Author: Aldous Huxley
Category: Literature
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Deforming time and makes each kiss the first;
That gives to hearts, to satiated lips
The endless bounty of to-morrow’s thirst.
Time passes, and the watery moonrise peers
Between the tree-trunks. But no outer light
Tempers the chances of our groping years,
No moon beyond our labyrinthine night.
Clueless we go; but I have heard thy voice,
Divine Unreason! harping in the leaves,
And grieve no more; for wisdom never grieves,
And thou hast taught me wisdom; I rejoice.
THE YELLOW MUSTARD
Cabined beneath low vaults of cloud,
Sultry and still, the fields do lie,
Like one wrapt living in his shroud,
Who stifles silently.
Stripped of all beauty not their own
The gulfs of shade, the golden bloom
Grey mountain-heaps of slag and stone
Wall in the silent tomb.
I, through this emblem of a mind
Dark with repinings, slowly went,
Its captive, and myself confined
In like discouragement.
When, at a winding of the way,
A sudden glory met my eye,
As though a single, conquering ray
Had rent the cloudy sky
And touched, transfiguringly bright
In that dull plain, one luminous field;
And there the miracle of light
Lay goldenly revealed.
And yet the reasons for despair
Hung dark, without one rift of blue;
No loophole to the living air
Had let the glory through.
In their own soil those acres found
The sunlight of a flowering weed;
For still there sleeps in every ground
Some grain of mustard seed.
The Poems
The temple at the headquarters of the Vedanta Society of Southern California, Hollywood — from 1939 until his death in 1963, Huxley had an extensive association with the Vedanta Society of Southern California, founded and headed by Swami Prabhavananda. Together with Gerald Heard, Christopher Isherwood and other followers he was initiated by the Swami and was taught meditation and spiritual practices.
List of Poems in Chronological Order
THE BURNING WHEEL.
DOORS OF THE TEMPLE.
VILLIERS DE L’ISLE-ADAM.
DARKNESS.
MOLE.
THE TWO SEASONS.
TWO REALITIES.
QUOTIDIAN VISION.
VISION.
THE MIRROR.
VARIATIONS ON A THEME OF LAFORGUE.
PHILOSOPHY.
PHILOCLEA IN THE FOREST.
BOOKS AND THOUGHTS.
CONTRARY TO NATURE AND ARISTOTLE.
ESCAPE.
THE GARDEN.
THE CANAL.
THE IDEAL FOUND WANTING.
MISPLACED LOVE.
SONNET.
SENTIMENTAL SUMMER.
THE CHOICE.
THE HIGHER SENSUALISM.
SONNET.
FORMAL VERSES.
PERILS OF THE SMALL HOURS.
COMPLAINT.
RETURN TO AN OLD HOME.
FRAGMENT.
THE WALK.
THE DEFEAT OF YOUTH
I. UNDER THE TREES.
VI. IN THE HAY-LOFT.
VIII. MOUNTAINS.
X. IN THE LITTLE ROOM.
XVII. IN THE PARK.
XX. SELF-TORMENT.
XXII. THE QUARRY IN THE WOOD.
SONG OF POPLARS
THE REEF
WINTER DREAM
THE FLOWERS
THE ELMS
OUT OF THE WINDOW
INSPIRATION
SUMMER STILLNESS
ANNIVERSARIES
ITALY
THE ALIEN
A LITTLE MEMORY
WAKING
BY THE FIRE
VALEDICTORY
LOVE SONG
PRIVATE PROPERTY
REVELATION
MINOAN PORCELAIN
THE DECAMERON
IN UNCERTAINTY TO A LADY
CRAPULOUS IMPRESSION (To J.S.)
