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Editorial Review Product Description
A fair and balanced look at the writing of Robert Anton Wilson and its relationship with the Kaballah, Finnegans Wake, General Semantics, Quantum Mechanics, Ezra Pound, The Wizard of Oz, Aleister Crowley, and a zillion other subjects. Whether you are a newcomer or already familiar with Dr. Wilson's work, welcome to the Weird and Wonderful World of Wilson. This book provides many pointers to ways people can deepen their understanding of the fields which shaped Dr. Wilson's world-view. ... Read more Customer Reviews (5) 
Trying too hard
I first encountered Illuminatus in 1989 during college and have read it annually since then, I never fail to find something new that I missed upon previous readings.Due to my interest in that book, I have read a majority of RAW's work.
So it's no surprise that I picked up the Insider's Guide.I won't rehash what the other reviewers said since they cover much of what is good or bad about the book.
My take is this: the author is not merely entranced with RAW, he wants to be RAW.He has affected many of RAW's catchphrases, comments and writing style and they appear regularly through the book.If I though the joke would make sense, I'd add an ironic 'heh heh heh' as the author does but unless you've read RAW and read this book, the joke simply doesn't work without explanation.
But it all comes off as forced, as if the author is trying far too hard to sound like his hero.As the old saying goes "He has the notes, but lacks the tune."It made the book feel stilted and poorly written.
And frankly, having read most of RAW's output, I can't say that the Insider's Guide added much to understanding it.I suppose it is a decent enough introduction to many of RAW's pet ideas (E-prime, Korbyzki, the 8-circuit model) but, honestly, RAW did enough of a job regurgitating his ideas over and over and over and over again, he didn't need someone else to cover it another time too.
I suppose the detailed cabalistic analysis of Illuminatus was interesting.In my opinion, it missed the real structure of the book (which only recently became apparent to me on my roughly 20th reading of the book.Hint: If you want to understand Illuminatus, read Prometheus Rising and look for parallels).Of course, there may be other hidden structures that we've all missed.
Lists and anecdotes
I enjoyed the intro by RAW, but it seemed more of an interview than an introduction. Recently I bought the Historical Illuminatus trilogy, and while reading Mr Wagner's book I became inspired to go and read the man himself. So this one is on hold right now till later. Seems to me to be more of a reference or introduction or overview to RAW. Which is fine. I am glad Mr Wagner wrote the book. He writes about RAW in a way RAW doesn't discuss himself, naturally.
Somewhat Worthwhile But Bob Deserves Better
I would have to describe this book as a (very) mixed bag. It is very frustrating and yet, at the same time, there is definitely enough "good stuff" in it to make it worthwhile reading even for the seasoned Robert Anton Wilson fan (in my case about 27 years seasoned).
On the down side, there are an incredible number of typos, grammatical errors, and other mistakes. Although Wilson always advised people to avoid absolutes, I must say that I was absolutely astounded. The quantity of errors would be extemely high for your average Internet post, let alone a book from a reasonably established publisher such as New Falcon. I found it hard to get through a single page without finding at least one error of one sort or another and often more than one, and I wasn't really looking that hard.
It is doubly amazing to find such a plethora of errors in a book by a poet who has also worked as a computer programmer, a technical writer, and a teacher of English! You might imagine that a poet would be even more sensitive to each word and to punctuation than even an accomplished prose writer. And programmers sweat every single character when they're coding, which, again, might lead one to expect a certain level of attention to detail. But, no, in this case the universe chooses to surprise us.
I should note that the sections at the beginning of the book which are written by Wilson himself are noticeably free of the errors which are endemic throughout the rest of the work.
I find it ironic that a product this slipshod could come from a publisher whose overriding emphasis could be described as trying to enable its readers to achieve states of higher human functioning!
Some errors include:
The German phrase "Ewige Blumenkraft!" which means "Eternal Flowerpower" (and is translated as such by Wilson in the Preface) comes, in the lexicon, to be "Hail Flowerpower!" (Page 65.)
The character Mao Tsu-Hsi sometimes becomes Mao Tu Tsi. (E.g., page 82.)
Likewise Sufi writer Idries Shah becomes Idris Shah and also is listed as still being alive although he died in 1996. (Page 103.)
"H.M., S.H." (as in "Hagbard Celine, H.M., S.H.") becomes "S.H., H.M." Perhaps Eric has a lower opinion of Hagbard than many of the rest of us and therefore puts the S.H. first. ("H.M., S.H." comes from a story in Camden Benares' hilarious Zen Without Zen Masters and stands for "Holy Man, S*** Head".)(Page 100.)
