My uncle was the author Lyall Watson. He was born Malcolm Lyall-Watson in Johannesburg, South Africa on 12th April 1939. He died in Gympie, Australia on 25th June 2008 and I had the privilege of being with him shortly before he passed away.
Lyall was my hero when I was a girl and he remains my inspiration to this day. He told the most amazing stories and, while I often took them with a pinch of salt, they planted a story-telling seed in me.
He did the most amazing things in his life … he was an adventurer and an explorer as well as being an author and he was the man behind the Moratorium on Commercial Whaling.
celebrating the cessation of whaling in the Indian Ocean
While he delighted in his notoriety and in giving interviews, he kept his real self very private.
I loved him so much and yet, when he died, I felt as if I’d hardly known him.
That’s one of the reasons that I’ve now started researching Lyall’s life. I plan to write a play about my journey to discover the man behind the myth. If I find out enough about him I may also try writing his biography.
I’ve been contacting the people I know who were in Lyall’s life – family members and friends – and asking them to share their memories with me. And now I’m asking the people I don’t know, who were also part of his life, if they would like to share their stories.
If you stumble on this page and you knew Lyall Watson and feel happy to share your memories with me, I would love to hear from you. You can make a comment on this page, or you can contact me by email: katherinelw [at] iprimus.com.au.
If you have memories you’d like to share but you’re worried about your privacy, rest assured that I will keep confidential anything you’d like kept confidential. I will check with you before publishing anything on this blog or in any other form.
I’ll be sharing my stories and memories in posts on this site and also adding photographs.
Photos of Lyall in 1972 here.
[...] Lyall Watson [...]
Lovely photos Katherine. Shame we cant see Alice’s face.
He looks so happy.
dear Katherine,
Lyall watson was an author we love and admire deeply. Would you believe it, it was only today that we read about his death. He would have thought it was such an uncanny coincidence that we would look up Lyall Watson on the Internet today – the 25th of June 2009!! It would have intrigued him for sure!
We (my husband and I) have read almost all of his books – and keep re-reading them at various times in our lives!!
may his soul rest in peace…
Take care. And God Bless.
Meenakshi and Cedric, Goa, India
anymore photos for us to see, katherine? still havnt found any that would be of interest to you, but i am not giving up!
I’ve been rereading his books and did remember that he had journeyed to the Phillipines studying healing techniques and spoke about them to a friend of mine here in Marin County. His work always inspired me. opened new ways of seeing the world and it’s a shock to realize that he’s gone.
Hi Katherine
I was greatly impressed by Lyall’s theories, and that he dared to explorer the scientific basis of thinking the unthinkable.
I was so much impressed that I recorded an interview between Lyall and Leslie Smith on BBC Radio 4 in either late 1978 or early 1979. In particular, his description of a tennis ball being turned inside out by a 5 year old Italian boy is riveting listening. Unfortunately, the tape was eventually lost. I wonder whether the BBC keep such things in their radio achives?
Sorry to hear that he has died, and I don’t quite know how he came to be so discredited. “Supernature” was one of the books of the seventies.
Thank you Gloria and Richard. Richard, I think I’ve heard that interview – and I may even have downloaded it. I’ll try to find it and see if I can link to it here.
Thank you for the prompt. And for the kind words.
Lyall may have been discredited by other scientists who are not so open to the truth.
Hi Katherine,
I have just finished reading ‘Elephantoms’. Being South African I identify with the elephant as Lyall did, especially the area near Knysna. My Mom sent me down to her brother who was a forester at a station called Hakerville each year for our December school holidays. I can remember seeing piles of elephant droppings from the elusive Knysna elephants on a regular basis when driving around the forests with my uncle. I also recall the rumours around the ledgendary Aftand and the disbelief when he was shot. It’s sad that man allows our precious heritage, which also includes the San, to disappear only to be found in history books.
Regards
Allan
Just a short compliment. Lyall was so far ahead of his times it is astounding. What also surprise me is the amount of work one man could accomplish. I think his lifestyle was similar to Einsteins’. They did not waste time with idle pursuits, TV, reading etc. Both pursued there passions with no interruptions.
Today it is different. Just living takes more time and devices designed to save time do the opposite. I am privileged to live in the bush with no electricity, no TV, but I miss good light and electricity for a computer. I can recommend the life.
If anyone wants to break away to sort out their crowded sinapses come to http://www.maputaland.net
Dear Katherine,
I am very saddened to hear of the passing of your uncle Lyall. I have only just found out and I am in shock. He was very influential to me and my family. When my brother first introduced me to Supernature, I found a hole new exciting world of curiosity and it gave me a new perspective on understanding how our natural world lives and breathes. He was truly an incredible human being and will be sadly missed. My condolences to you and your family.
Damien.
Dear Katherine,
Im sorry to hear about Lyall, his amazing books and thrilling ideas will live on forever, so indeed does he.
I was a very lucky boy, that my Grandfather placed some of Lyall Watsons books in our house, when I was 17 I discovered them and began to read Supernature, Gifts of Unknown Things and Heavens Breath. I have since collected most of his books and read them on a continual roster. Dr Watson has taught me so much and I will be forever greatful for his books and the beautiful planet he has formally introduced me to.
I have found your webpage on a search for new books. I knew that Lyall had passed last year but also knew that he had been working on a revised Supernature and a book on Plants, I often wonder and hope that some of his work may have been completed by a collegue or relative? Any posthumous treasures?
