The Philosopher's Stone

by Colin Wilson

Wilson probably has earned a reputation more as a scholar & biographer than as a novelist; but this novel, originally published in 1969, proves that he possesses significant skills in the area of fiction as well. He weaves a great deal of speculation into the meaning of existence & the future of the species into the plot; so much so that the book at times seems as much a work of philosophy as of fiction. The story centers on the experiences of Howard Lester, an enterprising young intellectual whose work with fellow researcher Henry Littleway leads to the discovery that implanting a minute bit of a metallic alloy into the prefrontal cortex can introduce a higher state of conciousness. (As in the case with Carlos Castaneda in his thematically-similar Don Juan chronicles, the researchers later discover that the artificial catalyst is unnecessary, but rather a convenient means to overcome years of conditioning). Lester & Littleway perform the operation upon themselves & proceed to refine their new skills until they are able to employ a sort of time vision that allows them to tap into racial memories. With this knowledge comes the realization that there are shadowy periods in our species' past that have been kept hidden from us by more powerful beings. Lester relates his moment of insight: "I knew with certainty that there is something in the world's prehistory that cannot be found in any of the books on the past. & it was obscurely connected with [a] sense of evil..." In the course of discovering how the Earth & humankind truly evolved, this tale touches upon everything from Mayan civilization to Abraham Maslow to H.P. Lovecraft's elder Gods.--From Independent Publisher (edited)

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Horror, Philosophy, Fantasy, Lovecraftian, Cthulhu Mythos

320 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Colin Henry Wilson was born and raised in Leicester, England, U.K. He left school at 16, worked in factories and various occupations, and read in his spare time. When Wilson was 24, Gollancz published The Outsider (1956) which examines the role of the social 'outsider' in seminal works of various key literary and cultural figures. These include Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre, Ernest Hemingway, Hermann Hesse, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, William James, T. E. Lawrence, Vaslav Nijinsky and Vincent Van Gogh and Wilson discusses his perception of Social alienation in their work. The book was a best seller and helped popularize existentialism in Britain. Critical praise though, was short-lived and Wilson was soon widely criticized.

Wilson's works after The Outsider focused on positive aspects of human psychology, such as peak experiences and the narrowness of consciousness. He admired the humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow and corresponded with him. Wilson wrote The War Against Sleep: The Philosophy of Gurdjieff on the life, work and philosophy of G. I. Gurdjieff and an accessible introduction to the Greek-Armenian mystic in 1980. He argues throughout his work that the existentialist focus on defeat or nausea is only a partial representation of reality and that there is no particular reason for accepting it. Wilson views normal, everyday consciousness buffeted by the moment, as "blinkered" and argues that it should not be accepted as showing us the truth about reality. This blinkering has some evolutionary advantages in that it stops us from being completely immersed in wonder, or in the huge stream of events, and hence unable to act. However, to live properly we need to access more than this everyday consciousness. Wilson believes that our peak experiences of joy and meaningfulness are as real as our experiences of angst and, since we are more fully alive at these moments, they are more real. These experiences can be cultivated through concentration, paying attention, relaxation and certain types of work.

Reviews

[Sandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

In her article on Colin Wilson in the May 30, 2004 "Observer," reporter Lynn Barber mentioned that the author, then 73, had seemingly read "every book ever written." She also noted that Wilson claimed never to have thrown a book away, and that his home library in Cornwall contained approximately 30,000 volumes. Well, any reader who delves into the author's 1969 offering, "The Philosopher's Stone," is not likely to dispute those statements. Though chosen for inclusion in Cawthorn & Moorcock's "Fantasy: The 100 Best Books," the novel could just as easily have been placed on a Top 100 Horror or Science Fiction list, and its range of literary, cultural, historical and anthropological reference is immense. In his 1961 book "The Strength to Dream"--which he refers to as "a study of the creative imagination"--Wilson had disparaged the works of the great horror writer H.P. Lovecraft, and was challenged by Lovecraft publisher August Derleth to try to write something in the Lovecraft style himself. The result was Wilson's 1967 novel "The Mind Parasites," and "The Philosopher's Stone" finds the author again taking an exceedingly scientific approach to outdo the antiquarian recluse of Providence, and with winning results.

