Aleister CrowleyRecensioni

Wow, I am speechless.
Definitely a great book to read. A little confusing at first. But with some background information it's totally logical.
Love it. That's for sure.

I don’t think I’m going to be able to use the Thoth Tarot in readings, even after I read the book and meditate upon the cards—although I think I will do all that, eventually; (ie: assess both the book and the cards); it’s good background knowledge. And really, the occultists of ANY part of the 20th century are a REAL evolution from the timid and sometimes untruthful masters of the 19th century and all those times, right…. But yeah: while I do NOT find Aleister to be “too rebellious”, and I like some of his writings, sometimes he just…. It’s a lot. Too complicated, really. I know I can be a little petty, but I was like ~he likes chess~ lol…. One of my own personal bugbears…. It took me a lot of time to realize that being forced to learn chess by my father was one of the burdens of my childhood; and I still don’t like the whole math-puzzle thing as the Great Intelligence Thing, right: why so many people give up on intelligence, even if they paper-thin pretend, because the smart people’s standards And ideals of intelligence…. Yeah. Although I have to say, I do admire his abilities in geometry; if you locked me in a room with a geometry teacher, today, I guess I’d bloody learn geometry, right: although not having a choice, or perhaps being offered a “choice” in which one of the options is highly stigmatized, just because people are petty…. Right…. But I do believe geometry could be used in mysticism, although I don’t rightly understand his arguments along these lines…. I feel like I’m not going to understand a very sizable chunk of the book, enough so that I won’t want to use the Crowley Deck, and be reminded of how little I know, basically.

But I had to know—what would happen if I tried, you know…. Maybe that’s what we should do with math: ask kids, require them, even, to take algebra or geometry for a year or whatever, and if they like it, fine; and if they don’t like it, they just have to find something else that they do like…. But all the demoting people and evaluating/placing them in hierarchies, and holding their basic personality type against them, right: it’s bullshit…. And it accomplishes nothing, basically, or very little aside from beginning the alienation process between those who are smart and conforming, smart but non-conforming, and everyone else…. To wit: basic brain size, but would like to conform, and the “bad kids”, right….

But yeah. But it’s a hundred million miles from saying it’s Aleister’s fault, you know. He was just another gifted kid that the system didn’t work for, your typical revolutionary type, basically…. And, again: I trust him over Papus and Eliphaz Levi and the timid pedants from the dawn of time in post-1789 Europe, any fucking day, right….

…. “What is the meaning of the Five of Wands? This card is subject to the Lord of Fire, because it is a Wand, and to the Sephira Geburah because it is a Five. It is also subject to the sign Leo, and to the planet Saturn, because this planet and this sign determine the nature of the card. This is no more than saying that a Dry Martini has got some juniper in it, and some alcohol, and some white wine and herbs, and a bit of lemon peel, and some ice. It is a harmonious composition of various elements; once mixed, it forms a single compound from which it would be very difficult to separate the ingredients; yet each element is necessary to the composition.
The Five of Wanda is therefore a ~personality~; the nature of this is summed up in the Tarot by calling it “Strife”.”

(p. 43, Weiser Books paperback edition, 1974 {reprint}).

That’s a great quote, and I will make a table of Crowley’s “names” for the cards, right. It is true that most of it falls under the three categories of: (I) already knew it; (eg Papus was an idiot); (II) still don’t know it (eg the Star and the Emperor thing); (III) and things I sorta understand more about now…. Maybe, but I’m not sure (some of the philosophy of Tarot and history of science fits in I, and some of it in III).

But yeah. It’s a book. It’s not shit; it’s a book, yeah.

…. More fun quotes:

“Reason is an impasse, reason is damnation; only madness, divine madness, offers an issue.” (p. 57)

“One must constantly keep in mind the bivalence of every symbol. Insistance upon either one or the other of the contradictory attributions inherent in a symbol is simply a mark of spiritual incapacity; and it is constantly happening, because of prejudice. It is the simplest test on initiation that every symbol is understood instinctively to contain this contradictory meaning in itself.” (p. 63)

I understand a lot of these basic concepts, but you quite often can’t say it fairer than Crowley, you know: and quite often these things bear understanding on a deeper level. We understand, until our native flaw grabs us: for me, I suppose, fear, specifically leading to a sort of tightening, a grasping after stasis, which makes me quite forget or perhaps ignore, what I know and do not care to disprove….

And many of the details escape me. Aleister was primarily a philosopher or something like a philosopher, rather than a storyteller, but he knows quite a lot about the old myths, and finds in old stories many philosophies….

…. And yeah, I’m probably more religious than Crowley sometimes presents himself as being—although even a devotional sort of Wiccan who is solitary is probably more like an irreligious mystic in some senses, than you’d expect a Christian to be—but I dislike capitalizing words like ‘god’ and ‘goddess’ and even ‘witches’ and ‘pagans’, and of course, ‘he’ and ‘she’, because it’s finally occurred to me, that although the gods and fairies are good friends to be treated with affection and respect, I should really be leaving all that awe, terror, and resentment behind with me my childhood religion—whatever the hell that was, right….

