Jay Stevens > Quotes

“On the morning of November 22nd, a Friday, it became clear the gap between living and dying was closing. Realizing that Aldous [Huxley] might not survive the day, Laura [Huxley's wife] sent a telegram to his son, Matthew, urging him to come at once. At ten in the morning, an almost inaudible Aldous asked for paper and scribbled "If I go" and then some directions about his will. It was his first admission that he might die ...

Around noon he asked for a pad of paper and scribbled

LSD-try it
intermuscular
100mm

In a letter circulated to Aldous's friends, Laura Huxley described what followed: 'You know very well the uneasiness in the medical mind about this drug. But no 'authority', not even an army of authorities, could have stopped me then. I went into Aldous's room with the vial of LSD and prepared a syringe. The doctor asked me if I wanted him to give the shot- maybe because he saw that my hands were trembling. His asking me that made me conscious of my hands, and I said, 'No, I must do this.'

An hour later she gave Huxley a second 100mm. Then she began to talk, bending close to his ear, whispering, 'light and free you let go, darling; forward and up. You are going forward and up; you are going toward the light. Willingly and consciously you are going, willingly and consciously, and you are doing this beautifully — you are going toward the light — you are going toward a greater love … You are going toward Maria's [Huxley's first wife, who had died many years earlier] love with my love. You are going toward a greater love than you have ever known. You are going toward the best, the greatest love, and it is easy, it is so easy, and you are doing it so beautifully.'

All struggle ceased. The breathing became slower and slower and slower until, 'like a piece of music just finishing so gently in sempre piu piano, dolcamente,' at twenty past five in the afternoon, Aldous Huxley died.”
― Jay Stevens

“If what we took to be objective reality was so fragile that it could be swept away by 400 milligrams of mescaline, then perhaps the vitalists who had argued that the brain was merely a mechanism to stabilize an anarchic world were correct. Perhaps the notion of objective reality was a paradox.”
― Jay Stevens, Storming Heaven; LSD and the American Dream

“Reading through the monographs, you could sense the confusion that LSD had created in the scientific community, when, using it as a deep probe into the unconscious, it had stirred up something that looked very much like their archenemy, the mystic religious experience!”
― Jay Stevens, Storming Heaven; LSD and the American Dream

“Возможно, причина этого была в том, что отказ от старых ценностей и рефлексов произошел до того, как им была найдена достойная замена. И этого не ожидали. Хиппи, кислотники — все они пребывали в растерянности, впервые осознав, что за каждый сантиметр новой территории, за каждую крупицу расширенного сознания тоже придется чем-то платить.

Платить по-разному. Например, мог ли кто-нибудь, всерьез познакомившись с ЛСД, вернуться к своей обычной работе менеджера по рекламе и сидеть на службе от звонка до звонка? Именно поэтому многие хиппи становились фермерами, ремесленниками, мелкими предпринимателями. У большинства психоделический опыт приводил к очевидному сдвигу системы ценностей, нежеланию играть в «игры власти», отказу от честолюбивых устремлений. У них исчезала соответствующая мотивация, и они отказывались от погони за деньгами. Но при этом у них отсутствовала альтернатива. Впоследствии именно из этой пустоты, из отсутствия альтернативы, вынуждавшей искать свой путь вне узких рамок необузданного материализма, и/или отстраненного мистицизма, выросло движение «нью-эйдж».”
― Jay Stevens, Storming Heaven: LSD and the American Dream

“An hour later she gave Huxley a second 100mm. Then she began to talk, bending close to his ear, whispering, 'light and free you let go, darling; forward and up. You are going forward and up; you are going toward the light. Willingly and consciously you are going, willingly and consciously, and you are doing this beautifully — you are going toward the light — you are going toward a greater love … You are going toward Maria's [Huxley's first wife, who had died many years earlier] love with my love. You are going toward a greater love than you have ever known. You are going toward the best, the greatest love, and it is easy, it is so easy, and you are doing it so beautifully.'

All struggle ceased. The breathing became slower and slower and slower until, 'like a piece of music just finishing so gently in sempre piu piano, dolcamente,' at twenty past five in the afternoon, Aldous Huxley died.”
― Jay Stevens