For fans of the literary con, its been a great few years.

Currently, we have Rich

ard Gere starring as Clifford Irving in The Hoax, a film about the 70s novelist who
penned a faux autobiography of Howard Hughes. Weve had the unmasking of James Fr
ey, JT LeRoy/Laura Albert and Harvards Kaavya Viswanathan, who plagiarized large
chunks of her debut novel, forcing her publisher, Little, Brown and Co., to reca
ll the book. Much has been written about the slippery boundaries between fiction
and nonfiction, the publishing industrys responsibility for distinguishing betwe
en the two, and the potential damage to readers. Theres been, however, hardly a m
ention of the 20th centurys most successful literary trickster: Carlos Castaneda.
If this name draws a blank for readers under 30, all they have to do is ask thei
r parents. Deemed by Time magazine the Godfather of the New Age, Castaneda was the
literary embodiment of the Woodstock era. His 12 books, supposedly based on mee
tings with a mysterious Indian shaman, don Juan, made the author, a graduate stu
dent in anthropology, a worldwide celebrity. Admirers included John Lennon, Will
iam Burroughs, Federico Fellini and Jim Morrison.
Under don Juans tutelage, Castaneda took peyote, talked to coyotes, turned into a
crow, and learned how to fly. All this took place in what don Juan called a sepa
rate reality. Castaneda, who died in 1998, was, from 1971 to 1982, one of the bes
t-selling nonfiction authors in the country. During his lifetime, his books sold
at least 10 million copies.
Castaneda was viewed by many as a compelling writer, and his early books receive
d overwhelmingly positive reviews. Time called them beautifully lucid and remarked
on a narrative power unmatched in other anthropological studies. They were widely
accepted as factual, and this contributed to their success. Richard Jennings, a
n attorney who became closely involved with Castaneda in the 90s, was studying at
Stanford in the early 70s when he read the first two don Juan books. I was a sear
cher, he recently told Salon. I was looking for a real path to other worlds. I was
nt looking for metaphors.
The books status as serious anthropology went almost unchallenged for five years.
Skepticism increased in 1972 after Joyce Carol Oates, in a letter to the New Yo
rk Times, expressed bewilderment that a reviewer had accepted Castanedas books as
nonfiction. The next year, Time published a cover story revealing that Castaned
a had lied extensively about his past. Over the next decade, several researchers
, most prominently Richard de Mille, son of the legendary director, worked tirel
essly to demonstrate that Castanedas work was a hoax.
In spite of this exhaustive debunking, the don Juan books still sell well. The U
niversity of California Press, which published Castanedas first book, The Teaching
s of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, in 1968, steadily sells 7,500 copies a y
ear. BookScan, a Nielsen company that tracks book sales, reports that three of C
astanedas most popular titles, A Separate Reality, Journey to Ixtlan and Tales of Powe
r, sold a total of 10,000 copies in 2006. None of Castanedas titles have ever gone
out of print an impressive achievement for any author.
Today, Simon and Schuster, Castanedas main publisher, still classifies his books
as nonfiction. It could be argued that this label doesnt matter since everyone no
w knows don Juan was a fictional creation. But everyone doesnt, and the trust tha
t some readers have invested in these books leads to a darker story that has rec
eived almost no coverage in the mainstream press.
Castaneda, who disappeared from the public view in 1973, began in the last decad
e of his life to organize a secretive group of devoted followers. His tools were
his books and Tensegrity, a movement technique he claimed had been passed down
by 25 generations of Toltec shamans. A corporation, Cleargreen, was set up to pr
omote Tensegrity; it held workshops attended by thousands. Novelist and director
Bruce Wagner, a member of Castanedas inner circle, helped produce a series of in