In the novel, we meet Howard Lester, a young scientist who is obsessed with the concepts of life prolongation and the expansion of human consciousness. By manipulating the prefrontal cortex of his brain, he gradually acquires the ability to use "time vision"--to look at an object and see its history--along with numerous lesser abilities. Wilson conflates into his story the mysteries of Stonehenge, Silbury Hill, Chichen Itza and the Voynich Manuscript; weaves in sidelines involving the provenance of Shakespeare's works and a haunted house mystery; treats the reader to numerous speculations regarding the potentialities of the human brain; and ultimately gets very dark and Lovecraftian indeed, as he shows us the true origins of man AND the Cthulhu Mythos! It is one wild story, lemme tell you, both mind-blowing and mind-expanding, and told with such a remarkable amount of scientific detail and citation as to seem absolutely credible. This reader almost found himself believing that he really COULD live forever, if he only stimulated his consciousness enough with what Wilson calls "value experiences," and that he COULD make concrete images appear by using the power of the mind, as Lester learns to do by the novel's end.

"The Philosopher's Stone," it must be said, is not an "easy" book. Wilson, self-proclaimed genius that he is, has, as I've mentioned, thrown in an incredible number of references into his novel; by my count, 214 that sent me scurrying to my encyclopedia, atlas and the Interwebs to check out. He is seemingly knowledgeable of every obscure philosopher (George Edward Moore, Henri Bergson, Edmund Husserl, etc.), mathematician (Julius Dedekind, Carl Gauss, Karl Weierstrass, etc.), composer (Ralph Vaughn Williams, Roland de Lassus, Carlo Gesualdo, etc.), Mayan authority (Diego de Landa, Whorf, Knorozov, etc.) and alchemist (Cornelius Agrippa, Alkindi, Costa ben Luca, etc.) who's ever lived, and the average reader will most likely learn an awful lot by the time he/she finishes this book. Wilson must have an IQ like a telephone number, but fortunately for the reader, he also has an astonishingly fine imagination to match. That said--and far be it for me to contradict a self-styled genius!--there do seem to be some slight problems with his book. He refers to a Grand Rapids, Illinois somewhere, when all we Yanks know that the city is in Michigan. He gets some quotes wrong, as far as I can tell: the Yeats poem referred to should read "truth flourishes where the student's lamp shines," NOT "where the scholar's lamp has shone." And he even misquotes his hero, George Bernard Shaw. The quote should read "minding your own business is like minding your own body--it's the shortest way to make yourself sick," NOT "the quickest way." He gets the title of a Benjamin Britten work incorrect; it's "A Boy Was Born," NOT "A Boy Is Born." And the title of G.C. Vaillant's book is "The Aztecs In Mexico," NOT "The Aztecs Of Mexico." Perhaps worst of all, in his description of the continent of Mu, he depicts a humongous chasm on the east coast; a little later, that same chasm is said to be on the west coast. Still, these are quibbles; the efforts of a comparative dunderhead to tweak a man who is manifestly some kind of evolutionary "throw forward" (to quote Wilson in this novel). The bottom line is that Wilson has written, in "The Philosopher's Stone," not just an engrossing and fun read, but one guaranteed to make the reader wonder and think. This is a great book.

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wilson's take on the Cthulhu mythos is certainly original, but it only appears after some 230 pages of often turgid exposition - and this is in a 268 page novel.

A narrator whose intellectual smugness and aura of the ivory tower make Lovecraft's protagonists seem like dynamic men of action obsesses over various more or less indistinguishable or highly suspect 'insights' that he believes hold the key to immortality and unlocking humanity's untapped potential.

Along the way, we are treated to various odds and ends of esoterica, occultism, fringe science and literary and musical criticism that read like they are culled whole from Wilson's considerable non-fictional output.

All in all, a typical mix of polymath autodidacticism and woolly-headed woo, all conveyed in Wilson's trademark prose: reasonable, earnest and lucid, like an old-fashioned BBC documentary presenter.

PS: Looking over this review, I feel I may have been a bit mean-spirited, but I still can't revise my rating. There is a certain heady rush of ideas in this novel, and I won't deny that Wilson says some interesting things about music. But his views on virtually everything else suspect at best. If this is to be judged as a novel of ideas, then the merit of the ideas in question has to be considered, and unfortunately we're in crank territory here with all sorts numinous notions about consciousness, human evolution and ancient civilizations. I think this is a book best read in one's adolescence, or shortly thereafter - or if one has completely failed to learn the basics of critical thinking later in life.

[T.J. Silverio · Rating 4 out of 5]

In The Philosopher’s Stone author Colin Wilson takes us on a journey of what is possible. The slow starting, fairly dense narrative is laced with interesting and often profound insights. I found myself reaching for a pen several times, a good sign in my grading book for this type of novel. As with his earlier novel The Space Vampires Wilson explores the tension between individuality and the collective, as in this passage:

“These ‘creatures’ possessed no individuality, in the sense that we do. Now most of our human problems are due to the self-division that arises from individuality, for all our problems can be summarized in one word: triviality. We are victims of the ‘demon of the trivial’, All human evils can eventually be traced to the narrowness of human consciousness.”

