Richard Roberts

The Impermanent Press is pleased to be the exclusive online distributor for these titles from the Vernal Equinox Press:

The Wind and The Wizard	Critical Praise	Order Info	Review
The Original Tarot & You		Order Info
Tarot Revelations with Joseph Campbell	Critical Praise	Order Info
Tales For Jung Folk	Critical Praise	Order Info
From Eden To Eros	Critical Praise	Order Info
Dance Unto Death	Critical Praise	Order Info
Save the Whales		Order Info
About Richard Roberts

Every once in a rare while comes a rare book: a book that virtually defies categorization; a book that actually, unbelievably, breaks new literary or philosophical ground. Finnegans Wake comes to mind, as does Robert Anton Wilson's Schroedinger's Cat.

Such a rare treat is Richard Roberts' novel The Wind and The Wizard. Dr. James Daley of the Dept. of Psychology at Diablo Valley College in Northern California writes in his cover blurb that the book is "at once an exploration of cosmic myth, a highly-conscious Jungian tale of the individuation path, an alchemical parable...and a fantasy/science fiction adventure of great fun."

Even this detailed description does little more than scratch the surface. And if it takes this much detail just to scratch the surface, imagine how much brilliance it took to conceive and write such a book — much less to make it work. In addition — the icing on the cake — it's a supremely entertaining read as well.

But we get ahead of ourselves. First things first:

The Wind and The Wizard is based on a unique conceit: drawing initially on a mythical image from Zimmer's "The King and the Corpse," a young orphan boy's magical monkey becomes the agent of transformation to miraculously transport them into Kenneth Grahame's novel The Wind in the Willows. Here they find themselves not only participating in the action, but actually affecting it. Once they learn what needs to be learned -- the first piece of an unraveling mystery concerning the nature and relationship of time, space and consciousness -- the two fantasy travelers are transported into another classic children's novel, where their adventures (as well as their education and emotional growth) continue. By the end of the action, young Bertie and Bongo have inhabited and assimilated the meanings of half a dozen acknowledged classics of children's literature, including Peter Pan, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and The Marvelous Land of Oz. And Bertie has learned the lessons necessary to transform not only his life but his entire universe.

This multi-leveled masterpiece succeeds on every level. As a nostalgic recreation of the classics of children's literature on which most of us were weaned, The Wind and The Wizard, (each chapter of which is written in the style of the book Bertie is inhabiting) is more than a mere pastiche; it's a tone-perfect recreation and continuation of these stories. For any of us who've ever yearned for more Oz adventures, or more of Peter Pan or Sherlock Holmes, here they are at last. Thus Roberts disproves Wolfe: You can go home again — if a generous genius cares enough to guide you there.

Roberts, a long-time friend of and collaborator (Tarot Revelations, 1979) with the late scholar of mythology Joseph Campbell, continues Campbell's work in his divination of the mythic meaning in these fairy tales, and goes several steps further in analyzing them. For Bertie, each of the characters he encounters becomes a living symbol of transformation as he weaves his way toward enlightenment; each represents one of the Jungian functions of personality as he spirals slowly toward psychological wholeness.

As if this is not enough, much of the book is devoted to the radical cosmology of physicist Stephen Hawking, which Roberts ties into psychology and consciousness.

Heady stuff! And yet this is not to imply the book is dense or unreadable. Just the opposite. It was written, after all, as a children's book — with enough sprightly humor, wicked puns and ecstatic adventures to capture the mind of any child, and enough intellectual depth to hold the interest of any student of physics and consciousness. We should rejoice that we can be taught serious wisdom through this painless and playful medium.

Roberts' awesome talent and insight have gestated in a number of previous books, but come to full fruition in The Wind and The Wizard — a book which is a gentle, fun-filled quantum leap in imaginative literature.

First published in 1971 as Tarot & You, this milestone in Tarot literature introduced the free-association technique of psychology to Tarot divination, which previously had depended upon books of pre-determined interpretations of the cards, similar to medieval dream books. Tarot & You was also the first book to make a correlation between the depth psychology of C.G. Jung and Tarot. This quality paperback edition contains all 19 spreads from the original hardback edition, enabling the reader to find the spread best suited to his own talents and abilities. Among these card layouts is the author's original creation, The Jungian Spread — a method of revealing the archetypes in the personal unconscious. The book also contains a transcript of the author's Jungian Spread reading for famed scholar of mythology Joseph Campbell.

An analysis of the mysterious philosophy in the ancient Tarot cards. Citing Dante, C.G. Jung, early alchemists and Gnostics, famed scholar of mythology Joseph Campbell his friend and student Richard Roberts reveal a "path" that has psychological and spiritual meaning for everyone in the modern world.

