This American underground classic is a rollicking cosmic mystery featuring Albert Einstein and James Joyce as the ultimate space/time detectives. One fateful evening in a suitably dark, beer-soaked Swiss rathskeller, a wild and obscure Irishman named James Joyce would become the drinking partner of an unknown physics professor called Albert Einstein. And on that same momentous night, Sir John Babcock, a terror-stricken young Englishman, would rush through the tavern door bringing a mystery that only the two most brilliant minds of the century could solve . . . or perhaps bringing only a figment of his imagination born of the paranoia of our times. An outrageous, raunchy ride through the twists and turns of mind and space, Masks of the Illuminati runs amok with all our fondest conspiracy theories to show us the truth behind the laughter . . . and the laughter in the truth. Praise for Masks of the Illuminati “I was astonished and delighted . . . Robert Anton Wilson managed to reverse every mental polarity in me, as if I had been pulled through infinity.”—Philip K. Dick “[Wilson is] erudite, witty, and genuinely scary.”—Publishers Weekly “A dazzling barker hawking tickets to the most thrilling tilt-a-whirls and daring loop-o-planes on the midway to a higher consciousness.”—Tom Robbins “Wilson is one of the most profound, important, scientific philosophers of this century—scholarly, witty, hip, and hopeful.”—Timothy Leary

If you received an invitation to attend a mysterious masked ball held by a secret organization of the rich and powerful, would you accept? Meet the five candidates who do: the scientist, the singer, the chef, the attorney, and the financier. They crave power, love, money, respect, fame – that which eludes them. Their enigmatic host, known only as Pig King, craves something more basic: salvation for his kind. But the Illuminati Ball requires a sacrifice… “I was seduced by Cynthia’s art. She is a wonder.” – Neil Gaiman “Creative genius.” – Forbes

Discusses consciousness, the nature of God, sexuality, human knowledge, robots, and the future.

Ia all of history a vast conspiracy? Cosmic joke? Robert Anton Wilson developed the story of the Illuminati, a conspiracy as old as time itself, as a vehicle to amuse and enlighten. His best-selling books, The Illuminati Trilogy and Cosmic Trigger, have delighted readers the world over and made the Illuminati conspiracy the perfect metaphor for our time. In the ILLUMINATI PAPERS, Robert Anton Wilson speaks through characters from his novels and other realities and presents his views on our future way of life. Includes The HEAD Revolution Secrets of Evolution How to Eliminate Stupidity Illuminati Interoffice Memos The Position Papers of Hagbard Celine Economic Liberation The Usual Gang of Lunatics, Mystics, and Characters Clamoring for a New Social Order

The sequel to the cult classic The Illuminatus! Trilogy, this is an epic fantasy that offers a twisted look at our modern-day world--a reality that exists in another dimension of time and space that may be closer than we think.