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Brave New World One of the most famous 20th century novels in the western world is a book called Brave New World. Written in 1931 by an Englishman called Aldous Huxley, it became a subject of much discussion as soon as first appeared. The reason why Brave New World is still so famous is that it describes a terrifying future world that is becoming more and more possible. Brave New World takes place 600 years in the future. At this time there is a world government. Its aim is for people to be happy, so that there are no more wars or violence. This government uses several very powerful methods to control people. The first is that people are no longer born from human beings. Instead, they are cloned in factories. There are five different types of clones. The best type of clone, called Alphas, become the leaders of society. The second group, the Betas, also have good positions in society. There is only one of each Alpha person or each Beta person. However, with the three lower groups, one egg is used to create up to 96 clones. Each of these clones is of course identical. The only reason why scientists have not created thousands of identical clones is that they have not yet learnt how to do this. These lower groups do the harder, more boring jobs that are needed in society. For example, the lowest group, the Epsilons, are always factory workers. As small children, each cloned group is taught to like and dislike certain things and people. For example, the second group, the Betas, are taught to dislike the lower groups because “they are stupid”. While the Betas sleep, they are told that they are “glad they are not Alphas, because Alphas work too hard”. In this way, the government makes sure that people are happy with their position in society and will not try to change things. The government also keeps people happy with the use of a drug called soma that make people happy. As a result, very few people are unhappy or feel any strong emotion. Again, the government wants people to be happy so that they will not try to change society. In this novel, Huxley asks very important and serious questions, such as, “If we can completely control people, is that a good thing? If we can give people drugs to stop them feeling unhappy, is that good or bad? If we do this, do we just stop them feeling, so that they have no real emotions? Do we want real, sometimes dangerous human beings, or do we want a controlled, ‘safe’ society?” Today, more than seventy years after Brave New World was first written, these questions have become more important than ever. |