He uses the device of implanted metal in the brain as a means to jumpstart heightened metal powers of consentration and vision. This allows the main characters to remain focused and open to grand insights on their journey. But I sense the author believes these "powers" are available to ordinary humans who choose to dedicate themselves to exploration and practice (which puts him in pretty good company with many thinkers today.) He goes on to suggest that the key to a successful life is active living, an attention and awareness to our surroundings and circumstances, not limited by convention and habit. He chides us for running on automatic:

“A train doesn’t have to think for itself – it goes forward on rails, which prevent it from altering its course. But a guided missile or an unmanned aeroplane needs a constant account of its surroundings and to constantly adjust itself to new conditions. Well, most human beings live like trains, they just chug forward through life, held on course by the railway lines of convention and habit. For several hundred years now, evolution has been aiming at creating a new type of human being, who sees the world though new eyes all the time, who can adjust his mind a hundred times a day to see the familiar as strange.”

We are wise to heed his words. I find these ideas easier to engage with in this narrative form rather than in a strictly philosophical article or book. Overall I found this to be a good read. Those looking for a thriller or mystery may become irritated at the slow pace or lack of overall plot structure, but the ideas and thought behind his work are commendable. It’s just another way of storytelling.

TJ

[Paul Dodd · Rating 2 out of 5]

I first read this book nearly 30 years ago. At the time it was, for me, one of those pivotal books that seemed to focus my philosophical thoughts. However, on just completing my re-reading this book, I have changed my mind completely. This book attempts to fit so many pseudo-scientific references into a coherent story, and I must say, doesn't achieve the result. For instance, it attempts to cover human aging and the "mystery" of death, parapsychology, the highly debated and disputed neoteny theory of human evolution, Mayan culture, utterly debunked theories of lost continents - most specifically Mu, and, of course, alien visitors and alien intervention in human affairs. I am left with the impression that this book was written simply as a vehicle for Wilson to espouse his (then?) pseudo-scientific theories to a wider audience. Since this is supposedly a work of fiction, if there are no valid references to support his theories, he simply invents them.

Treating the book as a complete work of fiction, I found it hard to relate to the characters. The leading character, Howard Lester, is a young and incredibly arrogant man, with few attributes that I found likeable. The other characters, though senior in years to Lester, definitely play, at best, supporting roles, and in many cases are completely subservient. The book was written in 1969 and even then I’m sure that it must have appeared dated. It struck me that the characters, the “science” and the philosophical theories would probably have fitted better into a late 19th century or early 20th century setting – more like HG Wells or HP Lovecraft, both of whom are clearly influences on Wilson. In 1961 Wilson wrote a stinging criticism of Lovecraft, but has proceeded to draw heavily upon him for this work and subsequent novels.

[Eugene Pustoshkin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book of speculative fiction (and a skillful trolling of Lovecraft). Colin Wilson masterfully describes first-person explorations into some of the facets of phenomenological existentialism and the philosophy of optimism. Utterly cheerful and enjoyable, with much of food for serious thought.

[Eugene Pustoshkin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Прочитал замечательную книгу Колина Уилсона «The Philosopher’s Stone» (была издана на русском — «Философский камень»). Она была написана в 1969 году в жанре спекулятивной фантастики и, по сути, является умелым троллингом Лавкрафта, а по совместительству — средством донесения важных концепций и идей феноменологического экзистенциализма и философии оптимизма, которых придерживался сам Уилсон. При чтении книги (по крайней мере, в оригинале) явственно ощущал ту концентрацию, с которой Уилсон, этот интереснейший феноменолог, писал данное сочинение. Всякий раз, когда я открывал книгу, интенсивность его концентрации передавалась мне очень быстро и сразу же повышала настроение. В «Философском камне» Уилсон обсуждает и развивает идеи Абрахама Маслоу (представленого в тексте под именем Аарон Маркс) и исследует возможности произвольно вызывать пиковые, или вершинные, переживания через концентрацию воли; в книге пиковые состояния называются «переживаниями ценности» (value experiences). К слову сказать, Уилсон был лично знаком с Маслоу и вёл с ним переписку.

