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The Doors of Perception cover art

The Doors of Perception

By: Aldous Huxley
Narrated by: Rudolph Schirmer
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Publisher's Summary

The critically acclaimed novelist and social critic Aldous Huxley, describes his personal experimentation with the drug mescaline and explores the nature of visionary experience. The title of this classic comes from William Blake's The Marriage of Heaven and Hell: "If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things through narrow chinks of his cavern."
©1954 Aldous Huxley (P)2009 BBC Audio

What listeners say about The Doors of Perception

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How to listen

This brief and very eloquent argument for the use of mescaline is quite convincing. I think anyone could benefit from this account of the substance even if I don't necessarily agree with it.

As for the performance, I found the audible breathing very distracting and the pace of reading dragged. That said, turning to 1.35x speed fixed both those issues.

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Great read

This was my second time reading/listening to this book, and I think I got more out of it this time around. It’s short and concise, yet profound.

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Monotonous narration

Love this book but can't believe such an amazing book could be delivered in such a boring and monotonous way! Most of the time I was thinking this must be a computer reading the book and not a human!

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Um, interesting

This was my first Huxley book so I probably didn't fully appreciate it but I still found it to have some interesting ideas. I felt the description about how the drug affects you at the start and the ideas for changing society at the end were great. The middle didn't really make a lot of sense to me.

The narrator was OK but I found the inhale sound after a lot of sentences irritating.

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I am with Jim Morrison

I liked the depth of knowledge on the psychedelic and the therapeutic elements to taking these drugs but also the last few pages, when he compares a visit from an angel as leaving their realm of perception and walking into the door of another reality. Quite the religious experience I’d imagine. Bucket list item try piote.

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Good listen if you've had an NDE.

it solidified everything I already knew but took it to the next level by showing me its possible to access what we want from the love of a NDE experience in this life. the narrator is very slow so I had to listen 1.5x speed which was a great pace.

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should have read the blurb

Autobiography was not what I expected when I downloaded Huxley's books. Glad this one was the first one I read. Now the others have some context to Huxley's mind.

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Very interesting

Well narrated.
I would recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in perception, hallucinagens, and psychotic from a critical, clinical perspective.
The only disappointing thing was how short it is.

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speed it up

if you speed up to 1.80x it's good read. Read this as just finished Brave New World & Revisited.

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A Respected Author

The status of the author in the philosophical field gives the subject matter the necessary respect.

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