Aldous Huxley
ENGLISH writer, Aldous Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) is best known for his novels including Brave New World and wide-ranging output of essays. He also edited the magazine Oxford Poetry, and published short stories, poetry, travel writing, and film stories and scripts.
One of the most prominent members of the famous Huxley family, he spent the later part of his life in the United States, living in Los Angeles from 1937 until his death in 1963.
Beginning in 1939 and continuing until his death in 1963, Aldous Huxley had an extensive association with the Vedanta Society of Southern California, founded and headed by Swami Prabhavananda. Together with Gerald Heard, Christopher Isherwood, and other followers he was initiated by the Swami and was taught meditation and spiritual practices.
In 1944 Huxley wrote the introduction to the "Bhagavad Gita: The Song of God", translated by Swami Prabhavanada and Christopher Isherwood, which was published by The Vedanta Society of Southern California.
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"A child-like man is not a man whose development has been arrested; on the contrary, he is a man who has given himself a chance of continuing to develop long after most adults have muffled themselves in the cocoon of middle-aged habit and convention."
~ A. Huxley
Mike Wallace Interviews Aldous Huxley (28 minutes)
Disclose.tv - Mike Wallace Interviews Aldous Huxley Video
He devoted his time at his small house at Llano in the Mojave Desert to a life of contemplation, mysticism, and experimentation with hallucinogenic drugs. His suggestions in The Doors of Perception (1954) that mescaline and lysergic acid were 'drugs of unique distinction' which should be exploited for the 'supernaturally brilliant' visionary experience they offered provoked even more outrage than his passionate defense of the Bates method in The Art of Seeing (1942). The book went on to become a cult text in the psychedelic 1960s, and inspire the name of the rock band The Doors (it was originally derived from William Blake's "Marriage of Heaven and Hell"). Huxley appears on the sleeve of The Beatles' landmark 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
"After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music."
~ A. Huxley
Messages of the Brave New World (Update) [21 minutes]
From 1941 through 1960 Huxley contributed 48 articles to Vedanta and the West, published by the Society. He also served on the editorial board with Isherwood, Heard, and playwright John van Druten from 1951 through 1962.
Huxley also occasionally lectured at the Hollywood and Santa Barbara Vedanta temples. Two of those lectures have been released on CD: Knowledge and Understanding and Who Are We from 1955.
After the publication of The Doors of Perception, Huxley and the Swami disagreed about the meaning and importance of the LSD drug experience, which may have caused the relationship to cool, but Huxley continued to write articles for the Society's journal, lecture at the temple, and attend social functions.
"An intellectual is a person who's found one thing that's more interesting than sex."
~ A. Huxley
Brave New World (1980)(3 hours)
Aldous Leonard Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and one of the most prominent members of the famous Huxley family. He spent the later part of his life in the United States, living in Los Angeles from 1937 until his death in 1963. Best known for his novels including Brave New World and wide-ranging output of essays, Huxley also edited the magazine Oxford Poetry, and published short stories, poetry, travel writing, and film stories and scripts.
"An unexciting truth may be eclipsed by a thrilling lie."
~ A. Huxley
Collected Works
Novels
* Crome Yellow (1921)
* Antic Hay (1923)
* Those Barren Leaves (1925)
* Point Counter Point (1928)
* Brave New World (1932)
* Eyeless in Gaza (1936)
* After Many a Summer Dies the Swan (1939)
* Time Must Have a Stop (1944)
* Ape and Essence (1948)
* The Genius and the Goddess (1955)
* Island (1962)
"Everyone who wants to do good to the human race always ends in universal bullying."
~ A. Huxley
The Age of Transitions
Short stories collections
* Limbo (1920)
* Mortal Coils (1922)
* Little Mexican (U.S. title: Young Archimedes) (1924)
* Two or Three Graces (1926)
* Brief Candles (1930)
* Jacob's Hands: A Fable (Late 1930s, rediscovered 1997) co-written with Christopher Isherwood
* Collected Short Stories (1957)
"Experience is not what happens to you; it's what you do with what happens to you."
~ A. Huxley
Brave New World Order - 1 of 3
Brave New World Order - 1 of 3 from James Bloyd on Vimeo.
Collected Poetry
* Oxford Poetry (magazine editor) (1916)
* The Burning Wheel (1916)
* Jonah (1917)
* The Defeat of Youth and Other Poems (1918)
* Leda (1920)
* Selected Poems (1925)
* Arabia Infelix and Other Poems (1929)
* The Cicadas and Other Poems (1931)
* Collected Poems (1971, posthumous)
"Great is truth, but still greater, from a practical point of view, is silence about truth. By simply not mentioning certain subjects... totalitarian propagandists have influenced opinion much more effectively than they could have by the most eloquent denunciations."
~ A. Huxley
Brave New World Order - 2 of 3
Brave New World Order - 2 of 3 from James Bloyd on Vimeo.
Travel writing
* Along The Road: Notes and essays of a tourist (1925)
* Jesting Pilate: The Diary of a Journey (1926)
* Beyond the Mexique Bay: A traveller's Journey (1934)
"Hell isn't merely paved with good intentions; it's walled and roofed with them. Yes, and furnished too."
~ A. Huxley
Brave New World Order - 3 of 3
Brave New World Order - 3 of 3 from James Bloyd on Vimeo.
Drama
* The Discovery (adapted from Francis Sheridan, 1924)
* The World of Light (1931)
* Mortal Coils - A Play (stage version of The Gioconda Smile, 1948)
* The Genius and the Goddess (stage version, co-written with Betty Wendel, 1958)
* The Ambassador of Captripedia (1967)
"I wanted to change the world. But I have found that the only thing one can be sure of changing is oneself."
~ A. Huxley
Aldous Huxley Interview Part 1 (10 minutes)
Screenplays
* Brave New World
* Ape and Essence
* Pride and Prejudice (Collaboration. 1940)
* Madame Curie (Collaboration. 1943)
* Jane Eyre (Collaboration with John Houseman. 1944)
* A Woman's Vengeance 1947
* Original screenplay for Disney's animated Alice in Wonderland 1951 (rejected)
* Eyeless in Gaza BBC Mini-series of five episodes (Collaboration with Robin Chapman. Aired 1971)
"Man approaches the unattainable truth through a succession of errors."
~ Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley Interview Part 2 (10 minutes)
"Maybe this world is another planet's hell."
"Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted."
"Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know."
"People intoxicate themselves with work so they won't see how they really are."
~ Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 1/8 (10 minutes)
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 2/8 (10 minutes)
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 3/8 (10 minutes)
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 4/8 (10 minutes)
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 5/8 (10 minutes)
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 6/8 (10 minutes)
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 7/8 (10 minutes)
Aldous Huxley - Berkeley Speech 1962 - The Ultimate Revolution - 8/8 (10 minutes)
"That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history."
"The vast majority of human beings dislike and even actually dread all notions with which they are not familiar... Hence it comes about that at their first appearance innovators have generally been persecuted, and always derided as fools and madmen."
"The worst enemy of life, freedom and the common decencies is total anarchy; their second worst enemy is total efficiency."
~ Aldous Huxley
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