This book is both ethnography and allegory.
Carlos Castaneda, under the tutelage of don Juan, takes us through that moment of twilight, through that crack in the universe between daylight and dark into a world not merely other than our own, but of an entirely different order of reality. To reach it he had the aid of mescalito, yerba del diablo, and humito- peyote, datura, and mushrooms. But this is no mere recounting of hallucinatory experiences, for don Juan's subtle manipulations have guided the traveller while his interpretations give meaning to the events that we, through the sorcerer's apprentice, have the opportunity to experience.
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To reiterate, I feel it important to point out right now that even though Carlos Castaneda focused primarily for the entirety of both: his first book, "The Teachings Of Don Juan"; and his second book, "A Separate Reality"-- on the use of mind altering drugs as it related to his enlightnment-- he was in error about their true role in learning; and he admits as much in his later works.
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Anthropology has taught us that the world is differently defined in different places. It is not only that people have different customs. It is not only that people believe in different gods and expect different post-mortem fates.
It is, rather, that the worlds of different peoples have different shapes. The very metaphysical presuppositions differ: Space does not conform to Euclidean geometry: Time does not form a continuous unidirectional flow: Causation does not conform to Aristotelian logic: Man is not differentiated from non-man, nor life from death as in our world.
We know something of the shape of these other worlds from the logic of native languages and from myths and ceremonies as recorded by anthropologists. Don Juan has shown us glimpses of the world of a Yaqui sorcerer, and because we see it under the influence of hallucinogenic substances, we apprehend it with a reality that is utterly different from those other sources. This is the special virtue of this work.
Castaneda rightly asserts that this world, for all its differences of perception, has its own inner logic. He has tried to explain it from inside, as it were- from within his own rich and intensely personal experiences while under don Juan's tutelage- rather than to examine it in terms of our logic.
That he cannot entirely succeed in this is a limitation that our culture and our own language place on perception; rather than his personal limitation. Yet, in his efforts he bridges for us the world of a Yaqui sorcerer with our own; the world of non-ordinary reality with the world of ordinary reality.
The central importance of entering into worlds other than our own- and hence of anthropology itself- lies in the fact that the experience leads us to understand that our own world is also a cultural construct. By experiencing other worlds, then, we see our own for what it is, and are thereby enabled also to see fleetingly what the real world- the one between our own cultural construct and those other worlds- must in fact be like. Hence the allegory as well as the ethnography. The wisdom and poetry of don Juan, and the skill and poetry of his scribe, give us a vision both of ourselves and of reality. As in all proper allegory, what one sees lies with the beholder, and needs no exegesis [* exegesis- an explanation or critical interpretation] here.
Carlos Castaneda's interviews with don Juan were initiated while he was a student of anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles. We are indebted to him for his patience, his courage, and his perspicacity [* perspicacity- the capacity to assess situations or circumstances shrewdly and to draw sound conclusions] in seeking out and facing the challenge of his dual apprenticeship, and in reporting to us the details of his experiences. In this work he demonstrates the essential skill of good ethnography [* ethnography- the branch of anthropology that provides scientific description of individual human societies]- the capacity to enter into an alien world. I believe he has found a path with heart.