TYPE Original Research

PUBLISHED 16 May 2023

DOI 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

Henri Michaux’s program for the

OPEN ACCESS psychedelic humanities
EDITED BY
Adam B. Barrett,
University of Sussex, United Kingdom Oliver Davis*
REVIEWED BY
School of Modern Languages and Cultures, University of Warwick, Coventry, United Kingdom
Martin Madsen,
Neurobiology Research Unit,
Rigshospitalet, Denmark
Richard Doyle, This article presents an analytical reading of the extraordinarily rich cultural
The Pennsylvania State University (PSU),
production around drugs by the 20th-century French poet, writer, critic, and
United States
visual artist Michaux (1899–1984). Over about a decade, from the mid-1950’s,
*CORRESPONDENCE
Oliver Davis
the otherwise habitually sober Michaux wrote five books, included within which
[email protected] were dozens of drawings, and made one half-hour film, charting his adventures
RECEIVED 28 January 2023 as an initially reluctant yet persistent psychonaut, principally with mescaline,
ACCEPTED 18 April 2023 but also with psilocybin, LSD, and cannabis. This has rightly been described
PUBLISHED 16 May 2023 as one of the most creative cultural explorations of mescaline. It is more
CITATION extensive, texturally complex, and esthetically demanding than Aldous Huxley’s
Davis O (2023) Henri Michaux’s program for the
psychedelic humanities.
far better known near-contemporaneous published work on psychedelics in
Front. Psychol. 14:1152896. English, which is well-known within and arguably foundational for psychedelic
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896 studies. Yet, this very complexity, as well as the national-linguistic context of
COPYRIGHT its articulation—there was no mass psychedelic counterculture in France—have
© 2023 Davis. This is an open-access article limited wider engagement with it. I argue that Michaux’s esthetic reconstruction
distributed under the terms of the Creative
Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, of psychedelics’ effects on his creative brain can be read as a “program” for
distribution or reproduction in other forums is the emerging field of the psychedelic humanities and that it makes a substantial
permitted, provided the original author(s) and contribution, which I sketch in outline here, to the following of core concerns:
the copyright owner(s) are credited and that
the original publication in this journal is cited, in (1) the role of psychedelics in enhancing “creativity”; (2) conceptualization of
accordance with accepted academic practice. the politics of psychedelics; and (3) the meaning and value of psychedelic
No use, distribution or reproduction is mysticism. I aim to show that Michaux’s work on drugs has much to contribute
permitted which does not comply with these
terms. to the cultural understanding of psychedelics today and accordingly that this
unjustly neglected classic of French—and global—drug culture deserves to be far
better known.

KEYWORDS

Michaux, psychedelic, mescaline, psilocybin, esthetics, politics, autoheteronomy,

anthropotechnics

1. Introduction
1.1. Background

The five books of writing, which also contain dozens of drawings, and
the half-hour film, which issued from Henri Michaux’s psychonautic self-
experimentation with mescaline during the 1950’s and 1960’s (Michaux, 1956, 1957,
1959, 1961, 1966; Duvivier, 1963), have been described as the century’s “most
sustained and creative” engagement with this particular psychedelic (Jay, 2019;

Frontiers in Psychology 01 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

p. 211).1 They also have more to say about cannabis, psilocybin, For largely contingent reasons of translation, the uptake of
and LSD, although their main focus, like mine in this article, is Michaux’s work during the American psychedelic counterculture
on mescaline. In part because of their textural complexity within was more limited than it might have been: the first but also the
and across three distinct media (writing, drawing, and film) and the most skeptical book of the series, Misérable Miracle (Michaux,
extremes of ambivalence they record about the various experiences, 1956), was published in English translation early enough, by the
as well as the national-linguistic context of their articulation— San Franciscan countercultural publisher City Lights, in 1963
there was no mass psychedelic counterculture in France—they have (Michaux, 1963a).3 The fourth, Connaissance par les gouffres
not been read nearly as widely or attentively as they deserve. Put (Michaux, 1961), also appeared in translation in the same year, as
more positively, the resurgence of cultural interest in psychedelics, Light Through Darkness (Michaux, 1963b), but of all the books in
which has accompanied their “renaissance” (Sessa, 2012) within the series, this is the one most constrained by the psychotomimetic
psychiatry, allows new questions to be posed about this hitherto paradigm. However, the second, decidedly more enthusiastic,
underappreciated material.2 upbeat, and in some respects most mystical book, L’Infini turbulent
(Michaux, 1957)—the one most attuned to the temperament
1 This description of Michaux’s work has proven to be more controversial of the American psychedelic counterculture—did not appear in
than I had initially anticipated, factually and politically. In the confines of English until much later, in the mid-1970’s (Michaux, 1975). While
this article, I am not in a position to independently substantiate it, since Michaux’s influence on the counterculture was limited, he was well
to do so would require a comprehensive treatment of major mescaline- acquainted with several of its key texts, concerns, and people: for
influenced creative work and wider cultural practice during the period; example, in L’Infini turbulent (Michaux, 2001,[1957]; p. 814), he
however, the claim is made within precisely such an extensive cultural history echoed Huxley’s discussion (Huxley, 2004 [1954]; p. 34–5) of the
of mescaline (Jay, 2019) and the purpose of citing it here is to give some Bardo Thödol (“Tibetan Book of the Dead”), and he met Allen
initial indication of the significance of Michaux’s work and to invite the reader Ginsberg in Paris in 1958 (Ginsberg, 1995; Morgan, 2006; p. 274;
to devote some of their time to engaging with my analysis. Nothing turns p. 346), gave him a signed copy of L’Infini turbulent (Michaux,
argumentatively, for me, on Michaux’s being preeminent in the way Jay’s 1957), and the pair subsequently corresponded (Martin, 2003; p.
comment implies. Politically speaking, the claim could be felt to ignore, 549).4
or as the more dramatic verb would have it, to erase, the very significant Alongside these contingencies of translation, which I believe
work of the Native American Church in using peyote over the century for largely explain the limited uptake of Michaux’s work by the
“postcolonial healing” (Calabrese, 2013). Without wishing to downplay the American counterculture, it is worth noting that in key respects
significance of the NAC’s work, I would suggest that its therapeutic ritual Michaux’s general outlook on psychedelics was narrower and
use of peyote is not primarily creative in the sense in which artists and somewhat more uptight: he only took laboratory-synthesized
psychologists understand this term, in particular, in so far as it rests on a mescaline rather than peyote and he flaunts this decision by
“core therapeutic emplotment” within a “very uniform” ceremonial structure
(Calabrese, 2013; p. 124). Controversially, for the psychedelic humanities
today, and surprisingly given that he had traveled extensively in Central and devotes a detailed and astute chapter to Michaux’s drug writings in his
South America earlier in his life, Michaux was not interested in peyote or in book on drugs and the imagination (Milner, 2000), underlining Michaux’s
indigenous uses of that mescaline-containing cactus; his interest was in just “ascetic” (374) and “agonistic” (403) relationship to the substances. Many
one of its spectrum of alkaloids in one of its laboratory-synthesized forms, monographs on Michaux’s work as a whole mention the mescaline decade
mescaline hydrochloride. I discuss the political significance of this choice in somewhat disapprovingly (e.g., Bowie, 1973; Parish, 2007). Peter Broome
§3. suggested that mescaline provided Michaux with “an incredible new projector
2 Underappreciated but not unread: early book-length studies of Michaux’s for his inner cinema” (Broome, 1977; p. 89). The notes and other scholarly
drug writing by psychiatrists and doctors (Ajuriaguerra and Jaeggi, 1963; apparatus in the Pléiade edition of Michaux’s works (Michaux, 2001, 2004)
Loras, 1967) approached it largely in terms of the psychotomimetic paradigm. are an extremely rich resource, extensively exploited in the present article.
The literary critic and philosopher Maurice Blanchot is dismissive of such Devenot et al. (2022) suggested that even to speak of a “psychedelic
readings in a characteristically perceptive article first published in 1958 renaissance” is to fall for a confidence trick on the part of pharmaceutical
(Blanchot, 1966), perforce covering only the first two books: “It would be entrepreneurs and “psychedelic pundits” keen to monetize psychedelics
more instructive to speak of a simple attitude such as impatience, which also while erasing indigenous cultures’ stewardship of plant medicines and
changes the experience of time.” (86) This and all subsequent translations maintaining prohibition.
from French are my own. Prompted by the title of the second book, L’Infini 3 The 1972 French edition of Misérable Miracle was much more
turbulent (Michaux, 1957), Blanchot suggests that mescaline allows Michaux enthusiastic about mescaline than the 1956 first edition, which was translated
an unsettling experience of the infinite (81) and enables him to sketch into English (Michaux, 1963a), thanks to the addition of “Addenda” much more
“a new form of literature” (87). A notable later monograph (Brun, 1999) in keeping with the more mystical and positive appreciation of the drug in
adopts a psychoanalytic approach, likening Michaux’s mescaline writings to L’Infini turbulent (Michaux, 1957).
Freud’s 1884 essay on cocaine (42) and argues that psychedelics enabled 4 All page references to Michaux’s published work in this article are given
Michaux to escape from feelings of being imprisoned in his body which to the scholarly editions of reference, volumes 2 and 3 of Michaux’s Œuvres
he had experienced since childhood (65). Anne Brun also suggests that the complètes in the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade (Michaux, 2001, 2004), rather than
abundance of onomatopoeia is an attempt to render a language of the to the various original editions. Two editions of L’Infini turbulent appeared
body reminiscent of the moment when the infant discovers language (93), during Michaux’s lifetime: the original edition of 1957 and a slightly revised
an argument clearly indebted to that advanced about the reemergence of edition published in 1964. The discussion about the Bardo Thödol occurs in
the ‘semiotic’ in poetic language (Kristeva, 1974). Literary critic Max Milner both editions.

