7 July 2022
You may think the second enlightenment started with the Beatles in India, chilling with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, or with Timothy Leary spiking Alan Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady aboard the magic bus.
You'd be wrong.
It was the Nazis.
No, no it wasn't. That's me being childishly facetious. In reality the Nazis have done much to damage the second enlightenment. When someone says twentieth century Germany, what's the first thing that springs to mind?
That's right. The second enlightenment.
What are you going on about Julian? I'm talking about the West's introduction to Daoist and Zen thought. The emergence of hippy culture. Popular media tells it by illuminating two windows. One, in America, incited by Timothy Leary and his merry pranksters. First hanging out with Jack Kerouac who started mashing up dope, jazz and Buddhism, then onwards, leading the charge in the acid experimentation of Haight-Ashbury counter-culture. The second being the World's most popular music group, John, Paul, George, and Ringo forgoing tuning in and dropping out in favour of mediation. And sitars.
I'm currently reading "Zen in the Art of Archery" by Eugen Herrigel, a German who taught philosophy in Japan during the nineteen twenties, and is credited with introducing Western audiences to Zen in the late 1940s and 1950s. Enter Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg smoking some doobies and riffing haikus to the sound of Bird. My original intention for this post had been to discuss silence and pilfer the more profound thoughts from "The Tao of Pooh" by Benjamin Hoff.
Much like twentieth century Western philosophy has done.
This was the original premise, the similarity of Wittgenstein and Heidegger to Daoism. Kierkegaard too, being all “we cannot communicate anything directly, that all true communication is indirect”. I had wanted to read Robert M. Pirsig's ‘Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance’. “But you don't like motorbikes Julian”, Anne said. “Read Archery instead”, she advised. Anne of course having read both of them, along with Hermann Hesse, and Thomas Mann, also including a Heidegger quote in her degree, along with one from The Eagles.
“Tell me about ‘Steppenwolf’” I asked. "What? It was the seventies. It had a profound effect on me at the time, but I can’t remember anything about it. It must have made sense back then."
The Glass Bead Game - Thievery Corporation
To ease us in to a convoluted tale I want to call "How Kant planted the seeds for the Hippies and the Nazis", may I suggest some chilled background vibes from Washington DC's Thievery Corporation, which seems more than appropriate for an article about stealing from Eastern thought.
Aside from all the really actual shitty things Adolf Hitler did, he also did a terrible job on rebranding Germany. There's a sort of auxiliary rebranding going on at the moment, what with the Call of Duty games, and an influx of Hollywood films including Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds", and Taika Waititi turning Christine Leunens's dark novel "Caging Skies" into the comedic hit film "JoJo Rabbit". All of which has again overshadowed what I perceive as the emergence of Eastern thought in Germany between the wars. I'd like to redress the balance. Yin and yang. Hippies and Nazism.
We can loop back round to the Tao of Pooh next week.
Our story starts with Kant. Trust me, I'm struggling here not to make childish, vulgar jokes.
You may be aware that in 1870 Immanuel Kant proposed an ethical framework along the lines of "be kind", to replace the onus of needing religion to keep us behaving. Less known is a hundred and fifty years back he also said all that is great in Western culture is derived from Tibet via India.
Wow, you may think. Wow. Yeah. Wow. That’s quite something isn’t it. You may also be unaware of Kant's hatred for Jews. In his twisted not-taking-his-own-advice-to-be-kind way, his praising of India allowed Sanskrit to be heralded as humankind's mother tongue, was really to say therefore not Hebrew. He managed to turn praising India into Jew bashing. Philosophical logic huh?
You make a joke involving Nazis and hippies and it all turns out to be true. Eugen Herrigel, Mr Zen Archery, was later accused of being a Nazi.
Kant stands as the gateway between Western modern and contemporary philosophy. The seed he planted, that Tibetan culture, on a road trip through India and China, is where it’s at man, would quietly grow. Hegel who inspired both the Nazis and the Communists, kept Kant in the konversation, allowing his influence to reach Heidegger and other Germans at the start of the twentieth century.
