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by Robert Greenfield (Author)
To a generation in full revolt against any form of authority, "Tune in, turn on, drop out" became a mantra, and its popularizer, Dr. Timothy Leary, a guru. A charismatic and brilliant psychologist, Leary became first intrigued and then obsessed by the effects of psychedelic drugs in the 1960s while teaching at Harvard, where he not only encouraged but instituted their experimental use among students and faculty. What began as research into human consciousness turned into a mission to alter consciousness itself. Leary transformed himself from serious social scientist into counterculture shaman, embodying the idealism and the hedonism of an age of revolutionary change.
Timothy Leary is the first major biography of one of the most controversial figures in postwar America.Back Jacket
In the first major biography of Timothy Leary, Robert Greenfield immerses the reader in the life and times of a compelling but troubled American icon.
To a generation in open revolt against any form of authority, Tune in, turn on, drop out became a mantra, and its popularizer, Dr. Timothy Leary, a guru. While in Mexico in 1960, Leary, then a charismatic lecturer in Harvard s psychology department, tried magic mushrooms for the first time and immediately became convinced that first psilocybin and then LSD could fling open the doors of perception. Under the aegis of Aldous Huxley, Leary launched the Harvard Psychedelic Project and transformed himself into a psychedelic messiah who promised it all: self-liberation, hedonistic satisfaction, and spiritual fulfillment.
"Compulsively readable."--New York Observer
"It will never be necessary to write another [biography of Leary]."
Louis Menand, The New Yorker
"Leary's wild ride is the subject of a hugely entertaining new biography by Robert Greenfield, the first man to take on the myth. LA Weekly
ROBERT GREENFIELD is the author of a biography of Jerry Garcia and a book about rock impresario Bill Graham, which won a Ralph J. Gleason Award and the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for Excellence. He lives in California.
A James H. Silberman Book"