I wish you all the best in your play and Biography on this amazing person.
Yours sincerely
Jeremy Rowling
lightning bird was simply the most inspiring book I have ever read
Lyall Watson fanclub is on Facebook!
For all those, to whom the books of Lyall Watson brought an infinite inspiration. Be member!
Good luck with your work about your uncle. I read some of his books years ago when I was a teenager and was just dipping into Supernature 2 after I came across my old copy. I liked his open-minded take on things and still do, though I am a bit more skeptical of the paranormal these days than back then. I wonder how you see his approach to it – do you think he was usually objective, or did he let his enthusiasm for the mysterious cloud his critical judgment a bit — make him a bit too gullible or overly inclined to believe in strange happenings? From his own first-hand experiences of odd phenomena, which do you think he found most extraordinary? His Wikipedia entry refers to an incident where he and other onlookers saw a woman make a grove of trees disappear by doing a ritual dance – did he ever tell that story? Sounds like he had a fascinating life, anyway, and I think a biography of him would be interesting.
It sounds like latterly he was less fashionable than at one stage? I wonder why that is. I guess there was just a real fascination with that whole area of the paranormal in the 70s and 80s and the topic just seems less trendy these days? Perhaps, as in my case, there is a slight disillusionment — we heard all these tantalising anecdotal accounts, but as time goes on proof, and mainstream scientific acceptance, of any of the famous paranormal phenomena seems as thin on the ground as ever. Still, I think the world would be poorer without people like your uncle probing into the more surprising and intriguing corners of human experience, and showing that we should not think we know it all yet.
Thank you for all the kind comments. They are much appreciated.
I agree, Oliver, the world would be a poorer place without people probing the fantastic and the surprising. We definitely don’t know it all yet, much as some of us would like to think we do…
At this stage I can’t comment on Lyall’s motivations or approach when writing – all I know for sure is that he was a born story teller…
Hi, Katherine! I am very grateful to you for continuing your uncle’s work, as it were! I have been very inspired by Lyall’s accounts!
I am interested in the reasons for skepticism regarding psychokinesis. There is ample evidence for the verity of psychokinesis, yet skeptics are investing huge amounts of energy into discrediting the paranormal. Two obvious reasons for resistance are: (1) established scientists are materially threatened by alternatives to convention, and (2) people of good intentions can be taken advantage of by fake psychics. A third, less obvious, reason for resistance, is that people of good heart do not want to have false hopes—that is, if one starts to have faith in the multitude of miracles possible through psychokinesis it could be devastating to have the belief proven false—so, it is safer to have doubt to start with!
For your readers who enjoy further validation of the phenomena of which your uncle wrote: i am just reading Walking Through Walls, by Philip Smith, the son of the American psychic healer Lew Smith. This memoir contains wonderful stories and general psychic history. For a very moving account of interspecies communication, see the website of Deena Metzger, go to selected writings, and read “Speaking with Elephants”. Look for the book Arigo–Surgeon of the Rusty Knife, by John G. Fuller, for fully-documented (by national news media) cases of psychic healing/surgery (numbering in the thousands). And, just today, i saw a video, on youtube, of a blindfolded basketball coach who hit a perfect basket from mid-court—an obvious case of telekinesis!
So, thanks again, Katherine!
jontz
Stumbled across your site. No, I didn`t know your uncle, but I knew his writings, books that very much enriched my life.
By the way, lovely girl at the top of your page!
I have found your webpage on a search for new books. I knew that Lyall had passed last year but also knew that he had been working on a revised Supernature and a book on Plants, I often wonder and hope that some of his work may have been completed by a collegue or relative? Any posthumous treasures?
Hi Katherine,
Just finished reading Elephantoms – a wonderful happy-sad but inspiring book.
I read Supernature and Lightening Bird many years ago but since then lost touch with his writings. Funny, but I never realised he was South African born.
Elephantoms I found particularly meaningfull becasue I live in Port Elizabeth (Nelson Mandela Bay) next door to Addo and 2.5 hr drive from Knysna.
I have also discovered the following website http://www.knysnaelephantpark.co.za. Lyall would surely be heartened that at last something is being done to protect the herd that remains.
My good friend Mike Vincent (a well known local wildlife cinematographer) is busy right now trying to get footage of the elusive elephants.
I wish you every success in your projects.
Dear Katherine…
Did Dr Watson have an understudy? he was working on some very interesting books, penguins, plants and a revised Supernature for the 2000′s. These works must have been close to completion. Please, is there any intention for Dr Watsons publisher to have these books completed and released?
One thing I really adored about Dr Lyall Watsons books was their frequency, or in-frequency. Without advertisement or warning they would just appear on bookshelves… I used to check for a new treasure every couple of weeks, (patinetly impatient) and when I found a new one every three years or so I was always well rewarded… Im still checking shelves Katherine…
Dear Katherine –
I’m sorry I have no more information on Lyall for you. For myself, he was a great story-teller, as you say, but also a poet – at home between the lines – able to see and describe concepts (and truths) that modern science would prefer to stay hidden, rather than admit its own limitations or its inability to explain or comprehend ‘existence’. I read his books often, and while he never strays far from being a ‘simple’ and well-disciplined biologist, his intuition and open-mindedness, I believe, is why his experience of life seems so full of uncontrolled wonder. He has gone, but he has left a thousand doors open behind him – we have only to go through them.
Every time I read his words, I go away with feelings of reassurance, and happiness, that almost everything I was taught at school was wrong, and that there is more, much more, to being a human than what we are institutionally led to believe.
