Has it really been a year since Pope Bob left this planet for unknown adventures? I still miss him and I'm still hoping that his remaining family can put together an anthology of his unpublished works. Maybe even the fabled Tale Of The Tribe? Some of the MLA'ers have been talking about completing T.O.T.T. themselves--in which case, I'll definitely be up for helping out with that. In the meantime - there's the two MLA-related Wikipedia pages. The collaborative fiction one and the newest, a page dedicated to the Illuminatus! trilogy. Cool stuff.
As for Pope Bob himself, well, I don't necessarily "believe" in an after-life..but if such a thing 'is' a possibility--I imagine he's still tripping the light fantastic with Arlen, downing pints of astral Guinness with Jimmy Joyce, Timmy Leary and Flann O'Brien, having ol' Ludwig Van teach him piano sonatas and blowing minds everywhere. Hail Pope Bob!
It's also the 102nd birthday of Dr. Albert Hofmann, who, in case you're not aware, was the first to synthesize a little compound called LSD. The man seems far more rational and sober-minded than a lot of "War On Some Drugs" types would have you believe. I've got a recording of Hofmann speaking at a psychedelics symposium held in San Francisco in September 1978. He describes his experiences with LSD with a clarity and focus that only a rational, scientific mind can conjure. You can read that 1978 lecture here.
It would be pure speculation to consider what 2008 would be like, had Aldous Huxley, Humphrey Osmond and Hofmann's view that psychedelics should be studied and used for therapeutic purposes won out over the mass-experimentation model of Leary, Ken Kesey and Allen Ginsberg. Some later counter-culturalists managed to bridge the gap a bit between the scientists and mystics (Terence McKenna comes to mind), but the cat's been out of the bag far too long now and the TSOG won't budge on the matter of keeping psychedelics illegal and "immoral"--so still no scientific testing and the only stuff available is dodgy 'street acid', which may contain a number of things and pure lysergic acid probably won't be one of them. Maybe someday that will change--but for the moment, I'm glad 'Uncle Albert' is still with us.
Check out Bogus Magus' post over at Only Maybe for another R.A.W./Albert Hofmann tribute.
4 comments:
RIP Mr. Wilson.
The blog has been blessed by some very interesting and highly thoughful posts by your good self regarding the work of Robert Anton Wilson and other members of what one may loosely term 'the counter-culture'. I'm beginning to wonder if my posts really fit in here anymore as they may seem to upset the overall balance of the blog. I don't mean this in a negative way at all. I think your posts are marvellous and far more stimulating than the mainly music based stuff I write. As my knowledge of such things is very limited I rarely have much to say about it all and my head is generally in a different space. As it says in my 'John Wesley Harding' anniversary post 'One Should Never Be Where One Does Not Belong' so I'm thinking of bowing out of 'Blog Is Not...' in order for the quality to remain high and for the sake of some sort of blog consistency. I'm sure your other readers would agree!
Please keep up the good work. I'm thinking of ideas for a blog of my own, to which you would always be welcome top contribute. I won't be starting anything new for a few months until my health is sorted out.
Please take all this as a compliment to your excellence, sir!
I'll keep reading and commenting, of course! See you at The Bear Pit!
Thanks for the compliments, sir - but really, there's no need for you to bow out of the blog.
The original idea of this blog was for all of the contributors to have their own voice--even if different voices clash with one another--I kinda like that disharmony and I think it makes things more interesting.
I'd definitely like you to stay on here, even if you only post once in a while--otherwise it's just going to be a solo blog once again (Pixie only likes commenting and Aloicious pretty much went AWOL).
If you really feel the need to start up your own project, definitely go for it--perhaps you can post here every so often? Just a thought.
I'd just like to blend a bit more with things but I can only be what I am...so that's the problem! I'll tell you what, in the spirit of support and constant brotherhood, I'll post here when I really feel I've got something to say that's not too far off at a tangent. Only trouble is...I'm always off at a tangent! We'll see what happens.
Peace.
Fair enough, Bear - but post whatever you feel like, it's all good, my man!
Peace Out.
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