Gary Lachman Books

Historian Gary Lachman delivers a fascinating, rollicking biography of literary and cultural rebel Colin Wilson, one of the most adventurous, hopeful, and least understood intellects of the past century.You will embark on the intellectual ride of a lifetime in this rediscovery of the life and work of writer, rebel, and social experimenter Colin Wilson (1931-2013).Author of the classic The Outsider , Wilson, across his 118 books, purveyed a philosophy of mind power and human potential that made him one of the least understood and most important voices of the twentieth century. Wilson helped usher in the cultural revolution of the 1960s with his landmark work, The Outsider , published in 1956. The Outsider was an intelligent, meticulous, and unprecedented study of nonconformity in all facets of life. Wilson, finally, became a prolific and unparalleled historian of the occult, providing a generation of readers with a responsible and scholarly entry point to a world of mysteries.Now, acclaimed historian Gary Lachman, a friend of Wilson and a scholar of his work, provides an extraordinary and delightful biography that delves into the life, thought, and evolution of one of the greatest intellectual rebels and underrated visionaries of the twentieth century.

Drawing on esoteric, spritual and philosophical thought, this book considers the all-important question -- why are we here? -- and offers a counter- argument to the current nihilsm prevalent in our world.

"Running alongside the mainstream of Western intellectual history there is another current which, in a very real sense, should take pride of place, but which for the last few centuries has occupied a shadowy, inferior position, somewhere underground. This "other" stream forms the subject of Gary Lachman's epic history and analysis, The Secret Teachers of the Western World. In this clarifying, accessible, and fascinating study, the acclaimed historian explores the Western esoteric tradition--a thought movement with ancient roots and modern expressions, which, in a broad sense, regards the cosmos as a living, spiritual, meaningful being and humankind as having a unique obligation and responsibility in it. The historical roots of our "counter tradition," as Lachman explores, have their beginning in Alexandria around the time of Christ. It was then that we find the first written accounts of the ancient tradition, which had earlier been passed on orally. Here, in this remarkable city, filled with teachers, philosophers, and mystics from Egypt, Greece, Asia, and other parts of the world, in a multi-cultural, multi-faith, and pluralistic society, a synthesis took place, a creative blending of different ideas and visions, which gave the hidden tradition the eclectic character it retains today." -- Publisher's description

"For the last four centuries, science has tried to account for everything in terms of atoms and molecules and the physical laws they adhere to. Recently, this effort was extended to include the inner world of human beings. Gary Lachman points to another approach in which consciousness is seen not as the result of neurons and molecules, but as responsible for them. Meaning is not imported from the outer world, but rather creates it; and consciousness is a living, evolving presence whose development can be traced through different historical periods."--Jacket

A spiritual adventure story tracing the profound influence of Hermes Trismegistus on the western mind.

In The Dedalus Book of the 1960s: Turn Off Your Mind, Gary Lachman uncovers the Love Generation's roots in occultism and explores the dark side of the Age of Aquarius.

Celebrates the influence of occult thought and sensibility on some of the great poets and writers of the last two centuries. 'It's a sure thing that anyone with a taste for literary esoterica and magical history will learn something from A Dark Muse' F

Bold and compact, this new biography of Carl Jung fills a gap in the understanding of the pioneering psychiatrist by focusing on the occult and mystical dimension of Jung's life and work, a critical but frequently misunderstood facet of his career.

Rudolf Steiner -- educator, architect, artist, philosopher and agriculturalist -- ranks amongst the most creative and prolific figures of the early twentieth century. Yet he remains a mystery to most people. This is the first truly popular biography of the man behind the ideas, written by a sympathetic but critical outsider.Steiner is widely known for what he left behind: a network of Waldorf schools, biodynamic farming, Camphill schools and villages and pioneering work in holistic health and environmental research. Although his achievements are felt all over the world, few people understand this unusual figure. Steiner’s own writings fill several bookcases, but are often dense and ‘insider’ in tone.Gary Lachman tells Steiner’s story lucidly and with great insight. He presents Steiner’s key ideas in a readable, accessible way, tracing his beginning as a young intellectual in the ferment of fin de siècle culture to the founding of his own metaphysical teaching, called anthroposophy.This book is a full-bodied portrait of one of the most original philosophical and spiritual luminaries of the last two centuries.

P. D. Ouspensky's classic work In Search of the Miraculous was the first to disseminate the ideas of G. I. Gurdjieff, the mysterious master of esoteric thought in the early twentieth century who still commands a following today. Gurdjieff's mystique has long eclipsed Ouspensky, once described by Gurdjieff as "nice to drink vodka with, but a weak man." Yet Ouspensky was a brilliant, accomplished philosopher in his own right, and some consider his meeting with the charismatic "Mr. G." the catastrophe of his life. Indeed, in subsequent years Ouspensky tried hard, with limited success, to break away. This book moves Ouspensky's own story center stage, against the backdrop of the Russian Revolution, the dervishes of Constantinople, and a cosmopolitan Europe entre deux guerres. The archetypal encounter it describes echoes that of Don Juan and Castaneda, or perhaps Mephistopheles and Faust. One of the great mystical adventures of our time, it will fascinate everyone interested in the farthest reaches of what it means to be human. The paperback edition includes a new chapter on Gary Lachman's own former work in Gurdjieff's psychology.