--- title: "Meaning & Key Takeaway of: Music was a kind of penetration. Perhaps…" description: "\"“Music was a kind of penetration. Perhaps absorption is a less freighted word. The penetration or absorption of everything into itself. I don't know if..." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/72d/stephen-fry-573_doors-of-perception_music-was-a-kind-of-penetration-perhaps_581497.jpg" --- # Music was a kind of penetration. Perhaps absorption is a… ![“Music was a kind of penetration. Perhaps absorption is a less freighted word. The penetration or absorption of everything into itself. I don't know if you have ever taken LSD, but when you do so the doors of perception, as Aldous Huxley, Jim Morrison and their adherents ceaselessly remind us…” quote by Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/72d/stephen-fry-573_doors-of-perception_music-was-a-kind-of-penetration-perhaps_581497.jpg) [Download](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/72d/stephen-fry-573_doors-of-perception_music-was-a-kind-of-penetration-perhaps_581497.jpg) [Open image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/72d/stephen-fry-573_doors-of-perception_music-was-a-kind-of-penetration-perhaps_581497.jpg) > ““Music was a kind of penetration. Perhaps absorption is a less freighted word. The penetration or absorption of everything into itself. I don't know if you have ever taken LSD, but when you do so the doors of perception, as Aldous Huxley, Jim Morrison and their adherents ceaselessly remind us, swing wide open. That is actually the sort of phrase, unless you are William Blake, that only makes sense when there is some LSD actually swimming about inside you. In the cold light of the cup of coffee and banana sandwich that are beside me now it appears to be nonsense, but I expect you to know what it is taken to mean. LSD reveals the whatness of things, their quiddity, their essence. The wateriness of water is suddenly revealed to you, the carpetness of carpets, the woodness of wood, the yellowness of yellow, the fingernailness of fingernails, the allness of all, the nothingness of all, the allness of nothing. For me music gives access to everyone of these essences, but at a fraction of the social or financial cost of a drug and without the need to cry 'Wow!' all the time, which is LSD's most distressing and least endearing side effects. ...Music in the precision of its form and the mathematical tyranny of its laws, escapes into an eternity of abstraction and an absurd sublime that is everywhere and nowhere at once. The grunt of rosin-rubbed catgut, the saliva-bubble blast of a brass tube, the sweaty-fingered squeak on a guitar fret, all that physicality, all that clumsy 'music making', all that grain of human performance...transcends itself at the moment of its happening, that moment when music actually becomes, as it makes the journey from the vibrating instrument, the vibrating hi-fi speaker, as it sends those vibrations across to the human tympanum and through to the inner ear and into the brain, where the mind is set to vibrate to frequencies of its own making. The nothingness of music can be moulded by the mood of the listener into the most precise shapes or allowed to float as free as thought; music can follow the academic and theoretical pattern of its own modality or adhere to some narrative or dialectical programme imposed by a friend, a scholar or the composer himself. Music is everything and nothing. It is useless and no limit can be set to its use. Music takes me to places of illimitable sensual and insensate joy, accessing points of ecstasy that no angelic lover could ever locate, or plunging me into gibbering weeping hells of pain that no torturer could ever devise. Music makes me write this sort of maundering adolescent nonsense without embarrassment. Music is in fact the dog's bollocks. Nothing else comes close.”” [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) ## About This Quote This interpretation was drafted with AI assistance. It is one reading of the quote, not the author's own explanation. Music can reveal the essence of things like a drug, but without its side effects, by connecting listener to deep reality through sound. **In simple terms:** Music reveals essence without drugs. Key Takeaway Listen deeply to experience essence. Themes art perception essence music philosophy Mood contemplative inspired Type philosophical inspirational When to use this quote - listening to classical - creating music - mindful meditation - enhancing focus Key Concepts aesthetic experience transcendence embodiment Questions to Reflect On - How does music change your perception of reality? - Can sound substitute altered states? A Different Perspective Music may not replace all drug experiences for everyone. ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ No ratings yet [Doors of perception](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/doors-of-perception/) [Music](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/music/) [Side effects](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/side-effects/) ## Related quotes > [In many instances, LSD actually produced terrifying and deleterious effects instead of beneficial effects, because of misuse, because it was a profanation.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/albert-hofmann/in-many-instances-lsd-actually-produced-terrifying-and-deleterious/) [Albert Hofmann](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/albert-hofmann/) > [I ended up becoming so self-conscious that my songs stopped being about my life and started being about what people thought of my music.