A Primary Reading List
When I was twenty, the poet Robert Kelly presented my wife Lindy and me with a reading list to get us started, so to speak, in life. He was concerned that the traditional education that we were receiving at Amherst and Smith Colleges was missing a lot of important things, like what the universe is, what it means to be human, the history of the non-Western Earth, how the gods have been named, and so on. I may still have that original Kelly list somewhere in a file, but I can’t find it. I do remember that his curriculum included The Sufis, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, Magick in Theory and Practice, and a few other books that I have carried over to this list, which is my current and expanded version of the Kelly “life” list.
My categories are fluid and informal and are provided here mostly to help organize the titles. Most of these books could easily slot into more than one category.
Originally I was just going to list the books, as Kelly did, but then that seemed spartan for this website era. Once I began composing descriptions, I realized that the nature of the books themselves as well as my present relationship to their content led me to have more—and different—things to say about them now than when I first read them. On a second pass I decided to add quotes from some (but not all) of the texts to give at least a taste of the author’s actual words.
A shorter description usually means that I have covered the book so thoroughly elsewhere in my writing that I don’t have the enthusiasm to repeat myself here. It sometimes means that I have forgotten too much of the detail in the book to do it full justice. In fact, I have forgotten some books almost completely, so I wasn’t able to describe them without looking back at them again to refresh my memory. In all cases, though, the books themselves had a huge impact—subtle or charismatic—that cannot be encapsulated. That is why I was able to forget the entire contents of some texts and still be influenced by them.
I have listed most translators, especially of contemporary books. Older works with multiple acceptable translations belong to the planet as is. They have entered the metaphorical noosphere and are already bouncing back out the Akashic Record (metaphorical or real).
1. The Form and Operation of the Part of the Universe That is Invisible to Us
In Search of the Miraculous by P. D. Ouspensky
The Strange Life of Ivan Osokin by P. D. Ouspensky
The Phenomenon of Man by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
The Theory of Celestial Influence by Rodney Collin
The Theory of Conscious Harmony by Rodney Collin
The Seth Material by Jane Roberts
Seth Speaks: The Eternal Validity of the Soul by Jane Roberts
Level 1 Meditation Class by John Friedlander
The Seven Planes of Consciousness: An Exploration of the Energy Frequencies of Human Awareness by John Friedlander
2. The Esoteric Tradition in the West
The Tarot by Paul Foster Case.
The Zodiac: A Life Epitome by Walter H. Sampson
The Planetarization of Consciousness: From the Individual to the Whole by Dane Rudhyar
The Astrology of Personality by Dane Rudhyar
Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition by Frances A. Yates
The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age by Frances A. Yates
The Rosicrucian Enlightenment; and Theatre of the World by Frances A. Yates
Magick in Theory and Practice by Aleister Crowley
An Outline of Occult Science by Rudolf Steiner
Cosmic Memory: Atlantis and Lemuria by Rudolf Steiner
The Nature of Substance by Rudolf Hauschka, translated by Mary T. Richards and Marjorie Spock
“The Theatre of Terrestrial Astronomy” by Edward Kelley
Unancestral Voice by Owen Barfield
Saving the Appearances: A Study in Idolatry by Owen Barfield
History in English Words by Owen Barfield.
3. The Nature of Our Body-Minds
The Primacy of Perception by Maurice Merleau-Ponty translated by James Edie
Signs by Maurice Merleau-Ponty translated by Richard C. McCleary.
Man on His Nature by Sir Charles Sherrington
Process and Reality by Alfred North Whitehead
Of Grammatology by Jacques Derrida, translated by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak
The Companion Species Manifesto: Dogs, People, and Significant Otherness by Donna Haraway
Crystals, Fabrics, and Fields: Metaphors That Shape Embryos by Donna Haraway
Welcome to the Desert of the Real: Five Essays on September 11 and Related Dates by Slavoj Zizek
The Gutenberg Galaxy by Marshall McLuhan
Migraine by Oliver Sacks
Metaphors of Vision by Stan Brakhage
Language, Thought, & Reality by Benjamin Lee Whorf
4. Psychology, Psychosomatic Healing, and Parapsychology
The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud
Thalassa: A Theory of Genitality by Sandor Ferenczi
The Alchemy of Healing: Psyche and Soma by Edward C. Whitmont
Living Your Dying by Stanley Keleman
Sexuality, Self & Survival by Stanley Keleman
The Fifty-Minute Hour by Robert Lindner
People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil by M. Scott Peck
Psychology and Alchemy by C. G. Jung
Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious by C. G. Jung
Symbols of Transformation by C. G. Jung
Civilization in Transition by C. G. Jung
The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality, & The Origins of Culture by William Irwin Thompson
The Myth of Analysis by James Hillman
Revisioning Psychology by James Hillman
Working the Soul by Charles Poncé
The Archetype of the Unconscious and the Transfiguration of Therapy by Charles Poncé
Freud & Man’s Soul by Bruno Bettelheim
Ether, God, and Devil/Cosmic Superimposition by Wilhelm Reich
Character Analysis by Wilhelm Reich
The Function of the Orgasm by Wilhelm Reich
Paranormal Foreknowledge by Jule Eisenbud
5. The Search for the Divine and Modes of Love and Ascension
Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi by Henri Corbin
The Sufis by Idries Shah
The Way of Passion: A Celebration of Rumi by Andrew Harvey
The Holy Kabbalah by A. E. Waite
Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda
Stones of the New Consciousness: Healing, Awakening, & Co-Creating with Crystals, Minerals, & Gems by Robert Simmons
6. Culture, Language, and Symbol
The Savage Mind by Claude Lévi-Strauss
Totemism by Claude Lévi-Strauss
The Raw and the Cooked by Claude Lévi-Strauss
Structural Anthropology by Claude Lévi-Strauss
The White Goddess by Robert Graves
Les Mots et Les Choses by Michel Foucault
The Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard, translated by Maria Jolas
Navaho Religion: A Study in Symbolism by Gladys Reichard
7. Science as a Path to Meaning
On Growth and Form by D’arcy Thompson
The Seven Mysteries of Life: An Exploration in Science and Philosophy by Guy Murchie
Origins of Sex: Three Billion Years of Genetic Recombination by Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan
Forerunners of Darwin: 1754-1859 edited by Bentley Glass, Owsei Temkin, and William Strauss, Jr.