[Devero · Rating 4 out of 5]

Come romanzo Lovecraftiano, questo di Wilson, è sia un successo sia un fallimento. Questo dipende da come si intende l'opera del Solitario di Providence, da quale accezione si considera.
Wilson in una intervista sostenne che lui era in grado di scrivere un romanzo alla maniera di HPL ma migliore di questi. Vediamo che non è proprio così.
Come scrittura è abbastanza scorrevole e usa un vocabolario che si potrebbe dire ricercato, e in questo è nel complesso un successo. Come stile e trama, le idee sono lovecraftiane. Ci sono forti echi delle tematiche di orrore cosmico, degli esperimenti proibiti di uomini che cercano di andare sempre oltre. In questo il romanzo è un successo.
Dove fallisce è sull'atteggiamento degli umani verso l'orrore ignoto. Un atteggiamento non di terrore, di desiderio dell'oblio o di non essere mai usciti dall'ignoranza, bensì di sfida e di convinzione che l'umanità vincerà. Ciò non è chiaramente lovecraftiano, perché l'annichilimento della coscienza umana di fronte all'orrere è sempre netto, la disperazione vince sempre.
Ad ogni modo è una bella lettura e un bell'esperimento, e le 3 stelle e mezza le merita tutte questo romanzo.

[Doug Bolden · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a common "Goodreads-ism" to say something like, "3.5 stars, rounded up to 4 because of [such and such reference]" or "4.25 stars, rounded down because it went a little long". This is a byproduct of any sort of whole number system, especially one that is top-loaded such as Goodreads (where 2-stars is supposed to mean that you found the book to be just ok, which is normally a 3-star rating, and your average reviewer is probably going to mark a book that was passable as somewhere between 3- and 4-stars). However, in this case, my strong opinion is that this book is a strongly 3.5-star book which swings wide into 2.5-star territory for much of its run. 4-stars is too many, and 3 is not enough. I went 4 after some back and forth because I think that folks who like this sort of book—brainy, slow, Lovecraftian pastiches—should probably read it. I do not think those who fit into that reader category will necessarily enjoy it, in the visceral sense of the word, but there is something to be found within it.

It has been a good long while since I have read a book that has tried so hard to be a "novel of ideas" and the others I have read have either been immediately dismissable as middling self-help/philosophy or genuinely enjoyable for their attempt to take a fictional approach to a real world concept in the long form. On the good end of the spectrum, I would put something like Flatland, which managed to be cute and quirky and blessedly short. I'll leave out examples on the bad end, because I have been a cantankerous old-man-reader for the past couple of decades and there is no good to be had in slagging off books in another book's review.

The problem with "novel of ideas" as a genre is that they so often take so definite a stance in their fictional meanderings that the fiction becomes a pawn to express some idea or another and is barely given any room to exist for its own sake, the world melted down into an extended metaphor and little else. In a case like this, Wilson has a particular take on the human mind and its contents, and everything finds him (or at least his author insert narrator) correct and on the right track. Generally, I would take a dozen Philip K. Dicks over one Wilson, for in phildickian lands the questions are left more open and at the end PKD is more concerned about upholding the human condition than with being ultimately right. Dick and Wilson are coming from similar time periods and some similar backgrounds, insomuch as how they break down a problem, but Dick was a potboiler writer, slinging yarns about spacefaring folks brushing up against the Other. Wilson is trying to do something similar, but with dozens of references and examples and supposedly cutting edge research—often giving a (perhaps unintentionally) distorted view of contemporary psychology and physics even by the late 1960s standards (one spends a fair amount of time in reading this wondering if this is meant to be a honest opinion of what causes people to age, or it that was all merely more metaphor about the worth of certain endeavors). Most of the good novels of the 20th century had strong ideas and concepts they were exploring, and most did it with a sense of joy, or at least a sense of passion or creativity, a goal in which this novel falls short.

Some might try to pass off the "slowburn" description to explain this tale. This I find false. "Slowburn" is best used to describe carefully paced stories where a sense of creeping dread, or creeping Other, is slowly exposed and built upon for full effect. This is simply 200+ pages of a mildly described thought experiment backing up the ramblings of a supposedly neo-transcendental modern thinker. Eventually he and his cohorts find, though accident, a special compound that, by accident, can be applied to the brain and create, though a mechanism barely understood by the characters, a leap forward in mental evolution. Along the way, various secondary characters mostly fall into rote roles, and there are fairly sexist and homophobic (and, to a degree, racist, though it is more conflicted on this front) commentaries thrown in. Wilson is perhaps playing at Lovecraft-spoofing in these regards. It is hard to tell. I chose to take it partially as such, a subtle tongue-in-cheek jab at the genre. I was probably being generous. It reads like a 1950s British male writing about anyone who was not of a particular class of 1950s British male, but at least some of those guys had a sense of fun (and self-deprecation) to make it more tolerable.

