daniel
11-10-2002, 05:54 AM
breaking open the head
by Richard Metzger, Disinformation - October 23, 2002
Breaking Open The Head by Daniel Pinchbeck
reviewed by Richard Metzger
When I was 12 years old and in the seventh grade, I bought a used paperback copy of Aldous Huxley’s psychedelic classic, The Doors of Perception. Looking back on it, the only reason I can think of that led me to buy it must have been The Doors connection. I knew that Jim Morrison took the band’s name from Huxley’s slim volume and it must’ve cost me all of 50 cents, so I picked it up. It wasn’t that I liked the Doors or anything—I didn’t like them much at all—but I was really, really (really!) curious about drugs at that age. Something about this mysterious book seemed to beckon me to take it home, so I did, along with a huge stack of comic books, I’m quite sure.
I read the entire book one morning sitting in church with my parents and grandparents, who, of course, had no idea what I was reading. I often chose books to read in church that allowed me to silently rebel against the odious weekly ritual I hated so much, so the subject matter and the meager page count made it a perfect “Sunday book” for me. I remember being astonished at what I was reading and made it a point to immediately—if not sooner—get my hands on some LSD, something that took me about two more years to actually acquire, but when I did, it certainly didn’t disappoint! Since that time I have returned again and again to the fountain of Huxley’s “gratuitous grace” during times of crisis or confusion in my life, and I have benefited greatly from the inner journeys and clarity provided by LSD, “magic mushrooms,” and later, the “sci-fi” dimensions of the DMT flash. I try to make it a point to take a high dose of mushrooms at least once a year, if for no other reason, to blow all the bad shit out of my brain....
The publication of Daniel Pinchbeck’s new book, Breaking Open The Head (Broadway Books, $24.95) is, to my mind, nothing short of a publishing event. Pinchbeck, co-founder and co-editor (with novelist Thomas Beller) of the highbrow literary magazine Open City, has come up with something I had despaired of seeing again after the untimely death of Terence McKenna, an instant classic of drug literature. And just in time: This generation badly needs its own Doors of Perception, and Breaking Open The Head is it, arriving not a moment too soon.
In a way, Breaking Open The Head is almost two books in one: On one hand an historical overview of how psychedelics (or “entheogens” in politically correct tripper parlance) made their way into the diet of middle-class American students, ushering in the ‘Age of Aquarius,’ “hippie,” and opposition to an unpopular and misguided war, and on the other hand a travelogue and marvelously candid account of Pinchbeck’s shamanic vision quest to “break open” his own head.
What’s particularly endearing about the book is that Pinchbeck himself is such a wonderful tour guide. Feeling alienated and depressed after the death of his father, (Abstract expressionist painter Peter Pinchbeck. His mother is writer Joyce Johnson, author of Minor Characters and at one time the girlfriend of Jack Kerouac), Pinchbeck became desperate to somehow lift himself out of the Sartrean nausea and disconnectedness he felt himself sinking into in his pursuit of a literary career in his native Manhattan. The book chronicles Pinchbeck’s journey from an atheist New York journalist to, as he puts it, a “shamanic initiate and grateful citizen of the cosmos.”
At times I couldn’t help but to picture George Plimpton, one of the original “participatory journalists,” in Daniel’s place, and this illustrates one of the book’s greatest strengths for the reader: In many ways Pinchbeck seems an unlikely candidate for spiritual enlightenment. As he describes himself at the start of the book, he’s very much an “old school” kind of writer, a drinker, and a bit of a womanizer—more Hemingway than Huxley—before a series of marvelously etched (and often humorous) encounters with Amazon witchdoctors, shaman, and the blissed-out inhabitants of the Burning Man Festival urge Pinchbeck on to a deeper and deeper understanding—not just of himself but also the weird historical moment we find ourselves in as we approach ten minutes to midnight on the Apocalypse clock.
About halfway through the narrative, I began to lament that Pinchbeck seemed to be missing out on the occult (as opposed to the “spiritual”) aspects of the psychedelic experience, but at that point a startlingly magical context (and one I, personally, wholeheartedly endorse) begins to emerge as he asks himself—and the reader—some very important questions: If these dimensions can be accessed by the judicious application of plant and chemical agents and if the bizarrely alien entities one encounters there are real and autonomous beings and not just a drug addled figment of our imaginations—then surely this is big news, isn’t it?