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/liz-phair/i-ended-up-becoming-so-self-conscious-that-my-songs-stopped-being/) [Liz Phair](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/liz-phair/) > [I just never gave anything else much thought after music. I just hope that I'm doing what God intended me to do, and that's…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/aaron-watson/i-just-never-gave-anything-else-much-thought-after-music-i-just-hope/) [Aaron Watson](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/aaron-watson/) > [I've always thought of music in the long term. I've always tried to write songs that people could listen to a couple of years…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-moore/i-ve-always-thought-of-music-in-the-long-term-i-ve-always-tried-to/) [Gary Moore](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-moore/) > [I have always thought of music as a highway with many lanes.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marvin-hamlisch/i-have-always-thought-of-music-as-a-highway-with-many-lanes/) [Marvin Hamlisch](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marvin-hamlisch/) > [I've always thought of music as something which gives the words their flight and their wings and the music often comes first, although sometimes…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/neil-diamond/i-ve-always-thought-of-music-as-something-which-gives-the-words-their/) [Neil Diamond](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/neil-diamond/) > [Music is cyclical, but I've never thought of the music I make as being so off the wall or left field that it wouldn't…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/billy-squier/music-is-cyclical-but-i-ve-never-thought-of-the-music-i-make-as-being/) [Billy Squier](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/billy-squier/) > [You can get into anything if you are determined. I always thought that with music, too.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-darnielle/you-can-get-into-anything-if-you-are-determined-i-always-thought-that/) [John Darnielle](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-darnielle/) > [Words make you think a thought. Music makes you feel a feeling. A song makes you feel a thought.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/anonymous/words-make-you-think-a-thought-music-makes-you-feel-a-feeling-a-song/) [Anonymous](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/anonymous/) > [I realized that music was the only thing I really thought about - music and writing.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/tierra-whack/i-realized-that-music-was-the-only-thing-i-really-thought-about-music/) [Tierra Whack](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/tierra-whack/) > [Music is going to go in some direction that is entirely inconceivable now. If someone had been asked twenty years ago what direction they…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/adam-yauch/music-is-going-to-go-in-some-direction-that-is-entirely-inconceivable/) [Adam Yauch](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/adam-yauch/) > [I found myself at a time in my career trying to impress everyone. I was constantly thinking about what everyone thought of my music.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/sonreal/i-found-myself-at-a-time-in-my-career-trying-to-impress-everyone-i/) SonReal > [Dabbling in music and being in music when I was young I had my own view of what I thought music was whether it…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/rakim/dabbling-in-music-and-being-in-music-when-i-was-young-i-had-my-own/) [Rakim](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/rakim/) > [I thought music could take you to a place where you didn't even feel ownership of it, you just felt lucky you were there.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wesley-schultz/i-thought-music-could-take-you-to-a-place-where-you-didn-t-even-feel/) [Wesley Schultz](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wesley-schultz/) > [Painting is the silence of thought and the music of sight.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/orhan-pamuk/painting-is-the-silence-of-thought-and-the-music-of-sight/) [Orhan Pamuk](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/orhan-pamuk/) ## More by Stephen Fry > [“...Catholic versus Protestant, essentially. It's that kind of fight. ... And it goes on to this day. Will we never learn? Who knows? Religion.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/catholic-versus-protestant-essentially-it-s-that-kind-of-fight-and-it/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [How dare you? How dare you create a world in which there is such misery that is not our fault? It's not right, it's…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/how-dare-you-how-dare-you-create-a-world-in-which-there-is-such/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [“Look at the kind of people who most object to the childishness and cheapness of celebrity culture. Does one really want to side with…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/look-at-the-kind-of-people-who-most-object-to-the-childishness-and/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [“The object of love should feel honoured or flattered, responsible in some way. Instead he felt insulted, degraded and revolted. More than