Alan Watts

Alan Watts was an intellectual and a popular interpreter of Eastern philosophies who came to prominence during the 1960s. The author of such works as The Way of Zen and Nature, Man and Woman, and The Book On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are, Watts recorded with Warner Bros. in 1967. The album is an introduction to Hindu thoughts and tradition, backed by drone rock performed on traditional Indian instruments. Watts was born in England in 1915 and published his first essay at 16 or the Journal of the Buddhist Lodge of London. He came to the United States in 1938 and became the Episcopal chaplain at Northwestern University during World War II. Watts went on to become dean of the American Academy of Asian Studies in San Francisco and made the public television series Eastern Wisdom and Modern Life. The sage cultivated an audience of millions through more than two dozen books along with lectures, recordings, and countless radio and TV appearances. Watts saw the problem of modern man as his alienation from his fellow man, and tried to mend it as a consultant for psychiatric institutions and hospitals and even the United States Air Force. He spent the mid-’60s traveling through Asia with his students. He died in California in 1973. ~ Ron DePasquale