You may be the only person qualified enough to write his biography, and I certainly hope you do. Are you also the niece worth far more than 200,000 camels? Good luck in your search for Lyall – I really hope you find him.
Sorry for the delay in getting back to you, Jeremy. I’m afraid Lyall didn’t have an understudy – not that I’m aware of anyway. He spoke a little about his ideas for new books but I think, with his illness, they didn’t progress beyond ideas. If I find out differently I will, of course, share the news here. There are some authors who manage to keep releasing books long after their earthly bodies are gone, but I think that’s due more to a raft of ‘ghost writers’ and the desires of the publishing house than to there being hundreds of manuscripts left behind under the bed!
Richard, thank you for sharing your sense of wonder and the feelings Lyall’s writing inspired in you. Yes, I am the camel niece. Maybe I should say ‘was’. That happened a long time ago when I was just 18…
I do appreciate all the lovely comments on this page. Thank you all.
hello Katherine,
I’m afraid I didn’t know your uncle personally, but I own and love all of his books. I discovered his work over 30 years ago, and have just finished The Whole Hog. He opened my mind to possibilities undreamt of, and the world is a poorer place without him. You were very lucky to have had him in your life.
All the best…
Dear Katherine, 14 March 2010
I was born the year after your uncle and I think I discovered Supernature in late 1960’s.
The interview with your uncle on BBC Radio 4 was fascinating and I heard it while at university studying physics. Luckily I recorded the programme on cassette tape and still have it in good condition.
If your are interested in having a copy I can email it to you as an MP3 recording via a web server “Dropsend”
My two grown up sons, (one is an electronics engineer in aerospace, the other a computer scientist working for Apple) are equally fascinated by your uncle’s writings and the tape recording and we all have shared it with many friends.
It would be wonderful to be able to share this interview with the rest of the world through your project.
Best wishes,
Martin
Cobham, England.
I also have a recording of the BBC Programme ‘Five Narrow Little Windows’ in which the Little Italian girl turned a pressurised Tennis Ball inside out, LyalL’s theory being that because she did not know this was impossible she could see reality in a different way, “imposing one reality on another’. I listened to this program many times as a young teenage and it had a profound effect on my thinking that lasts to this day. I went on to read Super Nature and am very grateful for your Uncle’s work.
I found this website tonight after playing the tape to my 6 year old daughter and then googling the incident.
I am happy to share the Radio 4 program with you or anyone else if you that would be of use.
Kind Regards
Gareth
A question
Lyall Watson was a world figure but also a South African of many generations, descended from the first governor of the Cape, how influenced do you think was Lyall was by other great South African scientists and mystics:- Eugene Marais, Laurens van der Post, Smuts, Johanna Brandt and Nicolaas van Rensburg?
Should we see him just as a great world figure
or as a great South african,
a great Afrikaner
or a Great African
or as all 4?
What do you feel?
Yours
Tony Jeffery
He only lived in South Africa for 23 years or less. So he spent at least 45 years elsewhere.I would say he was a great world figure. He also had Scottish ancestry.
Hi Tony and Jean,
Lyall left South Africa as a young man, but I think he always had strong roots there. He went back many times and had a home there until a few years before his death. Africa was always in his blood.
One of his grandparents was from an Afrikaans family, but his parents were very English South Africans (I hope that makes sense), so I don’t think he’d ever have thought of himself as Afrikaans.
He also lived for extended times in Ireland, England and in America, so I think he was a true international. His footsteps spanned continents and he travelled almost constantly but the letters I’ve read talk of Africa as home.
Thank you Gareth for the offer of the Five Narrow Little Windows interview. Martin sent it to me and I’ve been trying to upload it to this site, but so far have been unsuccessful.
I will keep trying…
Hello Katherine,
Our soul is always happiest in the land of our birth, so I am sure that what you say is true regarding Africa being Lyall’s true home. Do you have any photos of him as a young boy? I know that you may have some old photos from your trip to Africa. Will you publish one on your blog? I have at last found one photo with Lyall in it. There was a group of us on a boat in Greece. He just loved to sail. I know I have more photos and will dig them out eventually. I am a bit of a hoarder and have so many boxes to get through!
Can you answer this question for me – was Lyall’s father born in Scotland?
Regards, Jean
Hi Jean,
I don’t have any photos of Lyall as a child at the moment. sigh.
Great to hear that you’ve found one of the sailing ones…I’d love to see it if you have a chance to scan it and email it to me.
Lyall’s father wasn’t born in Scotland – but his grandfather was born in Cupar Fife according to the family records.
All the best,
Katherine
Just read”the Nature of Things”—why was Lyall so unbelieving of life-after-death…seems so at odds with where he was going.There’s so much proof of it and mainstream acceptance.You should try and contact him thru a reputable psychic…and hear what he says now!
In answer to the above message from Lute Jowell – if you read the Indian Vedas they also do not believe in life after death. It seems that the ancient Vedas were misunderstood. Read them and see. The Bhagavad Gita says that the “eternal in man cannot die”, but I dont think it means life after death, but perhaps more that there is an eternal spirit in us all that goes back to its source.
Katherine, April 16th 2010
I tried to contact you via the address above, but wouldn’t go through.
This isn’t mean’t to be a comment, only a means to make contact.
I lived next to Lyall in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and have a number of ancecdotes in time spent together. If you’re still interested.
