Aldous Huxley was born in Surrey England in 1894. His father was the editor of the prestigious Cornhill and his mother was Julia Arnold, niece of the poet and essayist Matthew Arnold. As such, he was exposed to the area of literature by his family at an early age.
At 16, Huxley contracted a disease that left him blind for two years and seriously impaired his vision for years to come. Huxley later wrote the loss of his sight was an "event that which prevented me from becoming a complete public school English gentlemen." This also ended any of his professional dreams that included becoming a doctor. Although he switched his professional career to literature from science, many of his works are scientific in nature.
In 1916, Huxley gained his undergraduate degree at Balloil College,Oxford, and served as a government office during World War I. He later taught at Eton for a brief time before he launched his career as a professional writer in the year 1920. He worked for the Westminster Gazette as a drama critic, and both House and Garden and Vogue as a staff writer.
His first published novel, Crome Yellow (1921) won him the reputation as a dangerous wit as he satires upper class artists in his book. He later composed other novels in a similar vein, including Antic Hay (1923) and Those Barren Leaves (1925).
Brave New World (1932) is considered one of his most impacting novels as it shows a pessimistic antiutopian future with both a totalitarian government and rampant and socially acceptable use of both drugs and sex. This book disturbed readers of the day as many of the issues in the book were never brought out in to the open in the current society of the 1930's.
