Review of 'The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell (Perennial Classics)' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
Last month I accidentally ended up at the exhibition Shamanic visions. Ayahuasca arts in the Peruvian Amazon at Musée du quai Branly. Although the subject didn’t particularly interest me – I cannot think of ayahuasca without thinking of recreational drug tourism – it apparently did appeal to the imagination of many others, given the unusual large crowds in the museum. I assume this is also the reason why The Doors of Perception, which was available in the gift shop, still enjoys such popularity today. I read it consecutively with two other cult classics: [b:On the Road|2552|On the Road|Jack Kerouac|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1605112490l/2552.SY75.jpg|1701188] and [b:Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas|7747|Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas|Hunter S. Thompson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1643996213l/7747.SY75.jpg|1309111].
A rose is a rose is a rose. But these chair legs were chair legs were St Michael and all angels.
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) is of course best known for his …
Last month I accidentally ended up at the exhibition Shamanic visions. Ayahuasca arts in the Peruvian Amazon at Musée du quai Branly. Although the subject didn’t particularly interest me – I cannot think of ayahuasca without thinking of recreational drug tourism – it apparently did appeal to the imagination of many others, given the unusual large crowds in the museum. I assume this is also the reason why The Doors of Perception, which was available in the gift shop, still enjoys such popularity today. I read it consecutively with two other cult classics: [b:On the Road|2552|On the Road|Jack Kerouac|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1605112490l/2552.SY75.jpg|1701188] and [b:Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas|7747|Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas|Hunter S. Thompson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1643996213l/7747.SY75.jpg|1309111].
A rose is a rose is a rose. But these chair legs were chair legs were St Michael and all angels.
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) is of course best known for his dystopian novel [b:Brave New World|3180338|Brave New World|Aldous Huxley|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1551151249l/3180338.SY75.jpg|3204877]. Long after moving to Los Angeles, he became interested in mescaline, a psychedelic drug that occurs naturally in cacti such as the Mexican peyote cactus. In 1953, he decided to use it under supervision. The Doors of Perception is his essay about this experience. (The sequel Heaven and Hell is added in most editions.)
Huxley observes that while his intellect was ‘little if at all’ reduced, his visual impressions were greatly intensified: ‘the eye recovers some of the perceptual innocence of childhood, when the sensum was not immediately and automatically subordinated to the concept’. In sum, he elaborates on the contrast between our consciousness or conceptual perception of the world, in which systematic reasoning, speech and symbols play an important role, and the enhanced visual perception he experienced, leading to an entirely different perception of reality which, according to Huxley, can lead to a better understanding of ourselves.
Though the intellect remains unimpaired and though perception is enormously improved, the will suffers a profound change for the worse. The mescalin taker sees no reason for doing anything in particular and finds most of the causes for which, at ordinary times, he was prepared to act and suffer, profoundly uninteresting. He can’t be bothered with them, for the good reason that he has better things to think about.
[…] These better things may be experienced (as I experienced them) ‘out there,’ or ‘in here,’ or in both worlds, the inner and the outer, simultaneously or successively. That they are better seems to be self-evident to all mescalin takers who come to the drug with a sound liver and an untroubled mind.
Huxley’s essays are interesting to read, especially when you realise they were written in the early 1950s. The author does attempt to approach his experience from a certain scientific angle, although in the end it is mainly self-examination. I understand why this plea for mescaline could become so influential among artists like Jim Morrison.
The universal and ever-present urge to self-transcendence is not to be abolished by slamming the currently popular Doors in the Wall. The only reasonable policy is to open other, better doors in the hope of inducing men and women to exchange their old bad habit for new and less harmful ones.