Frontiers in Psychology 02 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

giving the structural formula of mescaline hydrochloride as one The remainder of this Introduction will outline
of the two epigraphs to Misérable Miracle (Michaux, 1956, 2001; the settings in which Michaux took psychedelics, his
p. 618). Moreover, despite having written about his travels in typical doses, his aim or “set,” and his familiarity with
Central America earlier in his life (Michaux, 1929) and being contemporaneous biomedical research on psychedelics,
familiar with some indigenous uses of peyote - he mentions the in which the psychotomimetic paradigm was dominant,
Huichol and the Tarahumara, as well as some of the geometric before the substantive sections of the article argue for a
features of Aztec art and architecture on several occasions, for reading of his work as a programmatic template for the
example - he couches his own interest resolutely in terms of psychedelic humanities.
Western biomedicine. He does not discuss the role of peyote in
“postcolonial healing” (Calabrese, 2013) by the Native American
Church, nor the significant stewardship of the peyote experience 1.2. Setting
by that institution, and it is possible that he was unaware of
it. As the Beat poet, essayist, and stalwart of the American Most of Michaux’s drug experiences took place at home, in
counterculture Michael McClure noted, “A mescaline high is his flat on the Rue Séguier in central Paris. They began on 2
not a peyote high” (McClure, 1966; p. 42), and Michaux was January 1955 (Pic, 2014; p. 9), when Michaux, like the century,
aware that he was exposing himself to just one of the several was in his mid-fifties and already a very well established and well
psychedelic alkaloids in the peyote cactus.5 This preference connected, yet by repute, rather an aloof writer, poet, and visual
for synthetic mescaline and relative indifference to indigenous artist.8 The first experience took place in the company of some
practices also placed Michaux at variance with two significant five friends or acquaintances and his housekeeper; the mescaline
earlier French authors on peyote: pharmacist, entrepreneur, and was probably supplied by psychiatrist Dr. Julian de Ajuriaguerra
occultist Alexandre Rouhier, who dedicated his classic study (Ouvry-Vial, 1989; p. 200; Martin, 2003; p. 518). Most of the
to “THE SPIRIT OF CUAUHTEMOC” (Rouhier, 1927; p. iii, subsequent mescaline experiences were conducted with others
capitalization in original) and Antonin Artaud (Artaud, 1945).6 I present, or in an adjacent room, although Michaux occasionally
discuss the political ramifications of these choices of Michaux’s in took the drug alone, but only after having notified a friend by
Section 3 below. telephone, who would ring back 3 h later to check on him (Martin,
In France, there was little interest in Michaux’s drug books 2003; p. 520).
initially, with the first edition (Michaux, 1956) selling only around Michaux’s first experience of psilocybin (recounted in Michaux,
250 copies. He nevertheless acquired a certain notoriety for his 1961) took place in 1958 in the very different setting of the Sainte-
experiments with psychedelics and a planned public screening of Anne psychiatric hospital in Paris, as part of a clinical study (Delay
his film was banned in November 1968 (Michaux, 2004; p. 1540), et al., 1959) overseen by the charismatic director of its Clinic
though this must also be attributed to the generalized repressive of Mental Illnesses and Illnesses of the Brain and also Chair of
crackdown following the protests of Mai ’68. Prohibitionist drug Psychiatry in the Paris Faculty of Medicine, Jean Delay. Delay was
law in France, as in other countries, significantly tightened a friend of Michaux’s and is generally remembered for his role in
with regard to mescaline during the period in which Michaux
experimented with the substance and its immediate aftermath:
while his particular use of mescaline was, in the strictest of law. Nevertheless, two peculiarities of 20th-century French drug control law
senses, legal when he began his experimentation in the mid- deserve mention: first, that between the passing of the 1916 law and the
1950’s, it was no longer legal with the passing of the 1970 law tightening of domestic legislation in 1970, neither the mere possession of
explicitly prohibiting its use and whether his writings about controlled substances in private without intent to sell them on nor their use
drugs fell foul of other prohibitionist provisions is a moot in private were prohibited by law (Marchant, 2018; Black, 2022), even though
point.7 police and prosecutors would often behave as though they were (Retaillaud-
Bajac, 2009; p. 231-271). Second, to this day, French law continues to
place highly unusual emphasis on punishing what is characterized as
5 I am grateful to one of the reviewers of this article for introducing proselytising for drugs in Article L3421-4 of the Code de la santé (Légifrance,
me to McClure’s remarkable body of work and, in particular, the Meat 2007): in effect, offering any representation that is not harm-focused. This
Science essays. McClure was inspired to write his Drug Notes after reading internationally unusual restriction continues to exert an inhibiting effect on
a translation of an excerpt from Misérable Miracle in the Evergreen Review cultural production, grown-up public debate, and, in turn, on the allocation
(McClure, 1993; p. ix). of funding for research on psychedelics (Chayet, 2020). In Michaux’s case, the
6 Rouhier’s magnificent dedication reads in full: “I DEDICATE THIS BOOK ambivalence characterizing his published works on drugs makes it difficult to
TO THE SPIRIT OF CUAUHTEMOC, ‘THE EAGLE WHO DESCENDED’, HIGH construe them straightforwardly as proselytism for drugs and various harms
PRIEST OF THE AZTEC RELIGION, CUTTER OF THE PEYOTE AND LAST are mentioned, although a plausible argument could certainly have been
EMPEROR OF THE ANAHUAC, WHOM THE CHRISTIAN CONQUISTADORS, made in that direction and might well have been, had he been less well
HUNGRY FOR GOLD, TORTURED BY FIRE AND HANGED ON THE TWENTY- connected and more widely read.
FIRST OF AUGUST IN THE YEAR OF GRACE M D XX II” (Rouhier, 1927; p. iii, 8 Michaux had emigrated to Paris from his native Belgium in the 1920s and
capitalization in original). gone on to travel widely in Central and South America, the Middle East, and
7 Before 1970, the principal domestic drug control legislation in France East Asia, before settling for good in Paris (Ouvry-Vial, 1989; Martin, 2003).
was the 1916 law (Yvorel, 2012) and in 1957, mescaline was added by He had lived alone but for a housekeeper since the death of his wife in a
administrative decision to the list of substances under the purview of that domestic accident in 1948 (Martin, 2003; p. 441-2).

Frontiers in Psychology 03 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

the discovery of the antipsychotic effects of chlorpromazine in 1952 to scientific publications (Halpern, 1998; p. 19). Six of these are
(Thuillier, 1999; Healy, 2004; p. 88), but he had also been leading elogios references to Delay, who thereby figures as Michaux’s
clinical studies with mescaline from the mid-1940’s (Delay and “scientist-double” (Halpern, 1998; p. 19), a relationship somewhat
Gérard, 1948; Dassonneville, 2021; p. 89), following on from similar reminiscent of the Anglophone writer-psychiatrist dyad of Aldous
research conducted at the same institution on mescaline, by others, Huxley and Humphry Osmond (Bruchez, 2007; Dyck, 2008).
in the preceding decade (Dassonneville, 2021; p. 80). Delay also Delay returned the favor by concluding an article on LSD with
worked with LSD throughout the 1950’s (Thuillier, 1999; Dubus, reference to Michaux’s evocation of the “miserable miracles” of a
2022). His experiments with psychedelics on psychiatric in-patients “neighboring experience,” in other words with mescaline (Delay
at Sainte-Anne had no regard for the role of “setting” or “set” and, and Benda, 1958; p. 342), and by prefacing his film (Duvivier,
even by the psychiatric standards of the day, were in some cases 1963), to some extent thereby testifying to its scientific interest.
remarkable for their cruelty and obliviousness to patient consent Michaux was also on friendly terms with pioneering mycologist
(Dubus, 2022). Nevertheless, in the decidedly different quality Roger Heim, beginning a correspondence of some 20 letters with
distinguishing Michaux’s two narrated experiences with psilocybin, him in 1958; Heim supplied Michaux with synthetic psilocybin
recounted sequentially in Connaissance par les gouffres (Michaux, and psychedelic mushrooms (Michaux, 2004: xii, 1485). Michaux
2004; p. 16-36), the first at the hospital under clinical observation also read older scientific works on peyote and mescaline by Ellis
(but none of the other constraints imposed on in-patient subjects) (1898), Rouhier (1927), and Lewin (1928) (Martin, 2003; p. 514-
and the second at home, the significance of “setting” was already 5). He was well versed too in more literary engagements with
registering in France in the early 1960’s, despite Delay’s indifference psychoactive drugs, notably Thomas De Quincey’s Confessions, a
yet on the literary fringes of his entourage, in Michaux’s work in the foundational text for psychonautic drug-writing (Partridge, 2018),
psychedelic humanities. work by Baudelaire (1860) on cannabis and opium, and the more
proximate engagements, with mescaline, by Jean-Paul Sartre in
the 1930’s [Sartre’s own account was published posthumously in
1.3. Dose, substance, and aim or “set” Sartre (2010), but had circulated in unpublished form and is
mentioned in Merleau-Ponty (1942, 1945); see also Dassonneville
Generally, Michaux took mescaline hydrochloride in doses (2021) and Farrell (2021)] and by Artaud in the 1940’s (Artaud,
under 0.3 g, though on one occasion, he took 0.6 g, “six times the 1945).
sufficient dose for me,” owing to “an error of calculation” (Michaux,
2001; p. 723)—a “strange error” indeed (Blanchot, 1966; p. 83)
given that it came in capsules of 0.1 g—and had a very intense “bad 1.5. The psychotomimetic paradigm
trip,” only calmed by two home visits from his sympathetic doctor
later in the day.9 In other words, Michaux preferred to consume As well as Michaux’s likely supplier, Ajuriaguerra was the
mescaline in quantities just above the typical threshold dose (his co-author of the first monograph on Michaux’s drug writing
“sufficient” dose) of 0.1 g and rise to an intermediate dose of 0.3 g (Ajuriaguerra and Jaeggi, 1963), which construed the experiences
(Erowid, 2015), presumably so that he could still steer the trip largely in terms of the “model psychoses” or “psychotomimetic”
and “Observe the derangements [les dérèglements], the erroneous paradigm (Swanson, 2018) dominant in psychiatric research on
connections in thought, the errors of the thinking instrument, now psychedelics during the 1950’s but dating back, as a paradigm
upskittled, and the illusions of the human being who possesses for the effects of psychoactive drugs more widely, to the
this fragile thinking instrument.” (Michaux, 2001; p. 770). That mid-nineteenth-century work of Jacques-Joseph Moreau (“de
this constitutes a relatively open and exploratory “set” is a point Tours”) on cannabis, among other substances (Foucault, 2003;
to which I return in Section 2 below. p. 280-84). Ajuriaguerra and his co-author’s reliance on this
paradigm are unsurprising given its dominance in the day and
the way Michaux indulges in largely speculative comparisons
1.4. Contemporaneous biomedical between his experience and what he observed of the behavior
research on psychedelics and literary of patients at the Sainte-Anne and other psychiatric hospitals,
where he was seemingly permitted fairly free access to wander
precursors
the wards making amateur observations. Nevertheless, adherence
to this now obsolete paradigm is by no means complete, or
Several years before commencing his self-experiments with
sustained evenly, in the works; as the substantive part of this
mescaline, Michaux began reading widely in contemporaneous
article now aims to show, they survive the obsolescence of
psychiatric research on psychedelics (Martin, 2003; p. 514) and
that paradigm.
the drug works taken together contain around 80 note references

