The Dark Legacy of Carlos Castaneda - Salon

8/12/2019 The Dark Legacy of Carlos Castaneda - Salon

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student in anthropology, a worldwide celebrity. Admirers includedJohn Lennon,William Burroughs, Federico Fellini and Jim Morrison.

Under don Juans tutelage, Castaneda took peyote, talked tocoyotes, turned into a crow, and learned how to fly. All this tookplace in what don Juan called a separate reality. Castaneda, whodied in 1998, was, from 1971 to 1982, one of the best-sellingnonfiction authors in the country. During his lifetime, his books sold

at least 10 million copies.

Castaneda was viewed by many as a compelling writer, and hisearly books received overwhelmingly positive reviews. Time calledthem beautifully lucid and remarked on a narrative powerunmatched in other anthropological studies. They were w idelyaccepted as factual, and this contributed to their success. RichardJennings, an attorney who became closely involved with Castanedain the 90s, was studying at Stanford in the early 70s when he readthe first two don Juan books. I was a searcher, he recently toldSalon. I was looking for a real path to other worlds. I wasntlooking for metaphors.

The books status as serious anthropology went a lmost

unchallenged for five years. Skepticism increased in 1972 a fter JoyceCarol Oates, in a letter to the New York Times, expressedbewilderment that a reviewer had accepted Castanedas books asnonfiction. The next year, Time published a cover story revealingthat Castaneda had lied extensively about his past. Over the nextdecade, several researchers, most prominently Richard de Mille, sonof the legendary director, worked tirelessly to demonstrate thatCastanedas work was a hoax.

In spite of this exhaustive debunking, the don Juan books still sellwell. The University of California Press, which published Castanedasfirst book, The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge,in 1968, steadily sells 7,500 copies a year. BookScan, a Nielsencompany that tracks book sales, reports that three of Castanedas

most popular titles, A Separate Reality, Journey to Ixtlan andTales of Power, sold a total of 10,000 copies in 2006. None ofCastanedas titles have ever gone out of print an impressiveachievement for any author.

Today, Simon and Schuster, Castanedas main publisher, stillclassifies his books as nonfiction. It could be argued that this labeldoesnt matter since everyone now knows don Juan was a fictionalcreation. But everyone doesnt, and the trust that some readershave invested in these books leads to a darker story that hasreceived almost no coverage in the mainstream press.

Castaneda, who disappeared from the public view in 1973, began inthe last decade of his life to organize a secretive group of devotedfollowers. His too ls were his books and Tensegrity, a movementtechnique he claimed had been passed down by 25 generations ofToltec shamans. A corporation, Cleargreen, was se t up to promoteTensegrity; it held workshops attended by thousands. Novelist anddirector Bruce Wagner, a member of Castanedas inner circle, helpedproduce a series of instructional videos. Cleargreen continues tooperate to this day, promoting Tensegrity and Castaneda steachings through workshops in Southern California, Europe andLatin America.

At the heart of Castanedas movement was a group of intenselydevoted women, all of whom were or had been his lovers. They

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dark legacy o f Carlos Castaneda - Sa lon.com http://www.sa lon.com/2007/04/12/casta

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with Cleargreen president Amalia Marquez and Tensegrity instructorKylie Lundahl. A few weeks later, Patricia Partin, Castanedasadopted daughter as well as his lover, also disappeared. InFebruary 2006, a skeleton found in Death Valley, Calif., wasidentified through DNA analysis as Partins.

Some former Castaneda associates suspect the missing womencommitted suicide. They cite remarks the women made shortly

before vanishing, and point to Castanedas frequent discussion ofsuicide in private group meetings. Achieving transcendence througha death nobly chosen, they maintain, had long been central to histeachings.

Castaneda was born in 1925 and came to the United States in 1951from Peru. Hed studied sculpture at the School of Fine Arts in Limaand hoped to make it as an artist in the United States. He worked aseries of odd jobs and took classes at Los Angeles CommunityCollege in philosophy, literature and creative writing. Most whoknew him then recall a brilliant, hilarious storyteller with mesmerizingbrown eyes. He was short (some say 5-foot-2; others 5-foot-5) andself-conscious about having his picture taken. Along with his thenwife Margaret Runyan (whose memoir, A Magical Journey With

Carlos Castaneda, he would later try to suppress) he becamefascinated by the occult.

According to Runyan, she and Cas taneda would hold long bullsessions, drinking w ine with other students. One night a friendremarked that neither the Buddha nor Jesus ever wrote anythingdown. Their teachings had been recorded by disciples, who couldhave changed things or made them up. Carlos nodded, as ifthinking carefully, wrote Runyan. Together, she and Castanedaconducted unsuccessful ESP experiments. Runyan worked for thephone company, and Castanedas first attempt at a book was anuncompleted nonfiction manuscript titled Dial Operator.