My regards, Kim Moss
Hi Kim,
Thanks for contacting me – I have tried to email you but my message was blocked by your server.
Could you please try me again as I would love to be in touch.
Thanks!
Katherine,
I just wanted to tell you that your uncle’s books changed my life. Or more correctly, they planted the seed that would change my life. After reading Dreams of Dragons, I embarked on a career change that will hopefully lead to some clean energy sources for society. I’m still training, so time will tell. But his interest in absolutely everything was, in and of itself, inspiring.
And I can’t believe that he died in Gympie! A chunk of my family history lies in Gympie. It’s a small world.
All the best with your endeavours.
Liz
I want to inform you all, that there is a Lyall Watson fanclub page in Facebook :
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1566895149&v=info#!/group.php?gid=52501099712
thank you!
Sorry this is the right one:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=52501099712
Katherine, I never knew Lyall Watson. Like most I came to know him through his books. What wonderful books, some of the best nature and non-fiction writing I have read (and I have read a helluva lot) and like the best scientists Lyall realised that we are human beings first and foremost, and his scientific curiosities were always tied to a human ethic first and foremost. This is what made him a great biologist and I am sure a wonderful man. Lyall understood that divorcing genuine human ethics, responsibility and a sense of wonder from our scientific observations and investigations into inscrutable mysterious nature not only impoverished us, but impoverished science.
Watson’s maverick and iconoclastic stance and more often than not, implied criticisms of the impoverishment of science through the bankrupt philosophy of scientific materialism, science’s excessive commercialism and corruption, are more apt now than ever before. Big Science has truly lost its way and its heart, and any meaningful connection to the general public. By quietly pointing the way to the magic at the heart of the natural world and our own interaction with it, Watson was out of step with the egos, careerism and paycheck hungry world of corporate science and its ruling ideology of scientific materialism. He was like all thoughtful men and women a Cassandra in the wilderness. Yet he showed even then, you can always make a difference.
As a South African myself, I have a soft spot for ‘Lightning Bird’, loved his deserved bestseller ‘Supernature’. T’he Romeo Error’ too, and ‘Lifetide’ remain favourites, and his book on whales. Unfortunately the young generation of today, say under thirty-five (Watson was my father’s age, thirty years older than me) , and I am talking about the minority who are actually interested in liminal science and related controversies, are not nearly as aware of Watson’s writings for the most part as the older generation.
Yet in an age in which the priests of scientific reductionism are given ever more fawning press coverage and the science journals are ever more corrupted by commercial interests and stifling censorship of scientific mavericks and notions your uncle would have sympathised with (think medical science alone), and the corruption of science funding and the grant process, the moribund state of parapsychological research today (far worse than thirty years ago), the continued maligning and intimidation and career threats to scientists and academics out of step with the ruling ideology (as bad as ever maybe worse); your uncle’s message (if I may call it that) is more relevant and urgent than ever before. His writings need to be made newly available again, for now his books (esp his older ones) are increasingly hard to find in second hand bookstores and libraries. We must not let his legacy be forgotten, especially to the younger generation indoctrinated into scientism and scientific reductionism in the name of science. This deadens them to the world and themselves as your uncle so well understood, its consequences have been and will always be disastrous. Lyall Watson understood that there was no division between nature and supernature, like the great poets Blake and Wordsworth, the shamans and the like, it was and is a false duality.
If I could perhaps unjustly sum up and grossly oversimplify your uncle’s oeuvre, it is this – the natural is truly magical and supernatural, when you dig a little deeper, without prejudice and prejudgments and our failure to recognise this is at the heart of much of man-made misery in the world. Yet Lyall was no sentimentalist, he was more hard-nosed and genuinely skeptical than his critics ever cared to admit. In other words he was a genuine scientist, a rare thing in today’s world where careerism and independent thinking are often at odds. He realised that our faith in magic and the numinous is invigorated, evidenced by real science which remains as unfashionable as ever, not by discarding it. That’s just what the scientific materialists have done, discarded real science and then they projected their blunder onto your uncle and men like him.
Katherine, you should look at trying to get some of your uncle’s books republished, especially his older ones, like Supernature, Lifetide and Beyond Supernature for a new generation of readers who would love and be inspired by his writings but don’t know of him at all. I know it would be a headache, the publishing world ain’t for the faint-hearted and I don’t know what the legal status is here on his books and who holds the copyrights. Also I think his books, if they got new editions which would be great, could do with new forewords and introductions by a scientist or academic sympathetic to your uncle’s oeuvre, updating them for a new generation so to speak. Of course like I say, I know how difficult that may prove to be, and it’s probably something out of your hands, but we can dream…maybe it can be made a reality. Katherine maybe you could even author a biography.
In closing, I had no idea Lyall was so ill until after he died and am sorry he suffered so in his last years. His death came as a shock to me as I had assumed he was still in good health. His wonderful legacy remains.
Katherine,
I have recently started reading “LIFETIDE” many years after I first read “Supernature”. It has brought back all the excitement that I felt when reading his books. Do you know where in West Cork he lived?
Hi Katherine,
Would it be impertinent to ask how your uncle died? I’ve been scanning through the various online obituaries and no one seems to have included that information. I have to admit, I only found out earlier this evening that he’d passed away two years ago and the news came as quite a shock.
Many thanks.
Today is June 29 and something led me to google your uncle’s name on Internet and I found you. I love Lyall’s books. I never had the privilege of meeting him, however I am inspired. His book on inanimate objects were a great aid for me in understanding an episode that happened in my life. Perhaps I will write about it and post it on my website. My best to you in your search.