…. It’s funny how philosophers can kinda evaluate cultures or religions or whatever the way that an almost normal person would evaluate restaurants: like, Don’t eat at that Chinese restaurant on Chicago street—and if you do, at least, do me a favor and don’t get the soup, ok…. ~It’s like, they have a very definite opinion, and are not always in PR mode, or whatever: but they don’t have the same quality of attachment that an average lunatic has, you know, trying to pass the Chinese Exclusion Act or, supporting anti-Asian hate, right…. It’s funny, Crowley, (Aleister is a nice name too, and I love first names, but ~Crowley~ is a ~great name~, you know), could be like, (sips the soup) No I don’t care for the Hanuman cult; it’s not a proper expression of the idea of the Fool…. ~And maybe there’s something to that, although I’m not an expert on Hanuman devotion. India is permissive, but the Indian philosophers sometimes I think look down their noses on things like the Fool energy; maybe that combined to the philosophers ignoring and non-persecuting and non-helping people who just cut loose like, Yeah fuck that Brahman shit! This is Hanuman Temple! ~And then Crowley shows up, and he crinkles his nose, like, These people don’t understand, that the Fool is SO WISE….

[re-read upon posting: Or maybe it was—wasn’t Hanuman like God’s Little Helper, you know: like, Ram’s Little Helper….? Like, “he’s quick with a joke, or a light of your smoke”: he’s a good servant, that Fool…. And it’s like, No, that isn’t what the Fool is, you know…. Maybe hoomis misrepresent Hanuman, the way they misrepresent Jesus, as…. The church: I don’t even know what Jesus is supposed to be, anymore; or Loge, as the Irreconcilable Nut Without Good Qualities, right…. Yeah, no one more misrepresented than the Fool…. Lear’s Fool is alright; but people would rather be King Lear….!]

That’s my guess. Crowley understands a lot of things I don’t, even if I’d still have my own opinion even if I knew everything that he did, right.

…. Sometimes Crowley has a thought, and I can’t tell how I should say what I almost want to say…. Like about science and the church, right: I could say a lot, but it would probably piss off both of them, and I don’t want to offend the Christians unnecessarily, and I especially wish that I weren’t at odds with the scientists…. But yeah, it’s almost like baby science grew up in an abusive home, right….

Anyway: yeah. It’s funny how you can separate out books about tarot and books about runes and so on—you can separate out the thousand and one magical systems: tarot, runes, the various astrological systems, whatever you like—but not really books about divination and books about magic: because a system that can be used for (magical) information can also be used for (magical) action, right. Crowley uses different words—he’s so relatable, given his generation, you almost forget he was one of those Wise Old Men; I feel like someone should write a history of alternative culture in the 20th century called “The Misty Dawn”, you know: it would tickle the sensibilities of Gen Z, but the “good people” would be miffed at putting Mick Jagger and Gerald Gardner together on the same photo montage, right…. Also people would get angry and attack it, just because people are paranoid and attack things, pretty much in general, right; “she exists, and therefore, is to be attacked”—(lol, she is a woman, and therefore is to be wooed, right)—but yeah, it’s like, there are two things in magic: divination and “magic” or sorcery or whatever. You know, or you do. You take apart the world, to see what reality is going on, or you put reality back together in the way you want it to be, right…. Crowley’s phrases were marginally more Latinate, but I feel like that was the idea….

Oh yeah, and—I mean, there’s almost no point writing it if people aren’t ready, you know: Jesus and his pearls, right, and the piggies, right…. Like people are just going to throw a hissy fit over you trying to help them in a way that they can ~easily ignore~, lol…. Like, ok, You’re ill: but it’s ok—I have the general notion myself, if hashing out the many details is going to make the people who actually “value” petty details—and/or their illness—descend deeper into illness, we can just put it off for 150 years, right: maybe by that time, people will be able to form a more realistic view of the centuries, including their own, and including the distant ones, right…. But yeah, “The Misty Dawn” would be about the 20th century, and then the next book would be like a prequel, right: “The Pre-Dawn Hours: Alternative Culture in the 19th Century”.

And yeah: I’m not going to have a kid, but if we still keep up this ridiculous farce of this current inheritance system as being the best way to husband personal and collective wealth, and the whole bogus institution of the family and the rest of it—which was all kinda prefaced on the ideas basically: that female labor is free; you don’t give a fuck about your neighbor; and the community is too stupid/un-spiritual/callous/hostile to help people out, (admittedly many war socialists and riot socialists played into this, and many government socialists are only marginally better)—but yeah, I have a nephew; if he fathers a line, when the 2170s roll around you can write the kid a check for his ancestor’s roll in starting the “Misty Dawn” series of popular nonfiction history, right. (Obviously this is the best possible form of motivation for long-term planning! I can feel the juices of market freedom supporting this totally bullshit notion! How could people ever be free to accumulate wealth for themselves and their communities without the institution of the family! The very notion is a call to right-wing rioting! 😺)….