In 1959, Castaneda enrolled at UCLA, where he signed up for

California ethnography w ith archaeology professor ClementMeighan. One of the ass ignments was to interview an Indian. He gotan A for his paper, in which he spoke to an unnamed NativeAmerican about the ceremonial use of jimson weed. But Castanedawas broke and soon dropped out. He worked in a liquor store anddrove a taxi. He began to disappear for days at a time, tellingRunyan he was going to the desert. The couple separated, but soonafterward Castaneda adopted C.J., the son Runyan had had withanother man. And, for seven years, he worked on the manuscriptthat was to become The Teachings of Don Juan.

The Teachings begins w ith a young man named Carlos beingintroduced at an Arizona bus stop to don Juan, an old Yaqui Indianwhom hes told is very learned about plants. Carlos tries to

persuade the reluctant don Juan to teach him about peyote.Eventually he relents, allowing Carlos to ingest the sacred cactusbuds. Carlos sees a transparent black dog, which, don Juan latertells him, is Mescalito, a powerful supernatural being. Hisappearance is a sign that Carlos is the chosen one whos beenpicked to receive the teachings.

The Teachings is largely a dialogue between don Juan, the master,and Carlos, the student, punctuated by the ingestion of carefullyprepared mixtures of herbs and mushrooms. Carlos has s trangeexperiences that, in spite of don Juans admonitions, he continues tothink of as hallucinations. In one instance, Carlos turns into a crow

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valid ways of describing them? Toward the books end, Carlos againencounters Mescalito, whom he now accepts as real, not ahallucination.

In The Teachings, Castaneda tried to follow the conventions ofanthropology by appending a 50-page structural analysis.According to Runyan, his goal was to become a psychedelic scholaralong the lines of Aldous Huxley. Hed become disillusioned with

another hero, Timothy Leary, who supposedly mocked Castanedawhen they met at a party, earning his lifelong enmity. In 1967, hetook his manuscript to professor Meighan. Castaneda wasdisappointed when Meighan told him it would work better as a tradebook than as a scholarly monograph. But following Meighansinstructions, Castaneda took his manuscript to the University ofCalifornia Press office in Powell Library, where he showed it to JimQuebec. The editor was impressed but had doubts about itsauthenticity. Inundated by good reports from the UCLA anthropologydepartment, according to Runyan, Quebec was convinced and TheTeachings was published in the spring of 1968.

Runyan wrote that the University of California Press, fully cognizantthat a nation of drug-infatuated students was out there, moved it

into California bookstores w ith a vengeance. Sales exceeded allexpectations, and Quebec soon introduced Castaneda to NedBrown, an agent whose clients included Jackie Collins. Brown thenput Castaneda in touch with Michael Korda, Simon and Schustersnew editor in chief.

In his memoir, Another Life, Korda recounts the ir first meeting.Korda was told to wait in a hotel parking lot. A neat Volvo pulled upin front of me, and the driver waved me in, Korda writes. He was arobust, broad-chested, muscular man, with a swarthy complexion,dark eyes , black curly hair cut short, and a grin as merry as FriarTucks I had seldom, if ever, liked anybody so much so quickly Itwasnt so much what Castaneda had to say as his presence akind of charm that was partly subtle intelligence, partly a real

affection for people, and partly a kind of innocence, not of the naivekind but of the kind one likes to suppose saints, holy men, prophetsand gurus have. The next morning, Korda se t about buying therights to The Teachings. Under his new editors guidance,Castaneda published his next three books in quick succession. In ASeparate Reality, published in 1971, Carlos returns to Mexico togive don Juan a copy of his new book. Don Juan declines the gift,suggesting he d use it as toilet paper. A new cycle of apprenticeshipbegins, in which don Juan tries to teach Carlos how to see.

New characters appear, most importantly don Juans friend andfellow sorcerer don Genaro. In A Separate Reality and the twobooks that follow, Journey to Ixtlan and Tales of Power,numerous new concepts are introduced, including becoming

inaccessible, erasing personal history and stopping the world.

There are also displays of magic. Don Genaro is at one momentstanding next to Carlos; at the next, hes on top of a mountain. DonJuan uses unseen powers to help Carlos start his stalled car. And hetries to show him how to be a warrior a being who, like anenlightened Buddhist, has e liminated the ego, but who, in a moreNietzschean vein, knows hes superior to regular humans, who leadwasted, pointless lives. Don Juan also tries to teach Carlos how toenter the world of dreams, the separate reality, also referred to asthe nagual, a Spanish word taken from the Aztecs. (Later,Castaneda would shift the words meaning, making it stand not only


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In Journey to Ixtlan, Carlos starts a new round of apprenticeship.Don Juan tells him theyll no longer use drugs. These were onlynecessary when Carlos was a beginner. Many consider Ixtlan,which served as Castanedas Ph.D. thesis at UCLA, his mostbeautiful book. It also made him a millionaire. At the booksconclusion, Carlos talks to a luminous coyote. But he isnt yet readyto enter the nagual. Finally, at the end of Tales of Power, don Juan

and don Genaro take Carlos to the edge of a cliff. If he has thecourage to leap, hell at last be a full-fledged sorcerer. This timeCarlos doesnt turn back. He jumps into the abyss.

