You get a royal invitation to spend a few months at one of Queen Victoria's estates. Would you refuse? Probably not. Especially if you had been angling for it for years. And if you knew pretty much what would transpire. Black tie not strictly required. It was however, a very onerous occasion. In addition to the queen herself, Bernard Shaw and Aldous Huxley were also in attendance. Two extremely effective social engineers. There were none more loyal or more trusted, none better versed in the subtle art of gentlemanly persuasion. None more eager to earn their keep. They lent the affair a casual intellectual ambience. For about six months the world waited. What matters were considered? What sorts of things were said? The British had spent hundreds of years setting up a world wide hegemony. Were costly compromises to be made with an uppity Indian errand boy? Compromises were made. Which compromises were made by whom shall remain largely a matter of conjecture. In the end neither side lost face. Both sides keep up appearances. The British picked up and walked out of India as one skinny little man had predicted. Don't we love a happy ending? What a story. With a small modification here and there, what a movie. Gandhi.

Parrots parroting. Much has been written about Aldous Huxley, most of it in relation to his Brave New World. One may wonder why so many people bother to write anything at all. Especially since 98% repeat the same trite intentional misinterpretations. Aldous was so great this and Aldous was so brilliant that. He was an icon of modern literature. He set the cornerstone of modern philosophic thought. If one were not aware that he had died in 1963, one might believe he had been not a mere mortal. The most fascinating thing is that Aldous Huxley wrote The Brave New World. The second most interesting thing is that virtually identical ersatz interpretations are repeated ad nauseam. It's comical. It's entertaining. How can so many get it so wrong? Why do they bother? Anybody could write a socially acceptable review of his most famous work. Anybody? Anybody. There's not much need to change the words around. Nobody is the least bit interested in originality. Quite the contrary, if key words were changed the result would not be a proper job of parroting. Essential socially preordained misconceptions might be modified, or worse, they might be omitted. The Brave New World is scary, disgusting and dismal. This misreading is relentlessly hammered and hammered. What fallacies must always be included in a description of The Brave New World? You must know what they are. Otherwise you have no business writing about the Brave New World.

What if you wanted to get past the socially acceptable nonsense and see the actual Brave New World? Ah. So you want to get to the heart of the matter? Excellent! Don't read about Aldous Huxley. Actually it would be better not to read Aldous Huxley. A guide would be better. Aldous Huxley's other works are unguided journeys. But for the Brave New World there are guides. Edward Woodward is superb. His voice can be both male and female. His voice is a medium which will transport you to the new world. You might never have arrived on your own. A journey into Aldous Huxley's new world could be a mind altering experience. One not to be taken lightly. You may not look at human beings or even life the same way afterwards. Have a nice trip!

Read by Edward Woodward
"Morality, art, religion, love, pain, parenthood. These are things of the past. they only exist among the uncivilized savages in the remote New Mexican reservation. it was on this reservation that John was raised -- indeed was actually 'born' -- and he finds himself a true misfit in the Brave New World." -- from the cover.

There is so much petit bourgeois parrot's parroty.
If you get tired of warmed over hogwash, try some good stuff.
BRAVE NEW WORLD ? A Defence Of Paradise-Engineering
"In the future, it will be feasible technically - at the very least - for pharmacotherapy and genetic science to re-engineer us so that we can become - to take one example among billions - a cross between Jesus and Einstein. Transhumans will be endowed with a greater capacity for love, empathy and emotional depth than anything neurochemically accessible today. Our selfish-gene-driven ancestors - in common with the cartoonish brave new worlders - will strike posterity as functional psychopaths by comparison; and posterity will be right."
huxley.net/

Parrots' parroty. Most reviews of this book are warmed over hogwash. When one dog barks, the rest chime in with relentless unanimity. Nobody but nobody bothers to quote the heart of the matter from the book. Is everybody lobotomized, or what? It's as though everyone idolizes John, the savage. They see this ludicrous savage as a hero not as Huxley transparently presents him -- as a blithering idiot. Readers entrapped in a traditionally imposed moral paradigm are instinctively unable to see John the savage for what he is, a preposterously absurd anachronism. Out of place, unneeded, out of date -- a dangerous devolution. They are fundamentally and hopelessly entralled by institutionalized tyranny. Apparently they love it. They just can't get enough of it. Pandora's box could be closed. All the baddies could be stuffed back inside. But no. Most people are preconditioned to want that blasted lid kept wide open.