Anyway.

…. And then, yeah: if the first two “Misty Dawn” books sold well, we could do: “Working Through the Night: Alternative Culture in the Long Middle Ages, c.500-1789”. Or, if the publisher was getting a little tired by that point: “Getting Up To Go To the Bathroom in the Middle of the Night: Alternative Culture during the Renaissance (A Misty Dawn book)”—right?….

And 5th-century Athens or whenever, until Christianization, would be like—“Twilight: A Misty Dawn book”, right….

…. And then somebody could write like, a novel, Mid-day Splendor: A Novel (Inspired by the Misty Dawn series of creative nonfiction), about like, the matrilineal era, when the king was like the son-in-law of the old king: the daughter, the priestess if you like, chose the king….

…. (Re: Strength, renamed Lust)

“Lust implies not only strength, but the joy of strength exercised.”

The classic Christian occultist thing for this card would basically be to say that mercy is strength, I guess; strength is softness; self-‘control’ or even gentleness might be going too far, but something along those lines is often suggested.

Crowley’s saying is worth remembering, though. I suppose the main thing is just not to…. I mean, some people have kinda an animal strength or kinda a wild-mind-animal-strength, and call that strength; or else imagine that the thing is calm cruelty, that strength is the pain of lust destroyed and power seized and hatred embraced, you know…. At any rate, lust is certainly a sort of strength, and strength suggestive of lust being possible, at the very least….

At any rate, any seizing of power which you do not enjoy—which you do not ever, ever enjoy: year after year, decade after decade—is obviously unambiguously dangerous as well as supremely pointless, you know.

“Beauty and strength; leaping laughter and delicious languor, force and fire, are of us.”

…. (the will to live/the will to die: the Tower or “War”)

So you don’t have to reject what ordinary people accept; you just have to accept what they reject. Life and death are one; the will to live and the will to die are connected. Therefore, if one does not like life, one will not like death; if one likes life, one will like death. (I feel like that famous California Buddhist nun titled one of her books with something along those lines.) Therefore, I might say that the suicidal impulse is not “wrong” in the abstract or absolutely—people imagine that they’re supposed to say, “life is better than death; life is holy and death is abomination”—but is simply, although this is certainly bad enough, lacking in balance. We all naturally desire to change our state of mind, and doing things that inevitably cause “harm”—say, sports, for example—are a natural part of this; however, the will to live is meant to keep the death-will in balance, so that one knows that one changes something into its same-opposite…. So there’s no reason to be hasty, especially seeing as we are living eternal lives, you know.

…. It has been said before how the best words come from silence, even before a year or two or whatever before Eckhart Tolle was born, it was said how the best words float upon a sea of quiet…. And it will be said again. Silence is the eternal music, and in it each god hears a different song….

…. But yeah, among some sections of the population, the name “Aleister Crowley” is not held in the same, uh, regard, as, for example, “Oscar Wilde”—whose second book was attributed to “The Author of ‘A Woman of No Importance’”, and whose first book was, “By a Gentleman”—no, wait; I’m confusing him with someone…. Well, anyway. But yeah, all our researches and our classes and our “you give me that Ben Franklin portrait; I’ll give you the textbook” books have been unable to really decipher the sphinx’s riddle, as far as this “Aleister Crowley vs pop opinion” thing goes, right. But I promise, upon my alcoholic mother’s grave, that if you send me to study for seven years abroad in France and Italy, all expenses paid, then I will get lai—I will get labor-intensive, and this mystery shall be unraveled: both now, and for all time, like a disrobéd—“

“We’ll take it under advisement.”

…. I am very funny. People tell me this sometimes. They are correct. (Although obviously I kinda modify my humor to the circumstances, except for when I’m on LT, right.)

But yeah: it is strange and curious how the astrological signs of the cards don’t match up with the elemental signs of the cards: confusing, really. To some extent that itself makes sense—the world as something other than 78 sentences on the ‘cat sat on the mat’ level, but obviously in a specific sense it’s hard to grasp…. Occultism is not amenable to scientific control in that sense—and who doesn’t like control? Certainly not only chemists, right. Yeah, this stuff doesn’t go in ‘Success’ magazine next to ‘AI-run future: yay or nay’, and obviously we know what the writer of chemistry textbooks thinks about it, at least in his official capacity. Societal elites are endlessly amusing, you know: there won’t Be any more goddamn social control, as long as everybody shuts up and follows the rules…. ~If you state your theory more abstractly, you become your enemy, half the time, right…. But yeah: I guess that’s why occultism had to be suppressed when people wanted a religion that would “keep the loonies on the path”, basically: a philosophy of rationalism is hard enough to handle; it fills many with contempt: a philosophy of hidden symbols fills people with Rage and Fear—you might learn something! Or you might fail to learn, and find out that life is not a 10th grade math puzzle, you know…. But yeah, I’m not one of cry over the normies that often, but it is not such a wonderful strike of good fortune! Perhaps a little inconvenient! that they haven’t found the system that works for the average person, yet, you know…. And certainly that is the one thing the average person knows, on some level, perhaps too well: ask him what life is, he’d say, know what’s going on (What’s going on? Don’t punish me, with brutality!….), and who can do that: well if your name is Jesus Christ, or, less likely, if you Really Understand physics, right…. It’s not always easy to deal with life not always being unambiguously one thing rather than the other, but so it is: but then also, things CAN also be one thing rather than another, from experience: if I had been born one degree of Aquarius the other way, I’d have been the Prince of Swords, instead of the (Crowley Deck) Knight of Cups, but so it is, right: so I am…. I am not pure ratiocination, right, regardless of how rebellious; I am all things strange and unaccountable, right…. Often of all men the least…. Something, I am not quite sure what: it tends to change, from season to season, lol…. The least normal…. And the normals are crazy: but even if you’re not normal, ill normals will raise an ill non-normal, right…. Though the coward dies many times, and eventually, perhaps, is reborn….

