Saturday, January 11, 2025

Carlos Castaneda, Peruvian-Born American Anthropologist, Writer and Shaman

  Castaneda, Carlos

"The aim is to balance the terror of being alive with the wonder of being alive."  (06/15/2022) 

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Carlos Castaneda
Carlos Castaneda in 1962
Carlos Castaneda in 1962
BornCarlos César Salvador Arana
December 25, 1925
Cajamarca, Peru
DiedApril 27, 1998 (aged 72)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
OccupationAnthropologist, writer
NationalityAmerican
EducationUCLA (BA, PhD)
SubjectAnthropology, ethnography, shamanism, fiction

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Carlos Castaneda (born December 25, 1925, Cajamarca, Peru—died April 27, 1998, Los Angeles, California, U.S.) was a Peruvian-born anthropologist and writer who was considered a father of the New Age movement for his series of books based on the mystical secrets of a Yaqui Indian shaman. Though many critics came to believe that the works were more fiction than fact, they became international best-sellers, translated into some 17 languages.

An enigmatic figure who refused to be photographed or recorded, Castaneda offered conflicting autobiographical information, and much of his early life was unclear. Though he claimed to have been born in São Paulo, Brazil, U.S. immigration records listed his birthplace as Cajamarca. It was known that in 1951 he moved to the United States, where he studied anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles (Ph.D., 1973). According to Castaneda’s writings, during a trip to Arizona in the early 1960s, he met Don Juan Matus, a Yaqui who allegedly could manipulate time and space. Castaneda became his apprentice, and the two men embarked on a series of hallucinogen-fueled adventures. In 1965 Castaneda returned to Los Angeles and began writing about his experiences.

The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge was published in 1968 and quickly became a best-seller. With its eloquent descriptions of "non-ordinary reality," it proved particularly popular with American youth disillusioned with the Vietnam War. A series of books followed, including A Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan (1971) and Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan (1972). As his fame grew, however, scholars began casting a more critical eye on Castaneda’s writings, and a consensus arose that his works, though still viewed by many as meritorious, were fiction. Castaneda insisted that what he wrote was true, and he receded from the public eye. In his later life he gathered women around him in a cult-like community. His death was not publicly revealed for nearly two months.

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Carlos Castaneda (December 25, 1925[nb 1] – April 27, 1998) was an American anthropologist and writer. Starting in 1968, Castaneda published a series of books that describe a training in shamanism that he received under the tutelage of a Yaqui "Man of Knowledge" named don Juan Matus. While Castaneda's work was accepted as factual by many when the books were first published, the training he described is now generally considered to be fictional.[nb 2]

The first three books—The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, A Separate Reality, and Journey to Ixtlan—were written while he was an anthropology student at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Castaneda was awarded his bachelor's and doctoral degrees from the University of California, Los Angeles based on the work he described in these books.[6]

At the time of his death in 1998, Castaneda's books had sold more than eight million copies and had been published in 17 languages.[3]

Early life and education

According to his birth record, Carlos Castañeda was born Carlos César Salvador Arana, on December 25, 1925, in Cajamarca, Peru, son of César Arana and Susana Castañeda.[7] Immigration records confirm the birth record's date and place of birth. Castaneda moved to the United States in 1951 and became a naturalized citizen on June 21, 1957.[8] Castaneda studied anthropology and was awarded his bachelor's and doctoral degrees from the University of California, Los Angeles[6]

Career

Castaneda's first three books—The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, A Separate Reality, and Journey to Ixtlan—were written while he was an anthropology student at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He wrote that these books were ethnographic accounts describing his apprenticeship with a traditional "Man of Knowledge" identified as don Juan Matus, an Indigenous Yaqui from northern Mexico. The veracity of these books was doubted from their original publication, and are considered to be fictional by a number of scholars.[6][9][10][11] Castaneda was awarded his bachelor's and doctoral degrees based on the work described in these books.[6]

In 1974 his fourth book, Tales of Power, chronicled the end of the story of his apprenticeship with Matus. Despite published questions and criticism, Castaneda continued to be popular with the reading public, and subsequent publications appeared describing further aspects of his training with don Juan.[citation needed]

Castaneda wrote that don Juan recognized him as the new nagual, or leader of a party of seers of his lineage. He said Matus also used the term nagual to signify that part of perception which is in the realm of the unknown yet still reachable by man—implying that, for his own party of seers, Matus was a connection to that unknown. Castaneda often referred to this unknown realm as "nonordinary reality."[citation needed]