9 I shall return to reflect on the significance of this particular trip in §2,

2. The psychedelic enhancement of
below. When he felt things were getting out of hand, Michaux also sometimes “creativity”
resorted variously to the following real and imagined antagonists: sugar,
oranges, benzodiazepine chlordiazepoxide (Librium), nicotinamide (vitamin Although the main focus of research in the “psychedelic
B3), Véricardine (a heart medication containing phenobarbital), and even the renaissance” to date has been on the medical and therapeutic
stimulant camphor (Solucamphre) (Halpern, 1998; p. 106). potential of psychedelics for treating diagnosed mental health

Frontiers in Psychology 04 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

disorders, the question of whether psychedelics can enhance problem, on which they had been working for some time and
creative thinking more widely, and if so how, remains open had become “stuck.” The study concluded that above-threshold
(Sessa, 2008) and has recently been posed in relation to but moderate doses of the psychedelic, administered under
scientific creativity specifically (Gandy et al., 2022). “Creativity” conditions of “appropriate expectancy” (Harman et al., 1966;
is a particular focus in research on microdosing, whether in p. 216), enabled “enhanced ability to recognize patterns” (219),
the form of analyses of self-reports (Anderson et al., 2019; “deautomatization” (221), “[h]igh movitation to obtain closure;
Petranker et al., 2020) or an ongoing RCT study (Murphy et al., an appetite for elegance” (224), and the “[c]apacity to visualize
2021), the results of which are eagerly awaited given suspicions the completed solution in its entirety” (224).12 For successful
that self-reported benefits of microdosing might be placebo “creative” problem-solving by humans, this study suggested that
effects.10 technical, motivational, perceptual, and cognitive aptitudes are
“Creativity” was a preoccupation of pre-prohibition research all required. One of the abovementioned microdosing studies
on psychedelics, as is indicated by the name of Al Hubbard’s (Anderson et al., 2019), based on a grounded theory analysis of self-
Commission for the Study of Creative Imagination, established reports by microdosers, concluded that “creativity” came third in
in 1955, to extend the study of these substances beyond medical a list of benefits ascribed to the practice, after “improved mood”
use. “Creativity” was a particular focus of research on the and “improved focus” and before “self-efficacy” and “improved
West Coast of the United States, the cradle of the often energy.” Most of these are recognizably similar, despite the different
forgotten “technophilic” counterculture (Turner, 2006), notably language, to many of the benefits registered in the landmark
undertaken under the auspices of Willis Harman and Myron 1966 macrodose study (Harman et al., 1966), which made a
Stolaroff ’s International Foundation for Advanced Study in Menlo point of trying to focus narrowly on the technical problems and
Park, California, on the fringes of Stanford University; some aptitudes required to resolve them and preparing participants
of this research involved, as participants, Douglas Engelbart pre-administration to avoid addressing problems of a personal
and other pioneering computer developers from his Augmented nature during the trip. For professional problem-solvers, it is
Human Intellect Research Center at the Stanford Research reasonable to suppose that “improved mood” would also follow
Institute (Markoff, 2005; p. 67). Rather than research involving from a successful resolution of the problem. My point is not to
art or artists, “creativity” in this strand of pre-prohibition indulge in idle speculation about the relationship between two
research was largely understood as the resourceful and successful very different types of studies conducted under very different
solution of technical problems, in a manner akin to the conditions some half a century apart but rather to observe that,
popular-psychological notion of “lateral thinking” (De Bono, conceptually speaking, work on the psychedelic enhancement of
1970).11 creativity tends to look for a cluster or multiplicity of aptitudes
The most significant of these pre-prohibition “creativity” in which the perceptual, cognitive, and motivational are closely
experiments, using mescaline (Harman et al., 1966), involved as intertwined. In so far as scientists draw their understanding
participants engineers, architects, and scientists, each of whom of “creativity” from the surrounding culture, in a process
was asked to bring to the study one unresolved technical of abstraction and reconstruction that is explicitly built into
the grounded theory methodology of the microdosing study
(Anderson et al., 2019), their understanding and what they look
10 In this section, I generally place “creativity” within scare quotes because for empirically will to some extent reflect the fuzziness, or
(a) it is notoriously difficult to define and measure psychologically (Said-
Metwaly et al., 2017); (b) it has largely displaced the more venerable and
broader concept of the esthetic, which I feel would in many ways be
preferable; (c) despite the near-universal scientific and popular consensus
that it is a good thing, it has a sinister history of entanglement with the politics
of corporate “innovation”and technocratic rule, reflected in the favor it finds 12 The “primary active agent” in the experiments that were written up
today among microdosing Silicon Valley tech workers who design and refine was 200 mg of mescaline sulfate (Harman et al., 1966; p. 216). However, in
the digital instruments of global governance. common with a certain amount of other early research (for instance, Martin,
11 Their explicit technical-motivational conception of psychedelically 1962), the psychedelic was co-administered in this study with a stimulant, in
enhanced creativity in terms of improved problem-solving ability and this case, methedrine (methamphetamine) but with scant discussion of the
greater willingness to succeed was prominent in pre-prohibition scientific likely impact of the second drug. One of the co-authors, psychologist James
research and is neatly encapsulated in the title of one influential book- Fadiman, later gave an evasively euphemistic account of the second part
length study: LSD: The Problem-Solving Psychedelic (Stafford and Golightly, of this drug combination: “The dose was 50 micrograms of LSD, preceded
1967). Harman et al. (1966) is also a foundational point of reference in this by energizers.” (Fadiman, 2011; p. 168, emphasis added), the reference
book, which collates the accounts of problem-solving scattered through a to LSD probably being to the informal preliminary sessions before those
biomedical literature of the day which was more directly orientated toward written up. While it is hardly surprising that biomedical researchers tentatively
therapeutic use. The authors envisage psychedelics beyond their medical use resuming work on psychedelics in the renaissance should have steered well
as aiding “the alleviation of those countless problems by which man [sic] is clear of methamphetamine, now the most abhorred of substances (Parsons,
beset” (Stafford and Golightly, 1967; p. 30), or in other words for the general 2014), it is remarkable that the impact of co-administration of psychedelics
enhancement of human activity by solving problems in all manner of areas: with stimulants in this and other early research has yet to be discussed or
“business, pleasure, sickness, health, birth, death, ad infinitum” (30). replicated.