…. This is kinda specific just to a group of four cards, but:

“THE FOUR SEVENS

These cards are attributed to Netzach. The position is doubly unbalanced; off the middle pillar, and very low down on the Tree. It is taking a very great risk to descend so far into illusion, and, above all, to do it by frantic struggle. Netzach pertains to Venus; Netzach pertains to Earth; and the greatest catastrophe that can befall Venus is to lose her Heavenly origin.”

And that’s why I don’t like that—I mean, it’s very typical; some songs are memorable mostly for being SO typical, right: unusually so—(looks up) it was actually just called “Venus”, made by an obscure Dutch band in 1969, singing in English—I guess mostly about the color of their eyes, right…. And it’s like…. This is where music theory helps: it’s not ~exactly~ music vs lyrics; the melody or whatever is certainly nice, but the lyrics ~would be~ serviceable, you know, if the “program”, or I guess, the application—application vs aesthetics—were serviceable, right…. I mean, the rhyming is nice; the words fit the rhythm nicely; they picked a simple, easy metaphor to say simply and memorably what everyone was talking about, you know—cheap, illicit love, basically…. But the program or whatever you want to call it is SO false, you know: because they’re not servants of the good Venus, you know—they’re servants of Debauch, Futility, and Failure: and probably that was pretty much ALL they were, right—they didn’t take the, I mean—“all we are is of the gods”, right: there is, ~in a sense~, a way in which a debauched, failed girl is Venus, right…. But they don’t even take both high and low, without distinction: they are Very Discerning About Taking Only What Is Harmful, right! (!)…. You know, like….

Like, what the fuck, basically.

…. One is surprised at some of these cards Crowley is pessimistic about, right—not so much happiness and contentment and licit bliss and order and empire and everything, as…. Materialism, dreams, delusions, and unhappy death on the sly, you know…. And then you remember his reputation. Frank Sinatra was singing jazz tunes and the world was, aside from the war, calmly marching into a future of rationality, peace, progress and…. Other lies, you know. It’s funny; he rejects propagandistic sentiment, and does it by being hard in a way that’s almost traditional, but without being, I don’t know, just the wild caveman Red, you know. I just imagine him at the top of the old spiral tower or something—I’m not saying it right, but you know what I mean—and it’s lightning or whatever, but they’re having a party, playing Forties standards, while the male businessmen exclude and harass women, and the women curse at the Black servants, and Crowley looks down from the majestic height of his tower and curses those fucking British people, and calls them the Black Lodge, you know. Like, none of this LaVeyan shit where it’s like, you say white I say black; you say order I saw Chinese fire drill; you say the world exists and it’s good I say the world doesn’t exist and it’s the devil, right—none of that shit. Like, No, YOU are in a delusion; YOU are abnormal. EYE am an adept; EYE see the truth…. I am Aleister Crowley, and you don’t have to see what that means, because you’re just a little delusional deceiver of the people, you know. Run along. Live your little life. ~Like, there’s a majesty to him, right…. We pick such little people to be our leaders, so often. Obama was nice, and a lot of the rest at least clean up in a suit nice, but there’s so much more to it than that, right. The average chap is deeply afraid to pick a leader who’s better at leading than he himself is, right…. We don’t pick people with ~honest majesty~, and ~vision~, you know—we pick fraud leaders, because we feel ourselves to be leading a fraud’s life, in the end…. So we get angry, you know, over something superficial, basically. Delusion, you know. Total delusion.

…. But yeah, it feels like a great instruction how Crowley is pessimistic about the Tens, whereas I feel like the conventional view is very optimistic about—at least some of the Tens, right. The conventional view would I guess be: you start with nothing, or little; you become more and more, and finally in the end, sometimes it all ends as it should, right. ~(“Nothing”, and “as it should”—lol.) Crowley’s view I guess would be that it begins in mystery, and passes through moments of beauty and pain, before ending in failure: and returning to mystery, you know.