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All four books were lavishly praised. Michael Murphy, a founder ofEsalen, remarked that the essential lessons don Juan has to teachare the timeless ones that have been taught by the great sages ofIndia. There were raves in the New York Times, Harpers and theSaturday Review. Castanedas meeting with Don Juan, wroteTimes Robert Hughes, now seems one of the most fortunateliterary encounters since Boswell was introduced to Dr. Johnson.

In 1972, anthropologist Paul Riesman reviewed Castanedas firstthree books in the New York Times Book Review, writing thatCastaneda makes it clear that the teachings of don Juan do tell ussomething of how the world really is. Riesmans article ran in placeof a review the Times had initially commissioned from Weston LaBarre, one of the foremost authorities on Native American peyoteceremonies. In his unpublished article, La Barre denouncedCastanedas writing as pseudo-profound deeply vulgar pseudo-ethnography.

Contacted recently, Roger Jellinek, the editor who commissionedboth reviews, explained his decision. The Weston La Barre review,as I recall, was not so much a review as a furious ad hominemdiatribe intended to suppress, not debate, the book, he wrote viae-mail. By then I knew enough about Castaneda, from discussionswith Edmund Carpenter, the anthropologist who first put me on toCastaneda, and from my reading of renowned shamanism scholarMircea Eliadein support of my own review of Castaneda in the dailyNew York Times, to fee l strongly that The Teachings of Don Juandeserved more than a personal put-down. Hence the secondcommission to Paul Riesman, son of Harvard sociologist DavidRiesman,and a brilliant rising anthropologist. Incidentally, in all myeight years at the NYTBR, thats the only occasion I can recall of areview being commissioned twice.

Riesmans glowing review was soon followed by Oates letter to theeditor, in which she argued that the books were obvious works offiction. Then, in 1973, Time correspondent Sandra Burton found thatCastaneda had lied about his military service, his fathersoccupation, his age and his nation of birth (Peru not Brazil).

No one contributed more to Castanedas debunking than Richard deMille. De Mille, who held a Ph.D. in psychology from USC, wassomething of a freelance intellectual. In a recent interview, heremarked that because he wasnt associated w ith a university, hecould tell the story straight. People in the academy wouldnt do it,he remarked. Theyd be embarrassing the establishment.Specifically the UCLA professors who, according to de Mille, knew itwas a hoax from the start. But a hoax that, he said, supported theirtheories, which de Mille summed up succinctly: Reality doesnt exist.


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1976, he pointed to numerous internal contradictions in Castanedasfield reports and the absence of convincing details. During nineyears of collecting plants and hunting animals with don Juan, Carloslearns not one Indian name for any plant or animal, De Mille wrote.The books were also filled with implausible details. For example,while incessantly sauntering across the sands in seasons when harsh conditions keep prudent persons away, Carlos and don Juan

go quite unmolested by pests that normally torment desert hikers.

De Mille also uncovered numerous instances of plagiarism. Whendon Juan opens his mouth, he wrote, the words of particularwriters come out. His 1980 compilation, The Don Juan Papers,includes a 47-page glossary of quotations from don Juan and theirsources, ranging from Wittgenstein and C.S. Lewis to papers inobscure anthropology journals.

In one example, de Mille first quotes a passage by a mystic, YogiRamacharaka: The Human Aura is seen by the psychic observer asa luminous cloud, egg-shaped, streaked by fine lines like stiff bristlesstanding out in all directions. In A Separate Reality, a man lookslike a human egg of circulating fibers. And his arms and legs are like

luminous bristles bursting out in all directions. The accumulation ofsuch instances leads de Mille to conclude that Carloss adventuresoriginated not in the Sonoran desert but in the library at UCLA. DeMille convinced many previously sympathetic readers that don Juandid not exist. Perhaps the most glaring evidence was that the Yaquidont use peyote, and don Juan was supposedly a Yaqui shamanteaching a Yaqui way of know ledge. Even the New York Timescame around, declaring that de Milles research should satisfyanyone still in doubt.

