The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World (CBC Massey Lecture)

273 Pages·2009·13.34 MB·English

by  Wade Davis

the massey lectures series
The Massey Lectures are co-sponsored by CBC Radio, House
of Anansi Press, and Massey College in the University of
Toronto. The series was created in honour of the Right
Honourable Vincent Massey, former Governor General of
Canada, and was inaugurated in 1961 to provide a forum on
radio where major contemporary thinkers could address
important issues of our time.
This book comprises the 2009 Massey Lectures, “The
Wayfinders,” broadcast in November 2009 as part of CBC
Radio’s Ideas series. The producer of the series was Philip
Coulter; the executive producer was Bernie Lucht.
wade davis
Wade Davis is the best-selling author of several books, including
The Serpent and the Rainbow, Light at the Edge of the World,
One River, and The Clouded Leopard. He is an award-winning
anthropologist, ethnobotanist, filmmaker, and photographer,
and his writing and photographs have appeared in numerous
publications, including the Globe and Mail, Maclean’s,
Newsweek, National Geographic, the Wall Street Journal, and
the Washington Post. He currently holds the post of Explorer-
in-Residence at the National Geographic Society in
Washington, D.C., and divides his time between that city and
northern British Columbia.
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 1 27/11/09 4:31 PM
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 2 27/11/09 4:31 PM
T H E WAY F IN D E R S
Why A ncient Wisdom M atters
in the M odern World
WADE DAVIS
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 3 27/11/09 4:31 PM
Copyright © 2009 Wade Davis
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced
or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This edition published in 2008 by
House of Anansi Press Inc.
110 Spadina Avenue, Suite 801
Toronto, ON, m5v 2k4
Tel. [phone]
Fax [phone]
www.anansi.ca
Distributed in Canada by Distributed in the United States by
HarperCollins Canada Ltd. Publishers Group West
1995 Markham Road 1700 Fourth Street
Scarborough, ON, m1b 5m8 Berkeley, CA 94710
Toll free tel. [phone] Toll free tel. [phone]
House of Anansi Press is committed to protecting our natural environment.
As part of our efforts, this book is printed on paper that contains 100%
post-consumer recycled fibres, is acid-free, and is processed chlorine-free.
13 12 11 10 09 1 2 3 4 5
ISBN 978-0-88784-766-0
Library of Congress Control Number: 2009929674
Cover design: Bill Douglas at The Bang
Text design: Ingrid Paulson
Typesetting: Sari Naworynski
We acknowledge for their financial support of our publishing program the
Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, and the Government
of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (bpidp).
Printed and bound in Canada
Wayfinders_ITSC_int_US_iv.indd 1 27/11/09 4:36 PM
For David Maybury-Lewis
1929–2007
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 5 27/11/09 4:31 PM
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 6 27/11/09 4:31 PM
THE WAYFINDERS
Season of the Brown Hyena 1
The Wayfinders 35
Peoples of the Anaconda 79
Sacred Geography 116
Century of the Wind 162
Annotated Bibliography 224
Acknowledgements 245
Index 250
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 7 27/11/09 4:31 PM
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 8 27/11/09 4:31 PM
oNE
season of the brown hyena
“I want all the cultures of all lands to be blown about
my house as freely as possible. But I refuse to be
blown off my feet by any.” — Mahatma Gandhi
one of the intense pleasures of travel is the opportunity
to live amongst peoples who have not forgotten the old
ways, who still feel their past in the wind, touch it in
stones polished by rain, taste it in the bitter leaves of
plants. Just to know that, in the Amazon, Jaguar shaman
still journey beyond the Milky Way, that the myths of
the Inuit elders still resonate with meaning, that the
Buddhists in Tibet still pursue the breath of the Dharma
is to remember the central revelation of anthropology:
the idea that the social world in which we live does not
exist in some absolute sense, but rather is simply one
model of reality, the consequence of one set of intellectual
( 1 )
Wayfinders_ITSC_int.indd 1 27/11/09 4:31 PM