Jacob's Hands [Hardcover]

Aldous Huxley (Author), Christopher Isherwood (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 1998

Jacob Ericson is a shy, enigmatic, and somewhat inept ranch hand who works for crotchety Professor Carter and his crippled daughter, Sharon, on a ranch in California's Mojave Desert in the 1920s. One day he learns that his hands possess the mysterious gift of healing, a gift he uses to cure animals (whom he adores). Sharon (whom he also adores) then persuades him to heal her. When he successfully cures Sharon, his gift is quickly exploited and the boundaries of his charm and naivete begin to stretch. First he offers his healing powers for free at a church in Los Angeles - where Jacob has gone after Sharon, who fled her father and the ranch to pursue her dreams of stardom. Jacob and Sharon cross paths when they work for the same pair of exploitative showmen. Jacob stays with the seedy stage show only because Sharon is close by. It is when Jacob's gift is recruited to heal Earl Medwin, an eccentric, ailing young millionaire, that the love and security for which he has worked so hard begin to collapse.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This collaborative effort between Aldous Huxley and Christopher Isherwood, from a film project they were contracted to write in the late 1930s, was discovered in a trunk at Huxley's estate by actress Sharon Stone, who was researching the author's work for a film based on one of his short stories. Jacob's Hands is a novella-length film treatment for a script about a ranch hand who, after learning that he has the gift of healing, becomes disillusioned when he discovers that mending a broken body does not always heal a tormented soul. The slim volume proves both mesmerizing and moving, and the use of the present tense lends an air of innocence and mystery to the story, while the book's emotional undercurrents and passions stir up deeper, troubling responses. Jacob's Hands is a complex, disquieting modern fairy tale unlike anything else by either author, and a fascinating artifact of their Hollywood careers. --Michael Bronski

From Publishers Weekly

Forgotten in a trunk for six decades and uncovered by actress Sharon Stone, who flirted with the idea of producing it, this sentimental screen story, or novella, revisits the 1920s with a nostalgic eye. Gentle, simple-souled Jacob Erickson works on a ranch in the Mojave desert as a semi-magical healer of sick and injured animals. When Sharon, the boss's crippled but stage-struck daughter, asks shyly adoring Jacob to heal her, too, he obliges and she flees the ranch. Eighteen months later, they meet again in L.A.: he's a workman, healing children who are brought to him at a small church; she works in a burlesque theater?the reality pit stop of her stage dreams. Seeing money in Jacob's powers, the theater's unscrupulous managers blackmail Sharon into convincing Jacob to go into the healing business with them. Sharon and Jacob should go back to the clean pure desert and do some good, but they are trapped by Jacob's compassion for one of his patients, Earl Medwin, the chronically ill heir to a vast fortune, and by Sharon's final surrender to temptation?Earl's assiduous attentions and all that money. Written in the present tense, occasionally in summary paragraphs that seem to be standing in for dialogue, Huxley's and Isherwood's collaboration makes even Forrest Gump (which it resembles much more closely than, say, Isherwood's Cabaret-inspiring The Berlin Stories or Huxley's Brave New World) look morally complex. Even so, it exposes a strong spine of dramatic conflict and a definite period charm. Agent, Dorris Halsey; film rights to Arthur Axelman, Rialto Films and Dorothea Petrie. (Sept.) FYI: The book's jacket will feature an illustration by Don Bacardi, who was Isherwood's lover.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 160 pages
• Publisher: St Martins Pr; 1st edition (September 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312194676
• ISBN-13: 978-0312194673
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 5.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #949,955 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I love this book!, December 1, 1999

By 

Kelly Jones (Macon State College) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jacob's Hands (Hardcover)

The narration of this story is more simplistic than Brave New World, but keep in mind that Jacob's Hands was written as a screenplay, not a novel. Aldous Huxley and Christopher Isherwood have created a wonderful story and though the reading is easy, the questions brought to life in this tale are anything but. Jacob is the shy, gentle antagonist (who reminds me of John Steinbeck's Lenny)blessed and cursed simultaneously with the gift of healing. Exploited and heart-broken, he must determine the true benefit of mending the broken bodies brought to him when he can do nothing to repair their souls. Ideas in this story range from the physical hardships of the lame, to the role of spirituality in healing, to first loves and betrayal. Enjoyable and thought-provoking, I recommend this book to anyone who likes to ponder over Huxley's logic, or just enjoys to read.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars HEAL ME!, January 21, 2000

By 

Erin C. Stelter (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Jacob's Hands (Hardcover)

Jacob's Hands is a tantalizing account of one man's eyes opening. Poor Jacob, so ingnorant of the world. He truly believes in goodness. This book is a look into the evils of human nature. Human nature is greedy and self serving, unfortunately, Jacob does not realize this. In attempt to give his love all that he can, he opens himself up to exploitation. This book is a reader's journey into the souls of the pure and the corrupt. Perhaps the authors whished us all to take a good deep look into our own souls and the manner in which we treat others. This book is just one more glorious demonstration of life by Adlous Huxley, this time with the help of Christopher Isherwood.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars To Be Swallowed, April 24, 2007

By 

Stacey @ Tree, Root, and Twig (Houston Metro, TX) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Jacob's Hands: A Fable (Paperback)

The story goes that in 1997 actress Sharon Stone was reading the diaries of playwright/novelist Christopher Isherwood and discovered that Christopher has collaborated on a screenplay with novelist/essayist Aldous Huxley. She asked permission to search the estate, and in a dusty trunk was found a yellowed copy of Jacob's Hands. The best guess is that the fable had been written in the late 1930's, when (as the back jacket says), "a large sector of the intellectual community of Europe immigrated to the United States, to California in particular. What they found there was Nirvana - sunshine, freedome, mysticism, and the burgeoning movie industry." The two great thinkers met amidst this illectual Utopia and wrote this work together.

This is a short book, an easy read in an hour's time. As such, it is hard to say too much without giving it all away. Jacob is a good, honest, decent, sound, strapping young man. The kind of man that sees no ill will in others because he has none in himself. He learns as a farmhand on a California ranch that he has the power to heal. The power makes other love him, suspect him, and ultimately exploit him. He loves Sharon, the daughter of his former boss on the ranch. He meets Earl, a young millionaire with need of his healing powers. The three of them form a triangle that sort of reminds me of the ending of Ethan Frome (don't ask me why, though, since it's kind of a stretch).

The overriding theme, I believe, of the book is this question: is it more important to heal the soul or to heal the body? Are they ultimately connected or mutually exclusive? There is also some discussion of how sometimes we hold on to our illness, our weakness; we are wont to let them go. Because somehow they come to define us, and we survive more with the fear than we can live without it.

There is a brief introduction to the book by Aldous' wife, Laura Archera Huxley. It is useful in the fact that she gives some background into Aldous' thoughts on healing and the moral and religious implications of such a gift. It helps to set an informed backdrop to this interesting and thought-provoking fable.