Aldous Huxley wrote the Ape and Essence using two different sections. Chatto & Windus published the novel in the UK and the Harper & Brothers in the US. The novel presents a satire of the rise of the warfare on a large scale and the state of the 20th -century human environment.
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Author: Aldous Huxley
Genre: Science Fiction
Page: 222
Good reads rating: 3.77 of 5
My Rating: 7.4 of 10
Published: August 1992
Publisher: Ivan R. Dee
Language: English
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***Warning Spoilers Below This Point***
The famous novelist, Aldous Huxley, knew that to win a battle, one doesn’t always need to use a sword. He believed that it’s possible to win a battle or to change the minds of people if one comprises a strong will. He had the strength that he could write this satire -based novel, in which he demonstrated the pessimistic view of the political base that created mutual destruction.
The story starts with a vignette who describes the destruction of the entire world because of nuclear and chemical warfare at the hands of some intelligent baboons. Each of the team comprises some great scientists like Einstein, who forced the other people to press the button of destruction. When the buttons became pressed, a huge cloud occurred of gas, which carried the disease. The cloud spread out among both of them. Then the story leaps toward 100 years after the destruction in World War III. Nuclear weapons and the other chemical weapons harmed most of the human civilization. During the time they subsided, the radiation of the nuclear attack to the safer levels and a team of New Zealand scientists travelled to California in 2107 for rediscovery. A strange society created because of the radiation and three people from them captured a scientist, Dr Poole.
They introduced him to a society that lives by digging graves for clothes and by burning library books as fuel. Not only that, but they also killed the newborn babies if they were born with over three pairs of nipples and over seven fingers or toes, to preserve the purity of the genetic disfunction. The society worshipped Satan, whom they named Belial, and they also limited their reproduction process for only a two-week cycle, which started on the Belial’s Day Eve. The story reaches its climax when the Arch-vicar, the head of the church, confronted Dr Poole. There the Arch-vicar told Dr. Poole that there was another community named, Hots. He told that they don’t care about the post -World War effects and never followed the reproduction rules.
Dr Poole promised them to help them as a botanist to grow new plants for ploughing. But after some time, he escaped with Loola in search of the Hots as they heard that they live north of the deserts. Both of them arrived at the desert in Los Angeles and discover a tombstone showing an author’s name with the dates 1882-1948. It displayed three lines written on the tombstone, taken from the verse of Percy Bysshe Shelley, which he wrote on the death of John Keats.
This novel is a perfect science fiction story and offers meaningful satire aligned with Warfare. The book shows how horrible it was when the nuclear attack happened. He tried to show all the people about the aftereffect of the bomb and how difficult the situation became. It is an excellent and successful novel that I enjoyed reading. I rate this novel, 7.4 out of 10. Would I re-read the novel? Yes. Am I glad I read it? Yes.
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