structional videos. Cleargreen continues to operate to this day, promoting Tense

grity and Castanedas teachings through workshops in Southern California, Europe a
nd Latin America.
At the heart of Castanedas movement was a group of intensely devoted women, all o
f whom were or had been his lovers. They were known as the witches, and two of t
hem, Florinda Donner-Grau and Taisha Abelar, vanished the day after Castanedas de
ath, along with Cleargreen president Amalia Marquez and Tensegrity instructor Ky
lie Lundahl. A few weeks later, Patricia Partin, Castanedas adopted daughter as w
ell as his lover, also disappeared. In February 2006, a skeleton found in Death
Valley, Calif., was identified through DNA analysis as Partins.
Some former Castaneda associates suspect the missing women committed suicide. Th
ey cite remarks the women made shortly before vanishing, and point to Castanedas
frequent discussion of suicide in private group meetings. Achieving transcendenc
e through a death nobly chosen, they maintain, had long been central to his teac
hings.
Castaneda was born in 1925 and came to the United States in 1951 from Peru. Hed s
tudied sculpture at the School of Fine Arts in Lima and hoped to make it as an a
rtist in the United States. He worked a series of odd jobs and took classes at L
os Angeles Community College in philosophy, literature and creative writing. Mos
t who knew him then recall a brilliant, hilarious storyteller with mesmerizing b
rown eyes. He was short (some say 5-foot-2; others 5-foot-5) and self-conscious
about having his picture taken. Along with his then wife Margaret Runyan (whose
memoir, A Magical Journey With Carlos Castaneda, he would later try to suppress) h
e became fascinated by the occult.
According to Runyan, she and Castaneda would hold long bull sessions, drinking w
ine with other students. One night a friend remarked that neither the Buddha nor
Jesus ever wrote anything down. Their teachings had been recorded by disciples,
who could have changed things or made them up. Carlos nodded, as if thinking car
efully, wrote Runyan. Together, she and Castaneda conducted unsuccessful ESP expe
riments. Runyan worked for the phone company, and Castanedas first attempt at a b
ook was an uncompleted nonfiction manuscript titled Dial Operator.
In 1959, Castaneda enrolled at UCLA, where he signed up for California ethnograp
hy with archaeology professor Clement Meighan. One of the assignments was to int
erview an Indian. He got an A for his paper, in which he spoke to an unnamed Nativ
e American about the ceremonial use of jimson weed. But Castaneda was broke and
soon dropped out. He worked in a liquor store and drove a taxi. He began to disa
ppear for days at a time, telling Runyan he was going to the desert. The couple
separated, but soon afterward Castaneda adopted C.J., the son Runyan had had wit
h another man. And, for seven years, he worked on the manuscript that was to bec
ome The Teachings of Don Juan.
The Teachings begins with a young man named Carlos being introduced at an Arizona
bus stop to don Juan, an old Yaqui Indian whom hes told is very learned about plan
ts. Carlos tries to persuade the reluctant don Juan to teach him about peyote. Ev
entually he relents, allowing Carlos to ingest the sacred cactus buds. Carlos se
es a transparent black dog, which, don Juan later tells him, is Mescalito, a pow
erful supernatural being. His appearance is a sign that Carlos is the chosen one w
hos been picked to receive the teachings.
The Teachings is largely a dialogue between don Juan, the master, and Carlos, the
student, punctuated by the ingestion of carefully prepared mixtures of herbs and
mushrooms. Carlos has strange experiences that, in spite of don Juans admonition
s, he continues to think of as hallucinations. In one instance, Carlos turns int
o a crow and flies. Afterward, an argument ensues: Is there such a thing as obje
ctive reality? Or is reality just perceptions and different, equally valid ways

of describing them? Toward the books end, Carlos again encounters Mescalito, whom
he now accepts as real, not a hallucination.
In The Teachings, Castaneda tried to follow the conventions of anthropology by app
ending a 50-page structural analysis. According to Runyan, his goal was to become
a psychedelic scholar along the lines of Aldous Huxley. Hed become disillusioned
with another hero, Timothy Leary, who supposedly mocked Castaneda when they met
at a party, earning his lifelong enmity. In 1967, he took his manuscript to prof
essor Meighan. Castaneda was disappointed when Meighan told him it would work be
tter as a trade book than as a scholarly monograph. But following Meighans instru
ctions, Castaneda took his manuscript to the University of California Press offic
e in Powell Library, where he showed it to Jim Quebec. The editor was impressed
but had doubts about its authenticity. Inundated by good reports from the UCLA a
nthropology department, according to Runyan, Quebec was convinced and The Teachin
gs was published in the spring of 1968.
Runyan wrote that the University of California Press, fully cognizant that a nati
on of drug-infatuated students was out there, moved it into California bookstore
s with a vengeance. Sales exceeded all expectations, and Quebec soon introduced C
astaneda to Ned Brown, an agent whose clients included Jackie Collins. Brown the
n put Castaneda in touch with Michael Korda, Simon and Schusters new editor in ch
ief.
In his memoir, Another Life, Korda recounts their first meeting. Korda was told to
wait in a hotel parking lot. A neat Volvo pulled up in front of me, and the driv
er waved me in, Korda writes. He was a robust, broad-chested, muscular man, with a
swarthy complexion, dark eyes, black curly hair cut short, and a grin as merry
as Friar Tucks I had seldom, if ever, liked anybody so much so quickly It wasnt so
much what Castaneda had to say as his presence a kind of charm that was partly
subtle intelligence, partly a real affection for people, and partly a kind of in
nocence, not of the naive kind but of the kind one likes to suppose saints, holy
men, prophets and gurus have. The next morning, Korda set about buying the right
s to The Teachings. Under his new editors guidance, Castaneda published his next th
ree books in quick succession. In A Separate Reality, published in 1971, Carlos re
turns to Mexico to give don Juan a copy of his new book. Don Juan declines the g
ift, suggesting hed use it as toilet paper. A new cycle of apprenticeship begins,
in which don Juan tries to teach Carlos how to see.
New characters appear, most importantly don Juans friend and fellow sorcerer don
Genaro. In A Separate Reality and the two books that follow, Journey to Ixtlan and Ta
les of Power, numerous new concepts are introduced, including becoming inaccessibl
e, erasing personal history and stopping the world.
There are also displays of magic. Don Genaro is at one moment standing next to C
arlos; at the next, hes on top of a mountain. Don Juan uses unseen powers to help
Carlos start his stalled car. And he tries to show him how to be a warrior a be
ing who, like an enlightened Buddhist, has eliminated the ego, but who, in a mor
e Nietzschean vein, knows hes superior to regular humans, who lead wasted, pointl
ess lives. Don Juan also tries to teach Carlos how to enter the world of dreams,
the separate reality, also referred to as the nagual, a Spanish word taken from the
Aztecs. (Later, Castaneda would shift the words meaning, making it stand not onl
y for the separate reality but also for a shaman, like don Juan and, eventually,
Castaneda himself.)
In Journey to Ixtlan, Carlos starts a new round of apprenticeship. Don Juan tells
him theyll no longer use drugs. These were only necessary when Carlos was a begin
ner. Many consider Ixtlan, which served as Castanedas Ph.D. thesis at UCLA, his mos
t beautiful book. It also made him a millionaire. At the books conclusion, Carlos
talks to a luminous coyote. But he isnt yet ready to enter the nagual. Finally,
at the end of Tales of Power, don Juan and don Genaro take Carlos to the edge of a

cliff. If he has the courage to leap, hell at last be a full-fledged sorcerer. T

his time Carlos doesnt turn back. He jumps into the abyss.
- - - - - - All four books were lavishly praised. Michael Murphy, a founder of Esalen, remar
ked that the essential lessons don Juan has to teach are the timeless ones that h
ave been taught by the great sages of India. There were raves in the New York Tim
es, Harpers and the Saturday Review. Castanedas meeting with Don Juan, wrote Times Ro
bert Hughes, now seems one of the most fortunate literary encounters since Boswel
l was introduced to Dr. Johnson.
In 1972, anthropologist Paul Riesman reviewed Castanedas first three books in the
New York Times Book Review, writing that Castaneda makes it clear that the teach
ings of don Juan do tell us something of how the world really is. Riesmans article
ran in place of a review the Times had initially commissioned from Weston La Ba
rre, one of the foremost authorities on Native American peyote ceremonies. In hi
s unpublished article, La Barre denounced Castanedas writing as pseudo-profound de
eply vulgar pseudo-ethnography.
Contacted recently, Roger Jellinek, the editor who commissioned both reviews, ex
plained his decision. The Weston La Barre review, as I recall, was not so much a
review as a furious ad hominem diatribe intended to suppress, not debate, the bo
ok, he wrote via e-mail. By then I knew enough about Castaneda, from discussions w
ith Edmund Carpenter, the anthropologist who first put me on to Castaneda, and f
rom my reading of renowned shamanism scholar Mircea Eliade in support of my own
review of Castaneda in the daily New York Times, to feel strongly that The Teachi
ngs of Don Juan deserved more than a personal put-down. Hence the second commissi
on to Paul Riesman, son of Harvard sociologist David Riesman, and a brilliant ri
sing anthropologist. Incidentally, in all my eight years at the NYTBR, thats the
only occasion I can recall of a review being commissioned twice.
Riesmans glowing review was soon followed by Oates letter to the editor, in which
she argued that the books were obvious works of fiction. Then, in 1973, Time cor
respondent Sandra Burton found that Castaneda had lied about his military servic
e, his fathers occupation, his age and his nation of birth (Peru not Brazil).
No one contributed more to Castanedas debunking than Richard de Mille. De Mille,
who held a Ph.D. in psychology from USC, was something of a freelance intellectu
al. In a recent interview, he remarked that because he wasnt associated with a un
iversity, he could tell the story straight. People in the academy wouldnt do it, he
remarked. Theyd be embarrassing the establishment. Specifically the UCLA professor
s who, according to de Mille, knew it was a hoax from the start. But a hoax that
, he said, supported their theories, which de Mille summed up succinctly: Reality
doesnt exist. Its all what people say to each other.
In de Milles first expos, Castanedas Journey, which appeared in 1976, he pointed to n
umerous internal contradictions in Castanedas field reports and the absence of co
nvincing details. During nine years of collecting plants and hunting animals with
don Juan, Carlos learns not one Indian name for any plant or animal, De Mille wr
ote. The books were also filled with implausible details. For example, while ince
ssantly sauntering across the sands in seasons when harsh conditions keep pruden
t persons away, Carlos and don Juan go quite unmolested by pests that normally t
orment desert hikers.
De Mille also uncovered numerous instances of plagiarism. When don Juan opens his
mouth, he wrote, the words of particular writers come out. His 1980 compilation, Th
e Don Juan Papers, includes a 47-page glossary of quotations from don Juan and th
eir sources, ranging from Wittgenstein and C.S. Lewis to papers in obscure anthr
opology journals.

In one example, de Mille first quotes a passage by a mystic, Yogi Ramacharaka: Th

