Francesca Rael Mr.

Reese 2 Pre-AP English, Period 7 22 August 2012 A Prophecy The novel Brave New World is definitely one of the most influential and important dystopian pieces of literature in history. The society in Brave New World has been conditioned to think that their world is a utopia, but in reality it is a dystopia. The rulers of the nation realize that the world they have created is flawed, but want everyone to be pleased with their lives. Aldous Huxley's novel can also be seen as a criticism of the human race's enthusiastic adoption of technology. The fact that technology is so advanced in the novel that the humans have found out how to clone and mature fetuses rapidly depicts the futuristic setting of this novel. Aldous Huxley has essentially written an exaggeration on modern technology. Humanity has unfortunately become slaves to electronics and regrettably has succumbed to the prediction that Aldous Huxley has made. Nancy Wigston compares Aldous Huxleys Brave New World to our own society in her article Brave New World: Aldous Huxleys Predictions Seem To Be Upon Us. She explains that Huxleys forecast is looming above us, threatening to fully turn our society into the dystopia he created. Aldous created a novel concerning an infantilized, drug-dependent, sciencecontrolled, consumer society (Wigston), which is extremely similar to the civilization we live in now. Aging is also unknown among the population in Brave New World. In current civilization,

the general public (mostly women) has discovered a way to slow the aging process. The method is known as Botox, which is commonly used cosmetically to remove wrinkles and to treat certain muscular conditions. Women of celebrity-status can mysteriously regain their trim shapes with astonishing, and much admired, speed (Wigston). In the last years of his life, Aldous Huxley had constantly urged us to wake up (Wigston). We could possibly be running out of time to follow his instructions. Besides using his novel to warn us of the future, Aldous Huxley creates a society where there is no such thing as a divided allegiance (Huxley 217). This promotes collectivism, except for the fact that the clones know only their work and of nothing else. The leader of the Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre tells the students that they enhance the clones so as to make them exceedingly useful in whatever position they have been assigned. This creates a sort of civilized happiness, where people can never find sadness because they are exceedingly skilled at the tasks they perform. The new community in Brave New World is set up to be full of a kind of civilized happiness, and they follow a motto. The motto was Community, Identity, and Stability. Community, defined in Webster's Dictionary as a unified body of individuals, is completely lacked in the world existing in this novel. The idea that every one works for every one else (Huxley 77) does not promote a community working together, but instead a dysfunctional one. Even though the humans do not necessarily have equality they all gain it after death. The people in the lowest caste are as much needed as those in the highest caste. The next word in their motto is Identity. Identity is stolen from the characters in this novel. They are all treated the same, and the way the community is organized is similar to a communist community as I aforementioned. The citizens are conditioned for what they do and they essentially have no

choice but to follow orders. They are not allowed to create themselves. Stability is referring not to personal stability, but instead economic stability. Instead of fixing broken items, new ones were bought. Ending is better than mending. The more stitches, the less riches (Huxley 55). Mending something is considered to be antisocial. Also, this is used to mock those who are greedy, especially the rich, who just toss belongings away when they could be fixed very effortlessly. This society is extremely broken. The entire nation in Brave New World bases itself on technology and science and not the idea that you can have the freedom to make your own mistakes and be different from your fellow men. The science and technology was not only their primary interest, but it is also the main reason that the world in this novel is different from our world today, in 2012. Our own world is obsessed with not only technology, but also with advancing it further than we need. The world can only hope that technology does not advance to this extent and begin control our own personal ideas. Another prime example of why this novel is one of the most important dystopian novels in history is the fact that the author uses A.F. to measure time. In society today, we use A.D. (e.g. 2012 A.D.). A.D. is an acronym for anno domini which is Latin for in the year of the lord. Our community uses a piece of religion to label the years of time. However, the society in Brave New World looks up to the one of the main founder of the technology era, Ford, as much as we look up to God. Their religion is in a sense technology while ours is believing in a higher power. This is another example that technology rules them. Although the technology in our civilization is not nearly as controlling as it is in this novel, Aldous Huxley has somewhat successfully predicted the future. Sex, drugs, and

hypnopedia rule the world just as they did in the novel. In Brave New World, the Director and his lackeys teach the young children to engage in sexual acts. In Huxley's time, pre-marital sex was not a thought in any teenager's mind. Now, it is a normal action to take part in. Also, in the novel, a drug called Soma is used to induce feelings of euphoria. Many people today resort to illegal substances to forget about reality for a while. Television and other media are considered as today's social conditioning, also called hypnopedia. It is a shame that we have been so predictable. Some of the ways that the society in Brave New World treats their children can be applied positively to our world. We use many concepts to help children fit into society better. These concepts include training children to use their manners and also following up the training with a repetition of the manners. This is displayed in Brave New World when they demonstrate the principle of sleep-teaching or hypnopdia (Huxley 25). Parents usually always instruct a child to say please when they want something and thank you when a person has done something for them. This is similar to hypnopdia for the reason that the parent keeps repeating the words which the child should say if they wish to exhibit high-quality manners. The only difference is that the parents in our world are using this as a positive mechanism instead of a negative one, and they are not repeating it when the child is asleep. Another example of a method used by both our society and the society in Brave New World which helps children fit in is schooling early. In our community, we call early schooling preschool. In Brave New World, it was playtime (Huxley 32). The playtime in Huxleys novel is used for sexual training and preparing, but in our society we use preschool as a way to prepare children for elementary school. While they teach sex, we teach the alphabet and how to be polite. Huxley definitely used a few normal ideas to formulate his novel, Brave New World.

The book Brave New World is an alarmingly exact prophecy of technologys ability to control modern humanity. In Brave New World and the Technological Growth, David D. Miller explains the mass fear of some diseases being an epidemic among children and adults alike. ADHD is [portrayed as] an epidemic (Miller) amid modern-day Americas children. There is also an idea that depression is a serious pandemic amongst both adults and children. In reality, depression and ADHD should not be considered epidemics or anything of that sort. The victims of depression and ADHD are being medicated with much stronger drugs than necessary, which accurately resembles how soma is used in the novel. When someone is not happy in Brave New World, they simply take the drug soma (Miller) and they are suddenly all better. Those with ADHD and depression, along with those suffering of many other mental problems, are also suddenly all better after they take their medication. In this way, the author points out that the effects of soma and the way we have modernized medicating the general public is connected. Brave New World is an eye-opening book, and an insight on what our nation's future could consist of if the world does not slow down. We already have fallen into the enticing trap of technology, and we do not have much further to go until we turn into a figment of Huxleys imagination. Our society ultimately wants to be happy, but they should not seek happiness in dark places. To be conditioned to have feelings of happiness would make one miserable. This book is definitely an important piece of dystopian literature, and can show the world what may happen to it in the future.

Works Cited Miller, Derek D. Brave New World and the Threat of Technological Growth. Student Pulse. 2011. Web. 30 August 2012. Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. New York: Harper Collins, 1946. Print. Wigston, Nancy. Brave New World: Aldous Huxleys Predictions Seem To Be Upon Us. The Star. 24 August 2012. Web. 6 September 2012