While Castaneda was a well-known cultural figure, he rarely appeared in public forums. He was the subject of a cover article in the March 5, 1973, issue of Time, which described him as "an enigma wrapped in a mystery wrapped in a tortilla". There was controversy when it was revealed that Castaneda might have used a surrogate for his cover portrait. Correspondent Sandra Burton, apparently unaware of Castaneda's principle of freedom from personal history, confronted him about discrepancies in his account of his life. He responded: "To ask me to verify my life by giving you my statistics ... is like using science to validate sorcery. It robs the world of its magic and makes milestones out of us all." Following that interview, Castaneda completely retired from public view[1] until the 1990s.[12]

Tensegrity

For the structural principle coined by Buckminster Fuller in the 1960s, see Tensegrity.

In the 1990s, Castaneda once again began appearing in public to promote Tensegrity, described in promotional materials as "the modernized version of some movements called magical passes developed by Indigenous shamans who lived in Mexico in times prior to the Spanish conquest".[12]

Castaneda, with Carol Tiggs, Florinda Donner-Grau and Taisha Abelar, created Cleargreen Incorporated in 1995, whose stated purpose was "to sponsor Tensegrity workshops, classes and publications". Tensegrity seminars, books, and other merchandise were sold through Cleargreen.[13]

Personal life

Castaneda married Margaret Runyan in Mexico in 1960, according to Runyan's memoirs. He is listed as the father on the birth certificate of Runyan's son C.J. Castaneda, even though the biological father was a different man.[14] In an interview, Runyan said she and Castaneda were married from 1960 to 1973; however, Castaneda obscured whether the marriage occurred,[3] and his death certificate stated he had never been married.[14]

Death

Castaneda died on April 27, 1998[3] in Los Angeles due to complications from hepatocellular cancer. There was no public service; he was cremated and the ashes were sent to Mexico. His death was unknown to the outside world until nearly two months later, on June 19, 1998, when an obituary, "A Hushed Death for Mystic Author Carlos Castaneda" by staff writer J. R. Moehringer appeared in the Los Angeles Times.[15]

Castaneda's students

After Castaneda stepped away from public view in 1973, he bought a large multi-dwelling property in Los Angeles which he shared with some of his followers, including Taisha Abelar (formerly Maryann Simko) and Florinda Donner-Grau (formerly Regine Thal). Like Castaneda, Abelar and Donner-Grau were students of anthropology at UCLA. Each subsequently wrote a book about her experiences of Castaneda's / don Juan's teachings from a female perspective: The Sorcerer's Crossing: A Woman's Journey by Taisha Abelar, and Being-in-Dreaming: An Initiation into the Sorcerers' World by Florinda Donner. Castaneda endorsed both of these books as authentic reports of the sorcery experience of don Juan's world.[16]

Around the time Castaneda died, his companions Donner-Grau, Abelar and Patricia Partin informed friends they were leaving on a long journey. Amalia Marquez (also known as Talia Bey) and Tensegrity instructor Kylie Lundahl also left Los Angeles. Weeks later, Partin's red Ford Escort was found abandoned in Death Valley. Luis Marquez, Bey's brother, went to police in 1999 over his sister's disappearance, but could not convince them that it merited investigation.[6]

In 2003, Partin's sun-bleached skeleton was discovered by a pair of hikers in Death Valley's Panamint Dunes area and identified in 2006 by DNA testing. The investigating authorities ruled the cause of death as undetermined.[6][17] However, Castaneda often talked about suicide, and associates believe the women killed themselves in the wake of Castaneda's death.[6]

Reception

The veracity of these books, and the existence of don Juan, was doubted from their original publication,[6] and there is now consensus among critics and scholars that the books are largely, if not completely, fictional.[9][10][11]

Early responses

In the early years after the publication of Castaneda's first book, The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge (1968), there was significant positive coverage and interest in his work.

Time Magazine featured a review of The Teachings of Don Juan shortly after its publication. The review acknowledged the controversy and skepticism surrounding Castaneda's account but highlighted the book's allure, describing it as "an extraordinary narrative." The New York Times published a review that praised the book's captivating storytelling and its portrayal of Don Juan as a "remarkable, almost legendary figure." Life Magazine included a feature article on Castaneda and his experiences with Don Juan, describing the book as "breathtaking" and focusing on the intrigue of his shamanic journey.