Big fucking news, people. Big fucking news.... But what does this mean??? Why aren’t our finest minds working on getting to the bottom of this, one of the greatest mysteries facing us as human beings? Why instead are we turning away from wisdom and towards self-annihilation, war, and planetary suicide? It doesn’t make any damned sense!
As Einstein once said: “God does not play dice with the universe.” Could the widespread emergence of psychedelics in Western culture be an accident? Fifty years ago, psychedelics were practically unheard of outside of botanical or Beatnik circles. Today, an historical blink of the eye since, due to the pioneering public relations efforts of Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, Timothy Leary, Terence McKenna, and others, millions of people have experienced the enlightenment of the psychedelic experience. No, this was no accident—it’s all part of a strange and wondrous process that is unfolding in our lifetimes, and this book is a part of that process and carries on that tradition. The enlightenment and gnosis resulting from the use of visionary plants and neurochemicals may be mankind’s only hope for survival.
In an interesting interview that appears in the new issue of the Arthur newspaper, Pinchbeck argues that this is the task of the counterculture in our time: “This goal is the direct legacy of the counterculture—but it is actually hundreds if not many thousands of years older than that. In fact, this is the mission that we must somehow accomplish. Think of it as a secret raid to be carried out behind enemy lines, despite incredible odds and with no possibility of failure. The Beats and the Hippies saw through the abrasive insanity gnawing at the soul of America—this warmongering, money-mad, climate-destroying monstrosity which is now casting a dreadful shadow across this planet. Where the Beats acted intuitively, from the heart, we now have the necessary knowledge to put together a new paradigm that is simultaneously political, ecological, spiritual, and far more accurate than the outdated Newtonian-Darwinian model which is propping up the status quo.”
Breaking Open The Head is a serious, thoughtful, provocative and brave book that should be read by everyone who senses that breaking open his or her own head might be the sanest act to perform in today’s world. I urge all of you to read it.
by Richard Metzger, Disinformation - October 23, 2002
Breaking Open The Head by Daniel Pinchbeck
reviewed by Richard Metzger
When I was 12 years old and in the seventh grade, I bought a used paperback copy of Aldous Huxley’s psychedelic classic, The Doors of Perception. Looking back on it, the only reason I can think of that led me to buy it must have been The Doors connection. I knew that Jim Morrison took the band’s name from Huxley’s slim volume and it must’ve cost me all of 50 cents, so I picked it up. It wasn’t that I liked the Doors or anything—I didn’t like them much at all—but I was really, really (really!) curious about drugs at that age. Something about this mysterious book seemed to beckon me to take it home, so I did, along with a huge stack of comic books, I’m quite sure.
I read the entire book one morning sitting in church with my parents and grandparents, who, of course, had no idea what I was reading. I often chose books to read in church that allowed me to silently rebel against the odious weekly ritual I hated so much, so the subject matter and the meager page count made it a perfect “Sunday book” for me. I remember being astonished at what I was reading and made it a point to immediately—if not sooner—get my hands on some LSD, something that took me about two more years to actually acquire, but when I did, it certainly didn’t disappoint! Since that time I have returned again and again to the fountain of Huxley’s “gratuitous grace” during times of crisis or confusion in my life, and I have benefited greatly from the inner journeys and clarity provided by LSD, “magic mushrooms,” and later, the “sci-fi” dimensions of the DMT flash. I try to make it a point to take a high dose of mushrooms at least once a year, if for no other reason, to blow all the bad shit out of my brain....
The publication of Daniel Pinchbeck’s new book, Breaking Open The Head (Broadway Books, $24.95) is, to my mind, nothing short of a publishing event. Pinchbeck, co-founder and co-editor (with novelist Thomas Beller) of the highbrow literary magazine Open City, has come up with something I had despaired of seeing again after the untimely death of Terence McKenna, an instant classic of drug literature. And just in time: This generation badly needs its own Doors of Perception, and Breaking Open The Head is it, arriving not a moment too soon.
