Write a detailed note on
theme of Brave new World
Aldous Leonard Huxley is one of the
best the most subtle and intellectual modern writers. He was an author of
repute and his works present satirically the disillusionment in social life. He
is a spokesman of his century almost all the views and ideas in a highly
readable manner. David Daiches remarks in his “A Critical History of English
Literature”.
“He is
not really aware of
the
problems that face the
writer of
fiction of his day,
but does
know how to handle
in
isolation-exposition, argu-
ment and description.”
Huxley
was a keen observer of contemporary social and political reality and sought to
portray it in his novels and satirize the ills inherent in it. He realized the
dangers of an over indulgence in materialistic pursuits and physical pleasure.
‘Brave New World’ also expresses a
frightening expression of fears felt by many thoughtful people-fears of future
in which the only value would be material values. The novel is concerned with
the theme of what would become of man and the world and lived in, if such
excessive subservience to science and technology continued.
A utopian vision of a future world
Brave New World presents a
utopian vision of a future world while launching an attack on the present
day tendency of an over dependence on science and its discoveries. There
is an alarming tendency among human being to make the best the latest advantage
in the fields of scientific knowledge. The rapid advances made by science and
too much dependence on it have tended to rob man of his humanity. In the name
of social stability and security all emotional life and feelings are being
discarded. Their life is becoming mechanized and standardized. Edward Albert
rightly remarks,
“The novel gives a satirical
picture of what he imagines
the world would be under
the rule of science. No disease,
no pain but no emotion and
worse, on spiritual life”.
The predicament of the individual in
a mass community
Brave
New World presents the predicament of the individual in a mass community.
It shows us to what will become of the individual in a socialized community
where greater emphasis will be laid on community on the individual man and
woman. ‘Brave New World’ expanded these forebodings into a horrified picture of
a socialized and sterilized society dominated by the principles of community,
uniformity and stability.
‘Brave New World’ embodies a warning
about the future of man based on scientific and technological progress. The 20th
century has witnessed unprecedented advance in the fields of science and
technology. But Huxley released that these advances which were almost
universality hailed, as progress were fraught with danger. It is his attempt to
make man released that since knowledge is power, he yield the power that is to
say science and technology should be the servants of man-man should not be
adapted and enslaved to them. A. S.
Collins remarks,
“In “Brave New World’ he
had warningly
prophesied
that the growing power of
science in a material minded
world might result in a
world at dehumanized beings.”
‘Brave New World’ is an attack on
totalitarianism and the unchecked scientific advancement made at the cost
of the spiritual and moral or emotional aspect of man’s life. Like that novel,
it has its own didactic one. Huxley
cautions man against the life in a scientifically controlled world with its
indoctrination conditioning, test-tube babies, free sex, and suppression of
historical truth.
The institution of marriage has been
rendering superfluous. There is a perfect freedom in matters of sex. The term
‘chastity’ is merely a misnomer here. Bokanoveskian Process and pregnancy
substitutes are meant to satirize the advancement made by biological sciences.
The note on totalitarianism is being shown by the word of Mustapha Mond,
“Now such is
process the
old men work, the old men
copulate, the old men
have
no time, no leisure
from
pleasure, not a moment
to
sit down and think.”
The contrasting view of two different
worlds and their values.
The
novel presents the contrasting view of two different worlds and their values. The
first is the new world of the future World Sate with its emphasis on stability,
security, free sex and conformity to social order and ideals. The other world
is the old worlds like that of the Reservation with its emphasis on emotion
ties, freedom, individuality and moral or spiritual values.
On
the one hand, there are machinery, modern medicine and universal happiness and universal
happiness. On the other, we have God, Religion, Art and Poetry. One based on
the ideal of scientific industrialization is represented by Mustapha Mond and
the other on the lawrentian ideal of primitive vitalism represented by John the
savage.
Huxley
advances arguments in favour of both, but seems to believe in and show the triumph
of the traditional ways of the old world. He favours science only up to the
extent that it does not dehumanize man. Actually what he seems to seek is a
golden mean between the old world and the new one?
Conclusion
To summing up, ‘Brave New World’ is an imaginative
picture of the future world, which only mirrors the present world in a
distorted form. Huxley adopted Swift like ironical manner to express his
disillusionment with modern civilization based on scientific progress. Huxley
chiefly deals with the science affecting human life, the process of
dehumanization and the antagonism between the two worlds of scientific progress
and imaginative vitalism. ‘Finally to conclude in the words of
W. W. Robson,
In ‘Brave
New World, he gave
us a memorable
example of a
gloomy
modern genre…. The
novel is
more forceful than
Huxley’s early
satires because
Huxley no
longer protects
himself by satirizing everything
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