The Great Chain of Being by Arthur O. Lovejoy
Ontogeny and Phylogeny by Stephen Jay Gould
Investigations by Stuart Kauffman
The Sleepwalkers by Arthur Koestler
The Roots of Coincidence: An Excursion into Parapsychology by Arthur Koestler
The Heavenly City of the Eighteenth-Century Philosophers by Carl L. Becker
Physics and Philosophy by Werner Heisenberg
Physics and Beyond by Werner Heisenberg
Across the Frontiers by Werner Heisenberg
The Nature of Time, edited by Thomas Gold
8. Lost Civilizations, The Sources of Western Thought, and the Discovery of the Americas
The Last Human: A Guide to Twenty-Two Species of Extinct Humans by G.J. Sawyer, Viktor Deak, Esteban Sarmiento, and Richard Milner
The Roots of Civilization by Alexander Marshack
Hamlet’s Mill: An Essay on Myth & The Fame of Time by Giorgi de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend
Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings: Evidence of Advanced Civilization in the Ice Age by Charles Hapgood
The Presocratics edited by Philip Wheelwright
The Timaeus by Plato
The Enneads by Plotinus
Land to the West: St. Brendan’s Voyage to America by Geoffrey Ashe
The Common Background of Greek and Hebrew Civilizations by Cyrus H. Gordon
The Beothuk Saga by Bernard Assiniwi, translated by Wayne Grady
Westviking: The Ancient Norse in Greenland and North America by Farley Mowat
Northern Mists by Carl Sauer
Land and Life by Carl Sauer
The Early Spanish Main by Carl Sauer
Sixteenth-Century North America by Carl Sauer
Seventeeth-Century North America by Carl Sauer
Plants, Man, and Life by Edgar Anderson
9. Non-Western World-Views and Critique of the West
The Intellectual Culture of the Iglulik Eskimos by Knud Rasmussen
Mambu: A Study of Melanesian Cargo Movements and Their Social and Ideological Background by Kenelm Burridge
The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge by Carlos Castaneda
A Separate Reality; Journey to Ixtlan by Carlos Castaneda
The Eagle’s Gift by Carlos Castaneda
Tales of Power by Carlos Castaneda
Stone Age Economics by Marshall Sahlins
The World of Primitive Man by Paul Radin
The Trickster: A Study in American Indian Mythology by Paul Radin
Primitive Man as Philosopher by Paul Radin
Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Ogalala Sioux by John G. Neihardt
Sun Chief: The Autobiography of a Hopi Indian, edited by Leo W. Simmons
The Lost Universe: The Way of Life of the Pawnee by Gene Weltfish
The Toe Bone and the Tooth: An Ancient Mayan Story Relived in Modern Times (Stealing Benefacio’s Roses) by Martín Prechtel
Long Life, Honey in the Heart by Martín Prechtel
10. Practicing Mortality, Life, and Death
The Supreme Source: The Fundamental Tantra of the Dzogchen Semde Kunjed Gyalpo by Chogyal Namkhaf Norum and Adriano Clemente
Carefree Dignity: Discourses on Training in the Nature of Mind Drubwang Tsoknyi Rinpoche
Fearless Simplicity: The Dzogchen Way of Living Freely in a Complex World by Drubwang Tsoknyi Rinpoche
Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki-roshi
Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chögyam Trungpa
The Myth of Freedom by Chögyam Trungpa
Transcending Madness by Chögyam Trungpa
The Lion’s Roar by Chögyam Trungpa
Crazy Wisdom by Chögyam Trungpa
Easy Death: Spiritual Wisdom on the Ultimate Transcending of Death and Everything Else by Da Free John
The Tibetan Book of the Dead: The Great Liberation Through Hearing in the Bardo: A new translation with commentary by Francesca Fremantle and Chögyam Trungpa
The Tibetan Book of the Dead, translated by W. Y. Evans-Wentz
The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche
