The Joyous Cosmology: Adventures in the Chemistry of Consciousness

It was a quick read. Due to the material's age, I did not find anything that I haven't already come across elsewhere. The disdain for prohibition and the knowledge that it simply does not work plainly put as it was, to me, was a point of interest. Politicians (at least in this country) are so far behind this currently that a book from the late 1960s is still somewhat relevant. Of course, most of those mummies were around then too: I should call them all ghouls from now on. Do I recommend this one? Not really, you could probably find something more up-to-date along the same lines.

The other reviews pretty much said what I think. This was the last of Watts' books I had on my list to read, and I was understandably excited given the subject matter treated by one of my favorite thinkers. He uses his incredible ability of expressing complex ideas very simply in order to describe various "hallucinogenic" experiences he has had: the things he has seen, the thoughts that have occurred, etc. It sometimes reads pretty dry, when he uses very esoteric words to create a sort of poetry of sound instead of actually trying to convey a point. But in other places he raises such good observations and describes the altered thought process so clearly that the rest of the book more than makes up for it. It's an important Watts book show more for any fan of his to have in their collection, esp. given the collaboration with Alpert/Dass and Leary. It's also an excellent and natural companion piece for Huxley's The Doors of Perception/Heaven & Hell. show less