure to hormones and toxins), thermal (exposure to intense heat or cold, as one's future career would dictate), and other environmental stimuli, although there is an element of selective breeding as well. The following include specific instances of when the book has been censored, banned, or challenged: After the Age of Utopias came what we may call the American Age, lasting as long as the Boom. Men like Ford or Mond seemed to many to have solved the social riddle and made capitalism the common good. But it was not native to us; it went with a buoyant, not to say blatant optimism, which is not our negligent or negative optimism. Much more than Victorian righteousness, or even Victorian self-righteousness, that optimism has driven people into pessimism. For the Slump brought even more disillusionment than the War. A new bitterness, and a new bewilderment, ran through all social life, and was reflected in all literature and art. It was contemptuous, not only of the old Capitalism, but of the old Socialism. Brave New World is more of a revolution against Utopia than against Victoria. [38] Bertrand Russell felt Brave New World borrowed from his 1931 book "The Scientific Outlook", and wrote in a letter to his publisher that Huxley's novel was "merely an expansion of the two penultimate chapters of 'The Scientific Outlook.'" [53] Huxley, Aldous (1969). "letter to Mrs. Kethevan Roberts, 18 May 1931". In Smith, Grover (ed.). Letters of Aldous Huxley. New York and Evanston: Harper & Row. p. 348. I am writing a novel about the future – on the horror of the Wellsian Utopia and a revolt against it. Very difficult. I have hardly enough imagination to deal with such a subject. But it is none the less interesting work.In 1982, Polish author Antoni Smuszkiewicz, in his analysis of Polish science-fiction Zaczarowana gra ("The Magic Game"), presented accusations of plagiarism against Huxley. Smuszkiewicz showed similarities between Brave New World and two science fiction novels written earlier by Polish author Mieczysław Smolarski, namely Miasto światłości ("The City of Light", 1924) and Podróż poślubna pana Hamiltona ("Mr Hamilton's Honeymoon Trip", 1928). [59] Smuszkiewicz wrote in his open letter to Huxley: "This work of a great author, both in the general depiction of the world as well as countless details, is so similar to two of my novels that in my opinion there is no possibility of accidental analogy." [60] In 2009, a theatrical film was announced to be in development, with collaboration between Ridley Scott and Leonardo DiCaprio. [66] By May 2013 the project was placed on hold. [67] A. Huxley in Sanary 1 - Introduction". www.sanary.com. Archived from the original on 11 January 2017 . Retrieved 27 September 2019.

Social critic Neil Postman contrasted the worlds of Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World in the foreword of his 1985 book Amusing Ourselves to Death. He writes: George Orwell believed that Brave New World must have been partly derived from the 1921 novel We by Russian author Yevgeny Zamyatin. [55] However, in a 1962 letter to Christopher Collins, Huxley says that he wrote Brave New World long before he had heard of We. [56] According to We translator Natasha Randall, Orwell believed that Huxley was lying. [57] Kurt Vonnegut said that in writing Player Piano (1952), he "cheerfully ripped off the plot of Brave New World, whose plot had been cheerfully ripped off from Yevgeny Zamyatin's We". [58] Kiakimé, a native girl whom John fell for, but is instead eventually wed to another boy from Malpais. Livni, Ephrat (19 December 2018). "A woman first wrote the prescient ideas Huxley and Orwell made famous". Quartz . Retrieved 28 October 2020. Goldberg, Lesley (5 May 2015). "Steven Spielberg's Amblin, Syfy Adapting Classic Novel 'Brave New World' (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter.

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From birth, members of every class are indoctrinated by recorded voices repeating slogans while they sleep (called "hypnopædia" in the book) to believe their own class is superior, but that the other classes perform needed functions. Any residual unhappiness is resolved by an antidepressant and hallucinogenic drug called soma. Bernard, Helmholtz, and John are all brought before Mustapha Mond, the "Resident World Controller for Western Europe", who tells Bernard and Helmholtz that they are to be exiled to islands for antisocial activity. Bernard pleads for a second chance, but Helmholtz welcomes the opportunity to be a true individual, and chooses the Falkland Islands as his destination, believing that their bad weather will inspire his writing. Mond tells Helmholtz that exile is actually a reward. The islands are full of the most interesting people in the world, individuals who did not fit into the social model of the World State. Mond outlines for John the events that led to the present society and his arguments for a caste system and social control. John rejects Mond's arguments, and Mond sums up John's views by claiming that John demands "the right to be unhappy". John asks if he may go to the islands as well, but Mond refuses, saying he wishes to see what happens to John next. Translations of the title often allude to similar expressions used in domestic works of literature: the French edition of the work is entitled Le Meilleur des mondes ( The Best of All Worlds), an allusion to an expression used by the philosopher Gottfried Leibniz [12] and satirised in Candide, Ou l'Optimisme by Voltaire (1759). The first Standard Chinese translation, done by novelist Lily Hsueh and Aaron Jen-wang Hsueh in 1974, is entitled "美麗新世界" ( Pinyin: Měilì Xīn Shìjiè, literally " Beautiful New World"). The dehumanizing effects of over-organization are reinforced by the dehumanizing effects of over-popula­tion. Industry, as it expands, draws an ever greater proportion of humanity's increasing numbers into large cities. But life in large cities is not conducive to mental health (the highest incidence of schizophrenia, we are told, occurs among the swarming inhabitants of industrial slums); nor does it foster the kind of responsible freedom within small self-governing groups, which is the first condition of a genuine democ­racy. City life is anonymous and, as it were, abstract. People are related to one another, not as total person­alities, but as the embodiments of economic functions or, when they are not at work, as irresponsible seekers of entertainment. Subjected to this kind of life, indi­viduals tend to feel lonely and insignificant. Their ex­istence ceases to have any point or meaning.