💫

…. I like how Crowley is grown-up enough to meditate on the difference between “Pleasure”, and “Debauch”, although he has no time to waste on Christian negativity towards…. Existence, basically. Towards pleasure, basically, and self-expression. (I don’t like to think about how most of them weasel their way through that argument: like, they can’t admit what they want, really.)…. But yeah, it’s kinda like, to be incorrect and use the word “devils”—which doesn’t have any meaning, in truth, according to the classic Christian usage, since the Christians dream up things that were never, and shall not be: but it has a conventional usage, right—after the “devils” are freed from the tyranny of the angels, or the Christians, or whatever: they have to deal with each other. I guess I just mean “devils” in the sense of “natural” things, not dreamed-up or false, or, always-good, or not-embodied-never-embodied, right, (again: they just mean things they don’t have the fucking guts to come out and say, right….), and consequently, hated-by-the-pious, ie “devils”…. But yeah, I guess I just mean: whenever the supernatural tyranny is removed—or is not the current consideration, perhaps, you know—then the business of nature must be got on, which is not made easier by naivety or credulousness, you know…. The 49th percentile romanticism—the calling ‘debauch’, ‘pleasure’—I don’t know; there’s no way to really explain these things: you just have to live and find out—but the debauched common once-born ‘romantic’ is very much kinda this deluded Christian who doesn’t follow the rules of or participate in Christianity, but who is descended from the church, and caught in it, not always for the better, and credulously imagines that they receive the grace of Christ by…. Trying to live this debauched dream that never was, and shall not be, you know…. It’s the common Top40 view, and it’s insane. It’s not the ‘correct’ view of pleasure, you know.

…. Knowledges come in, like: 🫨

But yeah: Oscar Wilde said, Be yourself, everyone else is taken—but personally, I’d like to be able to stretch forth my hand and have Aleister Crowley’s brain, and Harry Styles’ fashion sense, right. 🕵️‍♂️🦹‍♂️

…. “It only makes things worse if one wishes that there were no Ten of Swords in the pack, or that the Five of Wands did not follow and upset the Four.”

I realize that for Crowley this is emphatically Not an accommodation with ‘Christian acceptance’, lol; I myself comment in an unfinished review that maybe Christianity is the joke that Loge played on humanity, lol…. But yeah: it is supremely ironic that the church preaches this sort of thing—acceptance, contentment—and then freaks out at tarot etc for not interpreting this as denial and, secret aggression, basically.

…. But yeah: Crowley wasn’t a Christian. People are afraid of Crowley; they’re afraid of mental illness; they assume they’re the same. But really, I find Christianity to be the—you know, loyalist Christianity, right: substitutionary atonement, right—imagine if one mentally ill person has a psychotic break, right: substitutionary atonement would be like, we’ll send someone else to the hospital, right, we don’t want to send the ill person; because it’s like, Well, Hell isn’t a place where you get treatment, right; it’s prison…. And it’s like…. I mean, it would be a very strange, very sentimental, very ill lie, you know, to pretend that you were the psychotic person, right….

~And Christians don’t really believe that way, you know; apparently there was some sentimental Victorian novel, right, where you give the thief an extra purse of gold and some fancy bread for the road, or whatever—some old, churchy novel people hear about second-hand, right…. But it would just be a symbol of illness to go to Hell imagining that that cures somebody, you know…. And nobody does believe that: it’s just, either sentimentality, or obscure sayings of the mythic rationalists, or else just custom, you know—loyalty to the tribe-customs.

As long as they’re not, you know…. “Pagan”, or magical, right…. Really, in our tribe, we believe in people being good. People are good…. (beat) You know, sometimes people are really bad; I get afraid.

(trying to gauge whether an escape will be necessary) Do you now, Christian.

…. But yeah: many sayings are left to be discovered in this book, and other books: but I do say it is not so good to feel pity, seldom good to be loyal, not good to feel guilty, a great sin to feel guilty over others. And it is not good to be frightened away from, or into, a belief. It is true that an agitated, disturbed, aggressive mind resists and often cannot really be helped: by your illness you can push away the medicine…. But what good doctor would a sane man be afraid of, and what sane doctor would try to frighten, you know—anyone? Whether over ‘rationalism’ and ‘anti-rationalism’ or—well, we know what the church loyalists were like.

…. But yeah, as instinctual, I guess, and custom-driven as the ordinary person is, and as useful and practical (in the broad sense: it obviously isn’t considered practical) as ‘weird’ things can be, sometimes including ‘rebel’ Christian ways, at times: when something bad happens, one wants to know that a responsible person is in charge, you know: and not a “Christian”, a Christian ideologue, right; obviously they would probably consider themselves Christians, random culturally appropriate responsible adults, right: but they wouldn’t get agitated and blame people based on some strange bit of theological “logic”-hate, right….

