--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Jonathan Chadwick <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > "In this new edition (2007) of his acclaimed autobiography long out of print and rare until now Alan Watts tracks his spiritual and philosophical evolution from a child of religious conservatives in rural England to a freewheeling spiritual teacher who challenged Westerners to defy convention and think for themselves. From early in this intellectual life, Watts shows himself to be a philosophical renegade and wide-ranging autodidact who came to Buddhism through the teachings of Christmas Humphreys and D. T. Suzuki. Told in a nonlinear style, In My Own Way wonderfully combines Watts' own brand of unconventional philosophy and often hilarious accounts of gurus, celebrities,
psychedelic drug experiences, ********* Back in 1967, I got an invite to a party at Alan Watt's house. I didn't go, but my friends told me he had a huge bowl of filter-tipped marijuana cigarettes, which I thought was unusually bobo <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobos_in_Paradise> . and wry observations of Western culture. A charming foreword written by Watts' father sets the tone of this warm, funny, and beautifully written story of a compelling figure who encouraged readers to 'follow your own weird' something he > always did himself, as his remarkable account of his life shows." --Amazon > --- On Fri, 10/10/08, Vaj [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > From: Vaj [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] San Francisco and Buddhism > To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com > Date: Friday, October 10, 2008, 5:08 PM > > > > > > > > > > On Oct 10, 2008, at 4:53 PM, Jonathan Chadwick wrote: > > > > > > > > How anyone can write an article about Buddhism in SF in the 1950's and not mention Alan Watts is beyond me: beginning in 1951 he was the only person in SF making a living at the academic teaching of Buddhism, first as a professor, then later as the academic dean, of what was at the time called the American Academy Asian Studies. Certainly everyone mentioned in the article would have deferred to Watts in any intellectual discussion of Buddhism, including "little" Suzukihttp://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ Suzuki_Roshi. And oh yeah, in 1957 Watts had published The Way of Zen, which now more than fifty years later remains the best introduction to Zen in a western language. > > > > While Watts had a reputation as a writer and speaker/teacher, did he speak from realization? If not, maybe that's why. I never had much interest in him, although I know the older generation had some enamoured with his writings. I always imagined a stodgy old Brit from what little I'd read and thereby lost interest. > > > Or perhaps the article was meant to emphasize those the author had some personal or indirect relationship to. I don't really know. >