THE LIFE THEORETIC
COMPLAINT OF A POET MANQUÉ
SOCIAL AMENITIES
TOPIARY
ON THE BUS
POINTS AND LINES
PANIC
RETURN FROM BUSINESS
STANZAS
POEM
SCENES OF THE MIND
L’APRÈS-MIDI D’UN FAUNE
THE LOUSE-HUNTERS
LEDA
THE BIRTH OF GOD
ON HAMPSTEAD HEATH
SYMPATHY
MALE AND FEMALE CREATED HE THEM
FROM THE PILLAR
JONAH
VARIATIONS ON A THEME
A MELODY BY SCARLATTI
A SUNSET
LIFE AND ART
FIRST PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
SECOND PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
FIFTH PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
NINTH PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
MORNING SCENE
VERREY’S
FRASCATI’S
FATIGUE
THE MERRY-GO-ROUND
BACK STREETS
LAST THINGS
GOTHIC
EVENING PARTY
BEAUTY
SOLES OCCIDERE ET REDIRE POSSUNT
THEATRE OF VARIETIES
A HIGHWAY ROBBERY
CALIGULA OR THE TRIUMPH OF BEAUTY
NERO AND SPORUS OR THE TRIUMPH OF ART
NERO AND SPORUS
MYTHOLOGICAL INCIDENT
FEMMES DAMNÉES
ARABIA INFELIX
THE MOOR
NOBLEST ROMANS
ORION
MEDITATION
SEPTEMBER
SEASONS
STORM AT NIGHT
MEDITERRANEAN
TIDE
FÊTE NATIONALE
MIDSUMMER DAY
AUTUMN STILLNESS
APENNINE
ALMERIA
PAGAN YEAR
ARMOUR
SHEEP
BLACK COUNTRY
THE PERGOLA
LINES
THE CICADAS
THE YELLOW MUSTARD
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
A HIGHWAY ROBBERY
A LITTLE MEMORY
A MELODY BY SCARLATTI
A SUNSET
ALMERIA
ANNIVERSARIES
APENNINE
ARABIA INFELIX
ARMOUR
AUTUMN STILLNESS
BACK STREETS
BEAUTY
BLACK COUNTRY
BOOKS AND THOUGHTS.
BY THE FIRE
CALIGULA OR THE TRIUMPH OF BEAUTY
COMPLAINT OF A POET MANQUÉ
COMPLAINT.
CONTRARY TO NATURE AND ARISTOTLE.
CRAPULOUS IMPRESSION (To J.S.)
DARKNESS.
DOORS OF THE TEMPLE.
ESCAPE.
EVENING PARTY
FATIGUE
FEMMES DAMNÉES
FÊTE NATIONALE
FIFTH PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
FIRST PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
FORMAL VERSES.
FRAGMENT.
FRASCATI’S
FROM THE PILLAR
GOTHIC
I. UNDER THE TREES.
IN UNCERTAINTY TO A LADY
INSPIRATION
ITALY
JONAH
L’APRÈS-MIDI D’UN FAUNE
LAST THINGS
LEDA
LIFE AND ART
LINES
LOVE SONG
MALE AND FEMALE CREATED HE THEM
MEDITATION
MEDITERRANEAN
MIDSUMMER DAY
MINOAN PORCELAIN
MISPLACED
LOVE.
MOLE.
MORNING SCENE
MYTHOLOGICAL INCIDENT
NERO AND SPORUS
NERO AND SPORUS OR THE TRIUMPH OF ART
NINTH PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
NOBLEST ROMANS
ON HAMPSTEAD HEATH
ON THE BUS
ORION
OUT OF THE WINDOW
PAGAN YEAR
PANIC
PERILS OF THE SMALL HOURS.
PHILOCLEA IN THE FOREST.
PHILOSOPHY.
POEM
POINTS AND LINES
PRIVATE PROPERTY
QUOTIDIAN VISION.
RETURN FROM BUSINESS
RETURN TO AN OLD HOME.
REVELATION
SCENES OF THE MIND
SEASONS
SECOND PHILOSOPHER’S SONG
SENTIMENTAL SUMMER.
SEPTEMBER
SHEEP
SOCIAL AMENITIES
SOLES OCCIDERE ET REDIRE POSSUNT
SONG OF POPLARS
SONNET.
SONNET.
STANZAS
STORM AT NIGHT
SUMMER STILLNESS
SYMPATHY
THE ALIEN
THE BIRTH OF GOD
THE BURNING WHEEL.
THE CANAL.
THE CHOICE.
THE CICADAS
THE DECAMERON
THE DEFEAT OF YOUTH
THE ELMS
THE FLOWERS
THE GARDEN.