Thanks for the lovely comments.
It’s an interesting idea to try to get some of Lyall’s books republished, Lawrence. I’m not sure that there would still be the demand for them, but you never know. I have often found well-thumbed copies in second hand bookstores (and promptly bought them for my own collection!).
Derrick, Lyall lived in a few different areas in West Cork. The home I used to visit him in was in Ballydehob.
Roberta, Lyall died of a massive stroke, brought on by Lewy Body Dementia. It was an awful condition for such an intelligent and independent person to suffer, but was mercifully brief. He was well looked after and loved through his final months as he was staying with his brother and his brother’s wife.
I hope this information helps. Thank you again for the comments. I look forward to reading your story Bettye.
Hello Katherine,
I am having problems scanning as I dont have my son around at the moment to help me. Getting a bit doddery in my old age! Hoping you dont need them yet, and how are you doing with your research?
Someone mentioned Lyall’s books being re introduced to the world. What a great idea, to perhaps have a trilogy of his Supernature, Lifetide and Beyond Supernature, sold together. His books were very important.
All best wishes, Jean
Hello again Katherine,
Can you tell me please what Lyall’s grandfather’s name was (you said he was born in Cupar).
Jean
Hi Katherine, What was Lyall’s grandfather’s first name. You mentioned he was born in Cupar.
Jean
[...] Lyall Watson [...]
[...] Fitzy suggested the Torus and I said it was reminiscent of an incident in Lifetide (1979) by Lyall Watson where he witnessed a little five-year old Polynesian girl who could turn a tennis ball inside out [...]
[...] Fitzy suggested the Torus and I said it was reminiscent of an incident in Lifetide (1979) by Lyall Watson where he witnessed a little five-year old Polynesian girl turn a tennis ball inside out with her [...]
Hi Katherine,
I just found this site. I live on Sherkin Island, a small island off the southwest coast of Ireland. I just found out 2 days ago that Lyall died two years ago. I was so sad to hear the news as not only did I read his books years ago (I still have ‘Gifts of Unknown Things’) but I met him at his house in Castlemehigan where he’d lived for many years. My husband and I were considering buying the cottage next door to him and when the auctioneer (as real estate agents are called here!) told me it was next to Lyall’s house I was so excited as I knew from reading the Prologue of one of his books that he lived in Castlemehigan.
Lyall invited us into his house – he was such a gentleman – and told us the story of how he finally managed to get right-of-way down to his cottage – the owner of the land wouldn’t give it to him and only finally agreed to when Lyall said he’d leave him the cottage when he died! Such is the fierce sense of land ownership here!! The cottage he lived in was idyllic – overlooking the Atlantic and the Fastnet Rock – and it was so cosy and warm inside. He told us the history of Castlemehigan – it was originally inhabited by 100 people and they climbed down the cliff-face to catch fish and dragged them up again and laid them out on a huge flat rock to dry! He knew the history of the whole area – more than many of the inhabitants of the area. He showed us his South African wine collection and gave me a copy of ‘Elephantoms’.
Katherine, I have many slides of his little cottage and would be happy to let you have one or two to put in your book if you write it – also more information he gave us.
I’m sorry about your loss – the world is lacking with such a man gone – he was my hero – I know he sailed round the world in his little boat ‘Samadhi’ – I too have sailed across oceans and understand his fascination and drive to do it.
I’d love to hear from you to know if you ever intend to write his biography. Good luck to you.
Sincerely,
Lisa Rhodes,
Sherkin Island,
Co. Cork,
Republic of Ireland
I have decided to place an image of Llyall on my shrine so that he may share in my blessings among all my beloved teachers.
I do so hope you write a biography as your uncle lived an amazing life. I have been reading and re-reading his books since I discovered them in the early 80′s and he’s had a profound impact on the way I think – inspiring me to enter the field of Biology and later Environmental science
WEST CORK.
I share all the feelings expressed above. Thank you Katherine for providing the platform.
Lyall has been one of my greatest teachers, through his writing, I never met him. My motive in writing is to list the other writers his ideas have led me to.
1.The lectures collected by David Lorimer,from the Mystics and Scientist conferences, under the Wrekin Trust, in “the Spirit of Science, from experiment to experience”, publ, Floris books.
2.”Living Energies”by Callum Coates, publ. Gateway Books,(a biographic appreciation of Victor Schauberger, another great visionary nature scientist and engineer).
3. “Secrets of the Soil” by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird, publ. Arkana/Penguin. Alternative Biology/ horticulture: irrefutable knowledge for our survival.
4.”The Field” by Lynn McTaggart, Publ Harper Collins, about Quantum physics, Zero point Field, and the consciousness of intention (eg, remote viewing etc.).
5.”Punk Science, inside the mind of God” by Dr, Manjir Samanta-Laughton, an new model of the universe where consciousness generates life, and the creative power of black holes is explained.
6. “The essential David Bohm” ed. Lee Nicholl. A must for all Lyall Watson desciples.
7. “The I Ching.” the Book of Changes, publ, Bollingen Series XIX, Princeton Univ. Press. A useful tool in the exploration of consciousness, time and chance.
I would be interested to hear of other contributions to the library Lyall Watson readers may have gathered .
I am not a scientist. Just an open minded artist. The greatest gifts we have are imagination, intuition and creativity. Lyall celebrated them all. I thank him for sharing.