But yeah: it would be nice when people are obviously in their head with the Delusion-Devil, and smash stuff before running off into the forest or whatever—the concrete forest—that you could then have a reasonably chat about what to do to clean up the bad vibes, right: like either do a tarot visualization together, or just do a smudging, right…. One of my old Episcopalian friends was like, “That’s the one thing I don’t like: the people who do smudging”: like it’s not Buddhism or something, so it must be sexual subversion; and it’s like, It’s literally a purification ritual; you do realize that it’s almost 180 degrees ~opposite~ to having sex, far more than chewing the cud of thoughts and ideas, you know…. (Although it was a weird story, me and the old liberal church lady: and I’m not telling the story right….) Even some of the Greek myths get in the dictionary—including the sexual ones, right—they just don’t include ceremonial magic on how to cleanse a space, right….

But yeah: people just kinda sit around, like, I wonder why there are crazy people…. And it’s like: I don’t know; there are So Many things I don’t know, right, but…. It’s like, Do you ever sit down and ask yourself what questions you ask of life, and whether it’s the right way to ask? It’s like, No, I’m normal.

But yeah: amazingly, it gets even worse than normal, lol…. Which is why I try not to be content with, just-normal, right…. Although I probably won’t do anything really ‘practical’ today; my intuition isn’t nearly as good as some people’s are, but I don’t assume that events are disconnected, or that if something bad happens, right, “Oh, I’ll just blithely assume that today’s astrology stuff is fine: and then, when that turns out to be a bullshit assumption, I’ll complain (to….?), bitterly, bitterly.”

Yeah: it’s funny, the task of magic…. Being sane, you know. Being practical. Advising the kings of earth, who gather in grain, armies, votes, and energy itself, you know….

And until you’ve made that a reality: you train, right. And so, life goes on.

Aleister’s “The Book of the Law” is very short, and I used to have a thing about reading very short books, (I guess if it were sexual, you’d call it a hang-up, lol)—I read all of Shakespeare and counted it as one book, to take the extreme example. But I am glad I’m reading this as a separate work, because it’s very different in style from a lot of his other work, for example “The Book of Lies”—a great book, incidentally. The title is like some punk band calling itself Pale Zombie, or something—like, “Dude we are so above trying to prove to you people that we are better than everyone else, the way that everyone else is. Over it!” (Sometimes those old Edwardian or whatever radicals will surprise you….) Although it’s funny, “The Book of the Law” could almost equally have been called, “The Book of the Un-law”, and “The Book of Lies” could equally have been, “The Book of Truth”. That’s the other thing about the “Lies” title: ALL words are lies, interpreted in a brittle, inappropriate way….

But yeah, “Lies” is like spiritual psychology—spiritual philosophy…. This is more like special interfaith, (I was a cool Christian who read “interfaith” books when I was just trying to drain the shit out of the Christian house so that I could live there, and now, with some strange conservatism, I call the books that I relate to the most as “interfaith”, as some kind of “I am the universe” objectivity, although I’ve reformed it by dividing interfaith into two groups, general and special), occultist religion. A lot of Aleister’s stuff is more philosophical than religious, and he’s never really one for authority, and this is much more philosophical than Wicca, for example…. But it does seem like this is a sort of religion. (He also called it a religion, but I always have to decide things for myself, lol.) It is a very abstract religion, with more the philosophy/theology thing, without too much mythology, except as a metaphor or illustration, not as a story, right—but if authority is maybe not quite the right word, it is certainly a case of revelation, and perhaps if he’s not “revealing” that you have to follow his way, that’s it, (the way that Paul did when he was in jail, lol), he is I suppose “revealing” his own authority over his own life, and how you can do likewise, if that makes sense…. Unlike say, “Magick in Theory and Practice”, which sounds kinda, conversational, almost…. Although that’s not why I stopped reading temporarily; it was more—I mean, in the long run, there’s no separation, just like there’s no separation between indigenous mythology and paleface mythology and science, in the end; there’s no separation, in the end, between philosophy and magick, spiritual philosophy, and ritual…. But having read kinda a lot of the Wayne Dyer/Carlos Castaneda type, over the years, since even before the goosecap years with the first of those two, I was worried that my ship wasn’t quite balanced, so to speak….

(shrugs) But yeah: that’s all just to multiply words—in the end, just, ~Yes, it’s not “How To Live A Normal Life: The Liturgical Church and the Christian Walk Today”, you know.

Because, just…. No, right. Just, no. Yes to LIFE, no to…. All that, basically.

…. Little Child Horus want you be his friend.

We have to help the children, you know. We have to start telling them the right way to go. The children live inside us; we should help them….

…. It is a very high magic: and it is delight.

(shrugs) And you know: sometimes stylistically I don’t know about it; ‘magick’ with a ‘k’ lol; and I shall appreciate it better when I brush up on the Egyptian myths and on numerology: Aleister’s friend could have saved me some time and written like a little poem about each special number, right….

But it is quite beautiful poetry. Some of the poets in the ‘standard canon’ are alright, including some of the ‘best’, but just BBC announcer voice/factory school homework can make short work of it, you know…. A lot of the Bible is poetry, too; “if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you”, Jesus, (I won’t give the next line, lol: too perfect~~~) isn’t a line from the Bible, but maybe it should be, right…. Resentment can make quick work of a Christian of any description, until even the honest critic is left wondering what else was behind it all…. Was there a good god before there was a bad one?