that, he…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/the-object-of-love-should-feel-honoured-or-flattered-responsible-in/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [The only people who are obsessed with food are anorexics and the morbidly obese. That, in erotic terms, is the Catholic church, in a…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/the-only-people-who-are-obsessed-with-food-are-anorexics-and-the/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [To me, reason is as spiritual as anything else, the beauty of reason seems to me indelible and ineffable and numinous... the spirit is…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/to-me-reason-is-as-spiritual-as-anything-else-the-beauty-of-reason/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [The stranger might laugh and seem to enjoy the writing, but you hug to yourself the thought that they didn't quite understand its force…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/the-stranger-might-laugh-and-seem-to-enjoy-the-writing-but-you-hug-to/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [“The future is a much bigger deal than the past,”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/the-future-is-a-much-bigger-deal-than-the-past/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [I gather a repulsive nobody writing in a paper no one of any decency would be seen dead with has written something loathesome and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/i-gather-a-repulsive-nobody-writing-in-a-paper-no-one-of-any-decency/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [I've never had any illusions about being a lead actor in films, because lead actors have to be of a certain kind. Apart from…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/i-ve-never-had-any-illusions-about-being-a-lead-actor-in-films/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [Because, let's face it, I do not get offered the parts that Brad Pitt has just turned down.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/because-let-s-face-it-i-do-not-get-offered-the-parts-that-brad-pitt/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [I will defend the absolute value of Mozart over Miley Cyrus, of course I will, but we should be wary of false dichotomies. You…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/i-will-defend-the-absolute-value-of-mozart-over-miley-cyrus-of-course/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [You can't just say there is a god because the world is beautiful. You have to account for bone cancer in children](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/you-can-t-just-say-there-is-a-god-because-the-world-is-beautiful-you/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [If you know someone who's depressed, please resolve never to ask them why. Depression isn't a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/if-you-know-someone-who-s-depressed-please-resolve-never-to-ask-them/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) > [It's as if scientists exert every effort of will they possess deliberately to find the least significant problems in the world and explain them.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-fry/it-s-as-if-scientists-exert-every-effort-of-will-they-possess/) [Stephen Fry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) [Explore all 466 Stephen Fry quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-fry/) ## More Doors of perception quotes > [If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear as it is - infinite](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/william-blake/if-the-doors-of-perception-were-cleansed-everything-would-appear-as/) [William Blake](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/william-blake/) > [Hallucinogens are a value changer...like it or not, it changes your values, it opens up windows (doors of perception.)](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/george-carlin/hallucinogens-are-a-value-changer-like-it-or-not-it-changes-your/) [George Carlin](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/george-carlin/) > [“... the doors of perception are hanging crazily off their hinges these days.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kate-atkinson/the-doors-of-perception-are-hanging-crazily-off-their-hinges-these/) [Kate Atkinson](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kate-atkinson/) > [The editor needs to put his own life on hold for the better of the magazine, the crew, and the readers. And to have…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/toni-jerrman/the-editor-needs-to-put-his-own-life-on-hold-for-the-better-of-the/) [Toni Jerrman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/toni-jerrman/) > [It is one of the commonest of our mistakes to consider that the limit of our power of perception is also the limit of…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/anonymous/it-is-one-of-the-commonest-of-our-mistakes-to-consider-that-the-limit/) [Anonymous](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/anonymous/) > [Aldous Huxley took the drug mescaline and then chronicled his experience in the book The Doors of Perception. Now, I don't actually think that's…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bill-bailey/aldous-huxley-took-the-drug-mescaline-and-then-chronicled-his/) [Bill Bailey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bill-bailey/) > [There are things of such darkness and horror—just, I suppose, as there are things of such great beauty—that they will not fit through the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-king/there-are-things-of-such-darkness-and-horror-just-i-suppose-as-there/) [Stephen King](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-king/) > [If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/william-blake/if-the-doors-of-perception-were-cleansed-everything-would-appear-to/) [William Blake](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/william-blake/) > [If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, infinite.