Huxley, Aldous Leonard

Huxley, Aldous Leonard (1894-1963), English novelist, essayist, critic, and poet, grandson of Thomas and brother of Julian, born in Godalming, Surrey, and educated at Eton College and the University of Oxford. He worked on various periodicals and published four books of verse before the appearance of his first novel, Crome Yellow (1921). The novels Antic Hay (1923) and Point Counter Point (1928), both of which illustrate the nihilistic mood of the 1920s, and Brave New World (1932), an ironic vision of a future utopia, established Huxley's fame. During the 1920s he lived largely in Italy and France. He emigrated to the United States in 1937. Among his more than 45 books are the volumes of essays Jesting Pilate (1926), Ends and Means (1937), Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow (1956), Brave New World Revisited (1958), and Literature and Science (1963). Other novels include Eyeless in Gaza (1936), After Many a Summer Dies the Swan (1939), Ape and Essence (1948), and Island (1962). Huxley also wrote on science, philosophy, and social criticism. Important non-fiction works include The Art of Seeing (1932), The Perennial Philosophy (1946), and The Devils of Loudon (1952). He became very interested in mysticism and parapsychology, and The Doors of Perception (1954) and its sequel Heaven and Hell (1956) deal with Huxley's experiences with hallucinogenic drugs.