[HN Gopher] Brave New LA: Aldous Huxley in Los Angeles (2013)
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       Brave New LA: Aldous Huxley in Los Angeles (2013)
        
       Author : samclemens
       Score  : 23 points
       Date   : 2021-07-28 16:01 UTC (2 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (lareviewofbooks.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (lareviewofbooks.org)
        
       | beckman466 wrote:
       | > in his home [in 1963] the British author, psychedelic pioneer
       | and visionary thinker Aldous Huxley lost his three-year battle
       | with cancer. Per his written request, Huxley's second wife,
       | Laura, injected him with a dose of liquid LSD as the end drew
       | near.
       | 
       | > She later described his passing as "the most serene, the most
       | beautiful death.
       | 
       | A psychedelic trip while passing sounds like a beautiful death
       | experience.
        
         | monkeynotes wrote:
         | Depending on your state of mind this could go either way. I
         | think you'd need to have totally accepted death and not fear it
         | in order to expire at peace, with or without LSD. But yeah, I
         | imagine it would have been quite a profound final experience
         | before going into the void.
        
       | Apocryphon wrote:
       | One wonders if he had not been stricken with cancer and lived
       | longer, if Huxley would have had the opportunity to interact with
       | fellow Southern Californian resident Philip K. Dick. Imagine
       | Huxley consulting on a _Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?_
       | adaptation...
       | 
       | As an aside, C.S. Lewis also passed away the same day as Huxley
       | and J.F.K.
        
       | dhosek wrote:
       | _After Many a Summer Dies a Swan_ is perhaps best remembered
       | today for having been mentioned in Christopher Isherwood 's _A
       | Single Man_ , but it's definitely worth reading. The 1950s saw a
       | number of British ex-pats in Los Angles writing novels about
       | their experiences. Isherwood's novel is another classic of the
       | genre although the best of the lot, in my opinion, is Evelyn
       | Waugh's _The Loved One_ (just skip the atrocious movie of the
       | same title which was so bad, Waugh stipulated that Hollywood
       | would never again get to film his work).
        
         | asdff wrote:
         | This time in Los Angeles's history from the 20s to the 70s or
         | so is just absurd when you read about all the goings on at the
         | time. Culturally the city was, and still is in many ways,
         | remarkably supernatural. Psychics everywhere, theosophists
         | colonizing the beachwood canyon hoping to form their own
         | utopia, the rise of the self realization fellowship, many cults
         | including Charles Manson's, the early rise of scientology in
         | Pasadena which roped in everyone from movie stars to
         | astrophysicists at JPL. It was all happening at the same time,
         | and most of these groups were taking a lot of psychedelic
         | drugs, often with very wealthy and influential benefactors such
         | as actors or business leaders. And to this day these cults,
         | supernatural groups, psychics, etc, are all still there
         | operating. It is startling how common I come across people in
         | this city who actively see a psychic, or deeply believe in
         | astrology, or are lining up for some meeting at a scientology
         | center, even today.
        
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       (page generated 2021-07-28 19:01 UTC)