1921, Wittgenstein ends his “Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus” with this quote
My propositions serve as elucidations in the following way: anyone who understands me eventually recognizes them as nonsensical, when he has used them—as steps—to climb beyond them. (He must, so to speak, throw away the ladder after he has climbed up it.)
"Throwing away the ladder" is seen to be one of those infuriating oxymoronic Zen sayings like "it took a lot of learning to know so little".
1927, and Heidegger wholesale rips off chunks of Daoist and Zen Buddhist works, without ever acknowledging his paraphrasing.
At the same time we have Eugen Herrigel learning Zen techniques in Japan, then publishing Archery in 1936. Being the arrow.
Time to introduce Hermann Hesse. I have wanted to read Hesse since I discovered incense. He's the archetypical poet warrior transcendental writer. He's Kerouac without the Jazz.
A few months back I started “Steppenwolf”. Of course Anne read it back in the seventies, along with Zen and Archery. I was very excited to finally be reading it. In my mind I had drawn parallels between Adam in the Netflix series “Dark”, with Steppenwolf, as soldiers out of time bringing mystique. It’s nothing like that. I lasted a chapter.
This week I opened "The Glass Bead Game". I love the title. I love the jacket. I love the song by Thievery Corporation. Turns out it's quite readable, as in, I understood it.
"Does anything happen in it, or is it all like this?" I asked Anne.
"It's all like that" she replied.
I thought about the twenty pages I had read. I thought about the five hundred and ten pages yet to read. Zen in the Art of Archery is only eighty six pages. No contest.
Julian. Where are the hippies? We were promised hippies.
Meet Ida Hofmann and lover Henri Oedenkoven, along with Karl Gräser. Two Germans and a Belgian, who in 1902, as scions of industrialists, had the money to buy a plot of land near the lake village of Ascona, Switzerland. Which they named, to give you a taste of things to come, Monte Verità, The Mountain of Truth.
Ida and Henri had a reform marriage, or as they called it, a "vegetarian marriage". In something that sounds like an exploitation b-movie, they lived as prehistoric people in an abandoned vineyard hut, one member dying, poisoned by a fellow drug addicted cultist. Slowly they built a community, where they practised naturism, nudism, vegetarianism, and veganism — outlawing cheese.
The locals called them balabiotts, regional speak for "nude dancers". They grew their hair long, and when actually required to wear clothing, favoured gowns and baggy Indian length trousers.
In case you don't think this is hippy enough let's throw in spiritual ecstasy, anarchists and psychoanalysts.
We're talking 1910, and into this utopia comes one Hermann Hesse. Along with C.G. Jung, and just to mix things up a little, a certain Rudolf Steiner. If German progenitor hippies inspired by Kant believing Tibet was the original Eden wasn't enough, Steiner took Kant's German idealist philosophy and blended in occultism, spiritualism and biodynamic agriculture. Like organic farming but with the extra sexiness of magic practices, such as burying ground quartz stuffed cow horns, to harvest cosmic forces in the soil. He was a theosophist, a sort of derailment slash mashup of Platonism, Hinduism and Buddhism, that believes in an ancient brotherhood of spiritual adepts known as the Masters, from... Tibet.
Also letting it all hang out at The Mountain of Truth was anarchist psychoanalyst Otto Gross, as portrayed by Vincent Cassel in "The Dangerous Method", whom both Freud and Jung considered an equal, along with rumoured visitors Lenin and D.H Lawrence. Only one of these two fucked Gross.
If fascism hadn't derailed Germany’s intellectual culture, it’s possible Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Hesse, Herrigel, and Steiner might have heralded a full Eastern Eden revolution long before California.
Thomas Mann's "Magic Mountain", a book in which nothing happens, for as many pages as The Glass Bead Game, can even be said to be Daoist in its "suspension of the event", finding oneself through inaction. Anne's read it three times. And still can't remember what happens at the end.
Let's finish with Joseph Beuys. If you think my pattern seeking antennae became crossed like the streams in Ghostbusters, producing a short circuit of what-the-fuckness, I give you Beuys, as an illustrated example of all this. He launched himself into the world talking about art to a dead hare while his face was covered in gold leaf and honey. He practised Shamanism, along with psychoanalytic techniques to teach and make art.