In a way, Breaking Open The Head is almost two books in one: On one hand an historical overview of how psychedelics (or “entheogens” in politically correct tripper parlance) made their way into the diet of middle-class American students, ushering in the ‘Age of Aquarius,’ “hippie,” and opposition to an unpopular and misguided war, and on the other hand a travelogue and marvelously candid account of Pinchbeck’s shamanic vision quest to “break open” his own head.
What’s particularly endearing about the book is that Pinchbeck himself is such a wonderful tour guide. Feeling alienated and depressed after the death of his father, (Abstract expressionist painter Peter Pinchbeck. His mother is writer Joyce Johnson, author of Minor Characters and at one time the girlfriend of Jack Kerouac), Pinchbeck became desperate to somehow lift himself out of the Sartrean nausea and disconnectedness he felt himself sinking into in his pursuit of a literary career in his native Manhattan. The book chronicles Pinchbeck’s journey from an atheist New York journalist to, as he puts it, a “shamanic initiate and grateful citizen of the cosmos.”
At times I couldn’t help but to picture George Plimpton, one of the original “participatory journalists,” in Daniel’s place, and this illustrates one of the book’s greatest strengths for the reader: In many ways Pinchbeck seems an unlikely candidate for spiritual enlightenment. As he describes himself at the start of the book, he’s very much an “old school” kind of writer, a drinker, and a bit of a womanizer—more Hemingway than Huxley—before a series of marvelously etched (and often humorous) encounters with Amazon witchdoctors, shaman, and the blissed-out inhabitants of the Burning Man Festival urge Pinchbeck on to a deeper and deeper understanding—not just of himself but also the weird historical moment we find ourselves in as we approach ten minutes to midnight on the Apocalypse clock.
About halfway through the narrative, I began to lament that Pinchbeck seemed to be missing out on the occult (as opposed to the “spiritual”) aspects of the psychedelic experience, but at that point a startlingly magical context (and one I, personally, wholeheartedly endorse) begins to emerge as he asks himself—and the reader—some very important questions: If these dimensions can be accessed by the judicious application of plant and chemical agents and if the bizarrely alien entities one encounters there are real and autonomous beings and not just a drug addled figment of our imaginations—then surely this is big news, isn’t it?
Big fucking news, people. Big fucking news.... But what does this mean??? Why aren’t our finest minds working on getting to the bottom of this, one of the greatest mysteries facing us as human beings? Why instead are we turning away from wisdom and towards self-annihilation, war, and planetary suicide? It doesn’t make any damned sense!
As Einstein once said: “God does not play dice with the universe.” Could the widespread emergence of psychedelics in Western culture be an accident? Fifty years ago, psychedelics were practically unheard of outside of botanical or Beatnik circles. Today, an historical blink of the eye since, due to the pioneering public relations efforts of Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, Timothy Leary, Terence McKenna, and others, millions of people have experienced the enlightenment of the psychedelic experience. No, this was no accident—it’s all part of a strange and wondrous process that is unfolding in our lifetimes, and this book is a part of that process and carries on that tradition. The enlightenment and gnosis resulting from the use of visionary plants and neurochemicals may be mankind’s only hope for survival.
In an interesting interview that appears in the new issue of the Arthur newspaper, Pinchbeck argues that this is the task of the counterculture in our time: “This goal is the direct legacy of the counterculture—but it is actually hundreds if not many thousands of years older than that. In fact, this is the mission that we must somehow accomplish. Think of it as a secret raid to be carried out behind enemy lines, despite incredible odds and with no possibility of failure. The Beats and the Hippies saw through the abrasive insanity gnawing at the soul of America—this warmongering, money-mad, climate-destroying monstrosity which is now casting a dreadful shadow across this planet. Where the Beats acted intuitively, from the heart, we now have the necessary knowledge to put together a new paradigm that is simultaneously political, ecological, spiritual, and far more accurate than the outdated Newtonian-Darwinian model which is propping up the status quo.”
Breaking Open The Head is a serious, thoughtful, provocative and brave book that should be read by everyone who senses that breaking open his or her own head might be the sanest act to perform in today’s world. I urge all of you to read it.