In 1897, an Indian yogi named Bava Lachman Dass exhibited himself at the Westminster Aquarium in London, demonstrating forty-eight yoga positions to a bemused audience. Four years earlier, Hindu philosopher Swami Vivekananda had spoken at the first World Parliament of Religions in Chicago, where theosophist Annie Besant rhapsodized about 'his inborn sense of worth' and the 'exquisite beauty' of his spiritual message. The Victorians had conflicted views on the religious beliefs and practice...

In 2002, the reclusive and legendary record producer Phil Spector gave his first interview in twenty-five years to Mick Brown. The day after it was published an actress named Lana Clarkson was shot dead in Spector's LA castle. This is Brown's odyssey into the strange life and times of Phil Spector. Beginning with that fateful meeting in Spector's home and going on to explore his colourful and extraordinary life and career, including the unfolding of the Clarkson case, this is one of the mo...

This is a narrative recounting a spiritual voyage taking the author around the world in a quest for the divine. A trail of chance, synchronicity, divine providence and the occasional railway and airline schedule, leads Brown from the extraordinary figure of the 19th-century occult adventuress Madame Blavatsky, via the philosopher Krishnamurti, to the genial Scottish clairvoyant who claims that the Christ of the age is alive and well and living in London. In India, he encounters the miracle...

In January 2000, two Ambassador taxis twisted their way up the narrow road leading towards Dharamsala in the Himalayan foothills of northern India - the home-in-exile of the Dalai Lama. In one taxi was a fourteen-year-old boy, the 17th Karmapa, one of the most important figures in Tibetan Buddhism.The boy's arrival in Dharamsala was the culmination of an extraordinary escape which had brought him 900 miles across the Himalayas, in conditions of high danger, from the monastery in Ti...

The story of Tenzin Palmo, an Englishwoman, the daughter of a fishmonger from London's East End, who spent 12 years alone in a cave 13,000 feet up in the Himalayas and became a world-renowned spiritual leader and champion of the right of women to achieve spiritual enlightenment.Diane Perry grew up in London's East End. At the age of 18 however, she read a book on Buddhism and realised that this might fill a long-sensed void in her life. In 1963, at the age of 20, she went to India,...

This book will help you to appreciate the timeless wisdom of the oldest form of Buddhism in existence today, to understand what it means to be a Buddhist, to recognize the key practices and traditions of Theravada Buddhism, and to avoid faux pas in conversation, in traveling, and in personal relationships.Access the world's religions with Simple Guides: Religion a series of concise, accessible introductions to the world's major religions. Written by experts in the f...

This book will help you to appreciate the significance of this particular school of Buddhism, famous for its focus on meditation and self-awakening, to understand the history of Zen and the Ways of Zen, to discover how Zen is a way of life — not a belief system, and to avoid faux pas in conversation, in travelling, and in personal relationshipsZen (in Chinese, Ch'an) is the form of Buddhism which the great teacher Bodhidharma brought to China from India in the late...

Love enlarges our hearts. To offer love to another human being, to the world or to God is the greatest gift of life. Love enriches every moment, every act. And, because we are only human, we love to be loved in return.Alas, human love is fleeting; the world is unloving. Only in God do we find a Beloved whose love for us is eternal and unconditional. Sri Chinmoy vividly describes how God loves us more than we can ever imagine. Through his eyes, we begin to fathom the true nature of ...

In today's multicultural society we are increasingly likely to meet and become friends with people from different religious backgrounds, and to find ourselves attending an unfamiliar ceremony. When this happens, there can be few of us who know exactly what to expect, or are confident about how to behave. This chapter from Do I Kneel or Do I Bow? will tell you everything you need to understand and take part in a Hindu ceremony. Armed with this basic information, you will feel relax...

A biography elucidating the Academy Award–nominee's meteoric rise, his tragic end, and his legacy.At the dawn of the 1990s, a new crew of leading men—Johnny Depp, Nicolas Cage, Keanu Reeves, and Brad Pitt—was rocketing toward stardom. River Phoenix, however, stood in front of the pack. But behind Phoenix's talent and beautiful public face was a young man who had been raised in a cult by nonconformist parents, who was burdened with supporting his family from a young ...

In this simple and accessible but beautifully written book, David Michie opens the door to the core teachings of Tibetan Buddhism, and shows us how he himself first began incorporating Buddhist practices into his daily life.What does it take to be happy? We've all asked ourselves this question at some point, but few of us have found the path to lasting fulfillment. David Michie thought he had achieved his life's goals--the high-level job, the expensive city apartme...

***Winner of the Oregon Book Award for General Nonfiction and Los Angeles Times bestseller"It makes good music sound better."-Janet Maslin in The New York Times***"A fascinating look into the West Coast recording studio scene of the '60s and the inside story of the music you heard on the radio. If you always assumed the musicians you listened to were the same people you saw onstage, you are in for a big surprise!"-Dusty Street, host of Classic Vinyl on Sirius XM Sa...