e Human Aura is seen by the psychic observer as a luminous cloud, egg-shaped, st
reaked by fine lines like stiff bristles standing out in all directions. In A Sepa
rate Reality, a man looks like a human egg of circulating fibers. And his arms and
legs are like luminous bristles bursting out in all directions. The accumulation
of such instances leads de Mille to conclude that Carloss adventures originated n
ot in the Sonoran desert but in the library at UCLA. De Mille convinced many prev
iously sympathetic readers that don Juan did not exist. Perhaps the most glaring
evidence was that the Yaqui dont use peyote, and don Juan was supposedly a Yaqui
shaman teaching a Yaqui way of knowledge. Even the New York Times came around, de
claring that de Milles research should satisfy anyone still in doubt.
Some anthropologists have disagreed with de Mille on certain points. J.T. Fikes,
author of Carlos Castaneda, Academic Opportunism and the Psychedelic Sixties, bel
ieves Castaneda did have some contact with Native Americans. But hes an even fier
cer critic than de Mille, condemning Castaneda for the effect his stories have h
ad on Native peoples. Following the publication of The Teachings, thousands of pil
grims descended on Yaqui territory. When they discovered that the Yaqui dont use
peyote, but that the Huichol people do, they headed to the Huichol homeland in S
outhern Mexico, where, according to Fikes, they caused serious disruption. Fikes
recounts with outrage the story of one Huichol elder being murdered by a stoned
gringo.
Among anthropologists, theres no longer a debate. Professor William W. Kelly, cha
irman of Yales anthropology department, told me, I doubt youll find an anthropologi
st of my generation who regards Castaneda as anything but a clever con man. It w
as a hoax, and surely don Juan never existed as anything like the figure of his
books. Perhaps to many it is an amusing footnote to the gullibility of naive sch
olars, although to me it remains a disturbing and unforgivable breach of ethics.
After 1973, the year of the Time expos, Castaneda never again responded publicly
to criticism. Instead, he went into seclusion, at least as far as the press was
concerned (he still went to Hollywood parties). Claiming he was complying with d
on Juans instruction to become inaccessible, he no longer allowed himself to be pho
tographed, and (in the same year the existence of the Nixon tapes was made publi
c) he decided that recordings of any sort were forbidden. He also severed ties t
o his past; after attending C.J.s junior high graduation and promising to take hi
m to Europe, he soon banished his ex-wife and son.
And he made don Juan disappear. When The Second Ring of Power was published in 197
7, readers learned that sometime between the leap into the abyss at the end of Ta
les of Power and the start of the new book, don Juan had vanished, evanescing int
o a ball of light and entering the nagual. His seclusion also helped Castaneda,
now in his late 40s, conceal the alternative family he was starting to form. The
key members were three young women: Regine Thal, Maryann Simko and Kathleen Chic
kie Pohlman, whom Castaneda had met while he was still active at UCLA. Simko was
pursuing a Ph.D. in anthropology and was known around campus as Castanedas girlfr
iend. Through her, Castaneda met Thal, another anthropology Ph.D. candidate and
Simkos friend from karate class. How Pohlman entered the picture remains unclear.
In 1973, Castaneda purchased a compound on the aptly named Pandora Avenue in Wes
twood. The women, soon to be known both in his group and in his books as the witc
hes, moved in. They eventually came to sport identical short, dyed blond haircuts
similar to those later worn by the Heavens Gate cult. They also said theyd studie
d with don Juan.
In keeping with the philosophy of erasing personal history, they changed their nam
es: Simko became Taisha Abelar; Thal, Florinda Donner-Grau. Donner-Grau is remem
bered by many as Castanedas equal in intelligence and charisma. Nicknamed the humm

ingbird because of her ceaseless energy, she was born in Venezuela to German pare
nts and claimed to have done research on the Yanomami Indians. Pohlman was given
a somewhat less glamorous alias: Carol Tiggs. Donner-Grau and Abelar eventually
published their own books on sorcery.
The witches, along with Castaneda, maintained a tight veil of secrecy. They used
numerous aliases and didnt allow themselves to be photographed. Followers were t
old constantly changing stories about their backgrounds. Only after Castanedas de
ath did the real facts about their lives begin to emerge. This is largely due to
the work of three of his ex-followers.
In the early 90s, Richard Jennings, a Columbia Law graduate, was living in Los An
geles. He was the executive director of Hollywood Supports, a nonprofit group or
ganized to fight discrimination against people with HIV. Hed previously been the
executive director of GLAAD, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. Af
ter reading an article in Details magazine by Bruce Wagner about a meeting with
Castaneda, he became intrigued. By looking on the Internet, he found his way to
one of the semi-secret workshops being held around Los Angeles. He was soon invi
ted to participate in Castanedas Sunday sessions, exclusive classes for select fo
llowers, where Jennings kept copious notes. From 1995 to 1998 he was deeply invo
lved in the group, sometimes advising on legal matters. After Castanedas death, h
e started a Web site, Sustained Action, for which he compiled meticulously resea
rched chronologies, dating from 1947 to 1999, of the lives of Patricia Partin an
d the witches.
Another former insider is Amy Wallace, author of 13 books of fiction and nonfict
ion, including the best-selling Book of Lists, which she co-authored with her brot
her David Wallechinksy and their father, novelist Irving Wallace, also a client
of Kordas. (Amy Wallace has contributed to Salon.) She first met Castaneda in 197
3, while she was still in high school. Her parents took her to a dinner party he
ld by agent Ned Brown. Castaneda was there with Abelar, who then went under the
name Anna-Marie Carter. They talked with Wallace about her boarding school. Many
years later, Wallace became one of Castanedas numerous lovers, an experience rec
ounted in her memoir, Sorcerers Apprentice. Wallace now lives in East Los Angeles,
where shes working on a novel about punk rock.
Gaby Geuter, an author and former travel agent, had been a workshop attendee who
hoped to join the inner circle. In 1996 she realized she was being shut out. In
an effort to find out the truth about the guru whod rejected her, she, along wit
h her husband, Greg Mamishian, began to shadow Castaneda. In her book Filming Cas
taneda, she recounts how, from a car parked near his compound, they secretly vide
otaped the groups comings and goings. Were it not for Geuter thered be no post-197
3 photographic record of Castaneda, who, as he aged, seemed to have retained his
impish charm as well as a full head of silver hair. They also went through his
trash, discovering a treasure-trove of documents, including marriage certificate
s, letters and credit card receipts that would later provide clues to the groups
history and its behavior during Castanedas final days.
During the late 70s and early 80s, Jennings believes the group probably numbered n
o more than two dozen. Members, mostly women, came and went. At the time, a pivo
tal event was the defection of Carol Tiggs, who was, according to Wallace, alway
s the most ambivalent witch. Soon after joining, she tried to break away. She at
tended California Acupuncture College, married a fellow student and lived in Pac
ific Palisades. Eventually, Wallace says, Castaneda lured her back.
Castaneda had a different version. In his 1981 bestseller, The Eagles Gift, he desc
ribed how Tiggs vanished into the second attention, one of his terms for infinity.
Eventually she reappeared through a space time portal in New Mexico. She then m
ade her way to L.A., where they were joyously reunited when he found her on Sant
a Monica Boulevard. In homage to her 10 years in another dimension, she was now

known as the nagual woman.

