Aldous Huxley's Hands
His Quest for Perception and the Origin and Return of Psychedelic Science
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- $17.99
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- $17.99
Publisher Description
Psychedelics, neuroscience, and historical biography come together when a journalist finds a lost photograph of Aldous Huxley and uncovers a hidden side of the celebrated author of Brave New World and The Doors of Perception. Allene Symons had no inkling that Aldous Huxley was once a friend of her father's until the summer of 2001 when she discovered a box of her dad's old photographs. For years in the 1940s and '50s, her father had meticulously photographed human hands in the hope of developing a science of predicting human aptitudes and even mental illness. In the box, along with all the other hand images, was one with the name of Aldous Huxley on the back. How was it possible for two such unlikely people to cross paths--her aircraft-engineer father and the famous author?This question sparked a journalist's quest to understand what clearly seemed to be a little-known interest of Aldous Huxley. Through interviews, road trips, and family documents, the author reconstructs a time peaking in mid-1950s Los Angeles when Huxley experimented with psychedelic substances, ran afoul of gatekeepers, and advocated responsible use of such hallucinogens to treat mental illness as well as to achieve states of mind called mystical. Because the author's father had studied hundreds of hands, including those of schizophrenics, he was invited into Huxley's research and discussion circle.This intriguing narrative about the early psychedelic era throws new light on one of the 20th-century's foremost intellectuals, showing that his experiments in consciousness presaged pivotal scientific research underway today.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this dizzying chronicle of post-WWII psychedelic experimentation, Symons (Nostradamus, Vagabond Prophet) explores the unlikely friendship between her father, Howard Thrasher, and Aldous Huxley. In the 1950s, Thrasher had an unconventional hobby of photographing hands, which he futilely insisted contained a code that could reveal patterns unique to the mentally ill. Symons reflects upon the interest piqued by her father's odd photographs, which he believed hinted at a diagnostic indicator for schizophrenia his suggestion of a genetic link for the disorder was flatly rejected at the time but was later reluctantly endorsed. She also delves into Huxley's simultaneous quest to study "psychedelic science" years before Timothy Leary urged a generation to "turn on, tune in, drop out." Acceptance of Huxley's "fearless curiosity" about psychic phenomena would also come long after his death in 1963, Symons notes. What stands out in this crammed book is the touching way Symons recalls a particular time in history and the men who helped shape its science through conversation with her elderly father. The book works as a "memory duet" of Thrasher's extraordinary research and Symons's recollection of the hundreds of hands her father meticulously studied and photographed. Photos.