Aldous Huxley insisted “Crome Yellow” was fiction. Ottoline Morrell disagreed | Hacker News Reader

Aldous Huxley insisted “Crome Yellow” was fiction. Ottoline Morrell disagreed

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84 pointslermontov10 comments

Huxley dramatized significant members of British society in Point Counterpoint, famously including DH Lawrence, so I wouldn't be surprised if he drew some characters from real life in this one, too.

This wasn't the only novel of Huxley's that his acquaintances saw themselves in to their dismay. His Antic Hay has a brilliant scientist. Professor Shearwater, with a wife who cheats on him. Apparently Shearwater was an obvious representation of J.B.S. Haldane, who was not amused.

I really hope she cheats on her husband with the dashing and handsome science fiction novelist character.

As a person who found myself grafted awkwardly into a friend's novel, it shrieks of callowness on the part of the author - a detour from propriety.

As a person who read and enjoyed Crome Yellow and Antic Hay, I'm glad Huxley didn't care what his friends thought of it

Yeah but your friend probably isn't as good of a writer as Huxley.

In Bloomsbury they were in and out of each other's lives, beds, and books. Those modern disclaimers saying "All characters and events are entirely fictional." make me laugh. It absolutely goes without saying that novelists, especially satirists draw on all their friends, family and work colleagues. If you're (un)lucky enough to be in or near that circle, even as the local bartender or random person they once met, the only question is where you feature.

Love reading about the Bloomsbury Set in London early 1900s. I think the finest novelization of that world is the E. M. Forester *Howard's End". Movie & TV versions work as well. One of those stories you can set in any generation and it holds sort of true ;)

Great read! And a great share!

It's fantastic when the article pushes my appetite for knowledge and offers a keyhole to aristocracy of days gone by. It's like shaking hands with one of it's participants while they momentarily bore themselves of their usual lavish life with my existence lol...

Though it is articles like this that make me ponder about such aristocratic life today, and how the modern proliferation and consolidation of wealth is a usurper of such relations and events to spawn current literature, in the now.

Having read the seminal Huxley work, I'm now looking forward to consuming Chrome Yellow, with verve.

Fantastic read, thanks, I needed that this morning.

I never thought to go check what else he had written, even though I've read several of the other authors listed.

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