Brave New World

Brave New World es una novela distópica escrita por el inglés Aldous Huxley, y publicada en 1932.

La edad no importa, los trabajadores tropicales son inoculados con fiebre tifoidea, etc. La novela anticipa los desarrollos en tecnología reproductiva, manipulación psicológica y acondicionamiento, para hacer profundos cambios en la sociedad…

En vocabulario vemos draped, bleakly, scribbled, y zealous

 

Para Brave New World, Huxley se inspiró en las novelas utópicas de H. G. Wells, con una visión oscura del futuro, una utopía negativa, con tiranía corporativa y acondicionamiento de la conducta. La depresión en Inglaterra en 1931, con desempleo masivo y el abandono del estándar del oro en la moneda, persuadió a Huxley que la estabilidad era esencial para la supervivencia de la civilización.

 

Front cover art, Brave New World

The enormous room on the ground floor faced towards the north. Cold for all the summer beyond the panes, for all the tropical heat of the room itself, a harsh thin light glared through the windows, hungrily seeking some draped lay figure, some pallid shape of academic goose-flesh, but finding only the glass and nickel and bleakly shining porcelain of a laboratory. Wintriness responded to wintriness. The overalls of the workers were white, their hands gloved with a pale corpse-coloured rubber. The light was frozen, dead, a ghost. Only from the yellow barrels of the microscopes did it borrow a certain rich and living substance, lying along the polished tubes like butter, streak after luscious streak in long recession down the work tables.

"And this," said the Director opening the door, "is the Fertilizing Room…

Meanwhile, it was a privilege. Straight from the horse's mouth into the notebook. The boys scribbled like mad.

Tall and rather thin but upright, the Director advanced into the room. He had a long chin and big rather prominent teeth, just covered, when he was not talking, by his full, floridly curved lips. Old, young? Thirty? Fifty? Fifty-five? It was hard to say. And anyhow the question didn't arise; in this year of stability, A. F. 632, it didn't occur to you to ask it.

"I shall begin at the beginning," said the D.H.C. and the more zealous students recorded his intention in their notebooks: Begin at the beginning. "These," he waved his hand, "are the incubators." And opening an insulated door he showed them racks upon racks of numbered test-tubes. "The week's supply of ova. Kept," he explained, "at blood heat; whereas the male gametes," and here he opened another door, "they have to be kept at thirty-five instead of thirty-seven. Full blood heat sterilizes." Rams wrapped in theremogene beget no lambs…

"What are you giving them?" asked Mr. Foster, making his tone very professional.

"Oh, the usual typhoid and sleeping sickness."

"Tropical workers start being inoculated at Metre 150," Mr. Foster explained to the students. "The embryos still have gills. We immunize the fish against the future man's diseases." Then, turning back to Lenina, "Ten to five on the roof this afternoon," he said, "as usual."

"Charming," said the Director once more, and, with a final pat, moved away after the others.

On Rack 10 rows of next generation's chemical workers were being trained in the toleration of lead, caustic soda, tar, chlorine. The first of a batch of two hundred and fifty embryonic rocket-plane engineers was just passing the eleven hundred metre mark on Rack 3. A special mechanism kept their containers in constant rotation… (Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley)

 

Vocabulario

Drape: cover or wrap loosely with folds of cloth.

Bleakly: in a way that suggests a lack of hope:

She thought of herself, bleakly, as having no chance of success.

In a way that is cold and empty:

The wintry vistas are bleakly beautiful.

Scribble: to write or draw something quickly or carelessly.

Zealous: enthusiastic and eager:

A zealous supporter of the government's policies.

 

Para saber

Para Brave New World Huxley se inspiró en las novelas utópicas de H. G. Wells, con una visión oscura del futuro, una utopía negativa, con tiranía corporativa y acondicionamiento de la conducta. La depresión en Inglaterra en 1931, con desempleo masivo y el abandono del estándar del oro en la moneda, persuadió a Huxley que la estabilidad era esencial para la supervivencia de la civilización.

Huxley usó los personajes de la novela para expresar ampliamente sus opiniones, particularmente el temor a perder la identidad individual en el futuro. Un viaje a Estados Unidos le dio a Brave New World mucho de su carácter. Huxley no solo se irritó por la cultura de los jóvenes norteamericanos, la alegría de lo comercial y la promiscuidad sexual, sino que encontró en My Life and Work de Henry Ford principios que se aplicaban en todo.

El calendario en la novela “AF”, se refiere a “Anno Ford”, comenzando en 1908, cuando el Modelo T salió de la línea de ensamblaje de Henry Ford.

 

Artículos relacionados

Winston vive en Airstrip One, las ruinas de una Inglaterra arrasada por la guerra, conflictos civiles y revolución… Nineteen Eighty-Four, de George Orwell

… despierta una mañana para encontrarse solo. Todos han desaparecido… The Autobiography of J. G. Ballard

… la tierra fue en realidad una gigante supercomputadora, creada por otra computadora, para dar respuesta a la última pregunta sobre la vida y el universo… The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Es muy importante insistir en los valores individuales. Que cada ser humano es único y en esto está basado el valor de la libertad… Aldous Huxley