Typical preconditioned parroty:
"The society Huxley presents is emotionless"
Some parrot must have read 1984 and got the books mixed up. It's only John, the savage, who can't have fun in The Brave New World. John doesn't know what a female orgasm is. When a female new world inhabitant graciously offers hands on instruction the clueless dummy becomes enraged and violent. He strikes her down, calling her an impudent strumpet. Impudent strumpet? That's an artful Shakespearean term. In the new world there are no senseless murders, no senseless trajedies to which one can artificially impose meaning, however artfully. So what if hedonism has replaced art? So what if art has disappeared in the absence of trajedy? Good riddance. Could you live with that? Or would you feel better knowing that if something feels really good it has to be bad, or better yet bad and illegal? Upon what does art depend for meaning? Senseless death, pain, suffering, violence, ignorance, injustice. Which world is full of brainwashed automatons, the new world or the contemporary world? John may be an underdog. As a misfit outsider he is deserving of pity. But is he really your hero? He certainly isn't ours.

Preconditioning is the determining factor in your contemporary world. But that can't be acknowleged because consideration of the socioeconomic basis for it is disallowed a priori.

Inverse relationship between hedonism and socioeconomic status.

"I can sympathise with people's pains, but not with their pleasures. There is something curiously boring about somebody else's happiness." Aldous Huxley

The term, "sexually promiscuous" whenever used in currrent societies is universally pejorative. "Sexually promiscuous" has a lack of relevance in Huxley's new world. Sexual promiscuity has relevance only when masses need reminding of their obligatory allegiance to an ancient moral paradigm. More than half of George Carlin's infamous words would also have to be jettisoned for lack of relevant meaning. Good riddance. Slut? Pimp? Whore? Bastard? SOB? Guilt? Shame? Good riddance. And don't come back.

"There is no religion."
Baloney. The brands have simply been switched.

"dependant upon drugs."
Huxley enjoyed drugs. That's no secret. Huxley was an admittedly avid drug user. He published several books describing his usage in great detail. Was he dependant? Is enjoyment always and in all cases the equivalent of dependance? Life in the Brave New World is dependant upon peace. Peace was so highly valued that agression was eliminated. Life in the Brave New World is dependant upon absence of war. Life in the Brave New World is dependant upon absence of greed. These are dependancies. Are they bad? Dependant upon drugs is an arbitrary cognitive construction which has relevance only for allegiance to an ancient moral paradigm. Furthermore, although Aldous Huxley had interest in mysticism and effects of so-called consciousness-expanding drugs, viz the traditional moral paradigm he was immoral. Mysticism-schmysticism. Do you believe that spiel? Intellectualizing about his experiences doesn't excuse him from such guilt, even if he recieved significant royalties for it. But parrots never mention this simple fact. Why? Because Huxley's "Brave New World Recanted" was his penitence for which he has recieved complete absolution.

"People are peaceful because they have been conditioned to fulfill their place in society."
As Huxley ultimately fulfilled his place in society perhaps?

"Huxley presents a dismal world."
Not in The Brave New World read by Edward Woodward. 1984 was dismal. Fahrenheit 451 was dismal. John, the savage, was born in a dismal world. Which book was read or not read? Or which virtually identical review parroted?

People in Huxley's world have "no control over events." Which book was read or not read? Or which virtually identical review parroted? Typical of Kansans whose thinking is strictly uniform. To ignore is for them not optional, it is an obligation. In fact ignorance has been given explicit legal sanction by the state legislature.

Customers who bought this book also bought: 1984 by George Orwell, Erich Fromm, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Mental preconditioning? What better evidence.

Preconditioning?

Let's be absolutely clear about a few things. People believe that The Brave New World is shocking because they are preconditioned to think so. People believe that The Brave New World is scary because they are preconditioned to think so. People believe that The Brave New World is dismal because they are preconditioned to think so. People believe that The Brave New World is a scientific dictatorship because they are preconditioned to think so. People believe that The Brave New World is inherently evil because they are preconditioned to think so.

