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17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Nice attempt at a juxtaposed position - but already disproved, April 7, 2007
Shroom: A Cultural History of the Magic Mushroom by Andy Letcher, 2006
Shroom is an interesting theory against the "mushroom theory of religion." Letcher brings together many new insights and material previously overlooked by many researching the field of entheobotany, and especially entheomycology. This book is a must read and a welcome tome to any good library on this subject.
But there are many problems with Letcher's thesis. Firstly, he props up many of his arguments by ignoring most of the newer research, and especially archaeological iconography, that has come to light post Wasson/Allegro. His argument focuses heavily on Wasson, McKenna and Allegro. And in his case against Allegro, all but one of the items he presents as evidence are bogus rumors that have already been debunked by Judith Anne Brown, Michael Hoffman and I since 2005.
He's completely dismissive of the idea of mushrooms in Christianity but only by attacking the shallowest of evidence, such as the Plaincourault issue (He's unaware that Panofsky was also debunked), while simultaneously ignoring enormous amounts of evidence contradictory to his theory, i.e. The Canterbury Psalter c.e. 1147, art from Abbey of Montecassino, circa 1072, amongst many others such as those published by Giorgio Samorini in Entheos Magazine. In fact, on page 173 in his supposed debunking of Clark Heinrich, instead of attacking Heinrich's research directly, Letcher bases his dissent on a mushroom experience Heinrich speaks about in his book. Weak and lazy tactics like these may fool some, but it's not going to fool anyone who has any serious amount of study in these areas. He also misquotes Heinrich and states that Heinrich built his research into Christianity from Allegro. However, on pg. 25 of Heinrich's book, it clearly states that he used Wasson's research.
Letcher similarly avoids iconographic evidence in the same way toward mushrooms in Hinduism, completely ignoring carvings and statues that clearly depict the mushrooms. See Hari Hari holding a mushroom, Rama and Hanuman Holding Mushrooms, etc., 700-800 C.E.
Letcher also missed the fact that most of the arguments today are for an entheogen theory, not just a specific `mushroom cult theory of religion' per se. Letcher erroneously focuses his research on debunking a single mushroom cult theory. However, many of us in this field have long ago moved away from any such argument. In fact, I don't really know anyone who proposes such a singularly focused theory except for Allegro, and maybe Wasson - and both of their pioneering arguments are near four decades old. For those interested in more information on this specific area, read Michael Hoffman's article on the Maximal Entheogen Theory of Religion - www.egodeath.com.
Letcher is certainly guilty of trying to make his evidence fit his argument, and throughout this book he blames other researchers for doing the same. I feel that he has likely painted himself into a corner with his words on pg. 78:
"The Western rediscovery of Mexican mushrooming practices began, ironically, with a vigorous scholarly denial that they had ever existed."
He then goes into the story of William Safford:
"...American botanist William Safford (1859-1926), oblivious of such shenanigans so close to home, published a paper on the identity of the supposed teonanacatl of the Aztecs in which he stated emphatically that Sahagun and his native informants had been wrong. They had mistakenly confused dried plant fragments for a fungus, and teonanacatl, revealed Safford, had been none other than the infamous peyote cactus [...]. ... Safford reported that `three centuries of investigation [had] failed to reveal an endemic fungus used as an intoxicant in Mexico'. He bolstered his argument by claiming that peyote `resembles a dried mushroom so remarkably that at first glance it will even deceive a trained mycologist'. He was wrong on both accounts."
Being that Letcher omitted so much of the archaeological evidence available to make his case, I couldn't avoid the obvious comparison that much of Letcher's theory will soon see a similar fate (if it hasn't already). His modern mushroom religion theory mirrors that of Safford.
Lastly, a contradictory and completely dangerous comparison is made in the book to something he admits is non-toxic, psilocybe mushrooms, to something very dangerous as sniffing glue:
"In Mice the LD50, that is the dose at which 50 per cent of the experimental subjects die, is 280 mg/kg of body weight, but a high dose in humans in only 0.5 mg/kg. With such a low toxicity it has been estimated that you would have to eat your own body weight in mushrooms to take a lethal dose, and indeed the are no reported cases of fatalities from psilocybin mushrooms, though children may be more at risk of physical harm." Pg. 20-21
"... magic mushrooms were a convenient, illicit and exciting way of making life under Tory rule more tolerable, no better or worse than sniffing glue..."
Pg. 244
Despite the books obvious problems, overall, I say buy it, read it, study it - but don't believe it.
4 out of 5 stars.
Update for Feb. 2008:
When I wrote this review last April, I was not aware of newer evidence that had already surfaced that disproves Letcher's book.
Found in the Ukraine was a widely dispersed Christian document from Greece in which discusses the mushroom - thereby debunking Letcher's book.
This leaves the remainder of this book as only valid for tidbits of research on mushrooms that Dr. Letcher has discovered. The overall thesis of this book had already been debunked before it was written - as the original discovery of the mushroom in these ancient texts was published in the academic journals in 1994.
I therefore must lower my previous rating of 4 stars down to 3 stars.
