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Imaginary Landscape, Making Worlds of Myth and Science
In a demythologized world, William Thompson finds that the power of myth is ironically being restored at the leading edge of science. This book surveys the present, from Post-Modern theory to a science encompassing Chaos theory and the Gaia hypothesis, and finds in it the threads out of which a future conceptual landscape might be woven.
Hardcover
First published June 15, 1989
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About the author
William Irwin Thompson
50 books33 followersWilliam Irwin Thompson is an American social philosopher, cultural critic, and poet. He received the Oslo International Poetry Festival Award in 1986. He describes his writing and speaking style as "mind-jazz on ancient texts". He is the founder of the Lindisfarne Association.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 5, 2025
An amazing book thats in dialogue with intelectuals such as Ralph Abraham (chaos mathematics), Lynn Margulis & James Lovelock (Gaia theory), and Francisco Varela (neurophysiology and autopoiesis)
The book frames itself as both an intellectual autobiography and a speculative synthesis. Thompson tracks his journey from a rebellious Sixties thinker through the introspective Seventies to a new planetary vision in the Eighties, embracing a worldview he calls “planetization".
Inside we get a heremneutic analysis of Rapunzel that goes in to the sexual symbolism in folk tales with evolutionary shifts and planetary cycles, that not only shows how myths can stay releveant throughouyt the years but also transfer and tranform their meanings acting like a cultural memory that anables us to analyse the past but also help us look into the future but transcoding the meaning of the myth onto current times. After the author outlines a historical progression—from prehistoric hunter-gatherer societies through industrial civilization up to a hoped-for planetary culture—each epoch reflecting a different mentality and societal “victim”. Worth a read for its creativity and versatility.
The book frames itself as both an intellectual autobiography and a speculative synthesis. Thompson tracks his journey from a rebellious Sixties thinker through the introspective Seventies to a new planetary vision in the Eighties, embracing a worldview he calls “planetization".
Inside we get a heremneutic analysis of Rapunzel that goes in to the sexual symbolism in folk tales with evolutionary shifts and planetary cycles, that not only shows how myths can stay releveant throughouyt the years but also transfer and tranform their meanings acting like a cultural memory that anables us to analyse the past but also help us look into the future but transcoding the meaning of the myth onto current times. After the author outlines a historical progression—from prehistoric hunter-gatherer societies through industrial civilization up to a hoped-for planetary culture—each epoch reflecting a different mentality and societal “victim”. Worth a read for its creativity and versatility.
February 23, 2015
This got me through and/or made me leave art school.
May 27, 2008
A wonderful book that teaches us how to squeeze the lore and symbolism out of fairy tales. Uses Rapunzel as a case study.
March 7, 2013
I checked this book out of the UCLA Library in my attempt to find "bridges" to Rudolf Steiner, since I was soon to start a new job at a Waldorf-inspired school and was doing my best to understand this visionary whose ideas I had trouble accepting.
Thompson, the founder of Lindisfarne and father of Evan Thompson, appreciates Steiner, and I appreciate Thompson, so I thought I might find some insight.
I don't think I actually finished this book before it was due. But I enjoyed Thompson's "mind jazz" flights of imagination. He finished this book around the same time his son and Francisco Varela were working on early parts of "The Embodied Mind." (1991).
In his prologue, Thompson credits Varela, James Lovelock, Lynn Margulis and Ralph Abraham for helping him synthesize a "fourth mentality." In his typology, the first mentality is arithmetic, simply counting. The second is the geometry of Pythagoras and Plato, where the ideal is unmoving geometry.
The third is dynamic. Linear equations allow us to grapple with motion, as did Galileo, Newton and Descartes.
And the fourth is the understanding of "chaotic," complex, aperiodic phenomena made possible by non-linear equations.
Elsewhere in the book, Thompson interprets the Rapunzel myth as (in one level of interpretation) a story of the evolutionary conflict between asexual and sexual reproduction. Mind jazz, indeed.
Thompson, the founder of Lindisfarne and father of Evan Thompson, appreciates Steiner, and I appreciate Thompson, so I thought I might find some insight.
I don't think I actually finished this book before it was due. But I enjoyed Thompson's "mind jazz" flights of imagination. He finished this book around the same time his son and Francisco Varela were working on early parts of "The Embodied Mind." (1991).
In his prologue, Thompson credits Varela, James Lovelock, Lynn Margulis and Ralph Abraham for helping him synthesize a "fourth mentality." In his typology, the first mentality is arithmetic, simply counting. The second is the geometry of Pythagoras and Plato, where the ideal is unmoving geometry.
The third is dynamic. Linear equations allow us to grapple with motion, as did Galileo, Newton and Descartes.
And the fourth is the understanding of "chaotic," complex, aperiodic phenomena made possible by non-linear equations.
Elsewhere in the book, Thompson interprets the Rapunzel myth as (in one level of interpretation) a story of the evolutionary conflict between asexual and sexual reproduction. Mind jazz, indeed.
April 10, 2007
This guy sounds like a fruitcake to begin with, but I went along with it and eventually found that he linked myth and science--or knowledge of the natural--in a very interesting and unusual way. If you are at all interested in myth/folklore and biology I'd recommended this book highly.
February 28, 2008
this one was a bit over my head...
July 25, 2009
This book is superb - GAIA can be grokked and lived with harmoniously by us crazy humans
February 23, 2008
Thompson takes you on an almost hallucinogenic trip into the human imagination.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews