Steve.....such a wonderful little essay on Carlos, and thanks for including that video from the BBC. I wonder why no documentaries were ever done on Carlos in America???

I was in college when I read the first Castaneda book, and my husband-to-be was an Anthropology student....we met because of interest in the Castaneda book.

Since then I have read all his books....each one becoming less interesting than the one before. I truly believe the first few books held the most of "truth," at least as Carlos saw it. Still, he probably did embellish everything he wrote with his own imaginative additions.

His work was fiction....and a new kind of fiction that included some real scenes within it. Passed off as non-fiction, it described a reality that was "in-between." And that gave it power. If nothing else, there was the power to IMAGINE, and if one can imagine it, one can (perhaps) experience it....or something like it.

I read a few of the "witch's" books and found them very inferior. I read Merilyn Tunneshende's books about "Don Juan" and truly enjoyed them. I read Margaret Runyon Castaneda's book about her early years with Castaneda, and also Amy Wallace's book, which was truly shocking and really made my stomach turn!

This is what I think about Carlos. I think he did meet a very Wise Native American man who cleverly used him to help himself and his friends transcend their circumstances. Someone who knew Carlos from the inside out. I don't think he knew him very long; Carlos would probably be difficult to know for very long without being repelled by him.

Carlos was what I call a "Sacred Thief." Not only did he steal from others, he also stole from his own soul. And it came back and bit him in the ass.

Yet, like all Sacred Thieves, he brought something "across the border" that changed everything. He had a hell of an imagination and was a breakthrough writer.

Every once in a while, I still think he is laughing and celebrating the fact that no one really knew him. Not even himself.