There is an entry for one of Wilson's characters "Stella. Or, as she sometimes calls herself, Stella Only." But no mention is made of her full name as given in the Illuminatus! trilogy, Stella Maris: "Her name is Stella. Stella Maris. Black star of the sea." The name Stella Maris relates both to Catholic tradition and to a D.W. Griffith movie in which Mary Pickford plays two different characters, facts which might have been of interest to fans of Wilson. (Page 104.)
The entry for "Swift, Jonathan" somehow gets alphabetized between "Taming of the Shrew (The)" and "Tantra." The entry on Swift also refers to a book by Wilson called Nature's Law. Except that he never wrote such a book, although he did write both Nature's God and Natural Law. (Page 106.)
Speaking of Nature's God, in the bibliography it gets a 1986 edition published by Loompanics Unlimited, which is five years before it was actually published and it was never published by that particular company. Apparently Wagner is again confusing it with the book Natural Law. (Page 236.)
The definition of tantra reffered to above states that it involves "prolonging the sexual act to achieve radically altered states of conscience." While that well may be sometimes an effect of the practice, I don't think that is quite what most are aiming for. (Page 106, again.)
The definition of tantra is followed immediately by a definition of the tarot deck, which is said to be "A collection of cards used for mediation and fortune telling, etc." Yes, of course. That is how labor and management usually work out their disputes isn't it? It would be cool I grant you, and might work better than much that they do now. But still, you may be sure, this is not what the author intended. (Yes, believe it or not, yet again page 106.)
(If nothing else, these last few examples make it clear why spellchecking your work is no substitute for proofreading it!)
John Lilly's famous tome Programming and Metaprogramming in the Human Biocomputer becomes Programming and Metaprogramming in the Human Metacomputer. (Page 164.)
H.L. Mencken becomes H.L. Menken, the Historical Illuminatus Chronicles become the Historical Illuminati Chronicles, County Kerry in Ireland becomes, apparently, its own country, Country Kerry, and so forth.
Lest I seem to be nitpicking, let me just say that while I could overlook two or three -- or even a dozen -- errors like these, the sheer quantity of them (and I have barely scratched the surface here) simply becomes stupefying after awhile. Maybe I'm just old fashioned, but I tend to like my reference works to actually be more or less correct!
Another issue is that sometimes the selection (or exclusion) of items in the lexicon, and the amount of text devoted to them, seem arbitrary. For example, Adam Weishaupt, founder of the Illuminati, a secret society which much of Wilson's work revolves around, gets only eight lines of text, but the Faulkner inspired "Yoknapatawpha diet," essentially irrelevant to Wilson's writing, gets 27 lines.
The book also seems in places very repetitive. One reviewer called it "severely repetitive"! In some cases this works, in that you really absorb the point or information in question, but often it just seems a waste of space that could have been better used for other material (such as, perhaps, elaborating on the parallels between the structure of Illuminatus! and D.W. Griffith's Intolerance, a connection which Wagner mentions in passing, but never pursues further).
Then there are textual analyses carried almost to the point of absurdity. One hopes that this overinterpretation is being done intentionally and for humorous effect, but I really don't think so.
A wise man once wrote, "[W]e are seeing what we believe nearly all the time and only occasionally seeing what we can't believe." But An Insider's Guide to Robert Anton Wilson is an exception to that rule. You'll see what you can't believe a whole lot more than occasionally.
As a previous reviewer here notes, this book is written in E-Prime, i.e. English prime (English without the "is" of identity), as were some of Wilson's own works. However, perhaps it would have been better had Mr. Wagner paid more attention to his E and less to his E-Prime.
Still, one cannot deny than Mr. Wagner, despite his egregious grammatical shortcomings and other lapses, is very knowledgeable and well read in many areas, and has many interesting and sometimes surprising things to say about the works of Robert Anton Wilson.
And, certainly, whatever my reservations about the book, I am glad that someone, namely Eric Wagner, took the time and effort to write a guide to Bob's oeuvre.
However, this is a book only for the diehard -- and very forgiving! -- Wilson fan. It is most certainly an "Insider's Guide to Robert Anton Wilson" and not an "Introduction to Robert Anton Wilson"!
The best introduction to the man and his work, in my opinion, is eitherCosmic Trigger: Final Secret of the Illuminati (his autobiography) or his fictional Illuminatus! trilogy written with Robert J. Shea.
Only for the diehard Wilson-fan
It's not very difficult to decide if you should buy this book or not. Because it all depends on how familiar you are with, and your personal opinion about, Robert Anton Wilson.
If you haven't heard about him before, if you don't have any interest in learning more about him, his background, what he's written and why; then don't bother buying An Insider's Guide to Robert Anton Wilson. According to the back of the book it doesn't matter if you're new to the world of Wilson or if you're already a devoted reader; the book is in everybody's interest since he's such a remarkable author.
