Brave New World Quotes

“But I like the inconveniences."

"We don't," said the Controller. "We prefer to do things comfortably."

"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."

"In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy."

"All right then," said the Savage defiantly, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

"Not to mention the right to grow old and ugly and impotent; the right to have syphilis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to be lousy; the right to live in constant apprehension of what may happen tomorrow; the right to catch typhoid; the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind." There was a long silence.

"I claim them all," said the Savage at last.

Mustapha Mond shrugged his shoulders. "You're welcome," he said.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“She would have laughed if she haven’t been at the point of crying.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“But why is it prohibited?" asked the Savage. In the excitement of meeting a man who had read Shakespeare he had momentarily forgotten everything else.
The Controller shrugged his shoulders. "Because it's old; that's the chief reason. We haven't any use for old things here."
"Even when they're beautiful?"
"Particularly when they're beautiful. Beauty's attractive, and we don't want people to be attracted by old things. We want them to like the new ones."
"But the new ones are so stupid and horrible. Those plays, where there's nothing but helicopters flying about and you feel the people kissing." He made a grimace. "Goats and monkeys!" Only in Othello's word could he find an adequate vehicle for his contempt and hatred.
"Nice tame animals, anyhow," the Controller murmured parenthetically.
"Why don't you let them see Othello instead?"
"I've told you; it's old. Besides, they couldn't understand it.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“Every discovery in pure science is potentially subversive.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“Lenina was shocked by his blasphemy. 'Bernard!' she protested in a voice of amazed distress. 'How can you?'
In a different key, 'How can I?' he repeated meditatively. 'No, the real problem is: How is it that I can't, or rather - because, after all, I know quite well why I can't - what it be like if I could, if I were free - not enslaved by my conditioning.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“They say that it is the fear of death and what comes after death that makes men turn to religion as they advance in years. But my own experience has given me the conviction that, quite apart from any such terrors or imaginings, the religious sentiment tends to develop as we grow older: to develop because, as the passions grow calm, as the fancy and sensibilities are less excited and less excitable, our reason becomes less troubled in its working, less obscured by the images, desires and distractions, in which it used to be absorbed; whereupon God emerges as from behind a cloud; our soul feels, sees, turns towards the source of all light; turns naturally and inevitably; for now that all that have the world of sensations its life and charm has begun to leak away from us, now that phenomenal existence is no more bolstered up by impressions from within or from without, we feel the need to lean on something that abides, something that will never play us false - a reality, an absolute and everlasting truth. Yes, we inevitably turn to God; for this religious sentiment is of its nature so pure, so delightful to the soul that experiences it, that it makes up to us for all our other losses.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“The exercise of authority restored her confidence, made her feel better.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“При правильном их применении слова способны быть всепроникающими, как рентгеновские лучи. Прочтешь — и ты уже пронизан и пронзен. Вот этому я и стараюсь среди прочего научить моих студентов — искусству всепронизывающего слова. Но на кой нужна пронзительность статье, об очередном фордослужении или о новейших усовершенствованиях в запаховой музыке? Да и можно ли найти слова по-настоящему пронзительные — подобные, понимаешь ли, самым жестким рентгеновским лучам, — когда пишешь на такие темы? Можно ли сказать нечто, когда перед тобой ничто?”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“I know. But that's all the more reason for severity. His intellectual eminence carries with it corresponding moral responsibilities. The greater a man's talents, the greater his power to lead astray. It is better that one should suffer than that many should be corrupted. Consider the matter dispassionately, Mr. Foster, and you will see that no offence is so heinous as unorthodoxy of behaviour. Murder kills only the individual-and, after all, what is an individual?" With a sweeping
gesture he indicated the rows of microscopes, the test-tubes, the incubators. "We can make a new one with the greatest ease-as many as we like. Unorthodoxy threatens more than the life of a mere individual; it strikes at Society itself. Yes, at Society itself," he repeated.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“Not quite. I'm thinking of a queer feeling I sometimes get, a feeling that I've got something
important to say and the power to say it--only I
don't know what it is, and I can't make any use of the power. If there was some different way
of writing ... Or else something else to write about ..." He was silent; then, "You see," he went on at last, "I'm pretty good at inventing phrases--you know, the sort of words that suddenly make you jump, almost as though you'd sat on a pin, they seem so new and exciting even though they're about something hypnopaedically obvious. But that doesn't seem enough. It's not enough for the phrases to be good; what you make with them ought to be good too.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“„Az lesz a vége, hogy odahozzák a szabadságukat a lábunk elé” – mondja Dosztojevszkij parabolájában a nagy inkvizítor -," és azt mondják nekünk: „Inkább igázzatok le, de tartsatok el bennünket.” És amikor Aljosa Karamazov megkérdi bátyját, a történet mesélőjét, hogy az inkvizítor gúnyolódik-e, Iván így felel: „Egy csöppet sem. Éppenséggel érdemül tudja be magának és társainak, hogy végre-valahára legyőzték a szabadságot, és ezt azért tették, hogy boldoggá tegyék az embereket.” Igen, hogy boldoggá tegyék őket, mert „az ember és az emberi társadalom számára soha semmi se volt elviselhetetlenebb, mint a szabadság!”
(Ford. Makai Imre)
Semmi, kivéve a szabadság hiánya, mert amikor rosszul mennek a dolgok, csökkentik a fejadagot, a rabszolgahajcsárok egyre többet követelnek, a földről felszállni nem tudó dodók ismét zajosan követelik majd a szárnyukat, hogy aztán megint csak lemondjanak róla, amikor jobbra fordulnak a dolgok, és a dodótartók elnézőbbek és nagylelkűbbek lesznek. A fiatalok, akik most becsmérlően vélekednek a demokráciáról, szabadságharcosok lesznek, amikor majd felnőnek. Az „Adjatok tévét és hamburgert, de tartsátok meg nyugodtan a szabadsággal járó felelősséget!” – kiáltás megváltozott körülmények között „Szabadság vagy halál!” – kiáltássá válhat. Egy ilyen forradalom kitörése részben azon erők közrejátszásának lesz köszönhető, amelyeket még a leghatalmasabb uralkodók sem tudnak irányítani, részben azon uralkodók tehetetlenségének, akik képtelenek eredményesen bevetni a tudománytól és technológiától a jövendő tirannusnak adott gondolatmanipuláló eszközeiket. Ha azt vesszük, milyen keveset tudtak és milyen kevéssé hathatós eszközök birtokában voltak, az előző korok nagy inkvizítorai meglepően sokra jutottak. De utódaik, a jövő jól tájékozott, minden tekintetben tudományos alapokon dolgozó diktátorai kétségtelen még többre jutnak majd.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“– De ha ön tud Istenről, miért nem mondja meg nekik? -kérdezte a Vadember felháborodva. – Miért nem adja oda nekik ezeket az Istenről szóló könyveket?
– Ugyanabból az okból, amiért nem adjuk oda nekik az Othellót; mert régi dolgok, mert a sok száz évvel ezelőtti Istenről szólnak. Nem a mostani Istenről.
– De Isten nem változik.
– Az emberek azonban igen.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“Különben is, az ember legjobb nyugalma az alvás, s ezt gyakran kijátszod; de erősen félsz a haláltól, mely semmi több. Nem több, mint alvás. Aludni. Álmodni tán.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“Moral education, which ought never, in any circumstances, to be rational”
― Aldous Huxley , Brave New World

“But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."

"In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy."

"All right then," said the Savage defiantly, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World