Author guide
Alan Watts' books, and where to begin
Watts wrote more than twenty-five books, but most people meet him as a voice: recorded lectures, clipped into countless videos. Here is where to begin on the page, and where to hear the real thing.
The Listening ShelfUpdated 3 October 20264 min read
In this piece
The short answer
Begin with The Wisdom of Insecurity (1951): short, clear, and the core of everything he said later. Then The Book (1966) if you want the big idea about the self, or The Way of Zen (1957) if you want history and context. To hear Watts himself, the recorded lectures in Out of Your Mind run fourteen hours.
Who he was
Alan Watts (1915 to 1973) was an English writer who moved to the United States in 1938 and spent his working life explaining Zen, Taoism and Hindu philosophy to Western audiences. He was briefly an Episcopal priest, then taught and broadcast from California, where a long-running radio programme made his voice famous. He was a populariser, not a scholar or a meditation master, and he said so. That is his strength: he makes difficult ideas sound like common sense.
Where to begin: three books
1. The Wisdom of Insecurity (1951). His argument that the hunt for psychological security is what makes us anxious, and that life only happens in the present. If you have read Eckhart Tolle, you will recognise the shape of it, half a century earlier.
2. The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are (1966). The idea that the separate self, a lonely ego inside a bag of skin, is a social convention rather than a fact. It is his most direct book and the one most people quote. We could not find an audiobook of it on Audible Australia.
3. The Way of Zen (1957). A history of Zen from its roots in Indian and Chinese thought, then an account of its practice. It is the most substantial of his books and was, for many Western readers, a first introduction to Zen. Again, no audiobook on Audible Australia when we checked.
His own voice
Most of the Watts people know is not from the books at all. It is from lectures recorded in the 1960s and early 1970s, which his son Mark Watts later collected and released. Those recordings are where most of the online clips come from.
Out of Your Mind is a set of these talks, fourteen hours long, and the only way to hear him at length on Audible Australia. It is a lecture series, not a book read aloud, so it suits long walks better than close study. Neither library catalogue we check holds it, and at A$48.76 it is one of the more expensive titles on this site, so it is a good use of a credit if you have one.
Every main book in publication order
| Year | Book | Audiobook |
|---|---|---|
| 1936 | The Spirit of Zen His first book, published in London when he was 21. | |
| 1951 | The Wisdom of Insecurity Why the search for security makes us anxious. Short. | John Lee, 3.8 hours |
| 1957 | The Way of Zen A history and explanation of Zen for Western readers; his most cited book. | Not found on Audible Australia |
| 1958 | Nature, Man and Woman | |
| 1960 | This Is It Essays on spontaneous experience. | |
| 1961 | Psychotherapy East and West | |
| 1962 | The Joyous Cosmology | |
| 1966 | The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are The idea of the separate self, argued in plain language. | Not found on Audible Australia |
| 1972 | In My Own Way His autobiography. | |
| 1975 | Tao: The Watercourse Way Unfinished at his death in 1973; completed with Al Chung-liang Huang. | |
| 2015 | Out of Your Mind Recorded lectures, released as an audio set. | Watts' own voice, 14.4 hours |
A note on the online clips
Short Watts clips set to music are everywhere. Many are cut from much longer talks, some splice several talks together, and a few lines attributed to him online are not his. If a quote matters to you, find it in a book or a full recording.
Common questions
Which Alan Watts book should I read first?
The Wisdom of Insecurity. It is short, it is clear, and it holds the idea his other books build on.
What is Alan Watts' most famous book?
The Way of Zen (1957) is his most cited book; The Book (1966) is the one most often quoted.
Is there an audiobook of Alan Watts reading?
Not of his books, but his recorded lectures are available. On Audible Australia, Out of Your Mind is fourteen hours of his talks in his own voice. The Wisdom of Insecurity audiobook is read by John Lee.