Once the narrator has disparaged homosexuals and Shakespeare and 95% of the human race and all of its struggles, and had several passages talking about masturbation and how cool it is that we can just drum up some sexy thought and rub one out (and no, I am not making this up, Wilson brings this up several times), we finally get into the Lovecraftian portion and it feels like flipping a switch. Past the half-way mark, the book does enter into more proper slowburn style, hinting at some great inhuman secret to history. It still meanders for a bit, though, and collapses back into the turgid smugness that has haunted its first half, and then, all of sudden, we have Azathoth and the Necronomicon and, essentially, an effective short story about seeing too much and how it impacts the normal human. This part is quite good, though slightly silly, and has some of the great moments of the novel. This section actually rose the novel up quite a bit in my opinion.

Of course, once this switch is flipped, the sort of intellectual lambasting that Wilson gives Lovecraft in his preface becomes a bit ironic, for Wilson dives in full force into working out the Mythos and nearly all the great ideas at the end of this novel are just restating things that Lovecraft has already worked out and played out in much shorter form.

Fred Chappell has shown that you can take a fascinating remodeling of the Lovecraftian mode in books like Dagon and stories like "The Adder". Chappell's unflinching recasting of Innsmouth into the Southern Gothic and Lovecraft's general anti-human universe into the dehumanization of a single man was fascinating and literary. Wilson's similar recasting, instead, feels too much like an English Lit professor rewriting Star Wars in the mode of Medieval poetry to show how to improve upon it, all the while failing to grasp what it is that he was complaining about.

It is not without merit. Where it sings is in its immense, if cherry-picked, scholarship of strange ideas and ideals from philosophy and weird history and the human mind. Had Wilson found the power to self-edit it down to something much less indulgent, even the smugness might have felt more earned.

I would say it is an important Lovecraftian novel, and one that should be read, but it is not a great one.

[Janines Bücher und Diy Zauber · Rating 5 out of 5]

Colin Wilson, ein Mann der mit seinen Büchern keine Emotionen auslösen möchte, sondern zum Denken anregen will.

Das hat er bei mir auf jeden Fall geschafft, denn der Stein der Weisen, ist eine Mischung aus Wissenschaft, Krimi und Science Fiction und das interessante daran? Colin Wilson hat sich so weit wie möglich an echte Quellen gehalten.

Es ist eine einzige Reise durch die Geschichte der Menschheit. Wir bekommen so viel Wissen vermittelt, es geht um Evolution, Shakespeare, die Geschichte der Maya, Bewusstseinserweiterung und Psychologie, um nur ein paar Thematiken zu nennen.

Es ist unheimlich philosophisch, der Autor gibt sich vielen Gedankenspielen hin, aus der Sicht eines heranwachsenden Mannes der sich für Mathematik und Wissenschaft interessiert. Und um das alles tiefgründiger erforschen zu können, lässt er sich einer Bewusstseinserweiternden Operation unterziehen.

Das Buch hat mich dazu gebracht mich mehr mit dem Autor auseinander zu setzen und noch mehr Bücher von ihm lesen zu wollen, denn es gibt eine unheimliche Bandbreite an Büchern zu den verschiedensten Themen von ihm, die allerdings nicht mehr so einfach zu bekommen sind .

Eine große Empfehlung an alle die Science Fiction mögen und gerne einiges lernen möchten beim lesen!

[Greg Gbur · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to admit: I almost didn’t finish reading Colin Wilson‘s 1969 novel The Philosopher’s Stone, recently reprinted by Valancourt Books. The novel is, in my opinion, a slow-starter; it takes quite some time for this curious story to find its focus. Once it does get started, though, Wilson’s curious mix of science fiction, history, philosophy and horror — written as an answer of sorts to the work of H.P. Lovecraft — is quite eerie and compelling.

What is it about? Like most of Lovecraft’s stories, it centers on intellectuals who delve too deeply into forbidden history — and inevitably draw the unwelcome attention of nearly omnipotent and uncaring beings more ancient than the Earth itself.

Read the whole review.

[Beverly J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

An astounding, mind-boggling book. I cannot wait to read more of this man's work.

[Aaron Lafond · Rating 5 out of 5]

M E T A L

[Irina · Rating 2 out of 5]

I haven't quite finished the book. I had about an hour and a half left of the 12-13 hour audiobook, but I just couldn't force myself. I enjoyed it a lot at the beginning with all the science things. But then it does go off on random topics for quite a bit, like Shakespeare's biography and other things. I don't know if I'm not clever enough to understand this book or what, but I just completely lost interest. And what is described in the blurb hasn't even happened at the point I was at, which was nearly at the end!