Hi Katherine,
Reading your uncles books, changed my life. He is my absolute all time hero and inspiration.
I have owned about 20 copies of Supernature in my life, but have given them all away to friends who need to be touched by the wisdom of this remarkable man.
I am presently reading “Gifts of Unknown Things” for the 3rd or 4th time and came across your blog whilst looking for a copy of Supernature online. My gift to myself this payday… lol
Anyway, nice to meet you. What I would give to have been able to sit down and listen to his stories….. what an absolute privilege.
God Bless and warmest regards – Shane
Dear Katherine,
I was in London yesterday, I was talking with my nephew about my life many years ago and naturally I did find myself speaking about Lyall. My nephew went straight in internet and there was the tremendous news about Lyall’s death.
I still cannot believe it. Lyall was and has been my special idol for 40 years even if we did lost contact – last letter from him was in 2007 from Irland, I must admit I never was a big letter writer but he was always in my mind.
For one full year – between 1970 and 1971 he was Cruise Director on the fabulouse Lindblad Explorer and I was his Assistant Cruise Director. We shared one year of adventure from the maiden voyage to antarctica to the seychelles through argentina, south africa, madagascar.
I remember the last cruise back from Mahe to Mombasa, on a fantastic evening with flat sea and red sunset waiting for the green flash that you see the moment when the sun finally disappears, saying goodbye to the indian ocean tossing our hats into the sea. We also wrote a song but I must try to remember all the words.
In London he used to come at my place in Islington, all dressed in white, for a full immersion into cinemas around leicester square. We could go to 3 or 4 cinemas one after the other with no interruption between them.
I am so sorry, so extremely sorry.
Love
Renato
Thank you so much for making contact Renato. I am posting some pictures of Lyall taken in 1972 by my grandparents. This may be how he looked when you knew him on the Lindblad Explorer…
Sorry for the delay in getting back to you Jean – Lyall’s grandfather was Thomas Smith Watson born 28 September 1875. Have you found a connection?
Good Day Maam,
I thought I just had to write and tell you how I laughed when I heard that an Egyptian man offered 200 000 camels for your hand in marriage.
Then Mr Watson, retorted by asking for your weight in Gold.
A good deal for the ambitious suitor, no doubt.
Lyall Watson is my absolute hero in life. I have been collecting and giving his books away for 20 years. Every time I read them, my understanding of life increases and my love for all that is around me flourishes.
RIP, Meneer. Jy is n yster.
From Uvongo on the South Coast of KwaZulu Natal – South Africa.
I am just another reader who has had many thousands of widows to the world opened by Lyall — and the experience continues as I find more in each book as I reread it.
I have recently obtained an e-reader and was disappointed to
find that Lyall’s books are not available in this format. I would lament the disappearance of the book as an entity but this format with its variable font and and highly visible “print” does allow the reader with fading vision to continue to enjoy reading as well as a speaking facility for the visually challenged- a condition which will affect more readers than they presently suspect.
Allowing the visually challenged access to Lyall’s “Windows to the World” seems to me very desirable indeed.
Is there any likelihood of the books appearing in this format Katherine?
Dear Lyall
Would like to point out that the Bryde Whale do not live on fish primarily as stated by you and the pronouncement of the name itself a differ.
The few hundred whales stomachs I have inspected and in particular the Bryde whale always contained krill and a handfull of fish which was in minority.
Regards
Ken
Hi, Lyall is one of my favourite authors, Gifts of Unknown Things inspired me when I first read it and continues to inspire me to this day, I read it again just recently.
I wish I had known he lived in Australia, I would have made the pilgrimage to meet him, I live only a few hours away from Gympie and greatly regret that I never got to thank him personally for his wisdom and insights into the world.
Best wishes to you.
Lyall Watson is my favorite author! Please make sure his work is transferred to nook book/kindle so people buy instead of ‘borrow’.
I wrote him and thanked him for his amazing pieces of work. He was kind enough to write back. It made my decade.
Hello Katherine
Llyall Watson is one of my most favourite authors. His Book Supenature made such a significant impact on my thinking that I have pursued a science & technology career for the past 35 years. Also had the privilege to meet him as I was involved in the Cradle of Mankind project. Very interesting and deep thinker who encouraged students to follow their intuition…I did and this led me to discover all kinds of knowledge about the history and future of Planet Earth.
I would like to email you as I would like to include some of his books at the National Science Week 2011 in Aug in Cape Town.
Thank you for making his legacy live on.
Kind regards Chabad
Hi Katherine, hope lifes treating you well. i was hoping to find some concrete info on the sun flicker or shadow flicker, that Lyall wrote in super nature? I had an accident and i think that the flicker had something to do with me falling asleep and crashing. and if this is true then there has tooo be a lot of car accidents that happen all over the world from the sun flicker. especially when the person driving is not even tired. If i can proove what your uncle said about it, then i can try and warn others that this is a scientific fact and maybe it would save lives also, and get more rumble stirps at high impact collision intersections. Lyalls book was a GOD send for me, cause i couldnt believe that i could just fall asleep just like that. Thanks for your time and dedication tooo your uncle. Dennis
Hi Kathrine….HELP. I haven’t even looked through the blog yet I will but I’m in urgent need of help. How is it possible that there is not a single copy of the the lightening bird to be found in South Africa. I have done as Tigger and search high and low, far and wide both on and off the net and can find nothing. Can you please help me if you know of a local source because I cannot afford the UK purchase on Amazon, it says some people may have two copies starting at $199 and customs it is out of my range.