The Los Angeles Times reviewed the book positively, emphasizing its impact on readers and its exploration of consciousness and reality. The Saturday Review highlighted the vividness of Castaneda's descriptions and his portrayal of Don Juan's teachings as thought-provoking and transformative. The Guardian's review of the book acknowledged Castaneda's skill as a writer and his ability to create a sense of immersion in his narrative.

Later responses

The veracity of Castaneda's work has been doubted since their original publication, even while reviewers praised the writing and storytelling.[6] For example, while Edmund Leach praised The Teachings of Don Juan as "a work of art," he doubted its factual authenticity.[10] Anthropologist E. H. Spicer offered a somewhat mixed review of the book, highlighting Castaneda's expressive prose and his vivid depiction of his relationship with don Juan. However, Spicer noted that the events described in the book were not consistent with other ethnographic accounts of Yaqui cultural practices, concluding it was unlikely that don Juan had ever participated in Yaqui group life. Spicer also wrote, "[It is] wholly gratuitous to emphasize, as the subtitle does, any connection between the subject matter of the book and the cultural traditions of the Yaquis."[11]

In a series of articles, R. Gordon Wasson, the ethnobotanist who made psychoactive mushrooms famous, similarly praised Castaneda's work, while expressing doubts about its accuracy.[18]

An early unpublished review by anthropologist Weston La Barre was more critical and questioned the book's accuracy. The review, initially commissioned by The New York Times Book Review, was rejected and replaced by a more positive review from anthropologist Paul Riesman.[6]

Beginning in 1976, Richard de Mille published a series of criticisms that uncovered inconsistencies in Castaneda's field notes, as well as 47 pages of apparently plagiarized quotes.[6]

Those familiar with Yaqui culture also questioned Castaneda's accounts, including anthropologist Jane Holden Kelley.[19] Other criticisms of Castaneda's work include the total lack of Yaqui vocabulary or terms for any of his experiences, and his refusal to defend himself against the accusation that he received his PhD from UCLA through deception.[20]

Modern perspectives

According to William W. Kelly, chair of the anthropology department at Yale University:

I doubt you'll find an anthropologist of my generation who regards Castaneda as anything but a clever con man. It was a hoax, and surely don Juan never existed as anything like the figure of his books. Perhaps to many it is an amusing footnote to the gullibility of naive scholars, although to me it remains a disturbing and unforgivable breach of ethics.[6]

Sociologist David Silverman sees value in the work even while considering it fictional. In Reading Castaneda he describes the apparent deception as a critique of anthropology field work in general—a field that relies heavily on personal experience, and necessarily views other cultures through a lens. He said that the descriptions of peyote trips and the work's fictional nature were meant to place doubt on other works of anthropology.[21]

Donald Wiebe cites Castaneda to explain the insider/outsider problem as it relates to mystical experiences, while acknowledging the fictional nature of Castaneda's work.[22]

Existence of Don Juan Matus

Scholars have also debated "whether Castaneda actually served as an apprentice to the alleged Yaqui sorcerer don Juan Matus or if he invented the whole odyssey."[9] Castaneda's books are classified as non-fiction by their publisher, although there is consensus among critics that they are largely, if not completely, fictional.[23][24][6]

Castaneda critic Richard de Mille published two books—Castaneda's Journey: The Power and the Allegory and The Don Juan Papers—in which he argued that don Juan was imaginary,[25][26] based on a number of arguments, including that Castaneda did not report on the Yaqui name of a single plant he learned about, and that he and don Juan "go quite unmolested by pests that normally torment desert hikers."[6] Castaneda's Journey also includes 47 pages of quotes Castaneda attributed to don Juan which were actually from a variety of other sources, including anthropological journal articles and even well known writers like Ludwig Wittgenstein and C. S. Lewis.[6] In response, Castaneda was defended in a letter to the editor by inventor of Core Shamanism, Michael Harner.[27][28] Walter Shelburne contends that "the Don Juan chronicle cannot be a literally true account."[29]

According to Jeroen Boekhoven, Castaneda spent some time with Ramón Medina Silva,[30] a Huichol mara'akame (shaman) and artist who may have inspired the don Juan character. Silva was murdered during a brawl in 1971.[31]