[Rami Hamze · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF at 160 pages. Colin Wilson is one of my favorite non-fiction existential authors. The Outsider is a work of genius among others of his work. However, his fiction attempt here did not come to life. Despite the meaty philosophical content, I did not feel the character, the setting, or the plot.

[Azra · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had heard of Colin Wilson before but had never read any of his books. This was an interesting take on the Cthulhu mythos, although it did take quite a while to get there.

Although this is a good story and the novel published in 1969, there were a few points that required a heavy suspension of belief or else I was almost taken right out of the story. These were mostly things the main character discovered in his 'revelations.' Some of them seem absolutely ludicrous for someone who is supposedly highly educated in the 1950s and '60s (the one about shy bladders being a case in point.) It was almost as if the main character was in Victorian times instead.

That said, it was an entertaining read. There is quite a lot of lead up to the actual Lovecraftian bits, which really doesn't start to show up until the last third of the book. That lead up, however, has its own feel to it. It isn't quite 'mad scientist,' but close.

Bonus points for the author including the Voynich Manuscript in the story.

[Laurence · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the introduction Wilson derides Lovecraft and seems quite full of himself, so not a great start. This combative versus Lovecraft stance puts the book on poor footing as I start off wanting to find fault with the story. To find why this is actually inferior to HPL, after all I am here because it is meant to be inspired by Lovecraft. I remember thinking that I had no doubt this would likely be better as a shorter story, as Lovecraft would have written. Decided to wade in either way.

Expecting a quite a dense philosophically inspired barely readable treatise, I was surprised to find this starts out quite accessible and actually quite interesting. The science generally aides the story. The discussion of how a conscious mind processes things and the way they are able to expand with a metal conduit is a well developed idea. I expected this to be dated and dull but actually found it completely fine. I'm reminded of Flowers For Algernon written 10 years before this book in 1959.

Then the pace increases in the second half and then becomes a bit too convoluted. So man has been created by the old ones as a tool, but we've become unwieldy. So we come into conflict, but luckily the old ones are sleeping.

Some interesting ideas, doesn't quite tie together well enough for me.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novel deals with themes dealt with more entertainingly in Wilson's The Mind Parasites. I picked it up while staying in a cabin near Lake Michigan, reading quickly in bed, excited at the prospect provided by the blurb on the cover and by Oates' foreword. I was, however, disappointed. Mind Parasites was better.

[Jonathan Hockey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reads very similar to a non-fiction book of Colin Wilsons. But the philosophy of Colin Wilson comes thick and fast in this one. Very dense material to read, but very interesting also. This is certainly not light reading material, but it will definitely give you some things to think about.

[Wendy 'windmill' · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Read

Another fantastic book of Wilson's. Thoroughly enjoyed the Lovecraftian theme that runs through it. I have read many of Wilson's books now, & he had a wonderful writing style thank keeps me gripped to the story.

[Philip Challinor · Rating 2 out of 5]

About as silly a work of fiction as Wilson has written (which means it's very silly indeed), but entertaining, and redeemed by its climactic vision of an ancient Lovercraftian civilisation.

[Jaye · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating read that reminded me of John Fowles's The Magus.

[Fastnbulbous · Rating 4 out of 5]

When Colin Wilson wrote in his nonfiction book The Strength to Dream (1961) that H.P. Lovecraft was a "very bad writer" whose work is best considered a case study more than literature, publisher August Derelith challenged him to try to write a better Lovecraftian book. Wilson did, with The Mind Parasites (1967) which Derelith published. With working class and no university background, Wilson proved to be a precocious organic intellectual, publishing his bestselling work of existentialist philosophy, The Outsider (1956) at 24. Wilson probably identified with Lovecraft's own status as an outsider, and clearly enjoyed his first experiment, because he went on to write the even more ambitious The Philosopher's Stone, and the “The Return of the Lloigor,” story. Nearly all of Wilson's academic references were attributed to real-world research, given his lifelong interest in consciousness, mysticism and the paranormal. He also used it as an opportunity to express his controversial opinions, like the one where Shakespeare kind of sucks:

"Later, I read Tolstoy’s essay on Shakespeare, in which he says all that I have just said, and a great deal more. I found it surprising that his clear analyses should not have completely destroyed Shakespeare’s reputation. And then, on reflection, I saw that it was not surprising. Most people live on a level of emotional triviality which means that when they read Shakespeare, they experience the pleasure of hearing their own feelings echoed. And since the language is impressive, and requires a certain intellectual effort to follow, they can have no doubt that this is really Great Literature. This combination – of fine language with totally trivial content – has kept Shakespeare’s stock high for three hundred years, and will continue to do so until the movement of evolution consigns him to the dustbin of quaint but meaningless antiquities."

