summary and reflections:

The book begins with being in the egg hatchery, where all people are raised in containers, the staff can then easily manipulate the fetus to the class he or she should be in. The classes are Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Epsilon in that order . The important tasks in society are taken care of by Alfa and Beta, they have a fairly free will while the remaining classes have a limited freedom and less important tasks to take care of, but still as necessary as the important ones. It is in this way that society is built. 

You see here directly in the book that they have a completely different approach to ethical issues than we have. For society to function, the classes must live in this segregation. An Alpha, for example, would not find it comfortable to spend time with a Delta or Epsilon because their intellect is not on the same level. 

In the course of the book, you get to follow Bernard Marx an Alpha man through his life, you find out that he was mistreated during the fetal stage. This meant that he got various defects, one of them was that he got the same physical qualifications as a gamma, because of this Bernard was harassed.

When Bernard notices that he does not really fit into his role as an Alpha, he begins to lose his confidence in society and how it is structured. He has a lot of thoughts about why so many things that we in our everyday lives think are obvious are completely absurd in their world. Some of those perceptions are that you have no feelings for anyone, nor do you get married. Only short conditions for your own enjoyment. The idea of ​​having some parents is very strange and you absolutely must not have your own opinions about things because then you can be perceived as rebellious. Science has also been changed so that it will suit them, everyone's living in a lie basically. 

Nor is there any misfortune in society. They achieved this by, as I said, keeping the different classes busy at all times. But if you, against all odds, feel depressed, you can take a couple of grams of soma, a drug without side effects that is guaranteed to make you think differently through various hallucinations. It is as if the whole population is afraid to feel emotions and their last resort is to take this drug.

Bernard later gets to know a young man named John. He grew up outside of civilization. Because of this, he is called a savage, but in our eyes he is not a savage but an educated man with values ​​and feelings that one should have. Bernard became very interested in John and wanted him to leave the "wilderness" and accompany him to civilization. John agreed to this but only if his mother was allowed to come along.

When they returned, there was a lot of focus on John and his mother Linda, because it was just a mother and her son but also that Linda did not look like the other women her age at all. Linda looked old but the others looked to be around twenty-five. This is due to the treatments and exercises that they are forced to undergo by the state. 

After a while, Linda becomes very ill and is taken to a boarding house where you are supposed to live your last days until you die. The hospitalized people get all the comforts imaginable to make their last time as enjoyable as possible. 

When John came there one day to check on his mother and show his care, the staff was very surprised because death in their eyes is not something strange at all but a process that must be carried out. It became even more complicated when they found out that it was the woman's son who had come there. A moment later, a nurse approached John and asked him not to act so strangely, as they had brought in a group of children to teach them and John gave them the wrong idea about death. 

At this point in the book, I reacted and thought it was very disturbing that you could say so to something that is as obvious as showing care to someone you are close to. But if society looked like this, it would probably seem like a strange phenomenon. Bernard becomes more and more fascinated by John's behavior, he begins to absorb much of John's way of thinking and devote himself to his own interests that can stimulate his personal interests. The directors of the society have now noticed for a long time that Bernard does not fit into their template when it comes to an idealistic Alpha man. He considers them a burden to all people because he does not work in harmony with the rest of the population. 

Bernard and the director then have a long conversation about why society sees it as it does. The director explains that if you want to achieve freedom of error, you have to sacrifice something in this case, it becomes your freedom and the right to be a unique individual for yourself. The consequence of Bernard having developed in this way is that he is sent to an island somewhere in the world where he can live exactly as he wants, something that would be meant as a punishment instead becomes a gift to him. 

My views on the book:

When I read the book, I always feel that their lives are very meaningless because they constantly strive to consume more and to always prioritize different pleasures. As I see it, life cannot be perfect if it was only about this. But it's about all the memories you collect and share with loved ones, to be able to have feelings and take a stand on things. Be able to experience new things, to share thoughts and perceptions with others. But since life has its ups and downs, not everything can be perfect all the time, but on the other hand you have to feel down if something tragic has happened to be able to move on in life and be happy. 

But if the people in this society are so emotionally cold, then they probably show no appreciation at all and how can one be happy? You can also see that pleasures in this society would just be something you do because that's how it is. And if they are happy all the time, how will they know that it is happiness if they have never been unhappy? 

So what I think Aldous Huxley has chosen to focus on in this book is the differences in their & our society. But I also noticed that Huxley pointed out the consuming that happens in the book, the state encourages that one would rather buy new than cook. If they stop consuming in that way, society as a whole will collapse because it is only what supplies civilization. Then the book is permeated by a new technology and advanced machines that make you really feel that it is a futuristic world you are reading about.

It may be that Huxley thought the world could look like in a hundred years, but it may not be that society looks the same as it does in the book. The book could be seen as a warning to us to constantly think that the world we live in should not be the same as You beautiful new world describes it. Therefore, I think the book is very relevant because we are moving towards new times where science is advancing all the time and the world is changing, then you can always keep this book in mind.

If you ask yourself the question of whether Huxley describes his own society in the book, it is probably a clear no. But what was it that encouraged him to write the book? Maybe he just wanted to give us a warning example or different events in his life could have had some impact. To be able to answer that question, one must have read a little about what Huxley had to go through. 

I read that he had to go through many tragic events, including his mother died when he was in his teens and Huxley later fell ill with Keratitis, which causes his eyes to become inflamed, because of this he could not see anything for a couple of years. Not only that, but his brother took his own life. Huxley must have been very affected by all this and that is perhaps why he chooses to write about a society without problems, worries and hardship.

Thank you for taking the time to read my analysis, hope you found it interesting and that it might make you a bit more motivated to read a book you have been put of for a long time. Happy reading!