Wallace believes this was an incentive to get Tiggs to rejoin. According to Wall
ace and Jennings, one of the witches tasks was to recruit new members. Melissa Wa
rd, a Los Angeles area caterer, was involved in the group from 1993 to 1994. Freq
uently they recruited at lectures, she told me. Among the goals, she said, was to
find women with a combination of brains and beauty and vulnerability. Initiation
into the inner family often involved sleeping with Castaneda, who, the witches c
laimed in public appearances, was celibate.
In Sorcerers Apprentice, Wallace provides a detailed picture of her own seduction.
Because of her fathers friendship with Castaneda, her case was unusual. Over the
years, hed stop by the Wallace home. When Irving died in 1990, Amy was living in
Berkeley, Calif. Soon after, Castaneda called and told her that her father had a
ppeared to him in a dream and said he was trapped in the Wallaces house, and need
ed Amy and Carlos to free him.
Wallace, suitably skeptical, came down to L.A. and the seduction began in earnes
t. She recounts how she soon found herself in bed with Castaneda. He told her he
hadnt had sex for 20 years. When Wallace later worried she might have gotten pre
gnant (theyd used no birth control), Castaneda leapt from the bed, shouting, Me ma
ke you pregnant? Impossible! The naguals sperm isnt human Dont let any of the nagua
ls sperm out, nena. It will burn away your humanness. He didnt mention the vasectom
y hed had years before.
The courtship continued for several weeks. Castaneda told her they were energetic
ally married. One afternoon, he took her to the sorcerers compound. As they were l
eaving, Wallace looked at a street sign so she could remember the location. Cast
aneda furiously berated her: A warrior wouldnt have looked. He ordered her to ret
urn to Berkeley. She did. When she called, he refused to speak to her.
The witches, however, did, instructing Wallace on the sorceric steps necessary t
o return. She had to let go of her attachments. Wallace got rid of her cats. Thi
s didnt cut it. Castaneda, she wrote, got on the phone and called her an egotisti
cal, spoiled Jew. He ordered her to get a job at McDonalds. Instead, Wallace wait
ressed at a bed and breakfast. Six months later she was allowed back.
Aspiring warriors, say Jennings, Wallace and Ward, were urged to cut off all con
tact with their past lives, as don Juan had instructed Carlos to do, and as Cast
aneda had done by cutting off his wife and adopted son. He was telling us how to
get out of family obligations, Jennings told me. Being in one-on-one relationships
would hold you back from the path. Castaneda was telling us how to get out of c
ommitments with family, down to small points like how to avoid hugging your pare
nts directly. Jennings estimates that during his four years with the group, betwe
en 75 and 100 people were told to cut off their families. He doesnt know how many
did.
For some initiates, the separation was brutal and final. According to Wallace, a
colytes were told to tell their families, I send you to hell. Both Wallace and Jen
nings tell of one young woman who, in the groups early years, had been ordered by
Castaneda to hit her mother, a Holocaust survivor. Many years later, Wallace to
ld me, the woman cried about it. Shed done it because she thought he was so psychi
c he could tell if she didnt. Wallace also describes how, when one young mans paren
ts died soon after being cut off, Castaneda singled him out for praise, remarkin
g, When you really do it, don Juan told me, they die instantly, as if you were sq
uashing a flea and thats all they are, fleas.
Before entering the innermost circle, at least some followers were led into a po
sition of emotional and financial dependence. Ward remembers a woman named Peggy
who was instructed to quit her job. She was told shed then be given cash to get

a phone-less apartment, where she would wait to hear from Castaneda or the witch
es. Peggy fled before this happened. But Ward said this was a common practice wi
th women about to be brought into the familys core.
Valerie Kadium, a librarian, who from 1995 to 1996 took part in the Sunday sessi
ons, recalls one participant who, after several meetings, decided to commit hims
elf fully to the group. He went to Vermont to shut down his business, but on ret
urning to L.A., he was told he could no longer participate; he was too late. Hed fa
iled to grasp the cubic centimeter of chance that, said Kadium, Castaneda often sp
oke of. Jennings had to quit his job with Hollywood Supports; his work required
him to interact with the media, but this was impossible: Sorcerers couldnt have t
heir pictures taken.
But there were rewards. I was totally affected by these people, Jennings told me. I
felt like Id found a family. I felt like Id found a path. Kadium recalls the first
time she saw Tensegrity instructor Kylie Lundahl onstage she saw an aura around
her, an apricot glow. Remembering her early days with the group, she remarked, T
here was such a sweetness about it. I had such high hopes. I wanted to feel the
world more deeply and I did.
Although she was later devastated when Castaneda banished her from the Sunday se
ssions, telling her the spirits spit you out, she eventually recovered, and now re
members this as the most exciting time of her life. According to all who knew hi
m, Castaneda wasnt only mesmerizing, he also had a great sense of humor. One of th
e reasons I was involved was the idea that I was in this fascinating, on the edg
e, avant garde, extraordinary group of beings, Wallace said. Life was always excit
ing. We were free from the tedium of the world.
And because, as Jennings puts
ten freed from the anxiety of
ven Wallace and Bruce Wagner,
etimes, according to Wallace,
au. Jennings and Wallace also
x lives in great detail.

