Magic & Mystery in Tibet

The Classic Account of a Woman's Extraordinary Journey to Tibet

By: Alexandra David-Néel

Narrated by: Nicolette McKenzie

This classic memoir by the remarkable French explorer and Buddhist Alexandra David-Néel is the one of the greatest Buddhist travelogues of the 20th century. She was the first European woman to meet the Dalai Lama (in the 1920s) and in 1924 became the first to enter the forbidden Tibetan capital, Lhasa.

She had already spent a decade travelling through China and Sikkim, India; lived and meditated in a cave on the Tibetan border; and everywhere learned about Buddhism from hermits, mystics and bandits. She recalled, 'In the course of my travels, I witnessed unusual events, met strange people and brushed the threshold of a particular spirituality'.

In Magic and Mystery in Tibet, Mme David-Néel recorded the mysterious, magical world she encountered. Among the extraordinary practices she described are the Tibetan mystics who could live naked in temperatures below freezing (tumo), monks who covered incredible distances on foot in strange leaps (lung-gom) and others who could seemingly defy gravity.

These practices became part of the legends of Tibetan Buddhism, as it became better known in the West - but they were first reported, from firsthand experience, by Mme David-Néel. Her writings proved a great influence on figures such as Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and Alan Watts. What makes this audiobook a classic is that she was not just an observer or a travel writer but a meditator and practitioner, respected by the lamas and monks she met. Her descriptions of Tibetan Buddhism, though dating from a century ago, ring true now, even with our greater contemporary awareness and understanding.

Despite her decades of life travelling, often in great hardship, across the Far East and Central Asia, she lived until the age of 101, dying in her home country of France.

©1932 Alexandra David-Néel (P)2016 Ukemi Productions Ltd

Amazing adventure story, especially for the times

I love stories of female adventurers from times when that was extremely unusual. The stories of the Tibetan practices are just wild in terms of what’s humanly possible. A special glimpse into a special time and place by a patient and hardy explorer.

The right voice for the story

I think this is as close as you can get to the mystic world of Tibet. I could imagine David Alexandra Neale would have a voice like that of the reader. Strong, goal minded, not too female.

Technically amazing.

Usually I roll my eyes reading anything about Tibetan Buddhism written by westerners before 21st century. However, this was a refreshing change. Alexandra knew her shit well enough to know what she didn’t know and was intellectually insatiable to learn as much as she could. I was floored by how good the information on Tibetan Buddhism is. We’re very lucky to have such an amazingly adventurous scholar manage to explore Tibet before the Chinese invasion, and give such a beautiful snapshot of Tibet Buddhism in its own time and place.

Fascinating anthropological story with doctrinal

The feminine narrator speaks in delightfully crisp RP style. Her pronunciation of the Tibetan terms is reasonably accurate and her English is very nicely spoken. To the person complaining that a British voice should not be rendering the Francophone ADN, it would be pointed out that ADN spoke and wrote proficient English.

ADN was a careful ethnographer and a wonderfully evocative writer. She states in the preface that the book is not a travelogue, but rather a retrospectively organized account of her observations and conversations during a 14-year period of travel. The plotline is chronological. The story unfolds during a period of Sino-Russian tensions which provoked an influx of imperial British agents into the Nepal-Sikkim-Bhutan-Tibet triangle. In other words, she had connections.

Barring local scuffles, foreign travellers with money [she had a private fortune] were more welcome then than now. Having walked the eastern Himalaya in the 1970's, living in villages and touring, I found ADN's descriptions splendidly rendered and indeed matching my memories.

References to Buddhist doctrine are simple and neutral, so as to elucidate but not encumber the story. ADN explains magical empowerments [wang] and the way in which villages feed their resident psychic protectors. She gives a thorough account of the practice of secluded spiritual retreats [tsam] and reports on her experience of doing tsam herself.

ADN clearly presents the wavering distinctions between moral-intellectual training in the monastic orders versus ritual magic traditions endemic to the folk culture. Superstitious terror, ritual chanting, miserable poverty, heavenly visions, telepathic trance-states, and skull-duggery are skillfully woven into a living textile of 1920's ethnography. Marvellous to listen and highly recommended!

Excellent script and narration

loved it.Very good presentation.
Hope things are real. Bringing us to Tibet and feels like we are there.