Title Brave New World Author Aldous Huxley Cover Art A.G.E. Foto Stock/First Light Publisher Vintage Canada - 2007 First Printing 1932 Category Speculative Fiction Warnings None Main Characters John , Bernard Marx, Lenina Crowne Main Elements Dystopia

Title Brave New World Author Fred Fordham Illustrator Fred Fordham Publisher Harper - 2022 First Printing Harper - 2022 Category Speculative Fiction Warnings None

Far in the future, the World Controllers have created the ideal society. Through clever use of genetic engineering, brainwashing and recreational sex and drugs, all its members are happy consumers. Bernard Marx seems alone in feeling discontent. Harbouring an unnatural desire for solitude, and a perverse distaste for the pleasure of compulsory promiscuity, Bernard has an ill-defined longing to break free. A visit to one of the few remaining Savage Reservations, where the old, imperfect life still continues, may be the cure for his distress…

Huxley’s ingenious fantasy of the future sheds a blazing light on the present and is considered to be his most enduring masterpiece.

Graphic Novel

Available in graphic novel form for the first time, Aldous Huxley's classic novel of authoritarianism Brave New World, adapted and illustrated by Fred Fordham, the artist behind the graphic novel edition of To Kill A Mockingbird.

Originally published in 1932, Brave New World is one of the most revered and profound works of twentieth century literature. Touching on themes of control, humanity, technology, and influence, Aldous Huxley's enduring classic is a reflection and a warning of the age in which it was written, yet remains frighteningly relevant today.

With its surreal imagery and otherworldly backdrop, Brave New World adapts beautifully to the graphic novel form. Fred Fordham's singular artistic flair and attention to detail and color captures this thought-provoking novel as never before, and introduces it to a new generation, and countless modern readers, in a fresh and compelling way.

This year I had planned to re-read two dystopian classics I had first read in high school, but while I was at it, the Brave New World TV series came out, so I had to add that one to the list too.

I'll start with that out of 1984, Farenheit 451 and Brave New World, I enjoyed the last one the least, while I consider the first two as books that belong in my top ten favorites. Now maybe Brave New World didn't have the high school connection, but truth was, I didn't find it hit me in quite the same way. 1984 terrifies me, as it is so relevant even today, what with suppression of media, worship of political leaders, and the desire to wipe out contrary thought. And just the overall darkness and the really horrifying last third. Farenheit 451 has similar themes but also just the thought of burning books, I mean I have trouble giving my books away to charities where they can be enjoyed by others, I hoard my books! So that one hit close to home.

Brave New World on the other hand, well, I could almost be willing to live in that world. I'm not someone that has grand ambitions, desire of extreme freedoms. If I had a job that made me happy (even if I was genetically engineered to enjoy the job, but we are all creatures of our genetics already, does it really matter *that* much if one is manipulated?), and most of the world around me is designed to keep me happy, if also in my place, then would I really mind it so much? Now, I'm not a very social person, prefering to curl up with a good book than attend public orgies. But on the whole, if you weren't aware of what you were missing, and unlike 1984 where societies is designed to make people miserable, wouldn't it not be that bad to live where the goal is to make you happy? Sure, you have to give up love. Love of family, love of spouse, love of children (there are no families are babies are produced in factories)...that's a big one to give up though. But the rest seemed pretty nice, you have friends, jobs you like, there's fresh air and clean water and plenty of food. And of course "happy pills" for those few days where you aren't as happy as you'd like to be, but hey, we already have those, like alchool, and these pills are without the nasty side effects like hangovers so if we're doing it anyway...

And without love, there's a lot less pain. Your husband can't beat you since there are no husbands. Your wife can't cheat on you since everyone sleeps with everyone. Death doesn't mean that much since you never really get all that attached to anyone. So no grief or sadness. I suppose people get angry or annoyed with each other still, but hey, "happy pills" remember?

But of course, you also have to give up freedom of thought. If you were born to be a janitor, better hope you never want to be author, or a scientist, since you are a janitor, no matter what. Every now and then the engineering and brainwashing doesn't entirely take. But even then, they don't torture and break you as in 1984, they just ship you off to an island somewhere. That sounds pretty terrible, but at the same time you are free to follow your pursuits there. And sometimes you can even choose which island. Like it a little rough? Pick the Falklands. Prefer a little warmer, thee's the Carribean. And you can hang out with other misfits, bit like that place of lost toys in the Rudolph movie.