it, Castaneda was a control freak, followers were of

decision-making. Some had more independence, but e
both of whom were given a certain leeway, were som
required to have their writing vetted by Donner-Gr
report that Castaneda directed the inner circles se

The most difficult part, Wallace believes, was that you never knew where you sto
od. Hed pick someone, crown them, and was as capable of kicking them out in 48 hou
rs as keeping them 10 years. You never knew. So there was always trepidation, a
lot of jealousy. Sometimes initiates were banished for obscure spiritual offenses
, such as drinking cappuccino (which Castaneda himself guzzled in great quantiti
es). Theyd no longer be invited to the compound. Phone calls wouldnt be returned.
Having been allowed for a time into a secret, magical family, theyd be abruptly c
ut off. For some, Wallace believes, this pattern was highly traumatic. In a weird
way, she said, the worst thing that can happen is when youre loved and loved and t
hen abused and abused, and there are no rules, and the rules keep changing, and
you can never do right, but then all of a sudden theyre kissing you. Thats the mos
t crazy-making behavioral modification there is. And thats what Carlos specialize
d in; he was not stupid.
Whether disciples were allowed to stay or forced to leave seems often to have de
pended on the whims of a woman known as the Blue Scout. Trying to describe her p
ower, Ward recalled a Twilight Zone episode in which a little boy could look at pe
ople and make them die. So everyone treated him with kid gloves, she said, and thats
how it was with the Blue Scout. She was born Patricia Partin and grew up in LaVe
rne, Calif., where, according to Jennings, her father had been in an accident th
at left him with permanent brain damage. Partin dropped out of Bonita High her j
unior year. She became a waitress, and, at 19, married an aspiring filmmaker, Ma
rk Silliphant, who introduced her to Castaneda in 1978. Within weeks of their ma
rriage she left Silliphant and went to live with Castaneda. She paid one last vi
sit to her mother; in keeping with the naguals instructions, she refused to be in

a family photograph. For the rest of her life, she never spoke to her mother ag
ain.
Castaneda renamed Partin Nury Alexander. She was also Claude as well as the Blue S
cout. She soon emerged as one of his favorites (Castaneda officially adopted her
in 1995). Followers were told hed conceived her with Tiggs in the nagual. He sai
d she had a very rare energy; she was barely human high praise from Castaneda. Par
tin, a perpetual student at UCLA and an inveterate shopper at Neiman Marcus, was
infantilized. In later years, new followers would be assigned the task of playi
ng dolls with her.
In the late 80s, perhaps because book sales had slowed, or perhaps because he no
longer feared media scrutiny, Castaneda sought to expand. Jennings believes he m
ay have been driven by a desire to please Partin. Geuter confirms that Castaneda
told followers that the Blue Scout had talked him into starting Cleargreen. But
she also suggests another motivation. He was thinking about what he wanted for t
he rest of his life, Geuter told me. He always talked about going for the golden cl
asp. He wanted to finish with something spectacular.
Castaneda investigated the possibility of incorporating as a religion, as L. Ron
Hubbard had done with Scientology. Instead, he chose to develop Tensegrity, whi
ch, Jennings believes, was to be the means through which the new faith would spr
ead. Tensegrity is a movement technique that seems to combine elements of a rigi
d version of tai chi and modern dance. In all likelihood the inspiration came fr
om karate devotees Donner-Grau and Abelar, and from his years of lessons with ma
rtial arts instructor Howard Lee. Documents found by Geuter show him discussing
a project called Kung Fu Sorcery with Lee as early as 1988. The more elegant Tenseg
rity was lifted from Buckminster Fuller, for whom it referred to a structural syn
ergy between tension and compression. Castaneda seems to have just liked the sou
nd of it.
A major player in promoting Tensegrity was Wagner, whose fifth novel, The Chrysan
themum Palace, was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner prize (his sixth, Memorial, was
recently released by Simon and Schuster). Wagner hadnt yet published his first no
vel when he approached Castaneda in 1988 with the hope of filming the don Juan b
ooks. Within a few years, according to Jennings and Wallace, he became part of t
he inner circle. He was given the sorceric name Lorenzo Drake Enzo for short. As
the group began to emerge from the shadows, holding seminars in high school aud
itoriums and on college campuses, Wagner, tall, bald and usually dressed in blac
k, would, according to Geuter and Wallace, act as a sort of bouncer, removing th
ose who asked unwanted questions. (Wagner declined requests for an interview.) I
n 1995 Wagner, whod previously been wed to Rebecca De Mornay, married Tiggs. That
same year his novel Im Losing You was chosen by the New York Times as a notable bo
ok of the year. John Updike, in the New Yorker, proclaimed that Wagner writes lik
e a wizard.
In the early 90s, to promote Tensegrity, Castaneda set up Cleargreen, which opera
ted out of the offices of Rugrats producer and Castaneda agent (and part-time sorc
erer) Tracy Kramer, a friend of Wagners from Beverly Hills High. Although Castane
da wasnt a shareholder, according to Geuter, he determined every detail of the ope
ration. Jennings and Wallace confirm that Castaneda had complete control of Clear
green. (Cleargreen did not respond to numerous inquiries from Salon.) The compan
ys official president was Amalia Marquez (sorceric name Talia Bey), a young busin
esswoman who, after reading Castanedas books, had moved from Puerto Rico to Los A
ngeles in order to follow him.
At Tensegrity seminars, women dressed in black, the chacmools, demonstrated moves
for the audience. Castaneda and the witches would speak and answer questions. Se
minars cost up to $1,200, and as many as 800 would attend. Participants could bu
y T-shirts that read Self Importance Kills Do Tensegrity. The movements were meant

