Brave New World

De: Aldous Huxley

Narrado por: Michael York

Originally published in 1932, this outstanding work of literature is more crucial and relevant today than ever before.

“One of the most prophetic dystopian works of the 20th century”—Wall Street Journal

Cloning, feel-good drugs, antiaging programs, and total social control through politics, programming, and media—has Aldous Huxley accurately predicted our future? With a storyteller’s genius, he weaves these ethical controversies in a compelling narrative that dawns in the year 632 AF (After Ford, the deity). When Lenina and Bernard visit a savage reservation, we experience how Utopia can destroy humanity.

A powerful work of speculative fiction that has enthralled and terrified readers for generations, Brave New World is both a warning to be heeded and thought-provoking yet satisfying entertainment.

©1932 Aldous Huxley; 1998 BBC Audiobooks America (P)2003 BBC Audiobooks America

Reseñas de la Crítica

"British actor Michael York's refined and dramatic reading captures both the tone and the spirit of Huxley's masterpiece." (AudioFile)

“Oh, Ford, Ford Ford, I Wish I Had My Soma!”

Brave New World is a bitterly funny and humorously tragic dystopian novel in which Aldous Huxley satirizes modern civilization’s obsession with consumerism, sensual pleasure, popular culture entertainment, mass production, and eugenics. His far future world limits individual freedom in exchange for communal happiness via mass culture arts like “feelies” (movies with sensual immersion), the state-produced feel-good drug soma, sex-hormone gum, popular sports like “obstacle golf,” and the assembly line chemical manipulation of ova and fetuses so as to decant from their bottles babies perfectly suited for their destined castes and jobs, babies who are then mentally conditioned to become satisfied workers and consumers who believe that everyone belongs to everyone. In a way it’s more horrible than the more obviously brutal and violent repression of individuals by totalitarian systems in dystopias like George Orwell’s 1984, because Huxley’s novel implies that people are happy being mindless cogs in the wheels of economic production as long as they get their entertainments and new goods.

Michael York does a great job reading the novel, his voice oozing satire for the long opening tour of the Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, and then modifying in timbre and dialect for the various characters, among them the self-centered brooder Bernard Marx, the budding intellectual poet Helmholtz Howard, the sexy, sensitive, and increasingly confused Lenina Crowne, the spookily understanding Resident World Controller of Western Europe Mustapha Mond, and especially the good-natured, sad, and conflicted Shakespearean quoting “savage” John.

I had never read this classic of dystopian science fiction, so I’m glad to have listened to this excellent audiobook, because it is entertaining and devastating in its depiction of human nature and modern civilization, especially timely in our own brave new Facebook world.

The last few chapters make the book

Slow start with a relatively slow story. The last few chapters make the book and give you a fair bit to chew on. Almost thought I was going to give up on this book but glad I stuck through. You can read other reviews to catch what the book is really about; I'm just providing the info I wish I knew ahead since I was listening for pleasure and made a quick decision to use up credits before they expire.

Visionary Look Into The Future Via 1932

The story is well written, the reading is excellent, but this is a very difficult audio book to listen to and follow along. It clips along at a brisk pace and so many new concepts and ideas are introduced in such fresh terms, that it is difficult to comprehend what is actually happening most of the time. I was new to the story and knew very little about it when I began listening. I ended up researching it on Spark Notes to comprehend the plot line and who all the character were. Even then it was difficult to comprehend what was happening at times; certainly one not to be listened to while doing other activities. I think the story must have been so brilliant for it's time, and it is fun to listen to things he visualized for the future, now, and how they have morphed into or away from our current social norm. Loved this aspect of it! It's one I would have to listen to again to fully comprehend the significance of it's brilliance. This one will take some work!

Masterpiece but dreadful Narration.

The book is splendid, but the inclination of the narrator to imagine the characters voices is to my opinion overdone and unnecessary. A grown man imitating women and children's voices is just distracting and add nothing to the book.

Dystopian classic hasn't aged well

Aldous Huxley was no science fiction writer. And how work describing a drugged up dystopian future misses the mark in many ways. The core of the story is philosophical, and maybe still relevant ... still, this one is classroom material and little more.

Poor audio quality.

Had to turn the volume way up just to be able to listen to the book. Annoying. Michael York was very good.

Quite a pneumatic rendition

parts of the book that are broken up by line breaks were difficult to understand but I think all in all it was handled quite well.

Such an accurate extrapolation.

Since the overall themes of the book have been part of our worldview my whole life, I had just assumed that I had read it years ago. Wrong.

The current direction of First World Culture being what it is, I thought I would revisit Huxley’s vision, hoping it had missed the mark. It was shocking, no irony intended, to see how many facets of our “Civilization” he foresaw. The eugenics, the drugs, the demand for constant entertainment, the hive thinking. They’re all there in today’s headlines.

Of course, some would point to the hyperbole of some plot points, but the current is there and the occasional Tidal Waves do strike.

Hopefully, there will be a few Savage voices that will have their cries for Human Civilization heard over the Din of American Idol! I know so many of you think you know the book, but read it again. And weep.

Michael York’s narration triples the impact!

Similar to 1984 but different

This is the first Aldous Huxley book I’ve read but I don’t plan on it being the last. Huxley has a brilliant and vivid imagination on par with Orwell. The narrator does a very good job, absolutely no complaints.

Brilliant performance of a timeless classic.

Beautiful narration. An absolute pleasure to listen to. Huxley's prescience has never been more obvious than it is today.