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Event
The Psychedelic Book of the Dead: Author/Podcaster Erik Davis on the Secret Links between Tim Leary, LSD & the Tibetan Book of the Dead
Date: Wednesday, February 3rd
Time: 7pm
Admission: $15
Location: Morbid Anatomy Museum, 424 Third Avenue, 11215 Brooklyn, NY
First published in 1927, Evans-Wentz's "The Tibetan Book of the Dead" repackaged a Tibetan cycle of tantric funerary texts used to verbally and ritually guide the dying and the dead through the various bardos, or intermediate states, that unfold upon the death of the body. A metaphysical best-seller in the West, "The Tibetan Book of the Dead" has been reprinted, retranslated and reconfigured numerous times, but never more audaciously than in "The Psychedelic Experience," a1964 book by Timothy Leary, Richard Alpert, and Ralph Metzner. The Leary book used Evans-Wentz's text to provide a typological map for the stages of psychedelic experience. Though a dated, ponderous, and arguably "colonialist" text, "The Psychedelic Experience" also cannily recognized the inherent possibilities of the Tibetan bardo concept in order to craft useful psycho-spiritual protocols out of the mortal phantasmagoria sometimes occasioned by psychedelics. The Leary group's influential remix of psychology, comparative religion, and cultural mediation helped set the stage for contemporary research into the use of psychedelics to treat end-of-life anxiety.
Erik Davis is an author, scholar, and award-winning journalist based in San Francisco. His most recent book is "Nomad Codes: Adventures in Modern Esoterica." He explores the "cultures of consciousness" on his weekly podcast Expanding Mind, and recently earned his PhD in religious studies at Rice University.
Please note: no refunds will be issued unless event is cancelled.
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LocationMorbid Anatomy Museum (View)
424 A Third Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11215
United States
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