As a Luftwaffe pilot he crashed in Crimea, and was saved from death when his mangled body was found by nomadic Tatar tribesmen, who wrapped him in animal fat and felt. Materials he would later use in his art, and an experience that led to Shamanism.
...I was completely buried in the snow. That's how the Tartars found me days later. I remember voices saying 'Voda' (Water), then the felt of their tents, and the dense pungent smell of cheese, fat, and milk. They covered my body in fat...
He made the whole thing up. He actually recovered from the crash in a German military hospital. He was also a Hitler Youth, who claimed to have rescued Carl Linnaeus's ‘Systema Naturae’ from a book-burning. Hermann Hesse of course being a ‘subversive’ author whose works were very much on the Nazi torch list.
This week I admit has been a sensory overload of information. To compensate, may I serenely suggest a purchase of one of my favourite things. Some Chinese incense.
www.etsy.com/listing/875383605/wuchen-xiang-agarwood-joss-incense
Aloeswood is known as agarwood, jinko in Japanese, or oud in Arabic. In Chinese, the name literally translates into “sinking wood”. Named for when parts of the Aquilaria tree become infected, and produces a dark resin which causes the previously light wood in the infected region to become extremely dense. Called a “fragrant knot”, it can sink in water. Traditionally, the degree to which a piece of aloeswood will sink is a sign of its grade – only those that have enough resin to fully sink can be classified as aloeswood.
In the natural environment, only about 1 in 100 trees will produce a fragrant knot, and only about 1 in 100 fragrant knots will sink in water. The longer the fragrant knot has to mature, the more dense it is likely to be, the more complex the aroma, and the more desirable.
Historically, China’s Hainan island and Guangdong region were producers of premium aloeswood incense. Hong Kong (香港, literal meaning “aroma port”) was also named for its abundance of Aquilaria trees.
Cast
Immanuel Kant b 1724
German philosopher whose Categorical Imperative tried to make an ethical framework without religion. Also a racist.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel b 1770
German philosopher who inspired everyone from Nazis to Communists to Deconstructionists
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Wilhelm_Friedrich_Hegel
Rudolf Steiner b 1861
Austrian occultist, social reformer, architect and clairvoyant. Theosophist and general nutter. Inspired Joseph Beuys.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolf_Steiner
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theosophy
Ida Hofman b 1864.
Proto Hippy, cofounder of the Monte Verità commune. Radical feminist, vegan, just generally radical as fuck
second.wiki/wiki/ida_hofmann
houseofswitzerland.org/swissstories/history/monte-verita-swiss-early-hippie-colony
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verit%C3%A0
www.monteverita.org/en/monte-verita/history
www.ascona-locarno.com/en/What-s-on/stories/monte-verita
Thomas Mann b 1875
German novelist and anti-fascist. Big on Nietzsche. Famous for The Magic Mountain and Death in Venice.
Buy The Magic Mountain and Death in Venice
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Mann
Hermann Hesse b 1877
German-Swiss novelist. Wrote about being a hippie forty years before they existed, and an anti-fascist. Famous for Siddhartha, Steppenwolf, and The Glass Bead Game. Invented being awesome.