Some anthropologists have disagreed with de Mille on certainpoints. J.T. Fikes, author of Carlos Castaneda, AcademicOpportunism and the Psychedelic Sixties, be lieves Castaneda didhave some contact with Native Americans. But hes an even fiercer

critic than de Mille, condemning Cas taneda for the effect his storieshave had on Native peoples. Following the publication of TheTeachings, thousands of pilgrims descended on Yaqui territory.When they discovered that the Yaqui dont use peyote, but that theHuichol people do, they headed to the Huichol homeland in SouthernMexico, where, according to Fikes, they caused serious disruption.Fikes recounts with outrage the story of one Huichol elder be ingmurdered by a stoned gringo.

Among anthropologists, theres no longer a debate. ProfessorWilliam W. Kelly, chairman of Yales anthropology department, toldme, I doubt youll find an anthropologist of my generation whoregards Castaneda as anything but a clever con man. It was a hoax,and surely don Juan never existed as anything like the figure of his

books. Perhaps to many it is an amusing footnote to the gullibility ofnaive scholars, although to me it remains a disturbing andunforgivable breach of ethics.

After 1973, the year of the Time expos, Castaneda never againresponded publicly to criticism. Instead, he went into seclusion, atleast as far as the press was concerned (he still went to Hollywoodparties). Claiming he was complying with don Juans instruction tobecome inaccessible, he no longer allowed himself to bephotographed, and (in the same year the existence of the Nixontapes was made public) he decided that recordings of any sort wereforbidden. He also severed ties to his past; after attending C.J.s


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And he made don Juan disappear. When The Second Ring ofPower was published in 1977, readers learned that sometimebetween the leap into the abyss at the end of Tales of Power andthe start of the new book, don Juan had vanished, evanescing into aball of light and entering the nagual. His seclusion also helpedCastaneda, now in his late 40s, conceal the alternative family hewas starting to form. The key members were three young women:

Regine Thal, Maryann Simko and Kathleen Chickie Pohlman, whomCastaneda had met while he was still active at UCLA. Simko waspursuing a Ph.D. in anthropology and was known around campus asCastanedas girlfriend. Through her, Castaneda met Thal, anotheranthropology Ph.D. candidate and Simkos friend from karate class.How Pohlman entered the picture remains unclear.

In 1973, Castaneda purchased a compound on the aptly namedPandora Avenue in Westwood. The women, soon to be known bothin his group and in his books as the witches, moved in. Theyeventua lly came to sport identical short, dyed blond haircuts similarto those later worn by the Heavens Gate cult. They also said theydstudied with don Juan.

In keeping with the philosophy of erasing persona l history, theychanged their names: Simko became Taisha Abelar; Thal, FlorindaDonner-Grau. Donner-Grau is remembered by many as Castanedasequa l in intelligence and charisma. Nicknamed the hummingbirdbecause of her ceaseless energy, she was born in Venezuela toGerman parents and claimed to have done research on theYanomami Indians. Pohlman was given a somewhat less glamorousalias: Carol Tiggs. Donner-Grau and Abelar eventually publishedtheir own books on sorcery.

The witches, along with Cas taneda, maintained a tight veil ofsecrecy. They used numerous aliases and didnt allow themselves tobe photographed. Followers were told constantly changing storiesabout their backgrounds. Only after Castanedas death did the real

facts about their lives begin to emerge. This is largely due to thework of three of his ex-followers.

In the early 90s, Richard Jennings, a Columbia Law graduate, wasliving in Los Angeles. He was the executive director of HollywoodSupports, a nonprofit group organized to fight discrimination againstpeople with HIV. Hed previously been the executive director ofGLAAD,the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. Afterreading an article in Details magazine by Bruce Wagner about ameeting with Castaneda, he became intrigued. By looking on theInternet, he found his way to one of the semi-secret workshopsbeing held around Los Angeles. He was soon invited to participate inCastanedas Sunday sessions, exclusive classes for se lect followers,where Jennings kept copious notes. From 1995 to 1998 he was

deeply involved in the group, sometimes advising on legal matters.After Castanedas death, he started a Web site, Sustained Action,for which he compiled meticulously researched chronologies, datingfrom 1947 to 1999, of the lives of Patricia Partin and the witches.

Another former insider is Amy Wallace, author of 13 books of fictionand nonfiction, including the best-selling Book of Lists, which sheco-authored with her brother David Wallechinksy and their father,novelist Irving Wallace, also a client of Kordas. (Amy Wallace hascontributed to Salon.) She first met Castaneda in 1973, while shewas still in high school. Her parents took her to a dinner party heldby agent Ned Brown. Castaneda w as there with Abelar, who then


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Castanedas numerous lovers, an experience recounted in hermemoir, Sorcerers Apprentice. Wallace now lives in East LosAngeles, where shes working on a novel about punk rock.

