A dark portrait of American hedonism. Huxley reminds us of the dark side of capitalism, of greed and desire, of living without acceptance of death and without regard for ethics. Fear is what keeps the Mr. Stoyte, the main character, imprisoned in his perpetual state of unhappiness. As is Huxley’s style, characters are representations of ideologies, fears, and wants common in his observation and imagination. But we are not left guessing who is virtuous and who has been led down the wrong path. Mr. Propter and Mr. Pordage share Huxley’s intellectual bent and lend the novel its philosophical strength. Propter’s lengthy monologues on ethics, action, and meaning contain hints to where Huxley would arrive decades later in his final novel, Island, published in the 1960s.

The book’s events are not hopeful. In fact, they leave the one feeling disturbed and even pitying characters who’ve committed grave crimes. But perhaps this is the point: for the reader to experience the results of living only for for the fulfillment of one’s desires and avoidance of one’s fears. Hope and positivity is reserved for heady discussions and displayed in the actions of Mr. Propter, but does not motivate change except in one instance. A cynical look at modern life in Southern California on the brink of World War II, AMAS captures the dark side of uninhibited desire for pleasure—the most American of wants

This got far more interesting in the final third. For most of the book I really felt like the potential within the premise of this novel (a rich and ignorant man obsessed with prolonging his life) wasn’t being utilised even close to its full extent. In the end, though, Huxley takes the premise in an incredibly unexpected direction which I think works well. Although I still think this novel could’ve done more with what it had, and could’ve done with a slightly more consistent tone, it certainly takes things down a bold and unexpected route, which, for me, made up for the shortcomings of the first two thirds to a large extent.

The plot is so scanty and the characters are so bare and the philosophical diatribes so long that this seems to barely qualify as a work of fiction. On the other hand, the philosophical diatribes are so good, the characters are so ridiculous, and the ending is so great, that it all ends up being worth it.

One of my favorite books pretty much ever, it is also one of Huxley's most overlooked. While it is rather wordy and pretentious, I think that was kinda the point.

3.5 stars. This is a book of the meaning of life wrapped in a (rather thin) package of fiction and satire. I oscillated between giving this 3 stars b/c I thought it was too didactic (and it most certainly is, let there be no question) and 4 stars b/c I appreciate reading something that makes me think. There is not a single sympathetic character. There are brilliant moments of the grotesque and the bizarre - Marquis de Sade, ancient carp, baboons, the diary of the Fifth Earl

Let's talk Huxley's philosophy. Huxley sees at least three levels of being 1) animal 2) human 3) eternity (god). The human level is bracketed by time; we are always aware of the beginning and end; we are obsessed with time, our youth, our age, or mortality; we worry; we are anxious; we fear; we are angry. As humans we crave, we desire, we want - and these things are evil (this premise is assumed by Huxley and not challenged). We are enslaved by our personalities and egos - our thoughts, wishes and feelings - and our ideals/values/religions, which are merely extensions of our personalities. We assume that possession = well-being and that stimulation = happiness. In fact man is nothingness. Good is possible on the level of the animals - "proper" functioning operating under laws of being (which were set by a creator?) - and on the level of eternity. The best we can do at the human level is preventative. Man's role is to make the world more safe for animals and spirits - by reducing the amount of fear, greed, hatred, domineering; by instilling personal responsibility so that no one expects a free lunch; by spreading property so that people cannot be bullied by the rich but also not enougth that they become bullies. 1/3 of production would be mass; 2/3 would be shifted to the individual. Peasants w/ agency. Although it is doomed to failure we are meant to empty ourselves of self. Propter makes the argument that if America were to write its constitution today, it would be a thing of evil. When it was written men and women were largely economically independent, able to support themselves, and this was considered a strength. The more bosses we have, the less we have a democracy (so he is not a socialist). He also notes that most people will not be interested.

Jeremy Pordage was named after Jeremy Bentham, the father of Utilitarianism. His belief was that right and wrong could be determined by whether it was the greatest good for the greatest number of people. According to one critic, Jeremy represents Huxley before he met Gerald Heard.

Did Huxley accomplish what he set out to do? Well, he wanted to share his philosophy of good and evil, or he wanted to write a satire about greed, or he wanted to find a way to combine these into a single package. The blurbs on my copy are outrageous (and false) - this book does not have a "highly sensational plot". This is not a Hollywood novel.

It is bizarre to have read Martyr!, Anthem, My Life as a Man and this back-to-back. My Life as a Man is literally about the cult of the personality.