Still, there isn't much in the way of art or music except when John (the "Savage" who grew up in a Reservation where people live, kinda like we do today, like you know, being born and having an actual mother) comes. Now he wasn't exactly drowing in books either but he had a copy of Shakespeare he liked to quote a lot. But that's where you are made to think, the Utopia is great and all, but John is forced to choose. Does he want to live here, where everyone is kept healthy and happy but more or less brain dead. Or does he want to go back to the Reservation where at least he can love, do what he wants, commune with nature (and actually "care" about nature) and read Shakespeare? As in Farenheit 451 and 1984 we aren't left with a happy ending. John doesn't lead a revolt and free the proles, in fact it is he who is destroyed. These aren't tales of how to overcome a dystopic regime (e.g. Hunger Games, though even that one leaves you wondering if what takes the place of the old regime may be as bad or worse than what was there before, but at least they "win"), but a warning not to end up in one in the first place since there is no getting out once it is there.

Because the one thing in common with these books is that they are not "stories" they are warnings. Where characters or plots can fall flat one must remember the point is to present a possible world, one that we could find ourselves in if we countinue down certain paths we are on. Probably no author thought any one of these possible outcomes were actually going to happen exactly as described. But just the same, what bits of what we have now are we willing to give up. Would you give up some of your ambitions in exchange for a drug that makes you happy? Would you give up books so you don't need to be exposed to thoughts that disagree with your own? All three books are 70 or more years old, and all three are still very relevant today. Now none of the authors had the internet in mind, and that makes it harder to wipe out all media/history/books/freedoms, but the internet brings it's own forms of dystopia, such has making it impossible to figure out truth from the nonsense that people put out there. I suppose we need another book to add to these three giants of the genre to cover that.

In fact as in Margaret Atwoods' intro to my copy of Brave New World, it isn't so much how well have we avoided these potential outcomes, but how close have we come over time. Sometimes we're a little more Brave New World, sometimes we swing a bit more towards 1984, but we have yet to break free from the potential of any of them.

As a quick note, I've watch the first season of the Brave New World TV series. Not particularly a fan of it, of course they changed some key things, particularly the place where John comes from. In the book it is a Native American Reservation but in the show it is more a kind of theme park for tourists who want to be appalled by the thought of birth and marriage and death. Also, to keep things interesting in the TV show there had to be a revolt (two actually) because we all know TV viewers need action, happy endings and entertainment. But the book is not entertainment, it is cautionary, so you can't overthrow it, only be destroyed by it. John has virtually no influence on anyone, especially Lenina whom he manages to convert in the show to his view of freedom, and don't get me started on the Epsilons. Also, there wasn't an AI running things in the book (in fact the TV series was heading a bit towards a Matrix like concept) which I felt kind of allowed the humans to wash their hands of any responsibility since it was the computer that was running things. Of course in the 1930's when the book was written the idea of a virtual world was still a very extreme concept given the first computer was only to be built a decade later.

I had this interesting thought of bringing Orwell, Huxley and Bradury to 2020 and said, "There's the internet, and cell phones, and whatnot. How would it change your worlds?" And I have to think, not much. 1984 and Farenheit 451 already used a kind of internet/TV to fill people's minds with nonsense and to spy on them. Brave New World would have just incorporated VR sex. Cell phones, if allowed, would just be monitored. Besides, easy enough for any government with enough power to just flip the switch and say "no internet for you".

Note that I started my dystopic journey in January, didn't realize I'd be reading these tales of social doom and gloom in an era of a pandemic. Kind of reminds you there are worse things than having to wear a mask...

September 2024

Four years later and I'm reading the graphic novel version. The artwork was great, and the pastel colour palette was perfect for this "utopic" society. I still don't have the attachment for this tale as I do for say 1984, most likely since I didn't read it in school and pick apart the various themes. And for what its worth, I'm not sure I'd hate living in that society. Ok, the everyone belongs to everybody part I wouldn't like that much, being an introvert, but everyone seems pretty happy even though they are genetically engineered and brainwashed to be that way, I mean is it that terrible if you get to be happy? Dunno, hard to say. Maybe I'd end up a Bernard, longing to read things like Shakespeare, or learning about science. I'm not one to follow fads and slogans. Its a tough one, dystopia or utopia, guess depends who you are. I just watched a Nature of Things episode about the science of heartbreak and how those tough times in life help to make us who we are, and you can't really appreciate the good without going through some of the bad.