The Doors Of Perception

Two great classics come to life in one of the most loved books in American History. Remastered to include Illustrated exercises, a biography of Aldous Huxley, and including the full essay of Heaven and Hell, and The Doors to Perception, this book is a great gift to those who are unfamiliar with his work, or may have forgotten about Huxley's famous contemplations of life and death. - ZKBS(c) All Rights Reserved.

Long before Tom Wolf’s The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test or Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Aldous Huxley wrote about his mind-bending experiences taking mescaline in his essay The Doors of Perception. Written largely from the first-person perspective, The Doors of Perception blends Eastern mysticism with scientific experimentation in equal parts, and what results is one of the most influential meditations on the effects of hallucinatory drugs on the human psyche ever written in the Western canon. Huxley’s Doors of Perception ushered in a whole new generation of counter-culture icons such as Jackson Pollock, John Cage, and Timothy Leary, and inspired Jim Morrison and the naming of his band, The Doors. HarperPerennial Classics brings great works of literature to life in digital format, upholding the highest standards in ebook production and celebrating reading in all its forms. Look for more titles in the HarperPerennial Classics collection to build your digital library.

Two of the most famous pieces of non-fiction by Aldous Huxley (best known for Brave New World), The Doors of Perception details his experiences on the mind-altering drug mescaline, while Heaven and Hell details the relationships between mysticism, art, and sense perception that these experiences helped Huxley to explore and develop. He analogizes the mental states achievable through the use of mind-altering substances to very forms of religious self-flagellation, and also theorizes that they might be used as a form of treatment for psychological ailments. The two works have been significant influences on thinkers in this field, as well as writers, theologians, and philosophers. Random House of Canada is proud to bring you classic works of literature in ebook form, with the highest quality production values. Find more today and rediscover books you never knew you loved.

An eye-opening response to Aldous Huxley’s widely influential work on psychedelics, physical reality, and consciousness What exactly are hallucinations? Are they actually doors to another reality? Anthony Peake thinks so. In this stunning book, he takes Aldous Huxley’s The Doors of Perception and updates it using the latest information from quantum mechanics, neurochemistry, and consciousness studies. Most human beings perceive the doors of perception as being securely closed. But here, Peake analyzes the concept of ‘the scale of transcendence’ and suggests there is a scale of perceptions whereby the doors are slowly opened, bit by bit, to reveal the true nature of reality. For ‘normal’ people, glimpses of this reality—what the Gnostics called ‘The Pleroma’—are experienced during ‘noetic’ experiences. However, for others, the doors are prized open by certain neurological processes starting with migraine and progressing through various altered states such as temporal lobe epilepsy, bipolar syndrome, autism, and schizophrenia. A pioneering work on the relationship between physical reality and consciousness, Opening the Doors of Perception suggests that man can, indeed, perceive reality in its true glory.

'The man who comes back through the Door in the Wall will never be quite the same as the man who went out'. Aldous Huxley first took mescalin in 1953 and continued his experiments with hallucinogenic drugs until 1963 when, on his deathbed, he asked for and was given LSD. Huxley explores the effects of the mescalin experience, describing how the drug enabled him to discover a 'sacramental vision of reality'. He also discusses the spiritual and moral implications of the experience, demonstrating how negative emotions can transform man's perceptual Nirvana into a 'schizophrenic hell'.

Inspired by the poetry of William Blake, Heaven and Hell delves into the murky topic of human consciousness through a discussion of religious mystical perception, biochemistry and psychoactive drug experimentation. Heaven and Hell explains how science, art, religion, literature, and psychoactive drugs can expand the reader’s everyday view of reality, offering a more profound grasp of the human experience. Like his earlier essay, The Doors of Perception, Aldous Huxley’s Heaven and Hell exerted a tremendous influence on the counter-culture movement of the 1960s, inspiring the imaginations of an entire generation of artists and revolutionaries like Jim Morrison and Jackson Pollack. HarperTorch brings great works of non-fiction and the dramatic arts to life in digital format, upholding the highest standards in ebook production and celebrating reading in all its forms. Look for more titles in the HarperTorch collection to build your digital library.

Half an hour after swallowing the drug I became aware of a slow dance of golden lights . . . Among the most profound explorations of the effects of mind-expanding drugs ever written, here are two complete classic books—The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell—in which Aldous Huxley, author of the bestselling Brave New World, reveals the mind's remote frontiers and the unmapped areas of human consciousness. This new edition also features an additional essay, "Drugs That Shape Men's Minds," which is now included for the first time.

How historical, social, and cultural forces shaped the psychedelic experience in midcentury America, from CIA experiments with LSD to Timothy Leary's Harvard Psilocybin Project. Are psychedelics invaluable therapeutic medicines, or dangerously unpredictable drugs that precipitate psychosis? Tools for spiritual communion or cognitive enhancers that spark innovation? Activators for one's private muse or part of a political movement? In the 1950s and 1960s, researchers studied psychedelics in all these incarnations, often arriving at contradictory results. In American Trip, Ido Hartogsohn examines how the psychedelic experience in midcentury America was shaped by historical, social, and cultural forces--by set (the mindset of the user) and setting (the environments in which the experience takes place).