--- title: "Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)" date: "2026-08-27T12:07:28+01:00" modified: "2026-08-27T12:07:54+01:00" url: "https://heritage.humanists.uk/aldous-huxley/" post_id: 14350 categories: ["Arts", "Human Rights", "Philosophy", "Science"] tags: ["Freethought", "Humanism", "Literature", "Philosophy", "Science"] --- # Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) > Aldous Huxley was never just a cynic or a mystic, or for that matter just a writer. He was a Humanist. What is more, he was a positive and constructive Humanist. What interested him was the better realization of human possibilities. > > Julian Huxley, letter to the editor of *The Humanist*, March 1964 Aldous Huxley was a novelist and essayist whose *Brave New World* (1932) remains the most widely read picture of a scientifically managed society and of what such a society costs. A grandson of [T. H. Huxley](https://heritage.humanists.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2020/12/Thomas-Henry-Huxley-1.jpg), son of [Julia](https://heritage.humanists.uk/julia-huxley/), and brother of [Julian](https://heritage.humanists.uk/julian-huxley/), he was a sceptic in the family tradition for the first half of his life. In the second half he turned to mysticism, though it remained a mysticism without dogma, priests, or a personal god. ### **Life** > Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. > > Aldous Huxley, ‘A Note on Dogma’ in *Proper Studies* (1927) Huxley was born in Godalming on 26 July 1894, into a family that included biologists, schoolmasters, and [Matthew Arnold](https://heritage.humanists.uk/matthew-arnold-1822-1888/). An eye disease at 16 left him nearly blind for a period and put an end to his hopes of becoming a doctor. He read English at [Balliol College, Oxford](https://heritage.humanists.uk/balliol-college-oxford/) instead, and by the early 1920s had made his name with satirical novels of the post-war intelligentsia. *Crome Yellow* (1921), *Antic Hay* (1923), and *Point Counter Point* (1928) are populated by clever people who believe in nothing, and the novels are hard on them and on their author. *Brave New World* imagined a future in which humanity had been made contented by genetic engineering, conditioning, and a drug. It is a satire on utopia rather than on science, and it is even-handed enough that readers have argued ever since about which side Huxley was on. In the later 1930s he became a committed pacifist, joined the [Peace Pledge Union](https://heritage.humanists.uk/peace-pledge-union/), and moved to California, where he wrote screenplays and, in *Ends and Means* (1937) and *The Perennial Philosophy* (1945), set out the view that the mystical traditions of all religions pointed to a single truth beneath their doctrines. *The Doors of Perception* (1954) recorded his experiments with mescaline. His last novel, *Island* (1962), imagined a good society to set against the bad one of 30 years earlier. He died in Los Angeles on 22 November 1963, the day of President Kennedy’s assassination. ### **Influence** Although Huxley’s later philosophy took him well away from the confident rationalism of his grandfather and brother, his early works, particularly *Brave New World*, remain towering examples of writing in the humanist tradition. Much like contemporary humanist [George Orwell](https://heritage.humanists.uk/george-orwell/)’s *Nineteen Eighty-Four* is, *Brave New World* is read in schools as a warning about technology and the dangers of surrendering our freedom to think and ask questions of ideology. --- Main image: [Aldous Huxley](https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw52047/Aldous-Huxley) by Bassano Ltd, bromide print, September 1931 NPG x84301 © National Portrait Gallery, London See also ---------- - [ H. G. Wells ](https://heritage.humanists.uk/h-g-wells/) - [ Olaf Stapledon ](https://heritage.humanists.uk/olaf-stapledon/) - [ Julian Huxley ](https://heritage.humanists.uk/julian-huxley/) - [ Julia Huxley ](https://heritage.humanists.uk/julia-huxley/)