Buy Siddhartha, and Steppenwolf, and The Glass Bead Game
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Hesse
Otto Gross b 1877
Austrian psychoanalyst and anarchist. Compatriot of Freud and Jung. Bohemian drug user, advocate of free love, founding grandfather of 20th-century counterculture.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Gross
libcom.org/article/otto-gross-anarchist-psychoanalyst
Eugen Herrigel b 1884
German philosophy professor, Nazi, and author of "Zen in the Art of Archery"
Buy Zen in the Art of Archery
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugen_Herrigel
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_in_the_Art_of_Archery
Martin Heidegger b 1889
German philosopher who inspired the existentialists, was an ill-advised Nazi, and secret Daoist. Wrote Being and Time.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Heidegger
Ludwig Wittgenstein b 1889
Long standing hero of mine, and general smart-arse about philosophy, closet Daoist. Wrote Logical-Philosophical Treatise
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi b 1918
Indian yoga guru famous for teaching Transcendental Meditation
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maharishi_Mahesh_Yogi
"Bird" Charlie Parker b 1920
American jazz alto saxophonist. What you think of as cool jazz, is Bird. An icon for the beats, forerunners of the hippies.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_Parker
Timothy Leary b 1920
American psychologist, author, psychedelic drug pioneer, and the most dangerous man in the world.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Leary
Joseph Beuys b 1921
German performance artist, teacher, Luftwaffe pilot, and shaman. Inventor of Happenings.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Beuys
Jack Kerouac b 1922
American wreckhead, poet, author, Buddhist and hippy progenitor. Known for his novel "On The Road"
Buy On The Road
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac
Neal Cassady b 1926
American wreckhead extraordinaire , inspired Kerouac and Ginsberg, psychedelic drug pioneer
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Cassady
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merry_Pranksters
Allen Ginsberg b 1926
American poet, Buddhist, and political activist. Known for his poem Howl
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Ginsberg
Robert M. Pirsig b 1928
American writer, biker, and philosopher, updated Zen and Archery to Zen and Motorcycles, as in "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance"
Buy Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_M._Pirsig
The Beatles b 1960
A pop group
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beatles
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beatles_in_India
www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/how-the-beatles-in-india-changed-america-201531
Further watching
A Dangerous Method - David Cronenberg
Jojo Rabbit - Taika Waititi
Further Reading
"Caging Skies" by Christine Leunens
https://www.hachette.co.uk/titles/christine-leunens/caging-skies/9781529396362/
Buy here
Sources and references
Heidegger and Taoism
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/271047383_How_Taoist_Is_Heidegger
https://philosophyandpsychology.wordpress.com/2010/03/18/heidegger-ripping-off-taoism/
https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/daoist-resonances-in-heidegger-9781350201071/
Kant and racism
https://www.cairn.info/revue-de-litterature-comparee-2001-1-page-13.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haight-Ashbury
Illustration by Timothy Hunt
©2019 Timothy Hunt
A shoutout to Timothy Hunt, my favourite illustrator, who very kindly allowed use of his work to enliven this post. Please do him a solid by following him on Instagram and liking all his posts. Even better would be visiting his shop and purchasing a print, gold star goes to commissioning him to design or illustrate your next project.
https://www.instagram.com/timothyjphunt
https://www.timothyjphunt.co.uk/shop
A small ask
I’m currently interviewing a few more authors , who have kindly relented agreed to humour my inquisitiveness. I feel rather sheepish in the number of subscribers, and would love their words and work to reach a wider audience.
If there’s anyone you know who you think would enjoy these posts, please forward this edition on to them, or a different one you think better suited to wooing. Better still, ring them up, harangue, shout, threaten and coerce them into subscribing. Nicely, of course.
Legally I have to tell you I might get five pence or something from Bookshop dot org should you purchase something, but really I just want to stick it to Amazon and keep independent bookshops alive. Yeah, rebel me, bringing the man down from the inside etc etc.
Interesting article - I came across Herrigel when I saw that Zen in the Art of Archery had been given to Henri Cartier-Bresson (The great legend of photography) by George Braque back in the 30s. It had a profound impact on his life and many of that era's artists.
I recently referenced it in my hitchhiking journey through Britain during an attempt (unsuccessful sadly) to break into Glastonbury. Let me know what you think if you get a moment to read it! https://nicolethbridge.substack.com/p/chapter-6-zen-and-the-art-of-breaking
Lovely, dense stuff. It's been a minute since I've read either Zen and Arrows or Wrenches. I wonder if "tools" are a deliberate subtext.
[Hess] "He's Kerouac without the Jazz," bravo and clappy hands!
Beuys did hang out in a room with a coyote before you could do that in with cgi. A measure of either artistic commitment, or the necessity of creating a narrative for art to be memorable, or something else entirely.