How does Aldous Huxley succeed to criticise BNW, although the world that is presented may appear just perfect to the reader?.
"Brave New World" written by the English author Aldous Huxley, born in 1894, is the portrait of an "ideal" world far in the future where society is made up of castes and babies originate from test-tubes, rather than from the womb of their mothers.
It is the portrait of happy-go-lucky society, conditioned in order to like their social destiny.
All in all, it is the portrait of a "brave" New World - indeed. But, then again, we have to bear in mind that there are several meanings of that word.
Brave New World might seem to be a merry world to that kind of reader who does not pay too much attention to it, who is blind for Huxley's acerbic wit and his use of satiric tricks of the literary trade. Huxley, however, knew how to criticise his contemporary world, the world of 1932, and what he thought might follow, in his novel BNW. The British author wisely used the future in order to attack the present and to foresee negative future aspects deriving from the present.
There are plenty of ways Huxley succeeds to present the weaknesses of his fictional world. .
It's not a perfect world at all. All through the novel we are being told about methods of conditioning, drug consumerism and hypnosis - for the sake of happiness itself.
In the first place it has to be said that the attentive reader may find the methods used to condition young children inhuman, just the thought of conditioning anyone may be met with disapproval. .
The detailed description of some experiments might give him the shivers (c.f. p. 2-3: test-tube babies; p. 16-20: hatred of flowers and books).
Another aspect that is most striking is the description of families and child-bearing in further times on page 33. This passage turns family life into a rather unfamiliar and horrendous issue. The reader most likely does not identify with what Mustapha Mond tells the students.