"Huxley, however, has an altogether different agenda in mind. He is seeking to warn us against scientific utopianism. He succeeds all too well. Although we tend to see other people, not least the notional brave new worlders, as the hapless victims of propaganda and disinformation, we may find it is we ourselves who have been the manipulated dupes."
huxley.net/

Unabridged Audio cassette version
Unabridged Audio CD version

Relevant comment by Vigdor Schreibman "Progress in this direction is now leading to recognition that the myths of guilt about human sexuality imported into the story of Adam and Eve by Judeo-Christian religious leaders and classic artists, are not logically inherent in what is, arguably, the most considered story of the Hebrew Bible. Thomas Shoemaker, who teaches religious studies at Mesa Community College, at Mesa Arizona, brings to light the possibility of a new understanding of the Genesis story. In his The Bible in Hebrew , Shoemaker asks, "Is it is possible that the most consistent reading of the story has been ignored for twenty centuries?" This inquiry is consistent with the recent recognition by church leaders, of the need to harmonize their powers with the truths of science."

Fueling the Fears of Science, By Arlene Judith Klotzko
"Fears of science-focusing specifically on the consequences of genetic manipulation-are being stoked on both sides of the Atlantic. In the United States, worries tend to center on the human applications of biotechnology, most notably cloning and a future in which genetic engineering of the human germ line will be possible. These largely neoconservative critics-including their intellectual big gun, Francis Fukuyama-see cloning as the thin end of the wedge. In their doleful view, therapeutic cloning will lead to reproductive cloning, which will lead to germ line interventions and, in Fukuyama's particular nightmare vision, a class of genetic aristocrats lording it over a genetic underclass, who may well turn violent unless the government offers them a eugenic way out of their sorry lot in life. For anyone who knows about science, this vision is preposterous. For the rest, it is very, very scary."
the-scientist.com/yr2002/jun/opin_020624.html

Typical reviewer's comments, in this case from Amazon.com:
"Brave New World Revisited is a trenchant plea that humankind should educate itself for freedom before it is too late. His novels go far in defining the character of modern man, while his later work reflects an interest in mysticism and the effect of the consciousness-expanding drugs."

Bernard Shaw should have given fifteen of Shakespeare's plays for the Revisitaion Huxley should have written. The Brave New World Revisited, was misnamed. It should have been the Brave New world Recanted. Limpid, unoriginal and out of sync with his other works, it succeeded in casting lasting aspersion upon his masterpiece, The Brave New World. As a result his reputation as a paragon of brilliance with, "tremendous knowledge of human relations," was reaffirmed. A spoonfull of sugar helps medicine go down. After his vapid revisitation was published it was hailed as the greatest of achievements. In certain ways it was. Our Ford would be proud. Huxley was elevated to the status of exhalted hero of humanity of the highest order, recieving valuable psychological and pecuniary positive reinforcements befitting such lofty rank. A fitting reward for correcting potential inappropriate conclusions drawn from the original work. Neglecting to redefine the original would have left completely unacceptable thoughts in many idealistic minds. In such a case, Huxley's last three books and his masterpiece would have had to have been interpreted completely differently. Huxley's later works, The Doors of Perception, Heaven and Hell, and Moksha when considered together with The Brave New World, would have delivered a totally unacceptable message to the masses. Integrity can be an expensive thing. Sometimes the bar is raised so high that its alternatives become quite attractive by comparison. Sometimes the price is too high. Sometimes one knows what must be done. Trenchant plea for what? Wake up and do what? A recantation of course. Timothy Leary was offered a similar deal. Which of course he jumped on with both feet. Result? TV. Movies. Book deals. He was turned on to a gravy train. He tuned in to a lucrative lecture circuit. Three days a week he delivered five mikes* of pure BS to an audience for an hour and collected five thousand dollars plus expenses per "lecture" while Leary's partner who accompanied him on the lecture circuit gravy train collected only three grand plus expenses for each hour of BS. His partner was none other than G. Gordon Liddy, erstwhile fall guy turned recanter -- and Chriscraft cruiser.

*Five microphones, not five micrograms.