Talking Zen: Reflections on Mind, Myth, and the Magic of Life

by Alan Watts, Mark Watts (Editor)

Overview

Insightful and entertaining essays spanning 40 years of lectures by Alan Watts on Zen, Taoism, psychedelics, and comparative philosophy.

Alan Watts's essays and talks range widely through psychology, art, religion, and politics, but always come home to the Zen core. For those familiar with Alan Watts’s style of presentation, the wonderful, memorable, and prophetic style of his voice is captured in this volume. Talking Zen puts on display Watts’s ability to explore the very subtle philosophies, those common across traditions and those unique to Zen, in ordinary and accessible language. These lectures paved the way for the rise of Zen in the West. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780834844537
Publisher:	Shambhala
Publication date:	06/21/2022
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	208
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

ALAN WATTS (1915–1973) was a renowned lecturer and the author of nearly thirty books, including The Way of Zen and The Book.

Table of Contents

Introduction Mark Watts vii

Picture Without a Frame 1

The Psychology of Acceptance: The Reconciliation of the Opposites in Eastern Thought and in Analytical Psychology 11

Mythological Motifs in Modern Science 41

Time and Convention: Five Broadcasts 61

Biting an Iron Bull 119

Taoist Ways 133

Swimming Headless 143

Zen Tales 159

Zen Bones 179

Notes 198

Editorial Reviews

You don’t even need to be particularly interested in Asian philosophies or religions to derive insights from the breadth and depth of Alan’s wisdom. One will walk away from this book having learned something new, something unexpected.”—Buddhistdoor Global

From the Publisher

2022-01-22
A collection of Zen lectures spanning the career of the great Western communicator of Eastern wisdom.

In assembling this book, an expansion of a 1994 edition, Alan’s son Mark selected lectures “that embodied the spontaneous and uncontrolled aspect of Zen most fully, and which left me with a compelling feeling that something extraordinary had happened.” That standard alone could have produced a much longer book, since it’s rare that one of the philosopher’s lectures failed to transmit spontaneous wonder. But keeping it short is much more in the spirit of the enterprise. Watts’ aim was always to dazzle more than to inform. In one lecture, he told his audience, “I am not a guru.” He referred to himself as “an entertainer,” adding, “I approach you in the same spirit as a musician with her piano, or violinist with his violin: I just want you to enjoy a point of view that I enjoy.” Regardless, he was an inspired performer, and while most of these talks were given extemporaneously, they hold up remarkably well on the page (credit is due to Mark). Even from the earliest lecture included here, given when he was just a teenager, Watts was both profound and witty. Anyone discovering Watts for the first time in these pages will be incredulous to learn that in the middle of the 20th century, there existed a Westerner who was not only fluent in Eastern philosophy, but who embodied the best of its wisdom so fully. No one since Watts has been able to articulate the paradoxes of spiritual life with more clarity or panache. He might celebrate nonsense, but in so doing he makes immense sense, the kind for which we seem always to be longing. To take but one example, the rousing conclusion to “Zen Bones” will snap readers into sharp clarity, if not satori.

Further confirmation that the Watts well won’t run dry.

Kirkus Reviews