  • Michael Korda, editor-in-chief at Simon & Schuster, was Castaneda's editor for his first eight books and discusses their work together in an essay in Another Life: A Memoir of Other People.[6]
  • George Lucas has stated that Yoda and Luke Skywalker were inspired in part by don Juan and Castaneda.[32]
  • Octavio Paz, Nobel laureate, poet, and diplomat, wrote the prologue to the Spanish language edition of The Teachings of Don Juan.[33]
  • Amy Wallace wrote Sorcerer's Apprentice: My Life with Carlos Castaneda, an account of her personal experiences with Castaneda and his followers.[34]

Publications

Books

Interviews

  • Burton, Sandra (March 5, 1973). "Magic and Reality". Time.
  • Corvalan, Graciela, Der Weg der Tolteken - Ein Gespräch mit Carlos Castañeda, Fischer, 1987, c. 100p., ISBN 3-596-23864-1

See also

References

Notes

  1. ^ Castaneda's birth name, as well as the date and location of his birth, are uncertain. According to a 1973 article in Time, U.S. immigration records indicate that Castaneda was born Carlos Cesar Arana Castaneda on December 25, 1925, in Cajamarca, Peru.[1] In the article, Castaneda was cited as saying that he had adopted the surname "Castaneda" later in life and that he had been born in São Paulo, Brazil. He also reported his date of birth as December 25, 1935.[1] In other accounts he gave his date of birth as December 25, 1931.[2][3] A 1981 article in The New York Times stated that Castaneda "was born Carlos Arana in a Peruvian mountain town 66 years ago", indicating a 1915 birth.[4] Most sources tend to favor the Peruvian birth and 1925 date.[5]
  2. ^ Detailed citations can be found at § Reception.

