This book is an anthology of commentary and criticism written within the transitional period between Alan Watts’ 1973 death and the twenty-first century intellectual horizon.
Comprised of 16 chapters written and published between 1974 and 1994, with up-to-date introductions from the essayists and other contemporary thinkers, this volume opens a window onto unexplored grounds of Alan Watts’ impact within late-twentieth-century discourse – an intermediate space where scholars reoriented their bearings through changing times and emerging academic trends. Offering varied explanations and assessments of Alan Watts, including his influence on the Beat and Hippie generations, and his popularization of Zen Buddhism in America, it tackles unaddressed questions within the milieu of late-twentieth-century America from the Reagan Revolution and religious conservatism, to paradigm shifts in Buddhist studies and the rise of post-colonial theory. Contributors’ post-mortem analyses and critiques of Watts allow for a thematic rendering of their consonance or dissonance with noted Beat, Hippie, and Zen Buddhism themes of his lifetime.
This volume will appeal to scholars and students of humanistic psychology, transpersonal psychology, the psychology of religion, comparative religion, and American studies.
Edited by:
Peter J. Columbus (Shantigar Foundation USA.)
Imprint: Routledge
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions:
Height: 229mm,
Width: 152mm,
Weight: 520g
ISBN: 9781032473994
ISBN 10: 1032473991
Series: Routledge Research in Psychology
Pages: 264
Publication Date: 13 April 2025
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Primary
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Introduction: Alan Watts – Then and There Part 1: Commentary 1. The Vintage Alan Watts 2. The Complete Alan Watts 3. Alan Watts’ Metaphysical Language: Positivity in Negative Concepts 4. The Theory of Non-duality in the Philosophy of Alan Watts 5. Alan Watts and the Therapeutic Process 6. Daemon est deus Inversus: The Androgynous Dialectics of Alan Watts 7.“Beyond Separation” 8. Alan Watts’s Word on Myths of Polarity: Power to Women, Nature, and the Left Hand of God Part 2: Criticism 9. The Meeting of the Twain: Alan Watts and The Supreme Identity 10. The Mystical Philosophy of Alan Watts 11. An Evaluation of Watts 12. Alan Watts Was Sure One Strange Kinda Chinaman! 13. The Wayward Mysticism of Alan Watts 14. A Response to Nordstrom and Pilgrim’s Critique of Alan Watts’ Mysticism 15. Zen, Mysticism, and Counter-culture: The Pilgrimage of Alan Watts 16. The Influence of Oriental Mysticism on American Thought 17. Editor’s Conclusion: Alan Watts – Yesterday and Today
Peter J. Columbus is administrator of Shantigar Foundation and serves on the Board of Directors of Valley Zendo – a Soto Zen Buddhist Temple in the lineage of Kodo Sawaki and Kosho Uchiyama. He holds a PhD in experimental psychology from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, USA.