THE HIGHER SENSUALISM.
THE IDEAL FOUND WANTING.
THE LIFE THEORETIC
THE LOUSE-HUNTERS
THE MERRY-GO-ROUND
THE MIRROR.
THE MOOR
THE PERGOLA
THE REEF
THE TWO SEASONS.
THE WALK.
THE YELLOW MUSTARD
THEATRE OF VARIETIES
TIDE
TOPIARY
TWO REALITIES.
VALEDICTORY
VARIATIONS ON A THEME
VARIATIONS ON A THEME OF LAFORGUE.
VERREY’S
VI. IN THE HAY-LOFT.
VIII. MOUNTAINS.
VILLIERS DE L’ISLE-ADAM.
VISION.
WAKING
WINTER DREAM
X. IN THE LITTLE ROOM.
XVII. IN THE PARK.
XX. SELF-TORMENT.
XXII. THE QUARRY IN THE WOOD.
Selected Non-Fiction
Huxley’s last home and where he died was located at the top of Mulholland Highway, beneath the first “O” in the Hollywood sign.
The Olive Tree and Other Essays
CONTENTS
NOTE
WRITERS AND READERS
T. H. HUXLEY AS A LITERARY MAN*
WORDS AND BEHAVIOUR
MODERN FETISHISM
LITERATURE AND EXAMINATIONS
ENGLISH SNOBBERY
TIME AND THE MACHINE
NEW-FASHIONED CHRISTMAS
HISTORICAL GENERALIZATIONS
CRÉBILLON THE YOUNGER
JUSTIFICATIONS
D. H. LAWRENCE
B. R. HAYDON
WATERWORKS AND KINGS
IN A TUNISIAN OASIS
THE OLIVE TREE
NOTE
GRATEFUL THANKS ARE due to the following for their kind permission to reprint certain of these essays: To Messrs. Macmillan and Co. Ltd., for ‘T. H. Huxley as a Literary Man’; to Messrs. William Heinemann Ltd., for the Introduction to ‘The Letters of D. H. Lawrence’; and to Messrs. Peter Davies Ltd., for ‘B. R. Haydon.’
The essays entitled ‘Crébillon the Younger’ and ‘In a Tunisian Oasis’ were included in the author’s ‘Essays New and Old,’ published in a limited edition in 1926. The remaining essays in this volume have not previously appeared in book form.
WRITERS AND READERS
IN EUROPE AND America universal primary education has created a reading public which is practically co-extensive with the adult population. Demand has called forth a correspondingly huge supply: twenty thousand million pounds of wood pulp and esparto grass are annually blackened with printer’s ink; the production of newspapers takes rank, in many countries, among the major industries; in English, French and German alone, forty thousand new books are published every year.
A vast activity of writers, a vast and hungry passivity of readers. And when the two come together, what happens? How much and in what ways do the readers respond to the writers? What is the extent, what the limitations, of the influence exercised by writers on their readers? How do extraneous circumstances affect that influence? What are the laws of its waxing and its waning? Hard questions; and the more one thinks about them, the harder they seem. But seeing that they are of intimate concern to all of us (for all of us are readers, with an annual average consumption of probably a million words a year), it will be worth while at least to look for the answers.
The relations existing between scientific writers and their readers are governed by rules agreed upon in advance. So far as we are concerned, there is no problem of scientific literature; and I shall therefore make no further reference to the subject. For the purposes of this analysis, non-scientific writing may be divided into three main classes. In the first we place that vast corpus of literature which is not even intended to have any positive effect upon the reader — all that doughy, woolly, anodyne writing that exists merely to fill a gap of leisure, to kill time and prevent thought, to deaden and diffuse emotion. To a considerable extent reading has become, for almost all of us, an addiction, like cigarette-smoking. We read, most of the time, not because we wish to instruct ourselves, not because we long to have our feelings touched and our imagination fired, but because reading is one of our bad habits, because we suffer when we have time to spare and no printed matter with which to plug the void. Deprived of their newspapers or a novel, reading-addicts will fall back on cookery books, on the literature that is wrapped round bottles of patent medicine, on those instructions for keeping the contents crisp which are printed on the outside of boxes of breakfast cereals. On anything. Of this kind of literature — the literature that exists merely because the second nature of habituated readers abhors a vacuum — it is unnecessary to say more than that there is a great deal of it and that it effectively performs its function.