I can pay up to a R1000 if need be for it, I hope you can help please.
The Alibris booksite has 22 copies of the Lightning Bird with a few at $10.00 american funds. The cost of Bookrate shipping (media mail) should be available.
Hi Wendy (and thanks gloia) – yes I did a quick google search and there are lots of inexpensive copies around. Make sure you search for “lightning bird” lyall watson – no ‘e’ in lightning – and you should find heaps.
Here’s the link to the Alibris page I found: http://www.alibris.com/search/books/qwork/3945001/used/Lightning%20bird
If you want to use Amazon then make sure you click on the used copies and just look for one that’s in good condition:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0671473611/ref=dp_olp_used?ie=UTF8&condition=used
Hope this helps!
Katherine
Hello Dennis – I’m afraid I don’t have any more information on the sun flicker.
Perhaps someone else reading this might know more…
If I do hear anything I’ll let you know.
Red the doctors books would be nice to know the professors who taught and influenced Lyall to continue the biorythmes past present and furture. How biology is defined.
Dear Katherine Lyall-Watson, I am really sorry to hear that Lyall has died. Your uncle had such an influence on me when I was learning about the mystical world. Supernature was one of those books we all read because it helped us stand apart from a world that marginalised the spiritual. I always trusted what he wrote and I cannot say this is true for all the books I read in those days. I now have my own miracles to share and I need to ask if you would allow me to quote a passage from Life Tide on my blog http://www.gaiatechuk.com/wordpress when I get to it. Its the piece about the tennis ball inversion. I hope you won’t mind. I am quite happy to let you read the entry before I publish it. Thank you and thank you Lyall. Well met.
I read LW’s books, “Supernature” and “The Romeo Error” back in my teens, after ordering them from the Metaphysical Research Group, in Archer’s Court, Hastings, England.
They turned around my entire passion for the extra-natural and I’ve not stopped reading about the subject/s since then. (I gave up the Tarot at 16 and I am currently firmly wedded to the I Ching) I am so grateful to that man: I always will be. Maybe, he was wasted in our time, being so far ahead of it, himself. I like to think so. He freed up minds and filled gaps in people’s inability to understand the apparently unfathomable area beyond our everyday lives!
It’s not done easily, stepping beyond the easily perceived but Dr. Watson did indeed offer the key to hidden doors and as I began reading his works, I felt awakened and relieved that I had found him. I’ve had many wondrous experiences in my life when I applied that extra-natural view.
Hi,strange but I was just checking saved e mails,and discovered for some unknown reason I had saved e mails from Lyall,the last one,telling me that he needed the peace of his cottage in Ireland and would be returning,but alas he didnt get here..I worked with him for many years here in a little village in southern Ireland,a place called Ballydehob,if you would like any news or pictures,for your book,you can contact me at,lizryanheart@yahoo.co.uk
Liz
I do not think Lyall was wasted in his time at all. He was one of the first of a growing band of scientists to look at supernatural life on earth. He set the standard. I had to get my son to type this as my arthritis is bad at the moment. Best wishes from Jean
Aloha Katherine and Others,
Thank you for creating this blog about your uncle. I met him in 1971 aboard the Limblad Explorer when he was the Ships Naturalist (As he described it to me back then, or as Renato stated elsewhere in this blog the Cruise Director. Not many years later he stayed with our family passing though Florida. It was shortly after that that I read Supernature. That was an incredible opportunity I missed not knowing his travels and books until afterwards. I was a but a teenager then and I would have valued his insights and the chance to inquire directly concerning his thoughts and opinions about the natural, and as yet largely unanswered, metaphysical world of which he wrote so much.
I have now read all his works including his first titled “Why We Can’t Eat Blue Food”. I just finished “The Secret Life of Inanimate Objects” a half hour ago for the first time. That prompted me to look Lyall up on the Internet and was graced with your blog. As stated by others his works have had a major influence in how I look and feel about the world.
When Lyall was visiting us back in the seventies he mentioned that he had a patron and benefactor living in England who was a very successful accountant who had retired a wealthy man and went on to “sponsor” some 50 individuals around the world. As described very briefly by your Uncle the point was to allow those individuals, Lyall being in that number, to be free of having to pay taxes. The result being that they would be given more freedom to then explore and create. I don’t have any idea who that person was but if he is still alive he would no doubt have insights about Lyall worth capturing.
One of the reasons he could travel though parts of the third world in his “quest” for knowledge was his tapeworm trick. He explained to me that in most countries it would have been patently rude to turn down any food that was offered as hospitality. He understood to do so he never would have been accepted and given the personal local knowledge that he was genuinely interested in. His solution was to develop a tapeworm before he set out as a form of natural antibiotic that warded off any microbes that he would invariably take in as he traveled though Asia or elsewhere. As he reflected the cure was then taking a contemporary antibiotic at journey’s end. You can tell the hardened and versed third world travelers by their acceptance of that story and realizing it as the unusual, but practical, solution for being able to go truly “bush” and being more accepted by the native culture. He offered if I ever needed them to contact him and he would send me the eggs. There was a time later on that I wish I had taken him up on his offer after becoming ill from the food in Asia.
If you would like advice on creating Eprint copies of Lyall’s works I am familiar with the process. I have reformatted books for the blind and dyslectic in the past.
Thank you for the opportunity to learn more about your Uncle. He was an astute gentleman and wise man. He will be missed . . .