to promote health as well as help practitioners progress as warriors. Illness w

as seen as a sign of weakness. Wallace recalls the case of Tycho, the Orange Sco
ut (supposedly the Blue Scouts sister). She had ulcerative colitis, Wallace told me
. She was trying to keep it a secret because if Carlos knew you were sick hed puni
sh you. If you went for medical care, hed kick you out. Once Tychos illness was dis
covered, Wallace said, Tycho was expelled from the group.
- - - - - - If Castanedas early books drew on Buddhism and phenomenology, his later work seem
ed more indebted to science fiction. But throughout, there was a preoccupation w
ith meeting death like a warrior. In the 90s, Castaneda told his followers that,
like don Juan, he wouldnt die hed burn from within, turn into a ball of light, and
ascend to the heavens.
In the summer of 1997, he was diagnosed with liver cancer. Because sorcerers wer
ent supposed to get sick, his illness remained a tightly guarded secret. While th
e witches desperately pursued traditional and alternative treatments, the worksh
ops continued as if nothing was wrong (although Castaneda often wasnt there). One
of the witches, Abelar, flew to Florida to inspect yachts. Geuter, in notes tak
en at the time, wondered, Why are they buying a boat? Maybe Carlos wants to leave
with his group, and disappear unnoticed in the wide-open oceans.

No boats were purchased. Castaneda continued to decline. He became increasingly

frail, his eyes yellow and jaundiced. He rarely left the compound. According to
Wallace, Tiggs told her the witches had purchased guns. While the nagual lay bed
ridden with a morphine drip, watching war videos, the inner circle burned his pa
pers. A grieving Abelar had begun to drink. Im not in any danger of becoming an al
coholic now, she told Wallace. Because Im leaving, so its too late. Wallace writes: S
e was telling me, in her way, that she planned to die.
Wallace also recalls a conversation with Lundahl, the star of the Tensegrity vid
eos and one of the women who disappeared: If I dont go with him, Ill do what I have
to do, Wallace says Lundahl told her. Its too late for you and me to remain in the
world I think you know exactly what I mean.
In April 1998, Geuter filmed the inner circle packing up the house. The next wee
k, at age 72, Castaneda died. He was cremated at the Culver City mortuary. No on
e knows what became of his ashes. Within days, Donner-Grau, Abelar, Partin, Lund
ahl and Marquez had their phones disconnected and vanished. A few weeks later, P
artins red Ford Escort was found abandoned in Death Valleys Panamint Dunes.
Even within the inner circle, few knew that Castaneda was dead. Rumors spread. M
any were in despair: The nagual hadnt burned from within. Jennings didnt learn until
two weeks later, when Tiggs called to tell him Castaneda was gone. The witches, s
he said, were elsewhere.
In a proposal for a biography of Castaneda, a project Jennings eventually chose
not to pursue, he writes that Tiggs also told me she was supposed to have gone wit
h them, but a non-decision decision kept me here. Meanwhile, the workshops continued
. Carol also banned mourning within Cleargreen, Jennings writes, so its members hid
their grief, often drowning it in alcohol or drugs. Wallace, too, recalls a lot
of drug use: I dont know if they tried to OD so much as to get there. Get to Carlos.
Jennings himself drove to the desert and thought about committing suicide.
The media didnt learn of Castanedas death for two months. When the news became pub
lic, Cleargreen members stopped answering their phones. They soon placed a state
ment, which Jennings says was written by Wagner, on their Web site: For don Juan,
the warrior was a being who embarks, when the time comes, on a definitive journ
ey of awareness, crossing over to total freedom warriors can keep their awareness,

which is ordinarily relinquished, at the moment of dying. At the moment of cros

sing, the body in its entirety is kindled with knowledge Carlos Castaneda left t
he world the same way that his teacher, don Juan Matus did: with full awareness.
Many obituaries had a curious tone; the writers seemed uncertain whether to call
Castaneda a fraud. Some expressed a kind of nostalgia for an author whose work
had meant so much to so many in their youth. Korda refused comment. De Mille, in
an interview with filmmaker Ralph Torjan, expressed a certain admiration. He was
the perfect hoaxer, he told Torjan, because he never admitted anything.
Jennings, Wallace and Geuter believe the missing women likely committed suicide.
Wallace told me about a phone call to Donner-Graus parents not long after the wo
men disappeared. Donner-Grau had been one of the few allowed to maintain contact
with her family. They were weeping, Wallace said, because there was no goodbye. Th
ey didnt know what had happened. This was after decades of being in touch with th
em.
Castanedas will, executed three days before his death, leaves everything to an en
tity known as the Eagles Trust. According to Jennings, who obtained a copy of the
trust agreement, the missing women have a considerable amount of money due to t
hem. Deborah Drooz, the executor of Castanedas estate, said she has had no contac
t with the women. She added that she believes they are still alive.
Jennings believes Castaneda knew they were planning to kill themselves. He used t
o talk about suicide all the time, even for minor things, Jennings told me. He ad
ded that Partin was once sent to identify abandoned mines in the desert, which c
ould be used as potential suicide sites. (Theres an abandoned mine not far from w
here her remains were found.) He regularly told us he was our only hope, Jennings
said. We were all supposed to go together, make the leap, whatever that meant. What
did Jennings think it meant? I didnt know fully, he said. Hed describe it in differen
t ways. So would the witches. It seemed to be what they were living for, somethi
ng we were being promised.
The promise may have been based on the final scene in Tales of Power, in which Car
los leaps from a cliff into the nagual. The scene is later retold in varying ver
sions. In his 1984 book, The Fire From Within, Castaneda wrote: I didnt die at the b
ottom of that gorge and neither did the other apprentices who had jumped at an e
arlier time because we never reached it; all of us, under the impact of such a t
remendous and incomprehensible act as jumping to our deaths, moved our assemblag
e points and assembled other worlds.
Did Castaneda really believe this? Wallace thinks so. He became more and more hyp
notized by his own reveries, she told me. I firmly believe Carlos brainwashed hims
elf. Did the witches? Geuter put it this way: Florinda, Taisha and the Blue Scout
knew it was a fantasy structure. But when you have thousands of eyes looking bac
k at you, you begin to believe in the fantasy. These women never had to answer t
o the real world. Carlos had snatched them when they were very young.
Wallace isnt sure what the women believed. Because open discussion of Castanedas t
eachings was forbidden, it was impossible to know what anyone really thought. Ho
wever, she told me, after living so long with Castaneda, the women may have felt
they had no choice. Youve cut off all your ties, she said. Now youre going to go bac
k after all these decades? Who are you going to go be with? And you feel that yo
ure not one of the common herd anymore. Thats why they killed themselves.
On its Web site, Cleargreen maintains that the women didnt depart. However, for the
moment they are not going to appear personally at the workshops because they wan
t this dream to take wings.
Remarkably, there seems to have been no investigation into at least three of the

