Not “The Mad Virgin of Psychedelia”

The support role played by women in the Euro-American psychedelic explorations of the 20 th century is almost a cliché. Rejection of traditional roles and gender dynamics was proclaimed, but unevenly practiced. Even the most recognizable and conspicuously capable women who were part of the psychedelic experiment took on the largest part of the domestic maintenance of the scene. In her Revolutionary Letters, Diane di Prima, describes taking over the preparation of Thanksgiving dinner for 50 people at Millbrook with a sinking feeling that somebody had better do some cooking, Rosemary Woodruff Leary went to jail for her husband by refusing to testify in a grand jury hearing against him, edited his speeches, sewed his clothing, and helped orchestrate his infamous 1970 prison escape, but stood unnoticed on the edge of the world stage until the publication of two recent posthumous biographies. Susi Ramstein, Dr. Hofmann’s laboratorian was discovered and recognized as the first psychedelic guide almost by accident. Valentina Pavlovna Wasson, rather than her husband Gordon, was the actual mycophile in the family. This talk will discuss the marginalization of psychedelic women, with particular attention to the case of Lisa Bieberman. Bieberman was a key participant in the extra-institutional activities of the infamous trio of Harvard psychedelic explorers, but she has not only been overlooked, but also caricatured for not presenting the kind of stereotypical female beauty that her more famous and well publicized male cohorts might have valued more. She was a psychedelic activist whose life had been transformed by LSD-mediated access to the indwelling Spirit . As a particularly prolific and articulate writer with a distinctly feminine perspective, she set about working to influence psychedelic culture from within. She engaged in harm reduction practice, provided advice on legal aid, directed experimenters to proven recipes, and was a switch board for the psychedelic community. As the author of some of the most lucid and durable accounts of exploration of the newly recognized dimensions of psychedelically altered consciousness, she influenced the development of organizations such as the Council on Spiritual Practices forty years later. Her insights provided a voice that might have redirected the movement to a less florid and showy manifestation if she had been better known and appreciated. As an example of what was missed, she is hard to beat.