and what can I say...I had heard many reviews of this book before reading it, some good, some so-so and others not so. But this book is amazing. I found it replete with allusions, allegories, metaphors and wonders.
This book presents the reader with a futuristic world, where the capitalistic mentality has seeped into every fabric and layer of life. It is a world centered on the utopia ideal, which in turn becomes a dystopia. This concept raises several interesting rhetorical questions: can man create a perfect society? What are the limits of human development? How much is too much in the structure of society? What is happiness?etc.
The book opens describing and explaining a human hatchery, where humans are created. And they are consequently reared and shaped through hypnopædic lessons and training that indoctrinates children from infancy upwards. In these drills children are disciplined according to a caste system that delineates the job and future of each human being.
Sexual pleasure is reduced to its most basic form, love does not exist, neither does passion. The arts are non-existent, books are unheard of, except reference books for logical reasons, and individualistic ideas are absent. This is a society where movies are in the form of porno graphical propaganda that advances the ideal of like-mindedness, there is no individual thought, and seeks to satisfy the most basic of sexual needs. In this society, there is no time for solitude, "everyone belongs to everyone else," and happiness lies in social stability as a whole. "The world's stable now. People are happy: they get what they want, and they never want what they can't get. They're well off; they're safe; they're never ill' they're not afraid of death; they're blissfully ignorant of passion and old age' they're plagued with no mothers or fathers they're got no wives or children, or lovers to feel strongly about; they're so conditioned that they practically can't help behaving as they ought to behave." And there's also soma, a pill rationed out every day, after work, that functions somewhat like prozac in its' essence. All these tools accumulate to veil the population to the facets of life that we are currently accustomed to. And there is no God, no belief in any deity, no life after death, no transcendental thought. There is no dirt, "ending is better than mending", cleanliness is next to godliness and the capitalistic model underpins thoughts and actions. Violent Passion Surrogate releases the human need for precisely that: violence and passion. Everything is clearly delineated and classified, surprises are not part of the social organization.
This books is not without its minor defects but as one whole, it is a masterpiece that has surpassed the deterioration of time.
Here, the last part of the final, most important conversation in the book between the Controller (Head Governor) and the Savage (who wasn't raised in this structure):
"But I like inconveniences." -Savage
"We don't, we prefer to do things comfortably."
"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."
"In fact you're claiming the right to be unhappy."
In the end, I highly recommend this jewel of a book, it will awaken thoughts and ideas that might have been dormant.
Here are helpful links that gives background information on the book: http://foothilltech.org/rgeib/english/bnw/
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