The book is set up as a memoir of the narrator, Dr. Howard Lester, starting with his childhood. Slowly things start to move when he collaborates with Sir Henry Littleway to research ways to expand consciousness, mental powers, life longevity and possibly immortality. Through an experimental brain operation, they gain the ability of "time vision" to see back in time via objects and artifacts. This leads them to learn about the interdimensional Old Ones. Will their research awake these sleeping gods and provoke disasters similar to extinction events, or will it lead to the next step in human evolution?

As much as I admire Lovecraft's body of work, I have to admit that this book held my interest better than most of those original stories. So, challenge accepted and succeeded.

[SciFi Pinay · Rating 2 out of 5]

"The scientist is unwilling to face death, and so he sacrifices his humanity and tries to identify himself with the abstract and eternal. And the religious man has the same motive, except that he may believe in an after life for which he has to prepare."

Correlation vs Causation issues throughout: I'd recommend this for its rich and profound (many) quotable philosophical and hard scifi ideas about the relationship between immortality, the concept of time and human consciousness, but somehow I couldn't get past the snobby and sexist views. I've never heard of this author before reading this -- while I've read a lot of classic scifi with these flaws, I can't believe that just the way a female character glances/looks at the main character would cause him to think that she is dull/dumb without even needing to do/say anything to him. I think this is where I draw the line for discriminating women in fiction lol! Also, that same character concludes that by being a 'thinker' i.e. mathematician/philosopher would literally add years to one's life... Personally coming from humble beginnings in a third world country where there is an abundance of 'non-thinkers', even if this is only fiction I find these out of touch, on the nose opinions problematic. Maybe we're not as privileged with maids and an education to have free time on our hands to be thinkers, this snobby author forgets this... plus he thinks engineers are 'irrelevant'. This is the legacy he's leaving behind and it's aging like milk. So the prominent mathematicians, artists and philosophers he's mentioned may be standing on the giant shoulders of socioeconomic privilege *I think* ...but what do I know even if I have a math degree myself 🤷🏻‍♀️ One thing I will not waver from, for sure, is that I believe this author is narrow-minded and lucky to not have been put in his place due to the time period of publishing this. He is quite full of himself, and his protagonist reflects this with delusions of grandeur, and world savior complex afflicted by baseless speculations. Asks profound 'whys' but takes the most ridiculous answers, so I recommend this with a big asterisk! Lastly, I don't like how the book cover has broken up the word 'Philosopher' against its proper syllabic deconstruction lol! There!

[Dr.J.G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

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The Philosopher's Stone
by
Colin Wilson.
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An absolutely amazing book from a writer that sings a different tune.

Feb 05, 2016.
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Looking at the other site, which is now incorporating the reviews originally written on Shelfari, discovered one had written one there -

"An absolutely amazing book from a writer that sings a different tune.

Feb 05, 2016. "

But found none in this, ones own blog! Hence, now this.
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What one wrote then, succinctly, was true enough. So's the factual description on the site that has now incorporated shelfari:-
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"Howard Lester, a young scientist, becomes obsessed with the problem of death and begins a series of unconventional experiments aimed at increasing human longevity. In the course of their research, Lester and his friend Sir Henry Littleway make a startling discovery: a simple and harmless operation on the brain's prefrontal cortex results in vastly expanded consciousness and mental powers. After undergoing the procedure themselves, Lester and Littleway develop remarkable abilities, including 'time vision', a means of seeing backwards into time. They begin by looking at the relatively recent past-the eighteenth century and Shakespeare's England. But they soon find they can see much further back, to the days of Stonehenge and the Mayans, and even earlier. . . . But as they get closer to uncovering the beginnings of human existence, they make a terrifying discovery: something ancient and immensely powerful, long asleep, has been awakened by their activities, and is determined to stop them at all costs. . . ."
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But that gives very little clue of the scope of the book or of the author, in terms of consciousness.
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To begin with, few understand what immense realm that is mathematics has to do with consciousness, and fewer relate it to spiritual realm, which latter is usually taken as a matter of faith governed by a governing body of an authority or another related to some religion or another.

Few comprehend the beauty that's not far from the first startled glance at a Monet in Paris - not the one that gave Impressionists their title, though that's superb, too, of course, and right there - that reduces one to standing there in tears for hours, sitting, going away to the park and returning promptly to continue!

