Aldous Huxley's Brave New World presents a portrait of a society whichis superficially a perfect world.At first inspection, it seems perfect in manyways: it is carefree, problem free and depression free.All aspects of thepopulation are controlled: number, social class, and intellectual ability areall carefully regulated. Even history is controlled and rewritten to meet theneeds of the party. Stability must be maintained at all costs.In the new world which Huxley creates, if there is even a hint of anger,the wonder drug Soma is prescribed to remedy the problem.A colleague, noticingyour depression, would chime inwith the chant, "one cubic centimetre of somacures ten gloomy.
" This slogan is taught to everyone, from the youngest to theoldest. Unhappiness, intellectual curiosity, disagreement, suffering – none ofthese feelings is allowed in the world which Huxley creates.At the first signof unhappiness, Soma is prescribed.Emotions of all types are strictlycontrolled to provide stability and predictability within the population.
- Thesis Statement
- Structure and Outline
- Voice and Grammar
- Conclusion
Another of the panaceas for social ills is the belief that everyonewould enjoy his or her work because he or she was "made" or trained for it whenyoung. Consequently, from birth, everyone in Brave New World is slotted tobelong to a specific social and intellectual strata. In conjunction with thisidea, all births are completely planned and monitored.
There are differentclasses of people with different intelligence and different "career plans."Thesocial order was divided into the most highly educated, the Alpha+, and then indescending intelligence, the following divisions: Alpha, Beta, Beta -, Gamma,Delta, and Epsilon, which is the last group comprised of those citizens of thelowest intelligence who are necessary to perform society's most menial jobs.Another of the problems with the society which Huxley depicts is thatthe people do not have individuality.They are all conditioned by subliminalmessages and artificial stimuli to respond the same way. Although all people aremeant to respond identically without thinking, a few are made 'imperfectly' and,as a result, do have personalities.These people violate the principles oftechnology and artificial personalities and consequently have to be sent away soas not to "contaminate".