Gaby Geuter, an author and former travel agent, had been aworkshop attendee who hoped to join the inner circle. In 1996 sherealized she was be ing shut out. In an effort to find out the truthabout the guru whod rejected her, she, along with her husband,

Greg Mamishian, began to shadow Castaneda. In her book FilmingCastaneda, she recounts how , from a car parked near hiscompound, they secretly videotaped the groups comings andgoings. Were it not for Geuter thered be no post-1973 photographicrecord of Castaneda, who, as he aged, seemed to have retained hisimpish charm as well as a full head of silver hair. They also wentthrough his trash, discovering a treasure-trove of documents,including marriage certificates, letters and credit card receipts thatwould later provide clues to the groups history and its behaviorduring Castaneda s final days.

During the late 70s and early 80s, Jennings believes the groupprobably numbered no more than two dozen. Members, mostlywomen, came and went. At the time, a pivotal event was the

defection of Carol Tiggs, who was, according to Wallace, always themost ambivalent witch. Soon after joining, she tried to break away.She attended California Acupuncture College, married a fellowstudent and lived in Pacific Palisades. Eventually, Wallace says,Castaneda lured her back.

Castaneda had a different version. In his 1981 bestseller, TheEagles Gift, he described how Tiggs vanished into the secondattention, one of his terms for infinity. Eventually she reappearedthrough a space time portal in New Mexico. She then made her wayto L.A., where they were joyously reunited when he found her onSanta Monica Boulevard. In homage to her 10 years in anotherdimension, she was now known as the nagual woman.

Wallace believes this was an incentive to get Tiggs to rejoin.According to Wallace and Jennings, one of the w itches tasks was torecruit new members. Melissa Ward, a Los Angeles area caterer,was involved in the group from 1993 to 1994. Frequently theyrecruited at lectures, she told me. Among the goals, she said, wasto find women with a combination of brains and beauty andvulnerability. Initiation into the inner family often involved sleepingwith Cas taneda, who, the w itches claimed in public appearances,was celibate.

In Sorcerers Apprentice, Wallace provides a detailed picture of herown seduction. Because of her fathers friendship with Castaneda,her case was unusua l. Over the years, hed stop by the Wallacehome. When Irving died in 1990, Amy was living in Berkeley, Calif.

Soon after, Castaneda called and told her that her father hadappeared to him in a dream and said he was trapped in theWallaces house, and needed Amy and Carlos to free him.

Wallace, suitably skeptical, came down to L.A. and the seductionbegan in earnest. She recounts how she soon found herself in bedwith Castaneda. He told her he hadnt had sex for 20 years. WhenWallace later worried she might have gotten pregnant (theyd usedno birth control), Castaneda leapt from the bed, shouting, Me makeyou pregnant? Impossible! The naguals sperm isnt human Dontlet any of the naguals sperm out, nena. It will burn away yourhumanness. He didnt mention the vasectomy hed had years


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were energetically married. One afternoon, he took her to thesorcerers compound. As they were leaving, Wallace looked at astreet sign so she could remember the location. Castaneda furiouslyberated her: A warrior wouldnt have looked. He ordered her toreturn to Berkeley. She did. When she called, he refused to speak toher.

The witches, however, did, instructing Wallace on the sorceric stepsnecessary to return. She had to let go of her attachments. Wallacegot rid of her cats. This didnt cut it. Castaneda, she wrote, got onthe phone and called her an egotistical, spoiled Jew. He ordered herto get a job at McDonalds. Instead, Wallace waitressed at a bedand breakfast. Six months later she was allowed back.

Aspiring warriors, say Jennings, Wallace and Ward, were urged tocut off all contact with their past lives, as don Juan had instructedCarlos to do, and as Castaneda had done by cutting off his wife andadopted son. He was telling us how to get out of familyobligations, Jennings told me. Being in one-on-one relationshipswould hold you back from the path. Castaneda was telling us how toget out of commitments with family, down to small points like how to

avoid hugging your parents directly. Jennings estimates that duringhis four years with the group, between 75 and 100 people were toldto cut off their families. He doesnt know how many did.

For some initiates, the separation was brutal and final. According toWallace, acolytes were told to tell their families, I send you to hell.Both Wallace and Jennings tell of one young woman who, in thegroups early years, had been ordered by Castaneda to hit hermother, a Holocaust survivor. Many years later, Wallace told me, thewoman cried about it. Shed done it because she thought he wasso psychic he could tell if she didnt. Wallace also describes how,when one young mans parents died soon after being cut off,Castaneda singled him out for praise, remarking, When you reallydo it, don Juan told me, they die instantly, as if you were squashing

a flea and thats all they are, fleas.Before entering the innermost circle, at least some followers wereled into a position of emotional and financial dependence. Wardremembers a woman named Peggy who was instructed to quit herjob. She was told shed then be given cash to get a phone-lessapartment, where she would wait to hear from Castaneda or thewitches. Peggy fled before this happened. But Ward said this was acommon practice with women about to be brought into the familyscore.