Frontiers in Psychology 05 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

clustered multiplicity, which characterizes this concept in ordinary can he add? His initial verdict (Michaux, 1956) on the impact
usage.13 of mescaline on his creative imagination is entirely negative:
As Mason et al. (2021) note, “Creativity is an essential cognitive “Mescaline diminishes the imagination. It castrates the image,
ability linked to all areas of our everyday life, allowing us to adapt desensualizes it. It makes images that are 100% pure, laboratory
to an ever-changing environment and come up with ways to solve grade. [. . . ] Thus it is the enemy of poetry, of meditation and
problems.” Creativity can in this sense be considered an essential above all of mystery.” (Michaux, 2001; p. 674). Furthermore, he
human aptitude. Nevertheless, ordinary cultural usage does also complains of the drug’s aftereffects: “Two weeks after the last
recognize one particular activity more especially concerned with experiment I was still unable to write except repetitively, in the
creativity than others: the making of art. Even those who concur most banal of ways; this is largely due to a lack of (natural)
with Joseph Beuys saying “Everyone is an artist” (Michaud, 1988; images [. . . ]. Even in conversation, although more garrulous, less
p. 36) cannot escape the fact that in the current social division restrained, I had become a pauper as far as images are concerned.”
of labor, those we call artists are especially concerned with (Michaux, 2001; p. 674). The mescaline visuals are dismissed as
creativity. It is plausible to suppose that creative artists who have a “tacky retinal circus” (Michaux, 2001; p. 632) and although he
experimented with psychedelics might have something substantial does not use the word, Michaux seems to object, in effect, to their
to contribute to the cultural conversation from which scientific kitsch: they are “shockingly like advertisements” (Michaux, 2001;
conceptualizations of elements within the creativity cluster are p. 624, italics original). Their garish colors, their insistence, and
drawn and it is in this spirit that I turn to Michaux.14 What their schematic or abstract quality, which detaches them from
the realm of sensuous experience, make them “the enemy” of
“poetry,” in Michaux’s initial judgment. We may not share the
13 Given that terms used to name elements within this creativity cluster rather conventional assumptions implicit in this verdict about what
vary between studies, I note that the perceptual and cognitive dimensions making (good) art, or conversation, involves—the production of
might together have been described as “aesthetic” aptitudes, according to sensuously rich “images”—but if we compare Michaux’s experience
a long-established use of this term in philosophy which has nevertheless with the findings of the 1966 creativity study discussed in the
fallen from favor in psychology. Although this “aesthetic” dimension was preceding paragraph (Harman et al., 1966), substituting “images”
not addressed in such terms in the discussion of their findings by the for “solutions,” then it seems that his early experiences of mescaline
study’s authors, it was alluded to briefly (as “aesthetic sensibility”) in the ran counter to those of the engineers and scientists enrolled on
somewhat amorphous working definition of creativity deployed in the study that study and resulted, so to speak, in a lowering of the rate of
from Carl Rogers (216): by “aesthetic”, I refer both to the perceptual and artistic production.
the cognitive dimensions involved, for example, in the capacity to see In his early encounters with the drug, even before the fourth
pattern as pattern, or “visualize” the solution (Harman et al., 1966; p. 224)— experiment’s dosing “error,” mescaline seems to frustrate Michaux’s
as well as that which pertains to the beauty of its form, for example, in capacity to produce creative work. The mescaline experiences are
the “elegance” of a “solution,” a way of speaking common in mathematics initially an unwelcome disruption to his settled ways of working
and technology, which also suggests economical use of symbolic or other creatively. Yet, they lead eventually to a body of work which is
materials. The relevance of this point will become clear in §3. Two recent remarkable not for the “images” it contains, less for its “content,”
studies (Kuypers et al., 2016; Mason et al., 2021) try to focus more precisely and more for how, by working through the adversity of that
on two dimensions widely thought to be important dimensions of creative disruption, Michaux undertakes a formal and textural esthetic
thinking: divergent and convergent thinking. The first (Kuypers et al., 2016) reconstitution of the pullulating profusion—the sense of sprouting
found an increase in divergent thinking during the acute phase following and generative multiplicity, of chaotic creative potentiality—which
ayahuasca administration; the second (Mason et al., 2021) did not find characterizes his experience. The first two books in the series
the same effect with psilocybin but did find that divergent thinking and (Michaux, 1956, 1957) adopt a novel textual practice whereby
creative cognition had increased after the acute effects had worn off, 7 days sparse marginal annotations in italics sit alongside the main
after administration. body of the text, effectively introducing two columns of text on
14 There is one obvious, principled but pedestrian reason why this is each page.15 Michaux commented in the preface to Misérable
the case: a single artist’s experience can count with no more weight Miracle (Michaux, 1956): “In this book the margin occupied
than any other participant in the statistical analysis of experimental results. more by shortcuts than titles expresses very insufficiently the
However, in the design of studies to investigate “creativity” and its psychedelic overlappings [les chevauchements], a phenomenon always present
enhancement, working definitions of “creativity” must to some extent be with Mescaline [. . . ]. No other ‘devices’ have been used. Too many
abstracted from a cultural conversation that remains very confused about would have been needed.” (Michaux, 2001; p. 620) A double text is
what that elusive quality might be but in which, nevertheless, art and artists thereby created, which is, as it were, doubled again by the inclusion
have since time immemorial generally been recognized to have a certain kind of the drawings in the first three of the five books (Michaux, 1956,
of proficiency or prominence. Appealing to a standard-issue conception of 1957, 1959), and the writing and drawing are in turn doubled by
the scientific method as an excuse not to take any account of the collective
wisdom reflected in that social and historical fact is itself a methodological
decision with consequences, not least in that not only the results but also 15 The resulting layout of the page bears a passing resemblance to
the working assumptions of such narrowly conceived research on “creativity” some medieval manuscripts which incorporate marginal annotations and
also feed back into the culture in a way which further flattens it to fit the glosses, although the italicized marginalia in Michaux’s case generally sit in a
thin template of techno-scientific rationalism. One task of the psychedelic more conflictual, unstable, and less harmonious relationship to the adjacent
humanities is to arrest this downward spiral. column.

Frontiers in Psychology 06 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

the filmic representation (Duvivier, 1963). This textual doubling, or that he was depressed, or “stuck,” personally or professionally,
multiplication—this proliferation of the text into text plus paratext, nor that he was prone to psychosis. Under these relatively open
complicated in turn by proliferation across media into drawings conditions of exploration—starting with the relatively open set
and film—can be understood as an attempt to go some way toward characteristic of the psychonaut—he seems to have had a more
expressing formally the pullulating multiplicity characteristic of radical experience of creativity as an original pullulating or
Michaux’s mescaline experience and the tendency for elements potentiating chaos before the emergence of order and form.
within that experience to overlap, influence, and interact with and Michaux’s early descriptions of mescaline’s effects often
impinge on one another—and to share that experience with his characterize the drug as a mechanism operating inside him,
audience in the way that it obliges them to read and see differently.16 heteronomously. He begins to realize that it will work upon any
The iterative formal reduplication of the text can be understood thought he feeds it: observing to himself that the “himalaya”
as the expression, in terms more of form than content, of his mountains he visualizes are “immense,” the two-letter m’s in this
experience of pullulating multiplicity and multiplication under adjective suddenly shoot off upwards and become “arches for
mescaline: “Pullulation! Pullulation everywhere! Pullulation from unthinkable and baroque cathedrals” (Michaux, 2001; p. 624).17
which there is no exit. Space full to overflowing, space of gestation, As he begins to discover that mescaline enhances his capacity for
space of transformation and multiplication; teeming space, which, self-suggestion, he resolves to try not to think of anything: “Let’s
even if it were only an illusion, would give better account than not give one idea, not one item, to this crazy mechanism. But
ordinary sight of what the Cosmos is.” (Michaux, 2001; p. 679). already the machine had begun moving again at one hundred
Considering Michaux’s work alongside the early images per minute.” (624) The mechanistic quality he attributes
creativity study, I surmise that mescaline provoked a radical here to the drug could perhaps be understood as his experiencing,
“deautomatization” (Harman et al., 1966; p. 221) of his creative under its influence, the limitations of his own mechanistic self-
practice, creating an initially unwelcome disruption of his settled conception, in particular, as this involves unhelpful capitalist-
ways of working but which ultimately enabled, through his productivist assumptions about what it means to be productive as
deliberate and repeated practicing against this new coefficient a creative artist, or even as an imitative reactualization from his
of adversity, a type of creativity quite unlike the production of reading of earlier trip reports [notably Rouhier (1927); p. 252].
sensuous images or literary “content” and much more concerned The abstracting effect which he attributes to the drug leads,
with inventions in texture and form. The “solutions” mescaline in his esthetic reconstitution of the experience, to an explosive
offers Michaux lie not in ready-made images that might be experimentation with form and medium by way of textural
captured from its visuals and reproduced citationally on the page complication and transmedial expansion. Most significant and
but rather in the way in which the psychedelic upskittled his consequential is the fourth experiment [in Michaux (1956)],
well-established ways of working and enabled or forced him to which begins with the abovementioned dosing “error” such that,
develop an innovative and expansive new practice of the form. unusually, he consumes a “heavy” dose of 0.6 g (Erowid, 2015).
In an illuminating counterpoint to biomedical research on the Michaux experiences becoming letters and a line: “Large Z’s are
psychedelic enhancement of creativity, Michaux’s work suggests passing within me (zebra-stripes-vibrations-zigzags?). Then it is
that psychedelics do not always enhance creativity simply by broken S’s, or then again, perhaps halves of them, incomplete O’s”
increasing output within existing forms and frameworks. They (Michaux, 2001; p. 733); “To have become a line was catastrophic,
sometimes first dismantle those forms and frameworks: they but it was also, if this is possible, all the more unexpected and
disassemble the production line, so to speak, and deautomatize the prodigious.” (Michaux, 2001; p. 738). In other words, Michaux
production. They thereby clear a space in which the subject can experiences becoming one with the very matter of his creative
reconfigure the terms of representation, remaking the forms, tools, activity, letters, and lines, in a psychedelically enabled immersive
and techniques of representing: when enhanced by psychedelics, expression of the renewed focus on medium and form often
creativity can also involve destruction and stoppage. I would thought to characterize esthetic modernism. Michaux’s experience
speculate that the capacity to rebuild new forms and frameworks bears some resemblance to the self-report by biochemist Kary
depends in part on training and discipline, and the enhancement
in creativity on the will to continue “practicing” with the creatively
destructive psychedelic technique. I return to the significance 17 Mouchard (1979; p. 168-9) noted that the title of the first book in
of such anthropotechnical practice in my conclusion. Evidently, the drug series, Misérable Miracle, contains a phonetic reflection of its
Michaux’s experience of mescaline was far more disruptive and, author’s surname in the repeated first syllable of each word; given Michaux’s
at least initially, chaotic than that reported by the engineers, interest in onomastics elsewhere, this is a pertinent observation. Here,
architects, and other macrodosed tech workers [in Harman et al. the double m, in “immenses,” refers us back to the title and the author’s
(1966)]. Why might this be? Perhaps because he approached the surname even while it serves as the occasion of Michaux’s first glimpse
drug with a relatively open set, as noted above (Section 1.3): he did of the drug’s enhancement of his capacity for self-suggestion. This line
not have a specific problem to solve, nor do we have any evidence of interpretation could be pushed further: given the dramatic reversal in
affective attitude between the first and second books (see §4, below), the
move from the “me, me” of Misérable Miracle to the “it” of L’Infini turbulent
16 The innovative formal doubling of the written text into text and paratext might be understood as the expression, drawing on the rudiments of a foreign
is by far the most significant of these proliferations, given that in some of his language with which Michaux was passingly familiar, of the transition from an
other work beyond the drug series, he also juxtaposes writing and visual art. agonistic ego-focused relationship to the drug to one more accepting of its
See Parish (2007). “autoheteronomous” activity.