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/william-blake/if-the-doors-of-perception-were-cleansed-everything-would-appear-to-2/) [William Blake](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/william-blake/) > [The really explicit phrase is doors of perception.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marianne-faithfull/the-really-explicit-phrase-is-doors-of-perception/) [Marianne Faithfull](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marianne-faithfull/) > [Hold infinity in the palm of your hand.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/william-blake/hold-infinity-in-the-palm-of-your-hand/) [William Blake](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/william-blake/) > [We pursue her in her incessant metamorphoses yet we never manage to trap her. She always escapes: each encounter ends in flight. We embrace…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/octavio-paz/we-pursue-her-in-her-incessant-metamorphoses-yet-we-never-manage-to/) [Octavio Paz](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/octavio-paz/) > [Every individual is at once the beneficiary and the victim of the linguistic tradition into which he has been born - the beneficiary inasmuch…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/aldous-huxley/every-individual-is-at-once-the-beneficiary-and-the-victim-of-the-2/) [Aldous Huxley](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/aldous-huxley/) > [“Through the doors of perception, down the corridors of uncertainty, and into the room of self doubt, opens the window of opportunity.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/david-parker/through-the-doors-of-perception-down-the-corridors-of-uncertainty-and/) David Parker > [The popular prophets have underestimated how strange the truth can be. The human brain, that 'perfect instrument,' that 'fabulous electronic dance,' can be our…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marilyn-ferguson/the-popular-prophets-have-underestimated-how-strange-the-truth-can-be/) [Marilyn Ferguson](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marilyn-ferguson/) [Browse all 30 Doors of perception quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/doors-of-perception/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Music was a kind of penetration. Perhaps absorption is a less freighted word. The penetration or absorption of everything into itself. I don't know if you have ever taken LSD, but when you do so the doors of perception, as Aldous Huxley, Jim Morrison and their adherents ceaselessly remind us, swing wide open. That is actually the sort of phrase, unless you are William Blake, that only makes sense when there is some LSD actually swimming about inside you. In the cold light of the cup of coffee and banana sandwich that are beside me now it appears to be nonsense, but I expect you to know what it is taken to mean. LSD reveals the whatness of things, their quiddity, their essence. The wateriness of water is suddenly revealed to you, the carpetness of carpets, the woodness of wood, the yellowness of yellow, the fingernailness of fingernails, the allness of all, the nothingness of all, the allness of nothing. For me music gives access to everyone of these essences, but at a fraction of the social or financial cost of a drug and without the need to cry 'Wow!' all the time, which is LSD's most distressing and least endearing side effects. ...Music in the precision of its form and the mathematical tyranny of its laws, escapes into an eternity of abstraction and an absurd sublime that is everywhere and nowhere at once. The grunt of rosin-rubbed catgut, the saliva-bubble blast of a brass tube, the sweaty-fingered squeak on a guitar fret, all that physicality, all that clumsy 'music making', all that grain of human performance...transcends itself at the moment of its happening, that moment when music actually becomes, as it makes the journey from the vibrating instrument, the vibrating hi-fi speaker, as it sends those vibrations across to the human tympanum and through to the inner ear and into the brain, where the mind is set to vibrate to frequencies of its own making. The nothingness of music can be moulded by the mood of the listener into the most precise shapes or allowed to float as free as thought; music can follow the academic and theoretical pattern of its own modality or adhere to some narrative or dialectical programme imposed by a friend, a scholar or the composer himself. Music is everything and nothing. It is useless and no limit can be set to its use. Music takes me to places of illimitable sensual and insensate joy, accessing points of ecstasy that no angelic lover could ever locate, or plunging me into gibbering weeping hells of pain that no torturer could ever devise. Music makes me write this sort of maundering adolescent nonsense without embarrassment. Music is in fact the dog's bollocks. 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