Valerie Kadium, a librarian, who from 1995 to 1996 took part in theSunday sessions, recalls one participant who, after severalmeetings, decided to commit himself fully to the group. He went toVermont to shut down his business, but on returning to L.A., he wastold he could no longer participate; he was too late. Hed failed tograsp the cubic centimeter of chance that, said Kadium, Castanedaoften spoke of. Jennings had to quit his job with HollywoodSupports; his work required him to interact with the media, but thiswas impossible: Sorcerers couldnt have their pictures taken.

But there were rewards. I was totally affected by these people,Jennings told me. I felt like Id found a family. I felt like Id found apath. Kadium recalls the first time she saw Tensegrity instructorKylie Lundahl onstage she saw an aura around her, an apricotglow. Remembering her early days with the group, she remarked,


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Although she was later devastated when Castaneda banished herfrom the Sunday sessions, telling her the spirits spit you out, sheeventually recovered, and now remembers this as the most excitingtime of her life. According to all who knew him, Castaneda wasntonly mesmerizing, he also had a great sense of humor. One of thereasons I was involved was the idea that I was in this fascinating,on the edge, avant garde, extraordinary group of beings, Wallace

said. Life was always exciting. We were free from the tedium of theworld.

And because, as Jennings puts it, Castaneda was a control freak,followers were often freed from the anxiety of decision-making.Some had more independence, but even Wallace and Bruce Wagner,both of whom were given a certain leeway, were sometimes,according to Wallace, required to have their writing vetted byDonner-Grau. Jennings and Wallace a lso report that Castanedadirected the inner circles sex lives in great deta il.

The most difficult part, Wallace believes, was that you never knewwhere you stood. Hed pick someone, crown them, and was ascapable of kicking them out in 48 hours as keeping them 10 years.

You never knew. So there was always trepidation, a lot of jealousy.Sometimes initiates were banished for obscure spiritual offenses,such as drinking cappuccino (which Castaneda himself guzzled ingreat quantities). Theyd no longer be invited to the compound.Phone calls wouldnt be returned. Having been allowed for a timeinto a secret, magical family, theyd be abruptly cut off. For some,Wallace believes, this pattern was highly traumatic. In a weirdway, she said, the worst thing that can happen is when youreloved and loved and then abused and abused, and there are norules, and the rules keep changing, and you can never do right, butthen all of a sudden theyre kissing you. Thats the most crazy-making behavioral modification there is. And thats what Carlosspecialized in; he was not stupid.

Whether disciples were allowed to stay or forced to leave seemsoften to have depended on the whims of a woman known as theBlue Scout. Trying to describe her power, Ward recalled a TwilightZone episode in which a little boy could look at people and makethem die. So everyone treated him with kid gloves, she said, andthats how it was with the Blue Scout. She was born Patricia Partinand grew up in LaVerne, Calif., where, according to Jennings, herfather had been in an accident that left him with permanent braindamage. Partin dropped out of Bonita High her junior year. Shebecame a wa itress, and, at 19, married an aspiring filmmaker, MarkSilliphant, who introduced her to Castaneda in 1978. Within weeksof their marriage she left Silliphant and went to live with Castaneda.She paid one last visit to her mother; in keeping with the nagualsinstructions, she refused to be in a family photograph. For the rest

of her life, she never spoke to her mother aga in.

Castaneda renamed Partin Nury Alexander. She was also Claudeas well as the Blue Scout. She soon emerged as one of his favorites(Castaneda officially adopted her in 1995). Followers were told he dconceived her with Tiggs in the nagual. He said she had a very rareenergy; she was barely human high praise from Castaneda.Partin, a perpetual student at UCLA and an inveterate shopper atNeiman Marcus, was infantilized. In later years, new followers wouldbe assigned the task of playing dolls with her.

In the late 80s, perhaps because book sales had slowed, or


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- - - - - - -

If Castanedas early books drew on Buddhism and phenomenology,his later work seemed more indebted to science fiction. Butthroughout, there was a preoccupation w ith meeting death like awarrior. In the 90s, Castaneda told his followers that, like don Juan,he wouldnt die hed burn from within, turn into a ball of light, and

ascend to the heavens.In the summer of 1997, he was diagnosed with liver cancer. Becausesorcerers werent supposed to get s ick, his illness remained a tightlyguarded secret. While the witches desperately pursued traditionaland a lternative treatments, the workshops continued as if nothingwas wrong (although Castaneda often wasnt there). One of thewitches, Abelar, flew to Florida to inspect yachts. Geuter, in notestaken at the time, wondered, Why are they buying a boat? Maybe Carlos wants to leave w ith his group, and disappearunnoticed in the w ide-open oceans.