Citations

  1. ^ Jump up to:a b c Burton 1973.
  2. ^ Epstein, Benjamin (March 1, 1996). "My Lunch With Carlos Castaneda". Psychology Today. Retrieved February 23, 2015.
  3. ^ Jump up to:a b c d Applebome 1998.
  4. ^ Walters, Ray (January 11, 1981). "Paperback Talk". The New York Times. Archived from the original on February 23, 2015. Retrieved February 23, 2015.
  5. ^ Chávez Candelaria, Cordelia; Garcia, Peter J.; Aldama, Arturo J. (2004). Encyclopedia of Latino Popular Culture, Volume One. Greenwood. p. 114. ISBN 978-0-313-32215-0. Archived from the original on February 26, 2018. Retrieved February 22, 2015.
  6. ^ Jump up to:a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Marshall 2007.
  7. ^ "Castañeda's birth certificate". astro.com. Retrieved August 14, 2021.
  8. ^ "U.S. Naturalization Record Indexes, 1791-1992". ancestry.com. Retrieved July 21, 2022.
  9. ^ Jump up to:a b c Baron, Larry (Spring 1983). "Slipping inside the Crack between the Worlds: Carlos Castaneda, Alfred Schutz, and the Theory of Multiple Realities". Journal of Humanistic Psychology. 23 (2): 52–69. doi:10.1177/0022167883232007. S2CID 143993277.
  10. ^ Jump up to:a b c Leach, Edmund (June 5, 1969). "High School". The New York Review of Books. 12 (11). ISSN 0028-7504. Archived from the original on October 13, 2012. Retrieved October 13, 2010.
  11. ^ Jump up to:a b c Spicer, Edward H. (April 1969). "Review: The Teaching of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge". American Anthropologist. 71 (2): 320–322. doi:10.1525/aa.1969.71.2.02a00250.
  12. ^ Jump up to:a b Applebome 1998b.
  13. ^ "ABOUT US". Carlos Castaneda's Tensegrity. Archived from the original on February 16, 2018. Retrieved July 18, 2018.
  14. ^ Jump up to:a b Woo 2012.
  15. ^ "Castaneda Obituary". All Things Considered. National Public Radio. June 19, 1998. Archived from the original on August 7, 2015. Retrieved February 23, 2015.
  16. ^ Donner-Grau 1982; Donner-Grau 1985; Donner 1991; Abelar 1992.
  17. ^ Flinchum, Robin (February 10, 2006). "Remains of guru's disciple identified". Pahrump Valley Times. Archived from the original on May 13, 2015. Retrieved February 22, 2015.
  18. ^ Wasson, R. Gordon. 1969. (Bk. Rev.). Economic Botany vol. 23(2):197. A review of Carlos Castaneda's "The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge.", Wasson, R. Gordon. 1972a. (Bk. Rev.). Economic Botany vol. 26(1):98–99. A review of Carlos Castaneda's "A Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan."; Wasson, R. Gordon. 1973a. (Bk. Rev.). Economic Botany vol. 27(1):151–152. A review of Carlos Castaneda's "Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan."; Wasson, R. Gordon. . 1974. (Bk. Rev.). Economic Botany vol. 28(3):245–246. A review of Carlos Castaneda's "Tales of Power."; Wasson, R. Gordon. 1977a. (Mag., Bk. Rev). Head vol. 2(4):52–53, 88–94. November.
  19. ^ Kelley 1978, pp. 24–25.
  20. ^ Harris 2001, p. 322.
  21. ^ Silverman, David (1975). Reading Castaneda: A Prologue to the Social Sciences. Routledge and Kegan Paul. ISBN 978-0-7100-8146-9.
  22. ^ Wiebe, Donald (1999). "Does Understanding Religion Require Religious Understanding?". In McCutcheon, Russel T. (ed.). The Insider/Outsider Problem in the Study of Religion. New York: Bath Press. p. 263.
  23. ^ Clements, William M. (1985). "Carlos Castaneda's the Teachings of Don Juan: A Novel of Initiation". Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction. 26 (3): 122–130. doi:10.1080/00111619.1985.9934668.
  24. ^ Rosenthal, Caroline; Schafer, Stefanie (2014). "Lochle, Stefan: "The Imposter as Trickster as innovator: A Rereading of Carlos Castaneda's Don Juan-cycle"". Fake Identity?: The Impostor Narrative in North American Culture. Campus Verlag GmbH. pp. 81–96. ISBN 978-3-593-50101-7.
  25. ^ Siegel, Ronald K. (1982). "Book Review: The Don Juan Papers: Further Castaneda Controversies". Journal of Psychoactive Drugs. 14 (3): 253–254. doi:10.1080/02791072.1982.10471937.
  26. ^ De Mille 1976, p. [page needed]
  27. ^ Kootte 1984.
  28. ^ Harner, Michael (May 7, 1978). "To the Editor". The New York Times. Retrieved January 12, 2023.
  29. ^ Shelburne, Walter A. (Spring 1987). "Carlos Castaneda: If It Didn't Happen, What Does It Matter?". Journal of Humanistic Psychology. 27 (2): 217–227. doi:10.1177/0022167887272007. S2CID 143666251.
  30. ^ Boekhoven 2011, pp. 210–217.
  31. ^ Schaefer & Furst 1996, p. 184.
  32. ^ Wickman 2015.
  33. ^ Paz 2014.
  34. ^ Wallace 2007.

Works cited

Works by students

Further reading

Parodies

  • Barthelme, Donald (February 11, 1973). "The Teachings Of Don B.: A Yankee Way Of Knowledge". New York Times Magazine. pp. 14–15, 66–67.
    • Republished in: Barthelme, Donald (2018). The Teachings of Don B.: Satires, Parodies, Fables, Illustrated Stories, and Plays. Counterpoint Press. ISBN 978-1-64009-026-2.

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Carlos Castaneda, Mystical and Mysterious Writer, Dies

By Peter Applebome

See the article in its original context from June 20, 1998, Section D, Page 16Buy Reprints
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Carlos Castaneda, whose best-selling explorations of mystical and pharmacological frontiers helped to define the psychological landscape of the 1960's, died two months ago just as privately and secretly as he had lived, associates revealed this week. Befitting a man who made an esthetic out of mystery, even his age is uncertain, but he was believed to be 72.

He died of liver cancer on April 27 at his home in Los Angeles, said Deborah Drooz, an entertainment lawyer, friend of Mr. Castaneda and executor of his estate. She said he had suffered from the illness for at least 10 months. After his death, his body was cremated and the remains were sent to Mexico, she added.

In books like ''The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge,'' Mr. Castaneda spun extraordinarily rich, hallucinogenic evocations of ancient paths to knowledge based on what he described as an extended apprenticeship with a Yaqui Indian shaman named Don Juan Matus. His 10 books, etched in layer upon layer of psychological nuance and intrigue, became international best sellers translated into 17 languages and were credited with helping to usher in the New Age sensibility and reviving interest in Indian and Southwestern cultures.

