James Dacre: are we living Brave New World's nightmare future?

The director of the first authorised stage dramatisation of Aldous Huxley's dystopian novel Brave New World reflects on why its human-centred vision is more relevant than ever in today's selfish, technology-led consumer society

Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World in 1931 in the shadow of the first world war, the Wall Street Crash and a devastating flu virus that had claimed millions of lives. The Treaty of Versailles had carved out a new Europe, while electricity, the automobile, production lines, new mass media and aeroplanes were changing the world. England was in the grip of a depression, but science and technology promised a better future: a world where disease, drudgery and poverty might no longer exist. Very few writers were bold enough to challenge this naive optimism but in Brave New World, Huxley certainly did; now his work, adapted by Dawn King for the stage and premiering at Royal and Derngate, Northampton, challenges audiences to do the same.

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