Great title, shame about the novel. One of Huxley's later novels, and really shows his interest in mysticism. Mr Propter is a barely-concealed mouthpiece for Huxley's own ideas on the Purpose of Man, and his enormous monologues were rather trying.

I can't bring myself to pick this up again.

Maybe it's becuase there is so much craziness in real-life right now so I don't need someone preaching at me... but I think I'll set it asside for now.

I bought and read this beautiful The Folio Society edition in 1980 with a paperback copy of 'Eyeless in Gaza'.

I've read the two again and surprisingly changed my opinion of both. Both have a great story. The premise of 'After Many a Summer' is uniquely intriguing, though I found it a little flippant this time. The satire is drawn a little too comically. Whereas the story that I'd completely forgotten about in 'Eyeless in Gaza' was rich in humanity and charm.

I'd also somehow erased the ponderous mysticism of 'After Many a Summer' from my memory and harshly attributed it to 'Eyeless in Gaza'. The latter was Huxley's first book after wholeheartedly adopting ideas of mysticism and spirituality and there's a fair amount of that. There's even more in 'After Many a Summer', and I believe it reached a crescendo of inclusion with his final book 'Island'. Though I'm not a big fan of Huxley's philosophy I'm not averse to reading it, though with the following caveat, that I believe Huxley did not integrate his philosophical ideas very well with the storylines. In 'After Many a Summer' there are slabs of text that wouldn't be out of place in a philosophical treatise. Integrated more with the story they would illustrate themselves better. In 'After Many a Summer', Mr Propter often recites a manifesto of his beliefs without helping the storyline at all. Though having said that, it wasn't this that irritated me so much as the persistence of it. These philosophical musings make up more than half the book.

It disappoints me that someone with Huxley's storytelling ability could not find a better way of conveying his beliefs. I really don't feel 'Island' will be on my reading list for some time.

This was one great short story and one great treatise on God and Man unfortunately compressed into one mediocre book. Huxley's reflections on the role of religion are certainly valid and worthy of their own cover; why squeeze them between the chapters of a pulp fiction short? The combination ruins the flow of both story lines and leaves the reader wondering why they didn't just skip to the end. A suggestion for the reader: if you want a smutty pulp short, skip any chapter involving Mr. Propter and read to the end. If you want philosophy, skip any chapter involving the Baby and read to the end of Part 2. If you want neither-skip it entirely.

These six characters searched for an author and found the perfect one. Spectacularly quoteable and very evocative of a humorous take on something like Last Year in Marienbad meets 8&1/2. A small amount of editing might have made this readably perfect, however besides this story’s tidy and diabolical ending is memorable and excellent.

This book is a somewhat odd mash-up of satire and philosophical lecture. On the one hand, we have an uber rich old man, Jo Stoyte, who lives in a castle in the San Fernando Valley. He owns a bank, a cemetery, an oil company… his home is reminiscent of Hearst Castle, filled with every modern convenience and stuffed with art from around the world bought with no plan or passion. His very young live in girlfriend is called The Baby. He also has a live in physician, Obispo, who has no redeeming qualities, (I do wonder where he got his degree) to watch over him, give him testosterone shots, and do research on extending the human life span. At the beginning of the story a British scholar, Jeremy Pordage, arrives, to work on the crates and crates of documents from the Hauberk family- this seems at first to have no bearing on the story, but in the end, it very much does. The other main characters are Peter, Obispo’s young, innocent assistant, and Mr. Propter, who does not live in the castle. While the other characters are the satire of capitalism, lechery, conspicuous consumption, Forest Lawn type cemeteries, and the fear of death, Propter is the moral and philosophical force. And, sadly, while the rest of the story is pretty amusing- and horrific in places- Propter is as dry as a mummy’s fart. He’s a noble person- he helps out the migrant workers (remember, this is during the Depression), is working on a way for people to be self-sufficient, and is against the kind of wealth aggregation that Stoyte represents- but he does not serve to advance the plot at all. It’s like Huxley couldn’t decide what kind of book to write, so he wrote them both and did not blend them elegantly at all. Four stars.

There are certainly some interesting ideas in this book, and it takes an unexpected twist, but overall I'd have to say that it's not worth wading through. The book certainly shows its age. There is a great deal of pontificating (the interesting ideas already mentioned), and it frequently feels like you're attending a lecture rather than a novel with interactions among genuine characters.

Huxley uses this book to critique the excesses of American culture, so that was interesting--materialism, obsession with youth, etc. The central character strongly resembles William Randolph Hearst, much like Orson Welles' Citizen Kane.