Here, Feuerstein (Holy Madness, 1991) tackles the spiritual potential of sex—comparing and contrasting motifs and practices from neolithic to neo-pagan times to conclude that we need to reconnect with the ancient experience of the energy of sex. ``Our civilization encourages us to neglect the lived body, even to ignore and deprecate it,'' writes Feuerstein. ``This dovetails with the Christian ideology that the body is corrupt and that we must therefore place our attention on the Eternal, the paradise beyond the finite human body and its concerns.'' Feuerstein contrasts our disembodied, guilt-filled state with neolithic Goddess cults that purportedly encouraged—and worshipped—a magically potent, boundlessly creative female sexuality. Later in human history, he says, the spiritual power of sexuality was ritually enacted as the coupling of a god and a goddess—which evolved into the secret rites of Tantra. With the rise of the ``phallocracy'' of Greece, however, the lusty feminine part of the equation was, according to the author, lost—and with the triumph of Christianity, the essential experience of sex as sacred energy was utterly crushed in the West. Feuerstein takes heart in the magical-feminist neo-pagan movement and other ``body- positive'' efforts, but argues that an expansive vision of the divine in the ordinary is necessary to restore us fully to our senses. Only then, he says, can we experience sex as a vehicle of ``sacramental transcendence.'' An innovative treatment, muddied slightly by Feuerstein's slack writing style and tendency to overstatement. (Illustrations.)
Pub Date: March 9, 1992
ISBN: 0-87477-683-X
Page Count: 256
Publisher: TarcherPerigee
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 1992
BOOK REVIEW
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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