And yes, that's true, Wilson has lived a fascinating life, written numerous books, been inspired by everything from Timothy Leary to Aleister Crowley, and there are fans of his in all ages all over the world. However, the book is still mainly for those already familiar with him, and who has read his books and appreciate what he has to say and his style of writing. The book contains interviews with Wilson, a lexicon related to him and his world, and analyses of his work. Sure, it's well-written, and all fans of Wilson will appreciate it, I guarantee it. However, what's the point with all the pictures at the end of it? They're all of lousy quality, and might as well have been excluded.
But if you haven't read Wilson then I cannot recommend this book, because its content can best be understood if you know him already. Here and there some interesting facts can be found even for the everyday reader, but to truly appreciate it you better know your Wilson before purchasing it.
However, if you've never heard of him or don't have any interest in getting to know him, then please spend your hard-earned money on a different book than this.
First Exegesis of Robert Anton Wilson: Daring!
This book, _An Insider's Guide To Robert Anton Wilson_ may yield much to both Initiates and the Hopelessly Befuddled (I belong to both groups, somehow)and nearly everyone in-between who has any interest in Robert Anton Wilson at all, at all. But Caveat Lector: This seems like quite the avant work. Not that it's filled with specialized jargon or postmodern blitherscabble. (The words "hegemony" or "transgressive" don't show in the text, that I remember.)On the contrary, the prose seems lapidary to me. The avant-ness resides elsewhere. The Author, Eric Wagner, has pulled off a difficult writing stunt I've never seen before: he writes an entire work of literary criticism in E-Prime, or English without any of the forms of "be" in it (am, is are, was were, be), thereby putting into play an epistemological-ontological gambit first proposed by the founder of General Semantics, Alfred Korzybski, and fleshed out by his student D. David Bourland. One of the main effects of using this hygenic language game: the author's assertions appear more clearly to emanate from his own nervous system; he makes things exceedingly difficult for himself in that he can't make any omniscient-sounding claims to Ultimate Truth or True Being or I Have THE Main Line On My Subject. Rather, E-Prime imposes a constraint on claims made in sentences that might violate what we learned in the 20th century about the nature of "reality." That is, E-Prime seems more in keeping with most of the interpretations of the Schrodinger's Wave Equation (i.e., the quantum theory), with Godel's Incompleteness Theorem in math, with Gestalt Psychology and later models of perception and the human nervous system, with the relativity of cultural values found in Anthropology, the relativity of neuroscience (everyone resides in their own "reality tunnel"), and the philosophy of Phenomenology, to name but a few of the epistemic gems in our cultural inheritance from the explosion of knowledge in the 20th century. E-Prime makes the foisting of a Belief System (BS)almost impossible for a writer. Somehow Wagner pulled it off. Damn if he didn't write the whole thing in E-Prime! (If you don't think that's difficult, try writing a letter to a friend telling them why some political position seems more desirable than another.)
If you've never heard of some of these highfalutin' epistemologies, no matter: reading the book and paying attention to the effects of the POV and lingering necessary uncertainty behind the prose might yield some interesting effects. Frankly, it blew my mind!
Wagner clearly has great admiration for his subject, and he thinks a book of literary criticism ought to seem able to come right out and make that clear, without the olde pretense of scholarly "objectivity." In this the book seems avant also. But he hasn't written a "fanboy" book, either. In addition to two interviews with Wilson, a Preface/Introduction/Overture by RAW himself, and lots of ludic Joycean and "insider" jokes, I loved two extremely insightful pieces of Wilson scholarship, "Appendix Samekh:Illuminatus!", which told me many things about the structure of one of the greatest conspiracy theory novels ever written, and one I've quite frankly probably read too many times, even though it's 805 pages. And here Wagner sheds light on a deep structure in the dreaded _Illuminatus! Trilogy_ , a structure I'd never guessed was so intricate; the other section of the book that I found particularly stimulating - and one in which many Joyceans would no doubt enjoy also - was Wagner's elucidation of "Joyce's Influence on (Wilson's) _Masks of the Illuminati_", a delightful and learned essay that demonstrates Wilson as a writer heavily influenced by the labyrinthine, multi-vocal cubist prose of the greatest Modernist (and Postmodernist!) writer of the 20th century.
The casual reader will learn a great deal about the dizzying scope of Wilson's influences, the use of occult knowledge, and the cosmic hilarity and optimism that resides at the heart of Robert Anton Wilson's life and work. Wagner has written, as far as I know, the first critical about RAW, and we hope many others will follow with their own views on this almost absurdly mutifaceted writer.
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