No boats w ere purchased. Castaneda continued to decline. Hebecame increasingly frail, his eyes yellow and jaundiced. He rarelyleft the compound. According to Wallace, Tiggs told her the witcheshad purchased guns. While the nagual lay bedridden with amorphine drip, watching war videos, the inner circle burned hispapers. A grieving Abelar had begun to drink. Im not in any dangerof becoming an alcoholic now, she told Wallace. Because Imleaving, so its too late. Wallace writes: She was telling me, inher way, that she planned to die.

Wallace also recalls a conversation with Lundahl, the star of theTensegrity videos and one of the women who disappeared: If Idont go w ith him, Ill do what I have to do, Wallace says Lundahltold her. Its too late for you and me to remain in the world Ithink you know exactly what I mean.

In April 1998, Geuter filmed the inner circle packing up the house.

The next week, at age 72, Castaneda died. He was cremated at theCulver City mortuary. No one knows what became of his ashes.Within days, Donner-Grau, Abelar, Partin, Lundahl and Marquez hadtheir phones disconnected and vanished. A few weeks later, Partinsred Ford Escort was found abandoned in Death Valleys PanamintDunes.

Even within the inner circle, few knew that Castaneda was dead.Rumors spread. Many were in despair: The nagual hadnt burnedfrom within. Jennings didnt learn until two weeks later, when Tiggscalled to tell him Castaneda was gone. The witches, she said,were elsewhere.

In a proposal for a biography of Castaneda, a project Jennings

eventually chose not to pursue, he writes that Tiggs a lso told meshe was supposed to have gone w ith them, but a non-decisiondecision kept me here. Meanwhile, the workshops continued.Carol also banned mourning within Cleargreen, Jennings w rites,so its members hid their grief, often drowning it in alcohol ordrugs. Wallace, too, recalls a lot of drug use: I dont know if theytried to OD so much as to get there. Get to Carlos. Jenningshimself drove to the desert and thought about committing suicide.

The media didnt learn of Castanedas death for two months. Whenthe news became public, Cleargreen members stopped answeringtheir phones. They soon placed a statement, which Jennings says


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definitive journey of awareness, crossing over to total freedom warriors can keep their awareness, which is ordinarily relinquished,at the moment of dying. At the moment of crossing, the body in itsentirety is kindled with knowledge Carlos Castaneda left the worldthe same way that his teacher, don Juan Matus did: with fullawareness.

Many obituaries had a curious tone; the writers seemed uncertain

whether to call Castaneda a fraud. Some expressed a kind ofnostalgia for an author whose work had meant so much to so manyin their youth. Korda refused comment. De Mille, in an interview withfilmmaker Ralph Torjan, expressed a certain admiration. He was theperfect hoaxer, he told Torjan, because he never admittedanything.

Jennings, Wallace and Geuter believe the missing women likelycommitted suicide. Wallace told me about a phone call to Donner-Graus parents not long a fter the women disappeared. Donner-Grauhad been one of the few a llowed to maintain contact with her family.They were w eeping, Wallace sa id, because there w as nogoodbye. They didnt know what had happened. This was a fterdecades of being in touch with them.

Castanedas will, executed three days be fore his death, leaveseverything to an entity known as the Eagles Trust. According toJennings, who obtained a copy of the trust agreement, the missingwomen have a considerable amount of money due to them. DeborahDrooz, the executor of Castanedas estate, said she has had nocontact with the w omen. She added that she believes they are stillalive.

Jennings believes Castaneda knew they were planning to killthemselves. He used to talk about suicide all the time, even forminor things, Jennings to ld me. He added that Partin was once sentto identify abandoned mines in the desert, which could be used aspotential suicide sites. (Theres an abandoned mine not far from

where her remains were found.) He regularly told us he was ouronly hope, Jennings said. We were all supposed to go together,make the leap, whatever that meant. What did Jennings think itmeant? I didnt know fully, he said. Hed describe it in differentways. So would the witches. It seemed to be what they were livingfor, something we were being promised.

The promise may have been based on the final scene in Tales ofPower, in which Carlos leaps from a cliff into the nagual. The sceneis later retold in varying versions. In his 1984 book, The Fire FromWithin, Castaneda wrote: I didnt die at the bottom of that gorge and neither did the other apprentices who had jumped at anearlier time because we never reached it; all of us, under theimpact of such a tremendous and incomprehensible act as jumping

to our deaths, moved our assemblage points and assembled otherworlds.

Did Castaneda really believe this? Wallace thinks so. He becamemore and more hypnotized by his own reveries, she told me. Ifirmly believe Carlos brainwashed himself. Did the witches? Geuterput it this way: Florinda, Taisha and the Blue Scout knew it was afantasy structure. But when you have thousands of eyes lookingback at you, you begin to believe in the fantasy. These womennever had to answer to the real world. Carlos had snatched themwhen they were very young.


