This book seemed really interesting to me and held my attention; I wish I had written about it earlier, as I think many of you would like it. But it's still available!
Kumano Kodo: Pilgrimage to Powerspots, by J. Christian Greer and Michelle K. Oing, describes a walking tour of a very old Japanese Shinto and Buddhist pilgrimage trail. It is not a tourist guidebook; it's a discussion of the history and culture of the trail and a description of what it was like to go on it.
The introductory section in the front gives background on the area of Japan discussed in the book. The trail is touted as a "heritage" area, but the difference between heritage and real history is explained. The Kumano Kodo is a UNESCO "Universal World Heritage Site." There were politics behind that, and the claim of "universal" appeal seems to be in tension with the claims of Japanese exceptionalism embodied in Shinto. All of this was new to me and fascinating.
The pilgrimage is then described. For each chapter on a section of the trail, there are vivid descriptions of the experience, with chapter headings on "Distance travelled," "Foods consumed," "Drinks slurped," the number of panic attacks and sock changes, and so on.
If you don't know Christian, he is a Discordian and an academic, currently serving at Stanford University as a lecturer after stints at Yale and Harvard. Here is a bit of his Stanford biography, not the usual sort of thing:
"J. Christian Greer, PhD, is a scholar of Religious Studies with a special focus on psychedelic culture. He holds a MDiv from Harvard Divinity School, as well as a MA and PhD (cum laude) in Western Esotericism from the University of Amsterdam. While a postdoctoral researcher at Harvard Divinity School, he led a series of seminars on global psychedelic cultures, which culminated in the creation of the 'Harvard Psychedelic Walking Tour,' a free audio guide detailing how the Harvard community has shaped the modern history of psychedelic culture. He is also the co-founder, and currently the co-chair of the "Drugs and Religion" program unit at the American Academy of Religion.
"His forthcoming book, Angelheaded Hipsters: Psychedelic Militancy in Nineteen Eighties North America (Oxford University Press), explores the expansion of psychedelic culture within fanzine networks in the late Cold War era."
Somehow I sense that the forthcoming book might be interesting.
As for his Discordian credentials, Christian is interviewed in the book Chasing Eris by Brenton Clutterbuck, and he managed to appear on Episode 23 of this podcast.
My wife asked me if Kumano Kodo was one of my "weird books." Maybe, but I think it could appeal to quite a few people.
I should mention that Robert Anton Wilson is mentioned by name on page 84, and various concepts popularized or invented by RAW recur in the text.
The book almost seems like an art book, as it has numerous collages in color, assembled from manga, comics, publications about Persian rugs and tourist guides for Japan. They seemed quite good to me; I spent a lot of time looking at them. I would not claim to be an art expert (or EXPERT as I believe RAW has sometimes spelled the word), but my wife says she has been dragged inside enough art museums to last a lifetime, so perhaps I am entitled to an opinion.
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