Over the years, scholars and critics have debated whether Don Juan existed and whether the books were anthropology or fantasy, fact or fiction, distinctions which no doubt amused Mr. Castaneda.

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Rather than respond, he lived in almost total anonymity, refusing to make public appearances, be photographed or tape-recorded. He continued to write up to his death and wanted his death to remain as private as his life, Ms. Drooz said. The Los Angeles Times reported his death yesterday after it was revealed by an Atlanta man who said he was Mr. Castaneda's son. He said he heard about the death when he learned of probate proceedings.

''Carlos Castaneda was a very impeccable man,'' Ms. Drooz said. ''Everything he wanted done he made clear to the very end, and to the very end he never remotely suggested he wanted an epitaph or a eulogy or a press release about this death. He spend his life eschewing media coverage and those around him respected that and allowed him to pass peacefully without attention. It was no secret. It just didn't seem appropriate to make a fuss.''

But C. J. Castaneda, 36, who owns a coffee shop in suburban Atlanta, and his mother, Mr. Castaneda's former wife, Margaret Runyan Castaneda, both say they are skeptical of that account and question why Mr. Castaneda's death certificate said he was never married and why news of his death was kept from them.

Mrs. Castaneda, who said they were married from 1960 to 1973, said Mr. Castaneda was not her son's biological father but he had the boy's birth certificate changed legally to say that he was the boy's father. Ms. Drooz said Carlos Casteneda was estranged from C. J. Castaneda, and the younger man was not his son.

The death certificate lists a niece, Talia Bey, who is president of Cleargreen Inc., which organizes seminars based on Mr. Castaneda's teachings. A hearing on Mr. Castaneda's estate, which benefits from enormous worldwide sales of his books, is to be held on July 2 in Los Angeles.

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If confusion follows in the wake of Mr. Castaneda's death, it would be consistent with the story of his life.

Mr. Castaneda had said that he was born on Dec. 25, 1931, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and that Castaneda was an adopted surname. Immigration records indicate that he was born on Dec. 25, 1925, in Cajamarca, Peru, and Castaneda was his given name.

He came to the United States in 1951, according to the immigration records, and was an obscure graduate student in anthropology when he sent off a manuscript in 1967 to the University of California Press in Los Angeles. The book was released as ''The Teachings of Don Juan'' in 1968.

After its paperback rights were resold, it became an international best seller. In the book, in encounters at once fanciful and intellectually and psychologically challenging, Don Juan instructs his disciple about becoming a ''man of knowledge'' in ways that ''clash disconcertingly with our prevailing scientific conception of reality,'' as Theodore Roszak put it in a review in The Nation. As the book begins, Don Juan instructs his pupil through the use of hallucinogenic drugs but as the book goes on, drugs are less a part of the learning process.

His second book, ''A Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan,'' continues the education process, this time focusing on the nature of sorcery. The third volume of the Don Juan books, ''Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan,'' is the most personal of the three, focusing on what Mr. Castaneda has learned. A review in Book World called it ''one of the most important statements of our time.''

The books made Mr. Castaneda an international celebrity, and he was featured on the cover of Time. But many of his later books received cooler reviews. In The New York Times Book Review in 1988, Margot Adler described ''The Power of Silence: Further Lessons of Don Juan'' as ''an unnecessarily cloudy pathway to the world of dreams and altered states.''

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And his career was clouded almost from the beginning by the debate over whether Don Juan even existed or whether Castaneda was, as one critic put it, ''one of the great intellectual hoaxers'' of all time.

Mr. Casteneda insisted that Don Juan was real. But others have said that, real or not, the books stand on their own both as windows onto the spiritual currents of the 60's and as part of a long tradition of vivid intellectual and spiritual quests.

''The most important question we can ask is not, 'Can Juan Matus be located in 1977 in Sonora, Mexico?' '' wrote Sam Keen in Psychology Today. ''It is rather: ''What does Don Juan tell us about ourselves, about the millions in this country and abroad, who have read his words in 11 languages?' As an archetypical hero, Don Juan may reveal to us something about the contours of the collective unconscious and the longings of our time.''

Life: The Body, the Mind, the Spirit

For example, your body needs fright. It likes it. Your body needs the darkness and the wind. Your body now knows the gait of power and can't wait to try it. Your body needs personal power and can't wait to have it. So let's say then that your body returns to see me because I am its friend.

