Introduction to Erik Davis’ Nomad Codes

I wrote a loving introduction to my pal Erik Davis‘  Nomad Codes: Adventures in Modern Esoterica out now from Mike McGonigal’s Yeti Books.  The book collects some of Erik’s visionary writings from the last twenty years including some of his work for the late and lamented Gnosis magazine, reminiscences of a SoCal stoner youth, meditations on Philip K. Dick, Sun City Girls, Terence McKenna and other key figures.  You can read the introduction here. Quote:

Erik is known for his writing about gnosis, subject of his acclaimed first book, Techgnosis: Myth, Magic and Mysticism in the Age of Information.  But what is the gnostic situation?   A basic definition: you are in a trap and you need to escape!  Many of us have lived our whole lives in this strange trap that’s variously given the names of late capitalism, postmodernity or just simply Babylon.  What happens to writing and writers in this situation?  Greil Marcus wrote that to understand Lester Bangs, you’d have to recognize that the greatest American writer of the 1970s might write nothing but record reviews.  To understand Erik and his fascination with weirdness and esoterica of many kinds, you’d have to recognize that just writing record reviews would be way too conservative an approach to actually describing our world today.”