Frontiers in Psychology 07 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

Mullis on his discovery of how to automate the polymerase chain Jacques Rancière, this “molecular” perspective on politics focuses
reaction, a discovery he was convinced had been enabled by self- on the micropolitical processes by which macropolitical (“molar”)
experimentation with LSD: “I was down there with the molecules” institutions, positions, and subjects who hold them come to be
[cited in Doyle (2011); p. 193]. In both Michaux’s and Mullis’s constituted.18 An exhaustive account of this approach is impossible
cases, the psychedelic trip enables a radical perspectival shift, within the constraints of the present article (see Davis, 2010; p. 74–
an immersive empathic-projective visualization of the scenario 100) but its merits are expressed succinctly in Michaux’s comment
at a microscopic level with a high degree of intensity: “I was on the microperceptual perspective which psychedelics enable:
living intensely in microperception, among the microsignals” “Everything or almost everything is constituted, constituting and
(Michaux, 2001; p. 997). It is in the cognitive yield enabled by this thus reconstituable.” (Michaux, 2004; p. 33) Reading through
engrossing shift of perspective to the microperceptual level that the lens of these “molecular” theorists of politics, Michaux’s
the successful “creative” problem-solving documented in the 1966 work suggests that the psychedelically trained mind’s sensitivity
creativity study (Harman et al., 1966) might best be understood to infraperceptual phenomena which remain below the level of
and explicated: the mind becomes a much more sensitive and ordinary awareness gives rise to a conviction that any constituted
more incisive instrument, reattuned to the basic elements of the object of consciousness, including those shared culturally and
problem, visualizing them at the microperceptual level, and capable politically, might be remade anew. This is not magical thinking
of remaking the forms and frameworks of its understanding around but rather the subjective “molecular” ground of the indispensable
those elements. political conviction that things could be otherwise.
If the political import of psychedelics is to show that every
object of common political belief and every believing subject
3. The politics of psychedelics might be remade anew, as Michaux and the political thinkers he
influenced suggest, little wonder that psychedelics seem to appeal
As well as offering insight into the way psychedelics enhance more to thinkers of radical, extreme, or revolutionary politics
creativity, the shift to the microperceptual documented in and to alarm those who prefer the centrist middle-ground of
Michaux’s drug works sheds new light on the increasingly vexed consensual, representative-electoral liberal democracy. Does this
question of the politics of psychedelics. For the historically mean, however, that psychedelics are entirely versatile in political
contingent reason of their entanglement with a left-leaning terms and are unwedded to any particular form of politics?
counterculture, it has often been assumed that psychedelics are While their use in numerous indigenous cultures as agents of
conducive to greater openness to other people and cultures, as socio-cultural consolidation and reproduction is well-documented
well as the profound realization of human interconnectedness with (Dobkin de Rios, 1990 [1984]), in a social setting that is
other species and the natural environment, for example, in the already heterogeneous, it is highly unlikely that psychedelics could
suggestion that psychedelics might be “ecodelics” (Doyle, 2011). readily serve the same consolidating purpose. The very “wildness”
This way of thinking has been reflected in the theorization of (Langlitz, 2012; p. 131) of these substances—the difficulty of
Acid Communism by Mark Fisher (Stamm, 2019) and Psychedelic predicting and stabilizing their effects—militates against this. For
Socialism by Jeremy Gilbert (Gilbert, 2017), as well as some psychedelics to function reliably in such a way would require that
outlying biomedical research (Nour et al., 2017; Lyons and Carhart- setting and set already be controlled so comprehensively as to make
Harris, 2018). However, a longstanding line of skepticism about the political use of psychedelics redundant: if a regime already
such claims, which dates back to the 1970’s (Felton, 1972), is had control of its subjects’ mindset and environment to such an
now gaining ground in the psychedelic humanities, as scholars extent, there would simply be no need to call on the amplificatory
point to the penchant for psychedelics among some right-wing effects of psychedelics.19 I call this the redundancy thesis: it posits
ideologues historically (Piper, 2015), the wider phenomenon of
“Rightist Psychedelia” (Langlitz, 2020) and the interest in these
substances in some corners of the alt-right today, including Q- 18 The influence of Michaux on Deleuze and Guattari has been noted
Anon and neo-Nazism (Pace and Devenot, 2021). Attempts to by Raymond Bellour (Michaux, 1998; p. lix-lxi), who remarks on the long
conceptualize the politics of psychedelics would thus appear to have quotation from one of the drug books (Michaux, 1961) in the early pages
reached an impasse: the substances seem to be conducive to either of Anti-Oedipus (Deleuze and Guattari, 1984 [1972]; p. 6-7). Although talk
extreme, or a number of extreme positions, with research to date of “molecules” evidently abounds in science and the wider culture, it may
suggesting that the most we can say is that they eschew the centrist well be that “the molecular,” in the precise sense it acquires politically in this
middle-ground of liberal democracy and that they are politically body of work, was also drawn from Michaux and from the first study of his
versatile, or “pluripotent” (Lonergan, 2021), and conducive to the drug writing, in which the “the molecular swarming of elements” and “the as
entrenchment of any already held belief. it were molecular disturbance of the constituents of thought” are particular
However, this impasse presupposes quite a conventional view of points of emphasis (Ajuriaguerra and Jaeggi, 1963; p. 12, 44). The genealogy
politics, which envisages the political in terms of already constituted of Rancière’s political thought presented in outline here may surprise some:
macropolitical positions and the subjects who hold to them. There there are, of course, other important elements he brings to—and assembles
is another way of looking at politics, well-established in theorization with—the “molecular” vision of politics outlined by Guattari and Deleuze but,
of radical democracy, which offers a more promising approach in my considered view, there is no doubting the continuity of this line of
better attuned to the way psychedelics function—and this is thinking.
probably no accident of history. Advanced by Deleuze and Guattari 19 I do not mean to imply that psychedelics have never been used by
(1984 [1972]; 1987 [1980]) and Guattari (2012), then recrafted by authoritarian political regimes or for abusive purposes by repressive state

Frontiers in Psychology 08 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

the redundancy of psychedelics for authoritarian macropolitical for future ‘leaders [manieurs]”’ (Michaux, 2001; p. 693). Michaux
organization, whether right or left. Rather, psychedelics are lacked the messianic ambition of Timothy Leary; his advocacy for
interruptive, “molecular,” emancipatory political technologies of psychedelics was far more contorted, unwieldy, and ambivalent—
radical freedom and emergence which are far more likely to weaken for characteriological reasons, I would suggest more than to avoid
established macropolitical structures than to consolidate them. This the French legal prohibition on proselytizing for drugs (see n.7).
does not mean that they are politically redundant—far from it— Nevertheless, it is extraordinary that Michaux not only apprehends
or that the old consensus about psychedelics being conducive to and resists the “maximomaniacal pressure” (Michaux, 2001; p. 812)
left-leaning politics can be restored: to say they are “molecular” he experiences in his encounter with mescaline but also envisages
technologies of radical freedom is not necessary to align them with a future in which psychedelics will be put to technocratic use in
left-wing politics but it is to oppose them to organized political the training of political leaders. That is, in a far more sinister
authoritarianism of any stripe and to calm mounting panic at vein than Leary’s vision of the university in which psychedelics
the prospect they may stand set to usher in a fascist future. A would eventually replace books as anthropotechnical devices for
new account is required of how the “molecular,” or micropolitical, the fashioning of selves, Michaux speculates about a strongly
activity of psychedelics and those groups who make use of them hierarchized technocratic political future in which psychedelics will
can transform macropolitical structures. Prominent in such an have become part of the curriculum for training an elite destined to
account will be many of the same aptitudes discussed in Section govern by moving the masses with carefully administered doses of
2, under the enhancement of “creativity”: from a “molecular” charisma.21
perspective, creative problem-solving is not only an individual How can this distinctly authoritarian vision of the future be
but also, fundamentally, a “transversally” intersubjective matter reconciled with my earlier claim that Michaux’s drug writing
(Guattari, 2012); the methodological individualism of the psy- inaugurates a “molecular” conception of politics according to which
sciences and the individualization which therapies derived from psychedelics tend to undo organized political authoritarianism?
their research produces, reflect, from a “molecular” perspective, Like many artists and intellectuals preoccupied with their own
arbitrarily anti-social decisions.20 creative activities, Michaux had what might be described as
In addition to inspiring a “molecular” approach to politics, of solipsistic or even, in his case, autistic tendencies: “Evil is other
the type encountered later in theorizations of radical democracy, people’s rhythm,” he wrote in 1949 (Michaux, 2001; p. 342,
Michaux’s work makes another contribution to the understanding italics original). When he imagines the possible advantage which
of psychedelic politics by registering, resisting, and partially psychedelics might give to the leaders of a hierarchical technocratic
interpreting a tendency toward what might be called delusions state of the future, he, like some of today’s oligarchs, pharma
of grandeur. “One is overcome by superlatives. One suffocates entrepreneurs, and “psychedelic pundits” (Devenot et al., 2022)
with superlatives. One would scream superlatives. One is immense and some of their critics, does not pause to consider that others
and radiant with superlatives. One is thirsty and in great need of with very different political viewpoints starting from much less
superlatives. The greatest and most extraordinary. One is insatiable. privileged positions could also enjoy a similar benefit but to
One lives superlatively.” (Michaux, 2001; p. 812). Michaux is wary different ends. He does not imagine, but his readers can, the
of this propensity toward the superlative: “If I had given something effect of such a boost in political self-belief on the undermotivated
of myself to this, it would certainly have led to megalomania. and quietly despairing multitudes who might lack the basic self-
In sum, the strings of the megalomaniac were being given a esteem and self-confidence which, according to philosopher Axel
sharp tug. A sharp and mechanical tug. So I didn’t respond. Honneth’s recognitive account of autonomy, for example, are
[. . . ] Perhaps one day the ingestion of Mescaline and some other essential proto-political conditions for the exercise of this and
well-chosen drugs will be made compulsory at university level other aspects of political agency: “molecular” conditions, even
though Honneth does not use this term (Honneth and Anderson,
2005). There is good reason to believe that without quite being
agencies working within ostensibly democratic countries. Mescaline, among above the threshold at which they might be diagnosed as clinically
other drugs, was used in experiments on prisoners at Dachau by Dr. Kurt depressed, a sizeable proportion of the world’s downtrodden lack
Plötner as part of the Nazis’ search for a truth serum to facilitate interrogation. the motivational means and self-belief to engage in projects of
In parallel, the Truth Drug Committee of the US Office of Strategic Services, individual or collective transformation: they are held captive by
the forerunner of the CIA, trialed mescaline in 1942 (Jay, 2019; p. 185). When their situation, beaten down by economic hardship and social
the war ended, Plötner was recruited by the Americans and went on to work deprivation, caught up in flows of information, “guidance,” and
in Project Bluebird, later absorbed into the MKUltra project. Bluebird and “entertainment.” Reading against its grain, from the perspectives
MKUltra sought to deploy psychedelics and other substances and techniques of radical democracy and recognitive theory outlined here,
for mind control and behavior modification and included experimentation perforce briefly, Michaux’s anticipation of a psychedelically assisted
on subjects who had not given their consent, in violation of the Nuremburg technocratic future suggests that there would be a considerable
Code. For the purposes of my “redundancy thesis,” the key conclusion to
be salvaged from this sickening history is that even the CIA concluded that
psychedelics were unsuitable for their purposes because they were far too 21 I elaborate on the argument presented in this section in my forthcoming
unpredictable in their effects. book on the politics of psychedelics. In so far as neoliberal capitalism already
20 Further discussion of this matter would take me too far away from relies on bureaucracies of ranking and is committed to self-optimization on
Michaux. It is the point of departure for my forthcoming book on the politics the part of its subjects, it might be able to make especially effective use of
of psychedelics. this superlative or “maximomaniacal” propensity in psychedelic experience.