Says Richard Roberts of this book: "It is my thesis that Waite's Tarot is specifically alchemical in theme, restoring what may have been the original orientation of the Tarot. In the twenty-two cards comprising the Major Arcana we have a genuine Gnostic document of the soul's initiation into higher consciousness. As such, the Major Arcana may be interpreted as a Western Book of the Dead."

A decade before his death, Campbell stated of this collaboration, "We have come to revelations of a grandiose poetic vision of Universal Man that has been for centuries the inspiration both of saints and sinners, sages and fools, in kaleidoscopic transformation. It is our hope and expectation that our readers, too, may be carried through the picture play of the magic of The Magician's wand and guidance of The Prophetess, to insights such as my lead, in the end, to the joy in the wisdom of The Fool."

In the 1970s, when author Richard Roberts was giving seminars on Jungian psychology with Joseph Campbell, he began having dreams about the archetypes. Campbell suggested he write them down, and Roberts collected the polished stories in this book. First published in 1983, Tales For Jung Folk has been used in numerous college courses, as it provides a clear gateway to a poetic knowledge of Jung's archetypes. Each story is followed by a primer describing the archetype (with appropriate quotations from the works of Jung) as well as exercises through which the reader can relate his or her own experience with the archetype through the use of dreams, guided fantasies and personal reminiscences.

For most of us, religious education begins with the Bible and a masculine concept of God. Utilizing lost books of the Bible and ancient Gnostic texts, author Richard Roberts reveals that the Old Testament deity, Jehovah, had been created by a feminine deity, Sophia, in order that He might create the world...but after the Creation, He falls victim to a bad case of chauvinism, declaring Himself the Supreme God.

Scholar of mythology Joseph Campbell was wont to say, "You can't read the Bible as history." What meaning, then, lies beneath the surface of the Genesis scene of the Tree, the Serpent, and Eve? By regressing the stars to 4,000 BC in a planetarium, the author provides conclusive evidence that this tableau comprised figures in a constellation worshipped by the followers of the Great Mother Goddess, long before the composition of the Book of Genesis. However, whereas Eve's serpent formerly inspired reverence for the inherently divine principle in nature, the scene is rendered in the present with a contrary meaning: fallen woman, fallen nature, and an evil serpent cursed by God. This act of "rewriting" Mankind's spiritual heritage in Genesis was the origin of what Roberts terms "the putdown of women."

After discussing what Roberts describes as "the pathology of patriarchy," he examines the religions of the Great Mother, tracing her dominant influence for some 6,000 years, from 7200 BC. to 1200 BC. — the dawn of the Iron Age.

In the final chapter, "Eros," Roberts discusses the psychic integration of masculine and feminine elements in order to promote a new harmony of the sexes, and why the witchcraft craze was a uniquely male hysteria. Given the programming to which the clergy had been subjected for 1,400 years, specifically in regard to the evil and dangerous nature of women, it was inevitable that the projection of women as evil (i.e., "witches") would arise from the collective unconscious.

Joseph Campbell's lifelong love affair with Native American mythologies had a great influence on Roberts, and a mystical vision of Sitting Bull determined him to write this book. All the events and characters are historically correct, and much of Campbell's philosophy about the nature of the deity finds its way into the words of Sitting Bull.

In this ecological science fiction novel, ancient Atlanteans evolve into modern dolphins and begin instructing their trainers. In the redemptive ending, the risen spirit of Joseph Campbell presides over the salvation of the earth's cetaceans.

Richard Roberts' literary career began in college, when he received an award for his poetry in The Atlantic Monthly's annual college writing contest. After teaching college English, Roberts came to California, where he won an award from KRON-TV for his play "The Paper Rose." Subsequently, he became a San Francisco playwright-in-residence with Jules Irving's highly esteemed Actor's Workshop.

In the 1960s, Alan Watts presented Roberts with a letter of introduction to Joseph Campbell, which led to a 20-year mentorship with the famed scholar of mythology — a partnership which included collaborating in seminars and writing books, and which lasted through the remainder of Campbell's life.

Campbell's influence on Roberts continued even after the latter's death in 1987. In Roberts' Save The Whales — a dramatic screenplay published in book form — Campbell's living spirit is resurrected in a cosmic reunion. It was Campbell's lifelong love affair with Native American mythologies which influenced Roberts to write Dance Unto Death, after Roberts experienced a vision of Sitting Bull. All the events and characters are historically correct, and much of Campbell's philosophy about the nature of the deity finds its way into the words of Sitting Bull.

In his college days, Roberts had vowed never to write a novel until he had an idea no writer before him ever had. In a vision, he conceived of a book in which his characters would "go into" other literary classics and interact with the characters, all the while writing in the style of the original authors of those classics. Roberts regards the resulting book, The Wind & The Wizard, as his life's masterwork.

Richard Roberts currently resides in a redwood forest in Marin County, just north of the Golden Gate Bridge in California.