Review: Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley

Brave New World is Aldous Huxley's deeply satirical answer to the Orwellian future Utopia. Huxley's is a world of drug induced contentment, genetic predetermination, and ingrained consumerism, all sold with a smiling face, and for the drugged population it's an easy sell. The ruling faction is aiming for stability, and beyond that they care not. The "if we could just keep people from moving, from researching, from developing" is a common theme is Ayn Rand's controversial hit Atlas Shrugged, and Brave New World is a manifestation of a future in which things have been stopped and are being controlled by those in power. Individuals are not allowed to thrive in this environment, but are shipped off to island isolated locations so that they cannot affect the surrounding society, or are driven to suicide.

This is a great futuristic sci-fi read, with a well-developed plot and characters and special treatment for the religion/science/consumerism discussion. Keep in mind the publish date of 1932, which makes the reverence of Ford and the prevalence of birth control even more meaningful. And what stood out to me was the flavor of nihilism throughout. And I really liked this book.

16 down on my way to 52.

Review: Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut

Vonnegut's writing is an exercise for the sharp, witty, satirical mind. Every page, every sentence. When I read (only when I'm reading my own non-collectors copy of a book, of course) I dog-ear pages, pencil notes in margins, and keep a running tab near the front for important page numbers, quotes, or connections between ideas. That was not really possible in Cat's Cradle because everything was worth looking into. I stopped the dog-earing after the first 50 pages because almost 25 of them were folded and it seemed pointless.

Obviously I really enjoyed this book, but that's my post-modern, dystopian predilection showing. Cat's Cradle is not a story book or a character study, it's more of an anthropological argument, and in fact it was this book that earned Vonnegut his masters degree where an earlier thesis had failed him. Science, religion, politics, patriotism, it all comes under fire here, and every shot is set up to make the reader laugh first, then think deeply. Vonnegut's disdain for blind patriotism and war is not hard to read here, but more deeply nuanced is his argument between science and religion. Blind pursuit of scientific knowledge leads right up to the book's doomsday ending, but while science, written as a heartless man, kills the bulk of life, religion is portrayed as a blatant lie intended to guide and ease suffering, in the end failing to do either. Middle of the road it is, then.

Book 12 on my way to 52 in 2011