Laura Ann Shulgin ( Gotlieb; March 22, 1931 – July 9, 2022) was an American author and the wife of chemist Alexander Shulgin, with whom she wrote the books PiHKAL (Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved) and TiHKAL (Tryptamines I Have Known and Loved).

Life and career

Laura Ann Gotlieb was born in Wellington, New Zealand, to parents Bernard Gotlieb and Gwen Ormiston, but grew up in the village Opicina outside the Italian city Trieste. Her father was U.S. Consul in Trieste for six years before World War II. In her writings she stressed the potential of these drugs from a Jungian psychoanalytic perspective, as well as their use in combination with hypnotherapy. She often appeared as a speaker at conventions and continued to advocate the use of psychedelics in therapeutic contexts.

Together with her husband she authored the books PiHKAL and TiHKAL.

According to her daughter, Shulgin had been in ill health because of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Shulgin died July 9, 2022, at her and her late husband's San Francisco Bay Area residence.

Along with its founders Dillan DiNardo and Thomas S. Ray, Shulgin was one of the three co-owners of the psychedelic pharmaceutical company Mindstate Design Labs, founded in 2021, until her death in 2022.

Publications

  • with Alexander Shulgin. PiHKAL: A Chemical Love Story. Berkeley: Transform Press, 1991.
  • with Alexander Shulgin. TiHKAL: The Continuation. Berkeley: Transform Press, 1997.
  • with Alexander Shulgin. "A New Vocabulary". In Robert Forte (ed.), Entheogens and the Future of Religion, Berkeley: Council on Spiritual Practices, 1997.
  • "Tribute to Jacob". In The Secret Chief: Conversations With a Pioneer of the Underground Psychedelic Therapy Movement by Myron J. Stolaroff, Charlotte, NC: Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, 1997.
  • Foreword, M. Crowley, Secret Drugs of Buddhism. Amrita Press, 2017.

References

  • Erowid Character Vaults: Ann Shulgin
  • Ann Shulgin dedica la traducción al español de PIHKAL y TIHKAL (In Spanish)
  • A New Class of Criminals: A therapist laments the loss to science of MDMA
  • Video: Psychedelic Psychotherapy with MDMA – Ann Shulgin: A Chemical Performance
  • Transform Press – Publisher of Ann Shulgin's Books