But yeah: this book is pretty much exactly what poetry should be, you know. Maybe it’s ~poetry~ that’s ’high magic’s aid’, you know. Angels know that those old poets were wizards, not cunning-men from the villages, right?….

But yeah, the greatest thing is not to see division: not between all the this and all the that: and not even between, ~the people who saw no division first and those who saw it second, or between those of the first way and those of the second…. Between the Wizard and the Fool, basically.

…. It is true that there is much danger in the “pit called Because”. Mentation, philosophy, can be very debilitating—very disempowering. “And then the philosopher sat down to discover whether he existed, and whether anything at all existed.” Even Epictetus the philosopher cautioned people about that sort of philosophy, you know.

And then the journalists sit and come to tell why the bad things fly like bats unhindered over the face of the whole earth, and why the good things only are illusory, and why ten years ago or whenever, there were good things, but they have flown to fairy-land which does not exist…. And if you try, almost to reason with them, or to show them the flower of the Goddess, they close their eyes and shout loudly: ‘Because Because Because!!!’

Such is their own path, but it is not well to be like them….

And it is true that to esteem death and suffering is simply to do poorly, you know: and most of what is called compassion is merely to esteem suffering, and to value its cultivation. Sometimes the true strength, the true help, is to give your friend a sudden shake, to help dispense with the cultivation of suffering, you know—and not the voluminous words of a Dickens, praised by his contemporaries for showing people the way of pity, you know…. Poetry is stylized rather than technical, but I think a lot of pity is almost to praise someone for suffering, because you think their suffering brings out something good in you—namely suffering, you know….

But yeah, another point: Buddhists and Christian contemplatives, Thomas Keating the monk and all those people, say that the greatest thing is silence, and value it over the divine words that float up from silence. I value the practice of silence less than I once did, but it is easy to overestimate the difference between words and silence, really. For before there can be divine words, there must be silence. And well have they said, that you cannot force the deep silence or the divine words, you can only experience what comes up for you: what the gods within present to you, as a gift.

Perhaps they have neglected to say that sometimes at least you ought to be indeed enjoying what comes up, however.

…. Yup, the introduction said that the third chapter wasn’t going to make sense: and it didn’t. Bible promise made by the prophets in the Old Testament, Bible promise fulfilled by JESUS in the New Testament. 👌

lol.

Aside from the whole aspect of you know: (softly) if you try to convert me one more time, I’m gonna tell you what I think of you, boy, (raises voice) And, I’m Going To Tell You What I Think Of Your Mother!

👹😮‍💨

Although, yeah: words like “war” can mean a lot of things, right. There’s a “war on drugs”. My Trump-y father talked to me about a Christian movie called “War Room” once, you know. But supposedly, we as a society do not gun down unbelievers or irresponsible teenagers, right. That’s for people you like. Malcolm X talked about “self-defense”, but he never actually gave any orders for gunning down whitey, right. He was such a violent epithet, though. Whereas if, I don’t know, Guns and Glory 7 comes out, then Henry Standardissue isn’t REALLY talking about gunning people down right…. Or at least, he wouldn’t be if it were: Guns and Glory 7: Guns of the Confederacy, right…. Or at least, if there were a big NASCAR character who listens to country music and MAYBE, Talks About owning a Confederate flag, right: talk about how he feels emasculated by the civil rights movement, how he’s oppressed now by the….

And, you know: that’s not to promise Aleister anything. I’m not a Thelemite really, and maybe if I read a book about the Mysterious Chapter, it would seem like a dud, right.

But yeah: there’s a passage of the Bible, I forget which one exactly, where Jesus promises the Little Englanders that the sword will never depart from the witches and the trolls and the opponents of the British Empire, and the Jesus Christ Mission of Democracy & Progress, right…. Until Mr. Green can rest and be serene, roses in every room!

And Richard Dawkins would be all, Fuck the witches and the trolls, sure: fuck everybody: fuck the LOSERS, bro: until the Ghost of Chemists Future and the Spirit of “Pride and Prejudice” unite to bring smugness to all the English people, and all the children—except for the ones that I don’t fucking like because they’re losers, right. Bro, I’m telling you: non-atheists are LOSERS, bro! They’re weird! “But at least some of them aren’t going to HELL, in the Circle of the non-British non-humbug non-collaborators with the Little England Project for Decency and Empire!”

And yet, I would never imply that those people don’t view me with the utmost respect and that they don’t carefully guard my rights from any “marginal” types in society that would dissent from our broad societal consensus of kindness, respect, and mutually acknowledged self-worth, right.

Hmm. Well, okay.

Revision: And yet, in public, I would never imply that….

Obviously Aleister has a reputation, and it does seem like some of his books are a little dicey: I wouldn’t do hard drugs, irresponsible drugs, you know—or really anything that’s illegal, as people view illegal drug taking as being like Naziism squared and it’s so not worth it. But as far as de-stigmatizing things that are different from the whole gossip girl reputation that they have (God I love that show: but I digress), I want to give you a slightly edited passage—slightly simplified; it is what I call fancy occultism; it came from the generation of guys who were very labyrinthine in their writings, although there are reasons hidden down there somewhere—and you can decide for yourself if everything he wrote promotes cocaine (Coca-Cola, lol) and “devil worship” (non-Church of Dickens, lol), etc.