Frontiers in Psychology 09 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

transformative benefit in the psychedelically assisted self-raising of analyze, differentiate, and reassemble—indeed, this is what it means
their self-esteem and motivation by a despondent global majority, to read critically.
indeed that this would in effect consolidate the force of their
political will.
There is one respect in which Michaux’s drug works 4. Michaux’s mystical naturalism
are politically problematic: as mentioned (Section 1.1), their
orientation is resolutely toward Western technoscience and The dominance of the psychotomimetic paradigm of
biomedicine and engages only very fleetingly with indigenous psychedelic efficacy in the biomedical science of Michaux’s
cultural practices. In this one respect, Michaux’s approach is day probably contributed to the difficulty of some of his early
rather narrow and ignorant and I would not wish to suggest experiences and, in turn, to his hostile early judgments. Yet, as
otherwise, though at least he is transparent about this orientation they develop, his drug writings reveal that this mindset changed
and, as the following section establishes, he is to some extent gradually, with repeated practicing of the psychedelic experience,
consistent or evenhanded in the sense that Christian mystical culminating in a stark divide between the first and second books.23
experience is also subordinated to scientific explanation and Despite attempting to stick with his initial skepticism and maintain
translated into secular naturalistic terms. Had he been questioned an agonistic, distanced, scientific, and observational relationship
on this point, I can imagine him responding along these lines: to the drug (Michaux, 2001; p. 847), in the second book he
however significant indigenous practices may be, like it or not, eventually reports a full-blown mystico-religious experience, in
Western technoscience is now the hegemonic paradigm and unless block capitals: “I HAVE SEEN THE THOUSANDS OF GODS”
indigenous experiences can be translated into its terms they (Michaux, 2001; p. 852). He also claims to experience being
are destined to remain of largely antiquarian interest. They can traversed by, in a sense, of one substance with, a wave of energy
certainly be “recognized,” as many scholars in the psychedelic he calls “the furrow” [le sillon], “Furrow without beginning or
humanities tirelessly demand, but whether much follows concretely end [. . . ], which I would say comes from one side of the world,
from earnestly felt rhetorical gestures in this direction is a decidedly traversing me as it moves to the other” (Michaux, 2001; p. 626).
moot point. Of course, Michaux’s approach contrasts markedly As his practicing of the drug proceeds, this initially harrowing
with that of some scholars in the psychedelic humanities, who wish experience is acknowledged in some sense to be the revelation of a
to envision a future that “respects the lineages of the knowledges valid metaphysical intuition about the universe and his set changes
that are essentially and not accidentally bundled with these plants— from resistance to acceptance: “I stopped struggling, I let myself
Indigenous and counterculture wisdoms” (Devenot et al., 2022). be traversed by the fluid which, entering by way of the furrow,
However, Michaux is less interested in “plant medicines” than seemed to come from the end of the world” (Michaux, 2001;
in synthetic chemical forms and, like it or not, the field of p. 648–9). Unsurprising too that in the second book (Michaux,
psychedelics is now very much wider than that of plant medicines 1957), he draws on Christian mystics, including Catherine of
and cannot be reduced to plant medicines. Even if one agrees with Siena (Michaux, 2001; p. 914); in the third (Michaux, 1961), he
the sentiment of these authors that indigenous uses constitute an recounts hallucinating snippets of “Trois Petites Liturgies de la
invaluable archive of techniques, as I do, a treasury of techniques présence divine” (1944), a cantata by the devout Olivier Messiaen.
sometimes at variance with Western technoscience, sometimes However, these mystico-religious experiences do not challenge
in prescient anticipation of its slow and forgetful “discoveries,” Michaux’s implicit commitment to philosophical naturalism and
perhaps often also superior and in certain ways richer than it, strong physicalism, or in other words, the belief that physics
one has to face the fact that Western technoscience is hegemonic offers a complete description of causality, that the universe is
in political and regulatory terms and that, under such hegemony, as the natural sciences describe it, that some physical entities
the conditions under which such techniques will be retrieved lack mental properties, and those physical entities with mental
from that archive and redeployed are likely to be determined to characteristics evolved from physical entities with no mental
a significant extent by the criteria determined by that paradigm. characteristics [for a fuller account of these related positions
Despite Michaux’s indifference to indigenous experience and see Angel (2002); p. 317-8]. In the “Addenda” to the first book,
history, I nevertheless take the view that his drug works also published only in the 1972 edition, after the completion of the
contain valuable resources with which we can reconceptualize the other texts of the cycle, he testifies to what amounts to lasting
politics of psychedelics, including in ways which will ultimately personality change over the intervening years, under the influence
favor well-founded demands for “psychedelic justice” (Cavnar and of psychedelics, yet this too is entirely intelligible within the frame
Labate, 2021), among them for the recognition—in a substantial of naturalism: “Strange! I have become active. Attentive to what
sense exceeding mere rhetoric and virtue-signaling—of indigenous is happening—in and of itself—without trying to deform it or
expertise, stewardship, and tradition.22 When reading, one need imagine it differently to make it more interesting to me” (Michaux,
not bow to pressure to accept or reject everything en bloc: one can 2001; p. 770).

23 In the second edition of Michaux (1956), published by Gallimard in 1972,

the sceptical and pessimistic verdict on mescaline delivered in the main body
of the text is flatly contradicted by a series of appendices revealingly entitled
22 I explain in more detail how in my forthcoming book on the politics of “Addenda,” in which Michaux presents a much more positive view of the
psychedelics. psychedelic, inflected by his subsequent practicing with the drug.

Frontiers in Psychology 10 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

Regarding the epistemological reliability of the mystical the sobering prospect of a natural philosophy of psychedelics,
experiences some users encounter under psychedelics, in Michaux’s work suggests that a more promising paradigm, which
particular the status of visions of what is sometimes called better captures the force of psychedelic experience, might be
“other entities,” there are two opposing extremes in the current mystical naturalism.
literature, exemplified in recent scholarship by Chris Letheby’s
plea for a “natural philosophy” of psychedelics (Letheby,
2021; p. 8), one which is compatible with naturalism and 5. Conclusion: the concept of
physicalism, on the one hand, and Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes’s psychedelics as anthropotechnics and
conviction that mystical experiences under psychedelics
a note on Michaux’s “program”
constitute evidence for panpsychism (Sjöstedt-Hughes, 2021),
on the other. Michaux’s work demonstrates both a strong
This article has argued that the drug works by Henri Michaux
mystical impulse and a strong commitment to naturalism and
make a substantial contribution to the cultural understanding
physicalism: not only is there no sense of dissonance between
of psychedelics in three areas: (1) the role of psychedelics in
mysticism and naturalism but in many ways, Michaux’s work
enhancing “creativity”; (2) conceptualization of the politics of
succeeds in integrating them, such that his position might be
psychedelics; and (3) mystical naturalism. In this way, I have
characterized as “mystical naturalism” (Angel, 2002), or a “mystic
gleaned from the treasury that Michaux’s work constitutes a
materialism” of the type Huxley and Leary espoused, perhaps
“program” for research in the psychedelic humanities. I must
even one anticipating the “biomysticism in awe of life itself ”
emphasize, in part, because this became a source of contention
which Nicolas Langlitz has seen gradually emerging from the
during the review process: a program, not the program. In siding
intersection between neuroscience and psychedelics (Langlitz,
so resolutely with Western technoscience and biomedicine, in
2012; p. 255).
its preference for synthesized laboratory chemicals over plant
Michaux’s mysticism nevertheless requires careful reading to
medicines and its relative lack of interest in indigenous cultural
discern its fidelity to naturalism and physicalism: sometimes
practices, Michaux’s program is certainly out of step with much
he comes quite close to suggesting that this experience
might be evidence of the real existence of other entities. As research in the field today. In reconstructing Michaux’s engagement
Blanchot noted perceptively: “Someone we have every reason with drugs as a “program,” I am not proposing that any
to believe has met the gods. Unique revelation. But do we other approaches thereby be displaced or invalidated. At the
gather around this encounter? Do we forsake our occupations, same time, Michaux’s vision has an integrity and honesty of
our thoughts, to consider so significant an affirmation? Not in its own which should not quickly be disparaged and, limited
the slightest. Even Michaux’s admirers speak of the incident though it is in other respects, he assuredly does have substantial
without emotion. For a start, I note this indifference.” contributions to make to contemporary debate in the three areas I
(Blanchot, 1966; p. 83). Michaux is, in a sense, convinced have outlined.
by his mystical experiences but only quality experience in a Finally, a note on the method. Implicitly, my analysis
restricted, implicitly subjective sense of the term compatible has envisaged Michaux’s work in terms of philosopher Peter
with naturalism and physicalism. The mystical visions he Sloterdijk’s conception of “anthropotechnical practicing” (Roney
sometimes experienced under psychedelics do not cause him to and Rossi, 2021), whereby psychedelics are anthropotechnics (tools,
question this framework, though at times he comes quite close to techniques, or technologies for the modification of the human),
doing so. and this way of conceptualizing psychedelics is, I believe, a
As Michaux reflects on his experience of mescaline, he traverses valuable—indeed, perhaps, foundational—theoretical framework
many different ways of envisioning the drug’s effects, of which for research in the psychedelic humanities. For Sloterdijk, humanity
mystical visions are just one: from mystical encounters with other is a self-enhancing species: we deploy anthropotechnical tools,
entities and cosmic energies, he passes through figurations of learn from the experience, refine, and repeat in an elevating
his serfdom to the drug to become the object of its feminine cycle of practicing to develop performance and yield. Some
seduction and be queerly penetrated by it. Passing through critics have lamented Michaux’s repetitiveness in the drug works
these different figurative plateaux, Michaux gradually embraces (Bowie, 1973; p. 151; Parish, 2007; p. 74). However, their
the belief that the drug reveals a power within himself that somewhat repetitive character makes more sense when they are
is also other than himself, which I have termed elsewhere the envisaged as the record of a program for self-enhancement
“autoheteronomous”: “a reserve within me, a zone x, an zone by repeated practicing with psychedelic anthropotechnics. For
in waiting of which I had had no knowledge,” “both a third Sloterdijk, the anthropotechnical instruments of education in the
party and yet purely myself ” (Michaux, 2001; p. 773; Davis, humanities, from their emergence in the 19th century, were
2022; 679). From the perspective of my reading of Michaux and books. For the psychedelic humanities, psychedelics assembled
the program I glean from him for the psychedelic humanities, with other techniques (including books and other cultural objects—
what matters most is the potential for a creative individual, these are not to be supplanted, contrary to Leary’s suggestion)
social and political transformation in the intelligent and skilled perform a similar educative function, yielding individual and
use of these substances within the frame of scientific naturalism social transformation. A “program” is also a script, a set of
and physicalism: the psychedelic humanities must, I would choices and outcomes that can in turn be fed back into new
argue, chart a scientifically enlightened path—but rather than experiments with new assemblages of psychedelics and other

