NEW AGE: Searching for The Spiritual Self

By the author of over 40 books on Western esoteric tradition, visionary consciousness and shamanism, Nevill Drury describes the way in which the New Age paradigm has absorbed the most recent discoveries of quantum physics and consciousness research. He explores the New Age focus on personal spiritual experience rather than formal religious doctrines. The New Age movement may well reflect the future of Western religion - a fusion of experiential and transformative spiritual practices grounded in the perennial wisdom traditions of both East and West. Drury explores the origins and precursors of the movement, its consolidation within the counterculture of the late 1960s and the influence of metaphysicians such as Emanuel Swedenborg, Mesmer, Madame Blavatsky and Gurdjieff, pioneering thinkers like Freud, Jung and William James, and the contribution to New Age thought of Indian and Native American spiritual traditions and transpersonal psychology. Chapters also cover Esalen and Gestalt, The Psychedelic Years, Maps for Inner Space, The Holistic Perspective, Mystics, Spirit Myth and the Cosmos, Science and Spirituality and The Challenge of Death. This is an exceptionally well illustrated quality large heavyweight softback, 224pp by publishers Thames & Hudson, much in colour. Rare 2004 first edition, 19.7 x 25cm.