nickdrake:

The Doors of Perception (1954) & Heaven and Hell (1956) are two essays written by English writer, Aldous Huxley (1894 – 1963.) The two are now, more often than not, bound together in a single volume, which form a remarkable insight into psychedelics. Through Huxley’s astute exploration of his own subjective, psy-experience with Mescaline, to his philosophical treatment of the mystical experience, therein lies the conceptual groundwork for contemporary psychedelic literature (psy-lit.)

It was a Spring, Monday morning in 1953 when Huxley took four-tenths of a gramme of mescaline and, armed with the use of a sitter (his wife) and a voice recorder, experimented the psychedelic experience on himself. The resulting essay of analysis and observation, The Doors of Perception, took it’s name from a passage by Blake, however Huxley was quick to psychologically differentiate between himself and the great poet artist.

“From what I had read of the mescaline experience I was convinced in advance that the drug would admit me, at least for a few hours, into the kind of inner world described by Blake. But what I had expected did not happen.”

nrkn:

nevver:

Letters of Note: Holden Caulfield is unactable [ edit. ]

Action Writing, 2006 large preview at googlebooks

Shakespeare & Co., Poet’s Corner, France. credit

Breaking the Rule of Cool: Interviewing and Reading Women Beat Writers

Lenore Kandel (Jan 14 1932 - Oct 18 2009) was a poet who hung out with Beat poets. She wrote a book of love poetry banned as obscene and seized by police who raided the shop selling it.

“a socialist utopia masquerading as a bookstore” for 50 years. His store has long been a literary hub, attracting the likes of Henry Miller, Richard Wright and William S.Burroughs. More importantly, George has been inviting people to live in his shop from its very first days. There are now 13 beds [sic] among the books, and he says that more than 40,000 people have slept there at one time or another. All he asks is that you make your bed in the morning, help out in the shop, and read a book a day.
Jeremy Mercer