Frontiers in Psychology 11 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

anthropotechnics, as John Lilly and Erik Davis, commenting on Funding

Lilly, have envisaged (Lilly, 1968; Davis, 2019; p. 32). Unfortunately,
because of the extent and difficulty of Michaux’s own works I gratefully acknowledge the financial support of Warwick
and for contingent reasons of translation, the insights they University’s Research Development Fund both with the costs of
contain have too long remained the preserve of a happy few basic research and the article publication fee.
and so not been available for such redeployment. Although
the account I have given here is necessarily selective in its
coverage, I have tried to focus on three particular areas in
Acknowledgments
which Michaux’s work has something substantial to contribute
I am grateful to the seminar audiences at NTU, UCL, and
to ongoing conversations today, while also acknowledging its
Oxford whose questions, comments, and interests helped me to
limitations.24
develop this work. I would also like to thank the two reviewers
for their substantial, probing, and challenging engagements with
earlier versions.
Data availability statement
Conflict of interest
The original contributions presented in the study are included
in the article/supplementary material, further inquiries can be The author declares that the research was conducted in the
directed to the corresponding author. absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be
construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Author contributions Publisher’s note

The author confirms being the sole contributor of this work and All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the
has approved it for publication. authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated
organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the
reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or
24 Full discussion of the film, in conjunction with the drawings, is reserved claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or
for a future article. endorsed by the publisher.

References
Ajuriaguerra, J., and Jaeggi, F. (1963). Contribution à la connaissance Dassonneville, G. (2021). Dans l’ivresse mescalinique: Jean-Paul Sartre,
des psychoses toxiques. Expériences et découvertes du poète Henri Michaux. clinicien de l’imagination? Cygne noir. Revue d’exploration sémiotique 3, 1462.
Dessins d’Henri Michaux faits sous l’influence de la mescaline. Basel: doi: 10.7202./1091462ar
Sandoz.
Davis, E. (2019). High Weirdness: Drugs, Esoterica, and Visionary Experience in the
Anderson, T., Petranker, R., Christopher, A., Rosenbaum, D., Weissman, Seventies. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
C., Dinh-Williams, L-. A., et al. (2019). Psychedelic microdosing benefits and Davis, O. (2010). Jacques Rancière. Cambridge: Polity.
challenges: an empirical codebook. Harm Red. J. 16, 4. doi: 10.1186./s12954-019-
0308-4 Davis, O. (2022). “Autonomy and ‘autoheteronomy’ in psychedelically assisted
psychotherapy,” in New Interdisciplinary Perspectives On and Beyond Autonomy,
Angel, L. (2002). Mystical naturalism. Relig. Stud. 38, 317–338. ed. O. Davis and C. Watkin (London: Routledge), 83–100. doi: 10.4324/9781003331
Artaud, A. (1945). D’un voyage au pays des Tarahumaras. Paris: Fontaine. 780-8
De Bono, E. (1970). Lateral Thinking: Creativity Step by Step. London: Harper
Baudelaire, C. (1860). Les Paradis artificiels. Paris: Poulet-Malassis.
and Row.
Black, S. (2022). “French Drug Control from Poisons to Degeneration,” in Delay, J., and Benda, P. (1958). L’expérience lysergique L.S.D.−25. A propos de 75
The Oxford Handbook of Global Drug History, ed. P. Gootenberg (Oxford: OUP), observations cliniques. L’Encéphale. Journal de neurologie, de psychiatrie et de médecine
284–300. psycho-somatique 47, 3. 169-209.
Blanchot, M. (1966). “L’infini et l’infini”, in Henri Michaux. Cahiers de l’Herne, ed. Delay, J., and Gérard, H. P. (1948). L’intoxication mescalinique expérimentale.
R. Bellour (Paris: L’Herne), 80–88. L’Encéphale 37, 196–235.
Bowie, M. (1973). Henri Michaux: A Study of His Literary Works. Oxford: Oxford Delay, J., Pichot, P., and Lemperière, T. (1959). La psilocybine. Historique.
University Press. Pharmacophysiologie. Clinique. La Presse médicale 67, 1731–1733.
Broome, P. (1977). Henri Michaux. London: Athlone. Deleuze, G., and Guattari, F. (1984 [1972]) Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and
Schizophrenia. Translated by Robert Hurley, Mark Seem and Helen Lane.
Bruchez, J. (2007). Henri Michaux et Aldous Huxley. Deux expériences.
London: Athlone.
Geneva: Slatkine.
Deleuze, G., and Guattari, F. (1987 [1980]). A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism
Brun, A. (1999). Henri Michaux ou le corps halluciné. Paris: Les Empêcheurs de
and Schizophrenia. Translated by Brian Massumi. Minneapolis: University of
Penser en Rond/Institut d’édition Sanofi-Synthélabo.
Minnesota Press.
Calabrese, J. (2013). A Different Medicine: Postcolonial Healing in The Native
Devenot, N., Conner, T., and Doyle, R. (2022). Dark side of the shroom: erasing
American Church. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
indigenous and counterculture wisdoms, and the open source alternative. Anthropol.
Cavnar, C., and Labate, B. (2021). Psychedelic Justice: Toward a Diverse and Conscious. 33,2, 476–505. doi: 10.1111/anoc.12154
Equitable Psychedelic Culture. Santa Fe: Synergetic Press.
Dobkin de Rios, M. (1990 [1984]). Hallucinogens: Cross-Cultural Perspectives.
Chayet (2020). Phantastica: ces substances interdites qui guérissent. Paris: Grasset. Bridport: Prism.

