15 Provocative Quotes From Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley

Written in 1931 and published in 1932, Brave New World was Aldous Huxley's fifth novel and first dystopian work. He said the novel was originally inspired as a parody of utopian novels written by H.G. Wells.

(Best Dystopian Novels for Writers.)

Brave New World follows multiple characters in a future world that replaces God with Ford, including measuring time since Ford and having a magazine titled The Fordian Science Monitor. As such, it's a world based on principles of the assembly line and finding efficiencies in work, life, and civilization—often going to incredible lengths to secure that efficiency and social structure.

Here are 15 quotes from Aldous Huxley's Brave New World that cover happiness, loneliness, civilization, Shakespeare, and more.

"Happiness is never grand."

"I can't understand a word you say. First it's vacuum cleaners; then it's knots. You're driving me crazy."

"If one's different, one's bound to be lonely."

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"I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

"In a properly organized civilization like ours, nobody has any opportunities for being noble or heroic."

"In the excitement of meeting a man who had read Shakespeare he had momentarily forgotten everything else."

(8 ways William Shakespeare can make you a better writer.)

"Our civilization has chosen machinery and medicine and happiness. That's why I have to keep these books locked up in the safe."

"Suffer little children."

"That is the secret of happiness and virtue—liking what you've got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their unescapable social destiny."

"The greater a man's talents, the greater his power to lead astray."

"These are unpleasant facts; I know it. But then most historical facts are unpleasant."

(Writing in the Shadows: On writing better historical fiction.)

"They'll grow up with what the psychologists used to call an 'instinctive' hatred of books and flowers. Reflexes unalterably conditioned. They'll be safe from books and botany all their lives."

"What fun it would be if one didn't have to think about happiness!"

"You can't consume much if you sit still and read books."

(12 thought-provoking quotes from 1984, by George Orwell.)

"That's one of the things I try to teach my students—how to write piercingly."