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27 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Partial critical engagement with entheogen theory of religious origins, April 1, 2007
Shroom covers topics including refutation of the mushroom theory of the origin of religion, the recent U.K. psilocybin mushroom scene, a critical treatment of Wasson's research methodology and mushroom theory of Vedic religion, and Tim Leary as backdrop leading up to the later popular use of psilocybin mushrooms. This is a valuable book that contributes some new perspectives and new coverage of entheogens in Western culture; this book is a must-have for entheogen researchers. The present review focuses exclusively on his critique of the mushroom theory of religious origins, which he sometimes treats as though it is a critical refutation of the overall entheogen theory of religion.
Letcher has not disproved the entheogen theory of religion, or even fully engaged with that hypothesis. At most, he has made a partial effort to call into question the mushroom theory of the pre-historical origin of religion, in the form of a secret cult spreading from a single origin over time and across regions. Letcher often comes across triumphally as having disproved the entheogen theory of the origin of religion, but a careful reading of his treatment of that particular topic shows that he has actually only shown something far narrower ; he has only refuted a highly specific point.
At most, Letcher's treatment of the entheogen theory of religious origins shows that we have no compelling archaeological evidence for a prehistorical mushroom cult that was secret and unbroken. When his rhetorical verbiage and his general discussions of history are put aside, the substance of his argumentation that remains does not amount to a compelling argument against the frequent use of mushrooms (or other visionary plants) throughout religious history.
Letcher's writing style is rhetorical, so that he tells the story of recent mushroom scholarship and culture well, presenting much of interest to the audience, including valuable new material. He uses a biased rhetorical style; for example, "lunatic fringe", "conspiracy theories", "unfounded speculations", "the myth" of the entheogen origin of religion. This charged rhetorical style obscures that fact that his argument for his refutation of the entheogen theory of the origin of religion rests on only a few, fleetingly discussed points of argument.
Letcher does not engage the bulk of the literary and artistic evidence that provide sufficient grounds to support the general entheogen theory of religious origins. He merely puts forth brief and rather arbitrary arguments dismissing a couple of the many depictions of mushrooms in Christian art.
Letcher's inadequate selection of cases to refute, and his brief, perfunctory treatment of these cases, is not sufficient in breadth or depth to compell adherents of various variants of the entheogen theory of the origins of religion to change their position, no matter how many times or how confidently he rhetorically dubs the theory as a "myth". For example, he would need to engage the range of art that is presented in the first three issues of Entheos magazine, and the range of arguments such as those presented in Giorgio Samorini's articles about Christian mushroom trees.
It's admirable to see an independent critical thinker comment on selected aspects of Allegro and Wasson, but only a few of those comments actually amount to engaging with the evidence for the general entheogen theory of the origin of religion. Letcher makes the risky move of overextending his specific focus on psychoactive mushrooms, at the expense of being under-informed on the general entheogen theory and the full range of arguments, interpretive frameworks, systems of assumptions, and evidence of various types in support of that broad-ranging theory.
As a thought-experiment with the hypothesis that normalized religious cultic use of mushrooms is only a few decades old, this aspect of the book is a valuable contribution to the field; however, Letcher switches inconsistently between that bold but narrow hypothesis and a broader, firm conclusion that the entheogen theory of religion altogether is merely a recent fabrication of popular scholarship and merely wishful thinking.
Letcher leaps from what he narrowly demonstrates, to a stance and a claim to have shown convincingly that the entheogen theory of religious origins (and fairly frequent entheogen use throughout religious history) is nothing but recent wishful thinking, a fabrication by a group that is a historical novelty: late 20th Century psychedelics enthusiasts, including mushroom enthusiasts in the U.K. from 1976-2006.
All theories involve a framework of assumptions. The fact that a scholarly theory uses a set of unproved assumptions does not instantly do away with (or "demolish") the theory. Letcher handles the evidence by the common strategy of dividing, isolating, and diminishing each piece of evidence in isolation, operating under the arbitrary silent assumption that entheogen use was rare, secretive ("conspiracy"), and deviant. But such a methodology is problematic and is controverted by the maximal entheogen theory of religion, which holds that Western history and Western culture have always been inspired to some extent by the ongoing practice of using visionary plants. The unavoidable question remains, "How are we to judge what is plausible and what was normal for that culture?"
Should we assume that the use of visionary plants was normal and significantly present throughout mainstream religion and culture, or that it was rare, a secretive conspiracy, and deviant (exceptional)? Selecting our assumptions about the backdrop, of what was normal in a culture, affects the validity of completely isolating each piece of potential evidence and then attempting to judge the plausibility of reading that piece of evidence as supporting the entheogen theory of religion. What seems plausible to a critical scholar depends on the backdrop of what we assume was normal in the culture.
For example, Letcher affirms that the cathedral door at Hildesheim, Germany depicts the tree of knowledge in the shape that "looks extremely like a giant Liberty Cap", but he argues that it cannot have meant a Liberty Cap, because the doors were carefully designed and the depiction cannot have been secret in that case, so the image cannot represent anything other than, or in addition to, a "stylized fig tree".