And few can comprehend that such beauty belongs to mathematics, too, not only to art, music, poetry, Himaalayan ranges and oceans.
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I came across this book accidentally, while looking for something to read when a guest of a very senior fellow ex-colleague in California, with whom I shared a name, so his wife was furious at my introducing myself - quite legitimately - as 'Dr. ...', and insisted I call the person back and say I am not to be confused with her husband. As the person at the other end of the line knew that, my calling back to say I was doing so due to being asked by the wife to clear up any such confusion, was probably taken with an understanding by that person about the issues involved.

The book came as a thunderous revelation when I began, thereafter, to read it. I did attempt to describe it to the hostess, wife of the owner, but she had disdain for such matters as much as for me, and probably never did look at it.
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The book does begin with the deep involvement of the protagonist with mathematics, and goes on to matters of consciousness, of perception and more.

One only wonders, did the author never think of travelling to India?

Was he, too, blinded by racism, colonial prejudice and more, as various others of similar potential capabilities were, thereby losing out on the tremendous progress they could have achieved?

James Hilton, Upton Sinclair, even W. Somerset Maugham who did travel and did have experience but wrote it off about himself while incorporating essentials thereof in a novel, come to mind.

William Shirer did go, did progress, but he limited himself by remaining on rational plane, and meeting only a person famous due to different reasons than spiritual paths; Pearl S. Buck similarly did travel to India but couldn't divest herself of the prejudices, and her struggle comes through in the less than half a dozen works of hers where India is involved.
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Subsequently I did read more of works of Colin Wilson, and it was always a pleasure. It's been about three decades, and as one begins another, one might try to recall names of what other books by him one read in '91 - '92, and the impressions they made.

This one? Let's say, it categorises people - those who delight and see the roof-blown-out immensity of it, and those who would sum it up as the book site does.
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[Matt · Rating 2 out of 5]

If I were rating this book on the last 80 pages or so alone, it would be a four or five-star novel. Unfortunately, to get to the good part I had to wade through over 200 pages of tedious plot development-not helped in the slightest by the fact that the narrator is a condescending jerk who is well aware that he has become superior to most everyone else. It honestly feels like this backstory could have been done in 80 pages to much better effect. The author also frequently uses the prop of referencing "other works" written by the narrator to explain away plot holes (which of course don't exist). Had this been done once or twice, it would have added a bit of color to the memoir feel of the book. Instead, it snapped my suspension of disbelief like a twig every time it came up.

Despite the 2-star rating, I honestly would recommend reading this book-there are a lot of interesting and enjoyable moments in the final third of the book that are worth reading. Just be prepared for a long slog to get to the good parts.

[Ataegina · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is exceptionally well written, with an interesting and captivating beginning. However, I sort of had to force myself to keep reading it until about its 60%, while the protagonist engages on a lot of philosophical, yet highly repetitive, divagations on mind's potential (to be fair they were quite interesting, but it was boring to read the same thing about ten times with different words). It was also slightly annoying his sense of superiority and arrogance expressed towards others in great part of the book. The book gave a great turnout at its last 40%, bringing together different myths and ancient civilizations to create a wonderful mixture of philosophy and cosmic horror that surprisingly had a happy ending.

[Gavin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm currently rereading this book. I first read it in my twenties, about forty years ago, so my perception of it may be expected to be somewhat different and it is but after reading the first thirty or so pages I still find it an enjoyable excursion into the mind of an eccentric intellectual. The protagonist Howard Lester is a young man who questions the apparent futility of human existence and discerns through his studies various clues that might lead to man achieving his evolutionary destiny. It may be complete hokum but it's a good read .. good enough to remember reread.

[VII · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was bad in several ways. First of all it is not a horror novel at all and its "cosmic" elements start to materialize only in the last 10% of the book or so. It is also badly written, though the author warns us that he wanted to write it the same way that he writes his science books. Expect supposedly interesting info (think Sheldon from BBT) that leads to nowhere, including some random obsession with Shakespeare's life. Finally, even Kant or Descartes don't identify with, and overvalue their mind (and hate their body) as much as him.

[Steve D'avis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this novel both enlightening & intriguing. It's written as a memoir and as such comes from a singular point of view as the narrative follows the main character through adventures in science, neurology, archeology & cosmology, among others. One has to remember this was published in 1969 and in that time, I imagine, for some would have been quite a revelation. 50+ years later, much has moved on. The storyline in the last section became very heavy for me, but I'm glad I persisted & was able to finish the book.

[Todd R · Rating 1 out of 5]

This a really long winded bore of a book. It's a bad and much too diverting Lovecraftian imitation that wouldn't have been as painful at half the size. In a smaller format Wilson's insights could have been better appreciated.

From the beginning I didn't see why I should care about an elitist class of faux scientists who spend their days listening to classical music and opining on the nature of the universe...it's a bore...read some real Lovecraft.