True Hallucinations: Being an Account of the Author's Extraordinary Adventures in the Devil's Paradise
"How the Magellan of mentats put his mind and body on the line and discovered the source of consciousness, the end of history, and the factors that govern the ingress of novelty into our world. If you've been there, this book will take you back; if you haven't, get ready." -- Phil Lesh, bass player of the Grateful Dead and Phil Lesh and Friends
"If only a fraction of McKenna's thought is true, he will someday be regarded as the Copernicus of consciousness. If not, he still offers plenty of down-to-earth reasons for preserving the planet, going beneath the surface of scientific inquiry into the psychedelic experience, and some truly amazing dope tales." – Richard Gehr, The Village Voice
This book by
Terrence McKenna (published by
Harper Collins in 1993) tells the true story of his expedition to the
Colombian
mission town of
La Chorrera with his brother
Dennis McKenna, and their girlfriends, to search for famed hallucinogen
oo-koo-hé, a mixture of
ayahuasca and
stropharia cubensis mushrooms. Instead they find a field of
psilocybin mushrooms in the
Amazon basin. They also encounter a
flying saucer, pirate
Mantids from
outer space,
James Joyce and his wife
Nora Joyce masquerading as
chickens, and discover
translinguistic matter as well as perhaps discovering
the missing link in the development of human consciousness and language.
Soon Terrance and Dennis were creating the
psychopharmacological “experiment at La Chorrera” which would eventually form the basis for Terrene’s expanded
Jungian ideas and his
I Ching based
timewave theory, which says that history is accelerating and will come to an end on December 23, 2012, in accordance with
the Mayan calendar.
I realized that my innate Irish ability to rave had been turbo-charged by years of psilocybin mushroom use. Aided by my devotion to psilocybin and the experiment at La Chorrera I had apparently evolved into a sort of mouthpiece for the incarnate Logos. I could talk to small groups of people with what appeared to be electrifying effect about the peculiarly transcendental matters that you will read about in these pages. It was as though my ordinary, rather humdrum personality had simply been turned off and speaking through me was the voice of another, a voice that was steady, unhesitating, and articulate - a voice seeking to inform others about the power and promise of psychedelic dimensions. – Terrance McKenna
There is also a cassette-taped version of True Hallucinations put out in the mid 1980s. McKenna began writing the book version in 1977, and in 1984 or so he read the manuscript onto tape. A finished, well-produced 8-cassette version, featuring Terrene’s distinctive voice and exceptional articulation, marvelous sound effects, and original rock music. The book version is somewhat different from the tapes (So I´m told having only read the book) - some chapters and themes have been added, including a very revealing epilogue, while other chapters and themes have been entirely or partially omitted.