Frontiers in Psychology 12 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

Doyle, R. (2011). Darwin’s Pharmacy: Sex, Plants and the Evolution of the Noösphere. Lyons, T., and Carhart-Harris, R. (2018). Increased nature relatedness and
Seattle: University of Washington Press. decreased authoritarian political views after psilocybin for treatment-resistant
depression. J. Psychopharmacol. 32, 811–819. doi: 10.1177/0269881117748902
Dubus, Z. (2022). (2022). L’émergence des psychothérapies assistés au
LSD (1950–1970). Ann. Médico-psychologiques Revue Psych. 181, 96–100. Marchant, A. (2018). L’Impossible prohibition. Drogues et toxicomanie en France
doi: 10.1016/j.amp.11002 1945–2017. Paris: Perrin.
Duvivier, E. (1963). Images du monde visionnaire. [Film] Basel: Sandoz. Available Markoff, J. (2005). What the Dormouse Said. How the 60s Counterculture Shaped the
online at: https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/cerimes/images-du-monde-visionnaire Personal Computer Industry. London: Penguin.
(accessed November 19, 2022).
Martin, J. (1962). The treatment of twelve male homosexuals with “L.S.D.” (followed
Dyck, E. (2008). Psychedelic Psychiatry: LSD from Clinic to Campus. Baltimore: by a detailed account of one of them who was a psychopathic personality. Psychoth.
Johns Hopkins University Press. Psychosom. 10, 394–402.
Ellis, H. (1898). Mescal: A New Artificial Paradise. The Contemporary Martin, J-. P. (2003). Henri Michaux. Paris: Gallimard.
Review LXXIII: 130-141. Available online at: https://archive.org/details/
Mason, N., Kuypers, K., Reckweg, J., Müller, F., Tse, D., Rios, Da., et al. (2021).
contemporaryrev23unkngoog/page/130/mode/2up?view=theater (accessed January
Spontaneous and deliberate creative cognition during and after psilocybin exposure.
28, 2023).
Translat. Psych. 11, 209. doi: 10.1038/s41398-021-01335-5
Erowid (2015). Mescaline dosage. Available online at: https://erowid.org/chemicals/
McClure, M. (1966). Meat Science Essays, 2nd edn. San Francisco: City Lights.
mescaline/mescaline_dose.shtml (accessed November 27, 2022).
McClure, M. (1993). Lighting the Corners: On Nature, Art, and the Visionary. Essays
Fadiman, J. (2011). The Psychedelic Explorer’s Guide. Rochester, VT: Park
and Interviews. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press.
Street Press.
Merleau-Ponty, M. (1942). La Structure du comportement. Paris: Presses
Farrell, P. (2021). Mescaline scribe. Available online at: https://chacruna.net/
Universitaires de France.
mescaline-scribe-beauvoir-sartre/ (accessed January 28, 2023).
Merleau-Ponty, M. (1945). Phénoménologie de la perception. Paris: Gallimard.
Felton, D. (ed.) (1972). Mindfuckers: A Source Book on the Rise of Acid Fascism in
America. New York City: Straight Arrow Publishers. Michaud, E. (1988). The end of art according to Beuys. October 45, 36–46.
Foucault, M. (2003). Le Pouvoir psychiatrique. Cours au Collège de France (1973- Michaux, H. (1929). Ecuador, journal de voyage. Paris: Gallimard.
1974), ed. by F. Ewald, A. Fontana and J. Lagrange. Paris: Gallimard and Seuil.
Michaux, H. (1956). Misérable Miracle: la mescaline. Monaco: Editions du Rocher.
Gandy, S., Bonnelle, V., and Jacobs, E. and Luke, D. (2022). Psychedelics as
Michaux, H. (1957). L’Infini turbulent. Paris: Mercure de France.
potential catalysts of scientific creativity and insight. Drug Sci. Policy Law 8, 1–16.
doi: 10.1177/20503245221097649 Michaux, H. (1959). Paix dans les brisements. Paris: Flinker.
Gilbert, J. (2017). Psychedelic socialism. Available online at: https://www. Michaux, H. (1961). Connaissance par les gouffres. Paris: Gallimard/Le Point
opendemocracy.net/en/psychedelic-socialism/ (accessed January 28, 2023). du Jour-N.R.F.
Ginsberg, A. (1995). Journals Mid-Fifties 1954-1958. Edited by Gordon Ball. Michaux, H. (1963a). Miserable Miracle. Translation by Louise Varèse, preface by
London: Viking. Octavio Paz. San Francisco: City Lights.
Guattari, F. (2012 [1977 and 1980]). La Révolution moléculaire. Paris: Les Michaux, H. (1963b). Light Through Darkness. New York: Orion.
Prairies Ordinaires.
Michaux, H. (1966). Les Grandes Épreuves de l’esprit et les innombrables petites. Paris:
Halpern, A-. E. (1998). Henri Michaux. Le laboratoire du poète. Paris: Seli Arslan. Gallimard/Le Point du Jour-N.R.F.
Harman, W., McKim, R., Morgar, R., Fadiman, J., and Stolaroff, M. (1966). Michaux, H. (1975). Infinite Turbulence. Translation by Michael Fineburg. London:
Psychedelic agents in creative problem-solving: a pilot study. Psychol. Reports Calder and Boyars.
19, 211–227.
Michaux, H. (1998). Œuvres complètes, volume 2. Edited by Raymond Bellour and
Healy, D. (2004). The Creation of Psychopharmacology. Cambridge MA: Harvard Ysé Tran. Paris: Gallimard.
University Press.
Michaux, H. (2001). Œuvres complètes, volume 2. Edited by Raymond Bellour and
Honneth, A., and Anderson, J. (2005). “Autonomy, Vulnerability, Recognition, and Ysé Tran. Paris: Gallimard.
Justice” in Autonomy and the Challenges to Liberalism: New Essays, ed. Christman, J
and Anderson, J (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) 127–149. Michaux, H. (2004). Œuvres complètes, volume 3. Edited by Raymond Bellour, Ysé
Tran and Mireille Cardot. Paris: Gallimard.
Huxley, A. (2004 [1954]). The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell. London:
Vintage Classics. Milner, M. (2000). “Henri Michaux,” in L’Imaginaire des drogues, by M. Milner
(Paris: Gallimard) 368–435.
Jay, M. (2019). Mescaline: A Global History of the First Psychedelic. New Haven: Yale
University Press. Morgan, B. (2006). I Celebrate Myself: The Somewhat Private Life of Allen Ginsberg.
London: Viking Penguin.
Kristeva, J. (1974). La Révolution du langage poétique: l’avant-garde à la fin du XIXè
siècle, Lautréamont et Mallarmé. Paris: Seuil. Mouchard, C. (1979). “La ‘pensée expérimentale’ de Michaux,” in Ruptures sur Henri
Michaux, ed. by R. Dadoun (Paris: Payot): 159–208.
Kuypers, K., Riba, J. De la Fuente Revenga, M., Barker, S., Theunissen,
E., Ramaekers, J. (2016). Ayahuasca enhances creative divergent thinking while Murphy, R., Sumner, R., Evans, W., Menkes, D., Lambrecht, I., Ponton, R.,
decreasing conventional convergent thinking. Psychopharmacology 233, 3395–3403. et al. (2021). MDLSD: study protocol for a randomised, double-masked, placebo-
doi: 10.1007/s00213-016-4377-8 controlled trial of repeated microdoses of LSD in healthy volunteers. Trials 22, 302.
doi: 10.1186/s13063-021-05243-3
Langlitz, N. (2012). Neuropsychedelia: The Revival of Hallucinogen Research Since
the Decade of the Brain. Berkeley: University of California Press. Nour, M., Evans, L., and Carhart-Harris, R. (2017). Psychedelics, personality
and political perspectives. J. Psych. Drugs 49, 182–191. doi: 10.1080/02792017,
Langlitz, N. (2020). Rightist psychedelia. Cultural Anthropology. Available online 1312643
at: https://culanth.org/fieldsights/rightist-psychedelia (accessed January 28, 2023).
Ouvry-Vial, B. (1989). Henri Michaux: Qui êtes-vous? Lyon: La Manufacture.
Légifrance (2007). Code de la santé publique, Art. L3421-4. Available online
at: https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/codes/article_lc/LEGIARTI000006688178 (accessed Pace, B., and Devenot, N. (2021). Right-wing psychedelia: case studies
January 28, 2023). in cultural plasticity and political pluripotency. Front. Psych. 3, 3185.
doi: 10.3389./fpsyg.2021.733185
Letheby, C. (2021). Philosophy of Psychedelics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Parish, N. (2007). Henri Michaux: Experimentation with Signs. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Lewin, L. (1928). Les Paradis artificiels: opium, morphine, cocaïne, peyotl,
chanvre indien, agaric, jusquiame, datura, alool, chloroforme, éther, chloral, Parsons, N. (2014). Meth Mania: A History of Methamphetamine. Boulder: Lynne
kawa, camphre, bétel, thé, hola, maté, tabac, arsenic. Tr. by F. Gidon. Riener Publishers.
Paris: Payot. Partridge, C. (2018). High Culture: Drugs, Mysticism, and the Pursuit of
Lilly, J. (1968). Programming and Metaprogramming in the Human Biocomputer. St Transcendence in the Modern World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Paul, MN: St Thomas Communication Research Institute. Petranker, R., Anderson, T., Maier, L., Barratt, M., Ferris, J., Winstock, A.,
Lonergan, E. (2021). Psychedelics: politically pluripotent. Available online et al. (2020). Microdosing psychedelics: subjective benefits and challenges, substance
at: https://mind-foundation.org/psychedelics-politically-pluripotent/ (accessed testing behavior, and the relevance of intention. J. Psychopharmacol. 36, 1. 85–96.
January 28, 2023). doi: 10.1177/0269881120953994
Loras, O. (1967). Rencontre avec Henri Michaux au plus profond des gouffres. Pic, M. (2014). “Preface”, in Mescaline 55, by Edith Boissonnas, Henri Michaux and
Chassieu: Bleyon. Jean Paulhan (Paris: Claire Paulhan), 8–79.

Frontiers in Psychology 13 frontiersin.org

Davis 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1152896

Piper, A. (2015). Strange Drugs Make for Strange Bedfellows: Ernst Jünger, Sessa, B. (2012). The Psychedelic Renaissance: Reassessing the Role of Psychedelic
Albert Hofmann and the Politics of Psychedelics. Portland: Invisible College Drugs in 21st Century Psychiatry and Society. London: Muswell Hill Press.
Publishing.
Sjöstedt-Hughes (2021). Modes of Sentience: Psychedelics, Metaphysics, Panpsychism.
Retaillaud-Bajac, E. (2009). Les paradis perdus: drogues et usagers de drogues dans London: Psychedelic Press.
la France de l’entre-deux-guerres. Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes. Available
Stafford, P., and Golightly, B. (1967). LSD: The Problem-Solving Psychedelic. New
online at: https://books.openedition.org/pur/126099 (accessed January 28, 2023).
York: Award Books.
Roney, P., and Rossi, A. (2021). Sloterdijk’s Anthropotechnics. Angelaki 26, 1.
Stamm, E. (2019). How Mark Fisher’s ‘Acid Communism’ has inspired a new current
Available online at: https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cang20/26/1 (accessed January
in politics and art. E-flux conversations. Available online at: https://conversations.
28, 2023).
e-flux.com/t/how-mark-fishers-acid-communism-has-inspired-a-new-current-in-
Rouhier, A. (1927). Le Peyotl (Echinocactus Williamsi Lem.): la plante qui fait les politics-and-art/9252 (accessed January 28, 2023).
yeux émerveillés. Paris: Doin.
Swanson, L. (2018). Unifying theories of psychedelic drug effects. Front. Pharmacol.
Said-Metwaly, S., Van den Noortgate, W., and Kyndt, E. (2017). Methodological 4, 172. doi: 10.3389./fphar.2018.00172
issues in measuring creativity: a systematic literature review. Creat. Theor. Res. Appl. 4, Thuillier, J. (1999). Ten Years That Changes the Face of Mental Illness. Boca Raton:
2. doi: 10.1515/ctra-2017-0014 CRC Press.
Sartre, J. P. (2010). “Notes sur la prise de mescaline”, in Les Mots et autres écrits Turner, F. (2006). From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole
autobiographiques, ed. by J. F. Louette, G. Philippe and J. Simont (Paris: Gallimard, Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism. Chicago: Chicago UP.
Pléiade) 1222–1237.
Yvorel, J. J. (2012). La loi du 12 juillet 1916: première incrimination
Sessa, B. (2008). Is it time to revisit the role of psychedelic drugs in enhancing de la consommation de drogue. Les Cahiers dynamiques 56, 128–133.
human creativity? J. Psychopharmacol. 22, 8. 821–827. doi: 10.1177/0269881108091597 doi: 10.3917/psyt.222.0009

Frontiers in Psychology 14 frontiersin.org