-- Don Juan in ''Journey to Ixtlan:

The Lessons of Don Juan''

Mescalito changes everything. Yet we still have to work like everybody else, like mules. I said there was a spirit inside Mescalito because it is something like a spirit which brings about the change in men. A spirit we can see and can touch, a spirit that changes us, sometimes even against our will.

-- Don Juan in ''A Separate

Reality: Further Conversations

with Don Juan.''

We men and all other luminous beings on earth are perceivers. That is our bubble, the bubble of perception. Our mistake is to believe that the only perception worthy of acknowledgment is what goes through our reason. Sorcerers believe that reason is only one center and that it shouldn't take so much for granted.

-- Don Juan in ''Tales of Power''

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The man will be, by then, at the end of his journey of learning, and almost without warning he will come upon the last of his enemies: Old age! This enemy is the cruelest of all, the one he won't be able to defeat completely, but only fight away.

--Don Juan in

''The Teachings of Don Juan''

Of Realities Separate and Unusual

The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, University of California Press, 1968.

A Separate Reality: Further Conversations With Don Juan, Simon & Schuster, 1971.

Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan, Simon & Schuster, 1972.

Tales of Power, Simon & Schuster, 1974.

Trilogy (three volumes), Simon & Schuster, 1974.

Don Juan Quartet (boxed set; includes The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge; A Separate Reality: Further Conversations With Don Juan; Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan, and Tales of Power), Simon & Schuster, 1975.

The Second Ring of Power, Simon & Schuster, 1977.

The Eagle's Gift, Simon & Schuster, 1981.

The Fire From Within, Simon & Schuster, 1984.

The Power of Silence: Further Lessons of Don Juan, Simon & Schuster, 1987.

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The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge was published by the University of California Press in 1968 as a work of anthropology, though it is now widely considered a work of fiction.[1][2] It was written by Carlos Castaneda and submitted as his Master's thesis in the school of Anthropology. It purports to document the events that took place during an apprenticeship with a self-proclaimed Yaqui Indian Sorcerer, don Juan Matus from Sonora, Mexico between 1960 and 1965.

The book is divided into two sections. The first section, The Teachings, is a first-person narrative that documents Castaneda's initial interactions with don Juan. He speaks of his encounters with Mescalito (a teaching spirit inhabiting all peyote plants), divination with lizards and flying using the "yerba del diablo" (lit. "Devil's Weed"; Jimson weed), and turning into a blackbird using "humito" (lit. "little smoke"; a smoked powder containing Psilocybe mexicana). The second, A Structural Analysis, is an attempt, Castaneda says, at "disclos[ing] the internal cohesion and the cogency of don Juan’s Teachings."[3]

The 30th-anniversary edition, published by the University of California Press in 1998, contains commentary by Castaneda not present in the original edition. He writes of a general discouragement from the project by his professors (besides Clement Woodward Meighan, a professor who supported the project early in its conception. In the foreword, Castaneda gives "full credit" for the approval of his dissertation to Meighan). He offers a new thesis on a mind-state he calls "total freedom" and claims that he used the teachings of his Yaqui shaman as "springboards into new horizons of cognition".[4] In addition, it contains a foreword by anthropologist Walter Goldschmidt, who was a professor of anthropology at UCLA during the time the books were written, and an introduction by the author. A 40th anniversary edition was published by the University of California Press in 2008.

The book was a New York Times best-seller, and it—along with its sequels—sold over 10 million copies in the United States.[5]

See also

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Wikiquote has quotations related to The Teachings of Don Juan.

References

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  1. ^ "The Straight Dope: Did Carlos Castaneda hallucinate that stuff in the Don Juan books or make it up?". 2002-06-21. Retrieved 2016-03-23.
  2. ^ Marshall, Robert (April 12, 2007). "The dark legacy of Carlos Castaneda". Salon. Salon Media Group. Retrieved 14 July 2018.
  3. ^ Castaneda, Carlos. The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge. Berkeley: U of California P, 1998: 155.
  4. ^ Castaneda, Carlos. The Teachings of Don Juan. New York: Eagle's Trust, 1998. Google books. Web. 26 Nov. 2014. https://books.google.com
  5. ^ Walters, Ray (11 January 1981). "Paperback Talk". The New York Times. Retrieved 30 December 2019.

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