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impossible to know what anyone really thought. However, she toldme, after living so long with Castaneda, the women may have feltthey had no choice. Youve cut off all your ties, she said. Nowyoure going to go back after all these decades? Who are you goingto go be w ith? And you feel that youre not one of the common herdanymore. Thats why they killed themselves.

On its Web s ite, Cleargreenmaintains that the women didnt

depart. However, for the moment they are not going to appearpersonally at the workshops because they want this dream to takewings.

Remarkably, there seems to have been no investigation into at leastthree of the disappearances. Except for Donner-Grau, theyd allbeen estranged from their families for years. For months after theyvanished, none of the other families knew what had happened. Andso, according to Geuter, no one reported them missing. Salonattempted to locate the three missing women, relying on publicrecords and phone calls to their previous residences, but discoveredno current trace of them. The Los Angeles Police Department andthe FBI confirm that theres been no official inquiry into thedisappearances of Donner-Grau, Abelar and Lundahl.

There is, however, a file open in the Marquez case. This is due to thetireless efforts of Luis Marquez, who told Salon that he first tried toreport his sister missing in 1999. But the LAPD, he said, repeatedlyignored him. A year later, he and his sister Carmen wrote a letter tothe missing-persons unit; again, no response. According to Marquez,it wasnt until Partins remains were identified that the LAPD openeda file on Amalia. To this day, he told me, they still refuse to askany questions or visit Cleargreen. His own attempts to getinformation from Cleargreen have been fruitless. According toMarquez, all hes been told is that the women are traveling.Detective Lydia Dillard, assigned to the Marquez case, said thatbecause this is an open investigation, she couldnt confirm whetheranyone from Cleargreen had been interviewed.

In 2002, a Taos, N.M., woman, Janice Emery, a Castaneda followerand workshop attendee, jumped to her death in the Rio Grandegorge. According to the Santa Fe New Mexican, Emery had a headinjury brought on by cancer. One of Emerys friends told thenewspaper that Emery wanted to be with Castanedas people.Said another: I think she was really thinking she could fly off. Ayear later, a skeleton was discovered near the site of Partinsabandoned Ford. The Inyo County sheriffs department suspected itwas hers. But, due to its desiccated condition, a positiveidentification couldnt be made until February 2006, when new DNAtechnology became available.

Wallace recalls how Castaneda had told Partin that if you ever

need to rise to infinity, take your little red car and drive it as fast asyou can into the desert and you w ill ascend. And, Wallace believes,thats exactly what she did: She took her little red car, drove it intothe desert, didnt ascend, got out, wandered around and faintedfrom dehydration.

Partins death and the disappearance of the other women arentCastanedas entire legacy. Hes been acknowledged as an importantinfluence by figures ranging from Deepak Chopra to George Lucas.Without a doubt, Castaneda opened the doors of perception fornumerous readers, and many workshop attendees found theexperience deeply meaningful. There are those who testify to the


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answers to the big questions. He helped me, Geuter said. But forfive of his closest companions, his teachings and his insistence ontheir literal truth may have cost them their lives.

Long after Castaneda had been discredited in academia, Kordacontinued to insist on his authenticity. In 2000, he wrote: I havenever doubted for a moment the truth of his stories about donJuan. Castanedas books have been profitable for Simon and

Schuster, and according to Korda, were for many years one of theprops on which the publisher rested. Cas taneda might haveachieved some level of success if his books had been presented, asJames Redfields Celestine Prophecy is, as allegorical fiction. ButCastaneda always insisted he d made nothing up. If he hadntpresented his stories as fact, Wallace told me, its unlikely the cultwould exist. As nonfiction, it became impossibly more dangerous.

To this day, Simon and Schuster stands by Kordas position. Whenasked w hether, in the face of overwhelming evidence to thecontrary, the publisher still regarded Castanedas books asnonfiction, Adam Rothenberg, the vice pres ident for corporatecommunication, replied that Simon and Schuster w ill continue topublish Castaneda as we always have. Tensegrity classes are still

held around the world. Workshops were recently conducted inMexico City and Hanover, Germany. Wagners videos are stillavailable from Cleargreen. According to the terms of Castanedaswill, book royalties still help support a core group of acolytes. OnSimon and Schusters Web s ite, Castaneda is still described as ananthropologist. No mention is made of his fiction.

Robert Marshall's novel, "A Separate Reality," was released last fall from

Carroll & Graf. A visual artist as well as a writer, he lives in New York

City.

MORE ROBERT MARSHALL.

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The Dark Legacy of Carlos Castaneda - Salon

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