"Let us hope that this book, poorly written and disjointed, but sincere, will help to clear up our relationship with our dear, dead friend Lee." Thus concludes a largely forgotten manuscript appended to Volume XII of the House Select Committee on Assassinations. "Lee," of course, was Lee Harvey Oswald, the man accused of having assassinated President John F. Kennedy in Dallas on November 22, 1963--and whose closest friend, many have argued, was Dallas resident George de Mohrenschildt.

For years following Kennedy's assassination there were rumors and assumptions--some started by de Mohrenschildt himself--that this colorful, larger-than-life European emigre possessed a key to understanding Oswald's alleged actions. The reflections presented here, recorded between 1969 and his death in 1977, was de Mohrenschildt's attempt to recover the humanity of a friend he believed had been demonized as simply an "insane killer." In a series of recollections about his brief friendship with Oswald and his wife Marina between the fall of 1962 and the spring of 1963, de Mohrenschildt recalls conversations about Lee's time in Minsk, about political issues of the day, particularly Latin America, and the Oswalds' turbulent and troubled marriage. He discusses the assassination and its aftermath, including his lengthy 1964 Warren Commission testimony, appearance on NBC television, and concludes with his own speculations about the possibility of a conspiracy to assassinate Kennedy and the question of Oswald's involvement. Threaded throughout are de Mohrenschildt's reflections on the corrosive effects of his friendship with the Oswalds on his and his wife Jeanne's personal and professional lives, first in 1964 and then echoing right up to the completion of this manuscript in 1976.

Deftly edited and annotated by Michael Rinella, whose introduction also supplies critical background information and context, this once unwieldy, grammatically quirky, and eccentrically organized text can now be seen for the valuable biographical, social, and historical document it actually is."

Pharmakon: Plato, Drug Culture, and Identity in Ancient Athens examines the emerging concern for controlling states of psychological ecstasy in the history of western thought, focusing on ancient Greece (c. 750 - 146 BCE), particularly the Classical Period (c. 500 - 336 BCE) and especially the dialogues of the Athenian philosopher Plato (427 - 347 BCE). Employing a diverse array of materials ranging from literature, philosophy, medicine, botany, pharmacology, religion, magic, and law, Pharmakon fundamentally reframes the conceptual context of how we read and interpret Plato's dialogues. Michael A. Rinella demonstrates how the power and truth claims of philosophy, repeatedly likened to a pharmakon, opposes itself to the cultural authority of a host of other occupations in ancient Greek society who derived their powers from, or likened their authority to, some pharmakon. These included Dionysian and Eleusinian religion, physicians and other healers, magicians and other magic workers, poets, sophists, rhetoricians, as well as others.Accessible to the general reader, yet challenging to the specialist, Pharmakon is a comprehensive examination of the place of drugs in ancient thought that will compel the reader to understand Plato in a new way.

Pharmakon: Plato, Drug Culture, and Identity in Ancient Athens examines the emerging concern for controlling states of psychological ecstasy in the history of western thought, focusing on ancient Greece (c. 750 - 146 BCE), particularly the Classical Period (c. 500 - 336 BCE) and especially the dialogues of the Athenian philosopher Plato (427 - 347 BCE). Employing a diverse array of materials ranging from literature, philosophy, medicine, botany, pharmacology, religion, magic, and law, Pharmakon fundamentally reframes the conceptual context of how we read and interpret Plato's dialogues. Michael A. Rinella demonstrates how the power and truth claims of philosophy, repeatedly likened to a pharmakon, opposes itself to the cultural authority of a host of other occupations in ancient Greek society who derived their powers from, or likened their authority to, some pharmakon. These included Dionysian and Eleusinian religion, physicians and other healers, magicians and other magic workers, poets, sophists, rhetoricians, as well as others. Accessible to the general reader, yet challenging to the specialist, Pharmakon is a comprehensive examination of the place of drugs in ancient thought that will compel the reader to understand Plato in a new way.