based on your understanding of spirit... etc. For me, the more conventional first: Thomas Merton, esp. Seven-Storey Mountain,New Seeds of Contemplation and his preface to The Wisdom of the Desert Dorothy Day, esp her autobiography The Long Loneliness and her writings for The Catholic Worker. And a bit less conventional maybe... Henry Miller, esp Tropic of Cancer, Colossus of Maroussi and The Books In My Life Dadaist Hugo Ball, esp. his diary, Flight out of Time, or Flight From The Times, depending on the translation. and finally, for now, the Japanese poet Ryokan.
Thomas Merton, definitely. Simone Weil (Jack Tarim, if you're still lurking out there somewhere, I still have your book) Viktor Frankl Mircea Eliade Joseph Campbell is interesting I'm sure I'll think of more...
I knew I was leaving off someone from my list: from the unorthodox: Michael Ventura, whose columns collected in Letters at 3 A.M., as well as his collection of dialogues with psychologist James Hillman in []We've Had One Hundred Years of Psychotherapy and the World is Getting Worse[/i] (or something like that) are nearly always insightful... with breakthrough insight, not "hmm, interesting" insight. For years he wrote for the L.A. Weekly, now he writes for the Austin Chronicle. Here's his archive of his past 132 columns http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/dispatch/columns/lettersat3am.html
Thanks a lot for posting that. I checked out the first column and was just struck - both by what he's saying and the simple, direct way he says it. I think I'll go back through that archive as soon as I've got some time.
I gave Dr. Wankler rep ten minutes ago so I can't give it to him again but I must second this notion about Ventura, he is a tremendous though unappreciated writer...and yes, often quite spiritual and illuminating. When I lived in LA in 1985-86 he saved my life with his columns in the LA Weekly. I haven't always kept up with him on a consistent basis since, but when I do it's almost invariably worth it. Well worth the effort to seek out.
King David Solomon before he fell off the wagon The writer of Song of Solomon E.L. Doctorow Henry Melville Allen Ginsberg Bob Dylan Bob Marley Hermann Hesse To me Gabriel Garcia Marquez is a spiritual writer Paul Hewson Van Gogh Ethan Walker III The Mystic Christ
Paul - The Letter to the Romans Moses - Genesis Samuel - Judges John - John Peter - 1st & 2nd Peter Matthew - self titled Mark - self titled Luke - Acts Isaiah - self titled King David - Psalms King Solomon - Proverbs & Ecclesiastes
There are a couple of living women I should've mentioned: Anne Lamott, whose Traveling Mercies is really good, and Kathleen Norris, who has a couple of good ones, esp. The Cloister Walk On the American Indian front, I like Black Elk quite a bit, and one of my all-time favorite books is Lame Deer: Seeker of Visions by John Fire Lame Deer and Richard Erdoes. It's kinda like Henry Miller meets Black Elk.
To second lisabrazil09, Lao-tzu. Tao Te Ching is the most spiritual and also cynical book in the world. I suggest the Gia-fu Feng translation. Nikos Kazantzakis
Silouan the Athonite: various writings...he never wrote a book, they just found tons of scraps of paper with writings on them after he died and its been sifted through, compiled and attempted to be put in some kind of order. Theophan the Recluse: The Spiritual Life & How to be Attuned to It Theophylact of Bulgaria: Explanation of the Gospels Ephraim of Syria: his poetry Symeon the New Theologian: his poetry Joseph the Hesychast: Letters Anastasios of Albania: Facing the World Cleopa of Romania: various writings finally, two novelists: Shusako Endo: The Samurai Yukio Mishima: As bizarre as a lot of his ideas were, he did have some valuable things to say when his "crazy switch" was occasionally in the off position. I'm sure I will think of many more, but these are ones that sprang to mind immediately.
Caitlin Matthews Scott Cunningham Starhawk Ann Moura Bill Wilson Jack Spong Robert Greenleaf Gary Snyder Jack Kerouac pre-1960 (before he got too drunk too feel anything) Allen Ginsberg And if you haven't read this guy, neither pass go nor collect $200 until you have: Swami Beyondananda . Priceless wisdom there.
Good call and Kerouac. I've been reading his collected letters in bits and pieces all summer. The first volume is great, but you can see the wheels starting to come off right about the time he gets famous, and by the end of the second volume... it's some of the most depressing stuff I've ever read. I like the bits of Starhawk I read. She really gives the willies to a lot of the old priests at the college where my wife and I work, and some reactionary catholic groups like to protest her lectures, which gave rise to her comment, "I don't know why they're so worried about witches. The Catholic church killed a lot of women for being witches, and witches never killed anyone for being Catholic." Now I have to get busy spreading reputation so I can rep Nicodemus' post for his reading list and for the comment on Mishima's "crazy switch."
I have to agree FlashMan here. His stuff is very enjoyable even if it is hip with the "Mystic of the Month Club."
Very famous interview he did on the old William F. Buckley show where he comes on stage drunk out of his gourd and bitter about everything. Just sad to watch, really. Great line. I'd rep your wife if I could .
Yeah. Kerouac pulled off showing up drunk at public appearances a decade before the Firing Line appearance, but he was pretty far gone by the time he talked to Buckley. There was a great reaction shot of Ginsberg I've seen in a couple of documentaries. He was in the audience, and looking incredibly concerned for Kerouac. Oh, my vague use of pronouns created the appearance that my wife made that comment: it was actually Starhawk's line, in an interview with Matthew Fox, whom I hereby add to my list based on his better books.
must concur re Fox. his Coming of the Cosmic Christ is some kind of classic, though i'm not sure what kind.
This may be a bizarre inclusion, but I'm going to throw Arvo Part's name in the mix. He writes music, and that's a form of writing (although not what Dr. Wankler was going for I'm sure.) I've learned more from his music than I have from a lot of people's writings though, so I'm adding him to my list.
I literally just started St. Nikolai Velimirovich's Prayers by the Lake, written from a monastery overlooking Lake Ohrid in what was Yugoslavia at the time, but is in present day Macedonia I believe. If the first few pages are any indication of how the rest of this is going to go, I will be adding this book to that list. He certainly had an inspiring view: St. Nikolai was a survivor of the Dachau concentration camp and spent two years there before the camp was liberated by American forces.