disappearances. Except for Donner-Grau, theyd all been estranged from their fami
lies for years. For months after they vanished, none of the other families knew
what had happened. And so, according to Geuter, no one reported them missing. Sa
lon attempted to locate the three missing women, relying on public records and p
hone calls to their previous residences, but discovered no current trace of them
. The Los Angeles Police Department and the FBI confirm that theres been no offic
ial inquiry into the disappearances of Donner-Grau, Abelar and Lundahl.
There is, however, a file open in the Marquez case. This is due to the tireless
efforts of Luis Marquez, who told Salon that he first tried to report his sister
missing in 1999. But the LAPD, he said, repeatedly ignored him. A year later, h
e and his sister Carmen wrote a letter to the missing-persons unit; again, no re
sponse. According to Marquez, it wasnt until Partins remains were identified that
the LAPD opened a file on Amalia. To this day, he told me, they still refuse to ask
any questions or visit Cleargreen. His own attempts to get information from Clea
rgreen have been fruitless. According to Marquez, all hes been told is that the w
omen are traveling. Detective Lydia Dillard, assigned to the Marquez case, said th
at because this is an open investigation, she couldnt confirm whether anyone from
Cleargreen had been interviewed.
In 2002, a Taos, N.M., woman, Janice Emery, a Castaneda follower and workshop at
tendee, jumped to her death in the Rio Grande gorge. According to the Santa Fe N
ew Mexican, Emery had a head injury brought on by cancer. One of Emerys friends t
old the newspaper that Emery wanted to be with Castanedas people. Said another: I th
ink she was really thinking she could fly off. A year later, a skeleton was disco
vered near the site of Partins abandoned Ford. The Inyo County sheriffs department
suspected it was hers. But, due to its desiccated condition, a positive identif
ication couldnt be made until February 2006, when new DNA technology became avail
able.
Wallace recalls how Castaneda had told Partin that if you ever need to rise to in
finity, take your little red car and drive it as fast as you can into the desert
and you will ascend. And, Wallace believes, thats exactly what she did: She took h
er little red car, drove it into the desert, didnt ascend, got out, wandered arou
nd and fainted from dehydration.
Partins death and the disappearance of the other women arent Castanedas entire lega
cy. Hes been acknowledged as an important influence by figures ranging from Deepa
k Chopra to George Lucas. Without a doubt, Castaneda opened the doors of percept
ion for numerous readers, and many workshop attendees found the experience deepl
y meaningful. There are those who testify to the benefits of Tensegrity. And eve
n some of those who are critical of Castaneda find his teachings useful. He was a
conduit. I wanted answers to the big questions. He helped me, Geuter said. But f
or five of his closest companions, his teachings and his insistence on their lit
eral truth may have cost them their lives.
Long after Castaneda had been discredited in academia, Korda continued to insist
on his authenticity. In 2000, he wrote: I have never doubted for a moment the tr
uth of his stories about don Juan. Castanedas books have been profitable for Simon
and Schuster, and according to Korda, were for many years one of the props on w
hich the publisher rested. Castaneda might have achieved some level of success i
f his books had been presented, as James Redfields Celestine Prophecy is, as allego
rical fiction. But Castaneda always insisted hed made nothing up. If he hadnt prese
nted his stories as fact, Wallace told me, its unlikely the cult would exist. As no
nfiction, it became impossibly more dangerous.
To this day, Simon and Schuster stands by Kordas position. When asked whether, in
the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the publisher still regarded
Castanedas books as nonfiction, Adam Rothenberg, the vice president for corporat
e communication, replied that Simon and Schuster will continue to publish Castane

da as we always have. Tensegrity classes are still held around the world. Worksho
ps were recently conducted in Mexico City and Hanover, Germany. Wagners videos ar
e still available from Cleargreen. According to the terms of Castanedas will, boo
k royalties still help support a core group of acolytes. On Simon and Schusters W
eb site, Castaneda is still described as an anthropologist. No mention is made o
f his fiction.