It doesn't occur to Letcher to imagine and address the obvious critical arguments and questions against his hasty discussion, such as: why assume that a mushroom allusion had to be secret? why is an officially designed depiction of a mushroom automatically ruled out as unthinkable? why was the fig tree stylized in the specific form of a Liberty Cap mushroom? what about the hundreds of other specifically psilocybin mushroom-shaped trees in Christian art?
Letcher has much homework to do if he wants to try to retain his hypothesis that psychoactive mushrooms were absent from Western religious history until the late 20th Century, and if he intends to convince critical entheogen scholars of that hypothesis -- a hypothesis that will be hard to maintain after seriously addressing, with responses to at least the most obvious counter-criticisms, the current full range of artistic evidence (post-Wasson and post-Allegro), which Letcher has barely engaged.
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12 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A great modern perspective on a culturally skewed topic, March 19, 2007
by Andy Letcher, is that most wondrous of finds; a magic mushroom book that dares to confront modern orthodoxy, and does so in a way that actually advances our knowledge in the field. Billing his text as "A Cultural History of the Magic Mushroom", Letcher does not disappoint in dishing up the tastiest mushroom morsels modern research can unearth. And for those of you who think you "know it all" already, I assure you, this book has the best a fungophile could hope for: New stuff.
Instead of starting at the dawn of time with proto-hominids chomping down mushrooms and inventing religion -- like most trendy mushroom books would have you believe -- Letcher instead takes an about-face and scrutinizes this myth of the "ancient mushroom cult" as well as the visionaries who elevated it to the status of academic lore. After first picking through the research and finding no hard evidence of this supposed ancient mushroom cult, Letcher then goes on to point out that for the bulk of Western history (pre-20th century at least), mushrooms were simply considered to be "poisonous" or "edible", and there was no in-between. The poisonous ones (including the "psychedelic" ones) were assiduously avoided and eaten only by mistake. This he demonstrates by finding literature which dates back to the 13th century, citing botanist's notes and journal reports of people accidentally ingesting poisonous mushrooms and believing they were at death's door. Although the notes from the doctors at the time report the oddest of symptoms (the poor fools had no idea what to make of "giddiness" that caused unceasing laughter), in hindsight it is clear that these are the earliest "trip reports" on record. As a student of mushroom lore for over twenty years I can honestly say I had no idea these early reports actually existed, and I applaud Mr. Letcher for his scholarship in retrieving them from the depths of history.
Comparing these priceless journal articles with the historical accounts of the first Spaniards to witness Mayan consumption of mushrooms, Letcher makes the case that Westerners simply had no idea what to make of this ritual, and considered it pagan and demonic and best, deadly at worst. If "Shroom" had ended here Letcher's point would have been well made with interesting research to boot, but it does not end here. Letcher pushes forward into the roots of the cultural movement that elevated the humble mushroom into an archaic religious symbol for an increasingly cynical age, and the primary target of this academic hit job is the legendary banker-turned-amateur ethnomycologist R. Gordon Wasson, the originator of the sacred mushroom myth. To say that Letcher has a bone to pick with Wasson would be putting it mildly. Let's just say Letcher barely masks his glee in annihilating this man's historical legacy, not only peeling apart his legendary theories one after the other, but criticizing the man himself for being somewhat stubborn and single-minded; too blinded by his own theory to do the proper research; too quick to mold the facts to meet his preconceptions; too arrogant and forthright to allow dissenting voices to penetrate his mythos. It is a view of Wasson I have never seen before -- including new insights into his relationship with Maria Sabina -- and like much of this book, contains a wealth of new material.
The second half of the book moves into hippie territory, speeding through Leary and the Sixties, which is all well-chewed territory. However, the freshest bits in this section come from stories of pre-MDMA rave culture in the UK, where free mushroom festivals and Stonehenge concerts were the British Isles equivalent of Woodstock and the Grateful Dead shows in the US. You can almost feel the change in the air when -- in the early 80s -- DJs with electronic beats and designer drugs moved in and rapidly took over the scene. This is when Letcher changes gears and gets into analyzing Terence McKenna's "Elf Clowns of Hyperspace". While Letcher is a bit gentler with McKenna than he was with Wasson (he claims that as a young man Terence "blew his mind" with his live rap), he still spares no organ in the body of Terence's work as he happily disembowels theory after theory. Letcher's middling conclusion is that although Terence was a great storyteller who helped popularize the mushroom, his theories and research skills -- like those of Wasson's -- were ultimately lacking in academic rigor and not to be taken seriously.
There's much more in Shroom worth mentioning -- new takes on Siberian shamanism, an analysis of mushroom use in Mayan culture, Amanita myths derailed, the modern commodification of the psilocybe market -- but I don't want to spoil all the surprises. The fact that I found this book so full of new material should be recommendation enough for people out there who think they know all there is to know in this field. If Letcher's work doesn't turn the magic mushroom crowd on its head, it will at least give them a new perspective on our current misshapen paradigms. Some mushroom enthusiasts spend their entire careers on the other side of the looking glass, but Letcher's climb up out of the mycological rabbit hole has let in a much-needed breath of fresh air. Shroom is definitely the new must-have book for all students of modern mycology. It makes everything that has come before it look like a fairy tale.
[...]
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