Brave New World: Vintage (Vintage classics)

A fascinating and unsettling read. Aldous Huxley’s vision of the future is both imaginative and disturbingly plausible, and the themes about society, control, and technology still feel incredibly relevant today. The writing is clear and engaging, and the story raises big questions without ever feeling preachy. It’s the kind of book that sticks with you long after finishing, making you reflect on the world around you. Thought-provoking, clever, and definitely a classic for good reason.

This is a book that I have been wanting to read for years but never got to it. I finally decided to give it a go. I was only aware of the basics of this book and I hadn't read any other reviews about it. What I discovered is quite a bizarre story that became quite addictive. It does have a strong literary fiction feel to it. At times the writing is poetic, at others disjointed and overall a story that gradually got under my skin. The world that Huxley has created is one where people are expected to be happy, they are brainwashed into feeling this. There is no mother, father or in fact any type of family connection. Each person has been produced in a test tube, each person has been altered at a genetic level to become what is required for Huxley's world to function. There is a layered social system where people are born to be what they are engineered to be, so someone with a lowly job will be content with that job. They don't aspire to be anything more than what they are supposed to be. Creating this world, the author then throws an anomaly in the system, this is something that shows that even with the use of technology there will be a time when nature intervenes, or it may be a simple human mistake. Either way, this is where the characters that start to question the system have a more important role. In the second half of the book, there is a move from the system to that of the outside world, this is more what we know today. Parents, relationships and unique traits and characteristics. This for me is where the story then takes an even more addictive turn. The comparisons built up between those in the system and those out of it are great. By the end of the book, I found I was very much interested in some of the characters. The ending, well that was a shock! This is a fabulous book to read, and I did struggle to find the flow at the beginning. I did read it in two sittings. The first sitting was a bit wobbly and at 33% I decided to have a break, this turned out to be a great time to pause and then coming back to it the following night. I then found myself unable to put this book down and finished it. This is a book that has loads of reviews, has loads of opinions and there are probably theories and it will have been analysed in every aspect. I read for the pleasure of it, so for me, this book was one that intrigued me. It did feel disjointed, to begin with, but it grew on me. I enjoyed this and I am very glad that I have read this book. For a book that was written in 1931 and published in 1932, it has some brilliant imagination and foresight into a possible future. A world where people are engineered to fit into a hierarchical society. It is a very good book and it is one I would happily recommend.

How might life be in around 600 years' time? Aldous Huxley makes a satirical stab at guessing, with his class system based on chemicals and the amounts of them placed in testtubes before babies are hatched. Depending on this you could either be an elite alpha, surrounded by privilege and luxury and in with a shout at running the world, or an in-between beta or gamma through to a delta or epsilon, there to perform menial tasks only. Which ever you end up as, any stresses, anxieties or anger are relieved with large doses of an instant-happiness wonder drug called Soma. And, as "everyone belongs to everyone else", sex with as many partners as possible as often as possible, with childbirth a thing of the past. Even chronological toddlers get in on the act as they're taught erotic play and sex games at a tender age. The most interesting characters are Lenina Crowne, the lead female, an alpha and healthy woman "already showing signs of Lupus", Bernard Marx, a top psychologist, with the brain of an alpha and the physical stature of a delta - the result of a chemical imbalance pre-hatching - and John "The Savage", the son of Linda, a Beta mother who took a trip with a top director to the world outside the "civilised" bubble and ended up being left behind when she got lost, accidentally became pregnant by the alpha director and gave birth. When Lenina and Bernard bring John back with them to "civilisation", following a similar visit, each is mutually fascinated by the other until Lenina demonstrates to John that she's instantly available to him, horrifyng him, ultimately with tragic results. To me, as a reader, this vision of a dystopian worldwide society - inspired by Henry Ford's newly automated factories and the advent of the consumer society - is abhorrent, reminding me, as it does, of things I've read and seen on TV about Nazism and mass brainwashing. But I found this book to be a riveting, absorbing page turner - pure quality in a short novel.

The story is fabulous, an absolute, well deserved classic. I read it many years ago as a school text and found it just as well-written and thought provoking this time around as I did in the 70's. So why the 3 stars? Well this kindle edition is appalling. So many typos some sections are almost impossible to read, my "favourite" is mis-naming Lenina to Lenin. Apostrophes are often replaced with question marks and words are jumbled. I seriously considered buying it again in another format just to make it legible. 5stars for the story, zero stars for proofreading.

A good story, however the kindle version appears to have been OCR scanned without proof reading and therefore there are a great many typos and other errors in the text. If you can put up with that, then go for it.

Pros: A classic that holds up, font and text is clearly readable, the introduction is brief an concise. Cons: From the pictures on Amazon page you cannot clearly tell that the illustration on the hard cover is not engraved into the book itself but just a dusk jacket. I have not found anything in description on the Amazon page that specifies otherwise . For a 90th Anniversary Edition I expected a more premium care/build of the book.

Perfeito!

Estupendo libro, leanlo

Bardzo fajne wydanie.

Huxley imagines a future where control doesn’t come from fear, but from comfort. No Big Brother screaming at you—just endless pleasure, distraction, consumption, and chemically engineered happiness. No books to burn, because no one wants to read. No repression, because desire itself has been redesigned. It’s chilling in the quietest possible way. Huxley’s warning isn’t about losing freedom violently, but about trading it away willingly, in exchange for comfort and stability. Re-reading it now feels less like revisiting a classic and more like holding up a mirror. Orwell warned us about power that hurts. Huxley warned us about power that seduces. And yes—small but important detail—the hardcover edition is nice. Clean design, compact and pleasant in the hands. A lovely object that contains a deeply uncomfortable idea.