Joseph D. Thomson, Kauai, Hawaii
Just seen this.
If you would like to know about Lyall’s grandfather, Andrew, and about Lyall’s part in designing the Springbok rugby badge, please ontact me.
Paul Dobson
paul@sportsmedia365.com.
I too am very saddened by hearing of his death. I am a South African who, as a teenager, chose to do my biography school project on him, having read all of his books, as well as those of Desmond Morris et al, and my childhood fantasy was to run away with him and explore the world. I wrote a letter to his very proud parents, never expecting to hear anything and lo-to my surprise – received an invitation to their home in Tulbach, Cape Town. There, I spent the day visiting with them, interviewing Mr Lyall-Watson (Douglas, his father), and his mom. They showed me their scrap book of article cuttings, the room dedicated to his books translated into over 100 languages, a giraffe scull he found as a child, and various photographs of his growing up. I was fortunate to have them give me a photo of him as a 6-year old studying a line of ants crawling up a wall, and then a photo of him in his 30′s, in the exact same pose. He never lost his sense of wonder and awe of the beauty and mysteries of the world! I also wrote to his publishers, and they sent me press materials for his soon-to-be-released book “Heaven’s Breath”. I’ll be more than happy to share this project with you. I had recorded the interview with his parents, but unfortunately, no longer have those tapes – it was over 20 years ago. I also had some tapes of Malcom being interviewed on the radio, but no longer have thoser either. They were fascinating – a few of the stories I can remember in great detail…in fact, I can still hear his voice. I am sure they should be archived somewhere – not sure if it was from Springbok Radio or BBC, back in early 1980′s. He was a man who inspired others with his unwavering curiosity and passion and love of the Truth hidden (and sometimes peek-a-booing) around us, and made us, if not necessarily agree with everything he said, at least made us question and not just agree, made us see and not just look, and brought a lot of like-minded people together. And that inspiration to the multitudes that he touched, I feel, is his greatest legacy of all.
Thank you Alexia for your lovely comments and the information you’ve given.
I’m thrilled to hear that you met my grandparents. Doug was always very proud and loved to share his stories and memories. If you still have the two photographs I would be very grateful if you’d scan and email them so that I can include them on this blog.
I do have one radio interview linked on this blog. You can listen to it here: http://katherinelyallwatson.wordpress.com/2011/05/22/lyall-watson-radio-interview/
Thank you again for writing and sharing your memories.
Joseph – I’ve just seen your lovely story about meeting Lyall on the Linblad Explorer. I’m so sorry I didn’t reply earlier.
Thank you for writing and sharing your experience of having Lyall to stay in Florida and hearing some of his stories.
I don’t know who the mysterious benefactor was … another mystery to be solved! I do know that he lived in Ireland for many years because he loved the country and because of their generous tax breaks for artists, writers and other creatives.
Your uncle was a tryly amazing man. Even if he wasn’t always right, he made people think, and maybe that’s more imporant. I’m sure you’ll do a great job on his story. Good luck with it.
I never knew your uncle but his books helped me question many things about this life of ours. I still have a copy of Supernature, which I first read back in 1973 – how time flies. Thanks for jogging a few memories.
Maureen McCallum, UK
Hello Katherine,
Please forgive the intrusion of a stranger.
I did not know your uncle personally, but I first came across his works about 30 years ago. What a difference he made in my life, I hadn’t thought of describing it as inspirational before, but that was what it was. He is/was one of my favourite authors.
I have to say my journey to discovering the absolutely marvellous scenario of Nature and all its glories, and idiosyncrasies, is still very strong due to your uncle, and I still enjoy discovering all the beautiful mysteries …… It started a never ending journey of discovering all sorts of information, we could say almost from the sublime to the ridiculous, except that your Uncle Lyall never wrote anything ridiculous.
Some of my friends today are astonished about some of the facts that I present to them gleaned from your uncle’s books … for example the other day I mentioned putting a blunt razor blade into a model of the pyramid of Cheops and it would be sharp again in the morning to a friend!
Probably this info will be of no use to you at all, since it is not personal. I felt I wanted to write however as he made such an impression, what a memory and a brain he must have had, coupled with such a broad minded understanding of all things that are different to what we are usually brought up to believe. So I just wanted you to know that …. probably I am one of thousands …. but still wanted to write and say so.
My only disappointment was that someone of such understanding and intelligence was not given more public prominence …I only caught a television interview by accident and then it was only for the last few minutes, but perhaps your uncle shied away from publicity.
I have to say that for the last 30 years, you know the scenario,when anyone has asked the question of who would you like to have at your table at a dinner party …. your uncle would definitely was one to have there.
I always envied his ability for all the information he held, obviously with lots of notes, but his explanations were given in such a way meant that those with no scientific education could grasp what he was saying very easily, that was an absolute gift.
I look forward to hearing and then reading about your book with great interest. I do hope I get to hear about it here in the UK
Thank you, Maura for your beautiful words.
It’s funny you should mention the dinner party guests game because Lyall was always on my list of people I’d want to have to dinner, even though he was my uncle and I had dined with him many times.
The pleasure of his company and the joy of his stories never paled for me.
I just unpacked my house after moving interstate after 30 years…All Lyall’s books are together – I realised I had 14 of his books all read by a younger hungry for knowledge such as his books provided. They are a rich source of wisdom and fascinating – I did not know he lived finally in Australia – Gympie…
You are very like your uncle Katherine. Are you still writing a book about his life?