Into the second class I put the two main types of propagandist literature — that which aims at modifying the religious and ethical opinions and the personal behaviour of its readers, and that which aims at modifying their social, political and economic opinions and behaviour.
For the sake of convenience, and because it must be given a name, we will call the third class imaginative literature. Such literature does not set out to be specifically propagandist, but may none the less profoundly affect its readers’ habits of thought, feeling and action.
Let us begin with the propagandists.
What hosts of them there are! All over the world thousands of men and women pass their whole lives denouncing, instructing, commanding, cajoling, imploring their fellows. With what results? One finds it rather hard to say. Most propagandists do their work in the dark, draw bows at a venture. They write; but they don’t know how far they will succeed in influencing their readers, nor what are the best means for influencing them, nor how long their influence will last. There is, as yet, no science of propaganda.
This fact may seem the more surprising when we reflect that there is something not far removed from a science of advertising. In the course of years advertisers have come to be fairly expert at selling things to the public. They know accurately enough the potentialities and limitations of different kinds of propaganda — what you can do, for example, by mere statement and repetition; by appeals to such well-organized sentiments as snobbery and the urge towards social conformity; by playing on the animal instincts, such as greed, lust and especially fear in all its forms, from the fear of sickness and death to the fear of being ugly, abs
urd or physically repugnant to one’s fellows.
If, then, commercial propagandists know their business so well, why is it that ethical and political propagandists should know theirs on the whole so badly? The answer is that the problems with which the advertisers have to deal are fundamentally unlike the problems which confront moralists and, in most cases, politicians. A great deal of advertising is concerned with matters of no importance whatsoever. Thus, I need soap; but it makes not the smallest difference to me whether I buy soap manufactured by X or soap manufactured by Y. This being so, I can allow myself to be influenced in my choice by such entirely irrelevant considerations as the sex appeal of the girl who smiles so alluringly from X’s posters, or the puns and comic drawings on Y’s. In many cases, of course, I do not need the commodity at all. But as I have a certain amount of money to spare and am possessed by the strange desire to collect unnecessary objects, I succumb easily to anyone who asks me to buy superfluities and luxuries. In these cases commercial propaganda is an invitation to give in to a natural or acquired craving. In no circumstances does it ever call upon the reader to resist a temptation; always it begs him to succumb. It is not very difficult to persuade people to do what they are all longing to do.
When readers are asked to buy luxuries and superfluities, or to choose between two brands of the same indispensable necessity, nothing serious is at stake. Advertising is concerned, in these cases, with secondary and marginal values. In other cases, however, it matters or seems to matter a great deal whether the reader allows himself to be influenced by the commercial propagandist or no. Suffering from some pain or physical disability, he is told of the extraordinary cures effected by M’s pills or N’s lotion. Naturally, he buys at once. In such cases the advertiser has only to make the article persuasively known; the reader’s urgent need does the rest.
Ethical and political propagandists have a very different task. The business of the moralist is to persuade people to overcome their egotism and their personal cravings, in the interest either of a supernatural order, or of their own higher selves, or of society. The philosophies underlying the ethical teaching may vary; but the practical advice remains in all cases the same, and this advice is in the main unpleasant; whereas the advice given by commercial propagandists is in the main thoroughly pleasant. There is only one fly in the ointment offered by commercial propagandists; they want your money. Some political propagandists are also moralists; they invite their readers to repress their cravings and set limits to their egotistical impulses, to work and suffer for some cause which is to bring happiness in the future. Others demand no personal effort from their readers — merely their adherence to a party, whose success will save the world automatically and, so to speak, from the outside. The first has to persuade people to do something which is on the whole disagreeable. The second has to persuade them of the correctness of a policy which, though it imposes no immediate discomforts, admittedly brings no immediate rewards. Both must compete with other propagandists. The art of political propaganda is much less highly developed than the art of commercial propaganda; it is not surprising.