On Page 42: Brave New World

[Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, First Harper Perennial Modern Classics Edition, 2006. Paperback, page 42]

Brave New World from Aldous Huxley is a story which takes place in a future with a completely different culture. The culture is hyper sexual with heightened gender roles and everything, even pleasure is meant for utility. Men are cogs in the machine and women are the gasoline that fuel them. It takes science, workaholism, and utilitarianism to their extremes while using genetic engineering and conditioning to ignore any factors that might interrupt those three.

That is not the synopsis I would have liked to write, but Brave New World is difficult for me to write about. Most writing leaves messages or lessons in the background. This book has affair amount of in-your-face rhetoric. This page is steeped in an alien culture and obvious rhetoric.

This culture is polyamorous without feelings. People feel for each other, but there is shame to having only one partner. There’s also shame if you withhold sex from said partner. In a way there’s a stunted aspect of people in this culture, like they never mentally passed late puberty— acting almost like 17 year olds.

There’s an emphasis on being or looking “stable” or “sane,” which are words that more often express what others are supposed to see in an individual rather than what they see in themselves:

“Stability,” said the Controller, “stability. No civilization without social stability. No

social stability without individual stability.” His voice was a trumpet. Listening, they

felt larger, warmer.  

There’s a public pressure to consume life in a consistent focused way, while always behaving as expected. However, alongside this façade, they are supposed to approach every situation as if they were looking for a relationship. Every man and every woman is to judge each other as a potential partner:

“Of course there’s no need to give him up. Have somebody else from time to time,

that’s all. He has other girls, doesn’t he?”        

Lenina admitted it.

“Of course he does. Trust Henry Foster to be the perfect gentleman—always

correct. And then there’s the director to think of. You know what a stickler…”

Nodding, “He patted me on the behind this afternoon,” said Lenina.

This is what I mean late puberty or 17 year old behaviour; a sexual mindset whilst assuming conformity and a lack of emotionality as being grown-up or “stable.” Toward the end of the passage we get in-world rhetoric with “men” on the “axles… sane men, obedient men stable in contentment” and then it turns to attack less utilitarian emotions: “Crying: my baby my mother…groaning: My sin… screaming with pain, muttering with fever, bemoaning old age and poverty.”

The people in this world are stuck and immature. Emotion to them is alien They were not only conditioned to misunderstand themselves, but to shame any display of grief or pain. This page 42 offers a look at world without growth, stunted in childish ignorance; a glimpse of a future where people are not taught to recognize and deal with their emotions.

Side note: I wanted to examine the gender biases and how women in this world are taken advantage of sexually. Parts of the book reminded me of Mad Men, which I found difficult to watch because of the treatment of women. This was different in that I finished the book (not the show). One page was not enough to go into this topic.