Fire in the Brain, Clinica} Tales of Hallucinations, by Ronald K. Siege!, Plume/Penguin Group, 276 pp., paper. HAKESPEARE KNEW the powerful visions that could rise up from the “heat-oppressed brain.’’ The ema? ~=human mind is capable of conjuring fantastic images from the microscopic to the cosmic and convincing its owner of their veracity. Author-researcher Ronald Siegel is not interested in discounting these wild imaginings, but recognizing the meaning they hold for the people who see, hear, imagine and dream them. In Fire in the Brain, he describes the experiences of people who have participated in his research into hallucinatory events. Many famous figures (saints and criminals among them) have suf- fered or even benefited from hal- lucinations. Joan of Arc, for in- stance, was guided by voices. Murderer Mark David Chapman played with little people who lived in his living-room wall. What is fascinating about Siegel’s accounts is how and why the human mind manufactures these hallucinatory experiences. Some hallucinations, such as the voices of Joan of Arc, are wise and non-threatening, “healthy” even. Others are the psychotic result of an oppressed childhood or deep depression and can, in the case of one doppelganger, ‘threaten the life of their owner. After reading the case studies in this book, i can tell you, reality is weird enough. We don’t need vir- tual reality games to be able to chart new hallucinatory territory. What do we need? Sleep depri- vation, sensory isolation, halluci- natory drugs, meditation, depres- sion, psychosis, loneliness, torture, a near-death experience — all conditions for seeing and believing something that isn’t really there. As associate research professor in UCLA's Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences depart- ment, Siegel has documented and Barbara Black BOOK REVIEW experimented himself in a variety of hallucinatory worlds. in some cases, he even lived with his subjects, eating what they zte, sleeping when they slept, all the while observing the behaviors that led to their hallucinations. Many people have hallucina- tions. Most understand they are not real. But in the cases Siegel chose, the people ‘‘all believed what they saw and heard.’’ Although these hallucinations came from their own minds, “once released they caused the people to act as if such things ac- tually existed in the wor!d out- side.”’ One man was so obsessed with a girlfriend who left him that he carried around a hallucinatory version of her for five years. He even projected her features onto the face of a new girlfriend, there- by creating a walking, talking ver- sion of the first woman. Ina fascinating story on dop- pelgangers, an elderly California woman describes how she was saved by her double. A young man entered her home looking for drugs. He bound and gagged her * Dining room tables and chairs * Entertainment Centres » Large selection of futon beds « Bedroom Suites , Bookcases ‘ Wardrobes ’ Bunk beds : PLUS MUCH MORE! ‘SOLID PINE & OAK FURNITURE OPEN: MON.-FRI. 9am-7pm SAT 9am-5pm SUN. 12noon-5pm and stuffed her in a closet. Scared, humiliated and injured, Agnes fell into anguished sleep. She awoke, feeling as if she were in a train tunnel. “The light around the door started pulsating with flames of color. ... The walls of the closet were covered with luminescent flowers and fancy lace patterns.” Agnes then sees, through the closet door, a little old woman: that looks exactly like herself. The woman is floating around the house assessing the damage. This makes her feel safe. Later. she sees the woman again and follows her to the kitchen and out the back door to a neighbor's house to safety. Terror is so powerful it can pro- duce remarkable perceptions. Although | found the two cases of torture particularly gruesome, | was glad to see that the human capacity to administer cruelty has an antidote: the victim’s mind. Where the body suffers insur- mountable physical pain, the mind whisks the sufferer away with its comforting hallucinations. A man who was tortured by the infamous “‘Fiances of Death’’ crew in Brazil found he could ad- just the frequency of his scream and go deeper into his brain. : “At just the right moment ... a door opened.” Through that door was another reality, of sand and beach and the fragrance of garde- nias. He felt he was lying right on the mystery of the universe, “the essence of time and space, of life and death, all condensed into a single idea.” After hearing the story of a Viet- nam vet who was left to die in a cage and who hallucinated the voice of a companion, Siegel agrees to undergo the same condi- The pewter mirror In the round pewter mirror I search the other in me and see a third I have never known Le miroir d'etain En regardant le rond miroir d'etain en cherchant l'autre moi qui vit avec moi jen decouvris un troisieme gue j'ignorais Lo specchio di peltro Guardando 1o specchio rotondo di peltro cercando I'altr’io Che vive con me il terzo ne scorsi che non conezcevo CARLO TOSELLI Wednesday, June 2, tions in a mock experiment. Unfortunately, he realizes how badly and hastily he has planned the isolation exercise when the vet leaves the basement room where he is locked in a baboon cage, turns out the lights, tapes around the door and says “Ever think you would die in a cage, buddy’ Twenty-four hours later, Siegel is planning escape routes with a fly. On a lighter note, Siegel also in- troduces us to a piano teacher who stops teaching because of , -auditory hallucinations she calls CORRECTION NOTICE In our BS-1A Accessory Fair flyer, tings on page 2 excludes birth- stone rings. Sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused. 1993 — North Shore News - 25 the voice of God, Siegel asks how she knows this. “Well, he doesn’t sound like Chariton Heston playing Moses in The Ten Commandments," she responds. Peppered with just enough scientific facts to bring the case studies to light, Fire in the Brain provides a drug-free excursion into the fantastic universe of the mind. STOVES & LIGHTS (NEW & USED) ¢ Tanks — Tubing — Fittings « Instant Hot Water Tanks $299 * Propane Tanks Re-dated = « Propane Repairs PROPANE aPPuInaEES & WOODSTOYES LTD. 2671 Go. 3°Ri., Kicked . I] {north end of No3 Rd) 270-3816 i Saturday, june 5 9:30 a.m. - 4 p.m. Come and browse € POETRY EVENING You are warmly invited to an evening of poetry with Carlo Toselli and Genni Gunn reading from Carlo’s new collection “THE PEWTER MIRROR” A reception will follow the reading. PLACE: AMBER BOOKSHOP TIME: Friday, june 4, 7:30-9:00pm Amber Bookshop Ltd. 2460A MARINE DR. WEST VANCOUVER, B.C. 926-1133 - DOWNSTAIRS Publishers: Sono Nis Press