{"id":3686,"date":"2025-08-03T16:42:35","date_gmt":"2025-08-03T16:42:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/?p=3686"},"modified":"2025-08-03T17:01:04","modified_gmt":"2025-08-03T17:01:04","slug":"goodnews-august-2025-editorial-about-jonathan-ott","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/2025\/08\/03\/goodnews-august-2025-editorial-about-jonathan-ott\/","title":{"rendered":"goodnews august 2025 \u2013 editorial: about jonathan ott"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

\u201cUtterly brilliant and inspired in every direction – writing, ethnobotany, chemistry, psychonautics, pharmacology, drug history, gardening, house building, hydroelectrics (he powered his house and village at one point with a hydroelectric system he installed), teaching, editing, and pretty much everything else you could ever find interest in. Jonathan had a gargantuan knowledge bank, skill set and even bigger heart. He will be so missed by so many.\u201d
\nHattie Wells, Psychedelic practitioner and co-director Breaking Convention<\/p>\n

Jonathan Ott was born on 2 June 1949 in Hartford, Connecticut, where he spent his childhood with his three sisters. According to Claudia M\u00fcller-Ebeling, who knew him well, he had to overcome \u00abfamilial, political, and academic boundaries and mostly limited spheres of awareness,\u201d before studying organic chemistry at the Evergreen State College in Olympia (Washington), and later in Mexico, where he made his home.<\/p>\n

In 1973, a fateful encounter brought him together with Richard Evans Schultes. He, Albert Hofmann and R. Gordon Wasson remained Jonathan\u2019s most important mentors. He also collaborated with other passionate ethnobotanical researchers such as Pablo\u00a0Blas Reko, Christian R\u00e4tsch and Jochen Gartz. Along with Alexander Shulgin and Antonio Escohotado, who also left us recently, he has now joined them in the land beyond the rainbow, where I hope they are having a good time together.<\/p>\n

Among many other things, Jonathan Ott is famous for having been the English translator of Albert Hofmann\u2019s book\u00a0LSD My Problem Child,\u00a0<\/em>and for having co-coined the term \u00abentheogen.\u00bb Not only was his Engish most elegant, and a pleasure to hear and read: his German was also remarkable, spoken with only the slightest accent. Other than Spanish, he was a scholar on Indigenous languages. He authored and co-authored a large number of books and articles, the most famous being his\u00a0Pharmacotheon: Entheogenic Drugs, Their Plant Sources and History<\/em>\u00a0(1993),\u00a0Ayahuasca Analogues. Pangean Enthogens<\/em>\u00a0(1984) and\u00a0Hallucinogenic Plants of North America<\/em>\u00a0(1976). You\u2019ll find a selection of his available writings\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ott was an experienced field collector in Mexico, where\u00a0managed a small natural-products laboratory and botanical garden of medicinal herbs. In March 2010, his home was destroyed by arson. In a vindictive act, the books given to him by Albert Hofmann were reportedly used as fuel, meaning the arsonist must have acted with premeditated intent. Fortunately Jonathan Ott was not home when it happened.<\/p>\n

From 1976 onward, Jonathan initiated several psychedelic conferences along with various partners, The psychedelic movements owes him more than we\u2019ll ever know or be able to express.<\/p>\n

The Gaia Media Foundation hosted or co-hosted him on several occasions. You\u2019ll find his talks \u00abThe Hermit of a Latter-Day St-Anthony Entertains St Albert\u00bb (LSD80, Basel 2023), \u00abAlbert Hofmann\u2019s Contributions to Chemical and Pharmaceutical Research\u00bb (2014) as well as an \u00abInterview with Faustin Bray\u00bb (World Psychedelic Forum 2008) and \u00abAlbert Hofmann & Jonathan Ott on Consciousness & Mystical Experience\u201d (Outside Dr. Hofmann\u2019s home on the Rittimatte 2002) on our\u00a0YouTube Channel<\/a>. I also found him\u00a0here<\/a>. Keep on scrollling\u2026<\/p>\n

Jonathan Ott and I were about the same age. He was a warm-hearted man, and I am very sorry he\u2019s no longer with us. He passed on 5 July; the cause of his death\u00a0remains to be revealed,<\/p>\n

In fond memory,
\nSusanne G. Seiler<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  \u201cUtterly brilliant and inspired in every direction – writing, ethnobotany, chemistry, psychonautics, pharmacology, drug history, gardening, house building, hydroelectrics (he powered his house and village at one point with a hydroelectric system he installed), teaching, editing, and pretty much everything else you could ever find interest in. Jonathan had a gargantuan knowledge bank, skillContinue Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,17,5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3686"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3686"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3686\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3731,"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3686\/revisions\/3731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gaiamedia.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}