After all, the “proper” Crowley/Crawley in those days was Matthew, and you know—come on. Come on, right. Grow up, eek.

Ok:

“[triad #1]
[1] Nothing is
[2] Nothing Becomes
[3] Nothing is not
[triad #2]
[4] GOD the Father and Mother is concealed in Generation
[5] GOD is concealed in the whirling energy of Nature.
[6] GOD is manifest in gathering: harmony: consideration: the Mirror of the Sun and the Heart
[triad #3]
[7] Bearing: preparing
[8] Wavering: flowering: flashing
[9] Stability: begetting
THE TENTH EMANATION
[10] The world”

And if that’s not numerology for the Minor Arcana, I’m a writer for “Downton Abbey”, you know.

…. It’s notable how it’s a sort of non-stereotypical, non-Christ-o-form Buddhism…. “Lies” could be read to mean, “statements not to get attached to”, you know.

…. Of course, it’s not really about Tarot, exactly—Tarot is just one thing—but it’s just such nice philosophy, you know. Philosophy not made out of stone….

…. It’s a bit like Castaneda, but not really. Castaneda is like shamanic philosophy, the man from the beginning of time reasoning it out about life; Crowley is fancy occultism’s philosophy, the riddle-man telling you all about life…. If only you knew. 😉

…. He’s like a ‘bad’ Buddhist. Not totally unknown in the Mahayana countries, that sort of thing, if not exactly how Buddhism gets packaged to the skittish post-Christians and the bored-by-the-Hollywood-scene, shock-me-with-a-little-asceticism crowd, you know.

…. I guess Aleisty IS the ultimate shock to the system to the England normies, you know. (Don’t feel! Don’t think! Don’t embarrass yourself! Don’t embarrass US, dammit!) I can think; I can see beyond the veil of the apparent…. And I can feel; I can be courageous. And you don’t like it, but: were you under the impression that I cared? Would anybody ever REALLY, ~like~ that, really? And what would they be like, if they did?

I remember when I was small they had the village cops come to tell us about ‘drugs’—just say no; just be normal. But there are so many ‘drugs’, so many substances; many are legal, and more should be so, and this idiot perfectionism just sets people up for failure, you know. And there are so many bad-drugs, and instances of substances taken irresponsibly, you know: and there will be more of both, inevitably. And you need so much more to manage any incorrect desires in that situation than, ‘Your parents sent the village cops to teach you idiot perfectionism’, you know…. No one knows everything, or even all that much, really, and plenty of emotionally okay people might have to ask questions that seem a little basic to the cool kids and the specialists and the (god damn) journalists, you know…. But it’s hard to have an open heart, a healthy heart, with a closed mind, and that’s the traditional teaching of the Christian village, you know—huddled round the church.

…. “If I really knew what I wanted, I could give up Laylah, or give up everything for Laylah.”

But I don’t, so I’m normal, you know.

Apollo, that’s profound.

…. “Some men look into their minds and into their memories, and find naught but pain and shame.”

The Morrigan’s a rough girl, but then, I’ve been issued a red card in my day, too. Sometimes better to foul the fucker and make him go to the line and earn it again, (to change the metaphor), than just…. You know, Ah no! Another field goal! You guys are good! Way better than my team! ~you know

~ Although incidentally, things like soccer used to be illegal because theoretically everyone was either working (farming, mostly), “praying” (I just hope things will be alright! I hope Charlie has to get married raise some kids before they realize they’re a para-alcoholic!), doing military training (to protect us from our brother Christians, who are not to be trusted), or maybe yeah, raising about ten kids. But soccer? Whom does that help you control?

…. He really resists stereotypes, it’s great. Not to be a priest who kills poets, or a poet that lies and doesn’t work so that you have to work for him, right: but a priest-poet. Body and soul.

…. What is is part of what isn’t, and what isn’t, is; there’s no dividing them, separating them, or being ‘careful’—so long as you don’t lie to yourself.

Well, the book does not seem to be by Crowley, rather inspired and approved, whatever that means. The illustrations are by one of Crowley's acolytes and artists, and they are impressive in and of themselves. But the text is very brief and infused with lots of "High Magick" kind of stuff. Almost like Monty Python - "And now for something completely different..."½

Excellent mountaineering sagas and tips on organic mosquito control.½

Brilliantly beautiful with descriptions dictated to artist Lady Frieda Harris and approved on every level and every step along the way by Crowley himself. Amateurs will not understand that the symbolism in these cards are arguably the most complicated and true to the Kabbalistic roots of anyTarot deck. If you are an occultist on any level, just having the artwork is reward in itself. Suggest anyone serious about learning about the cards get Lon Milo DuQuette's book "Understanding Aleister Crowley's Thoth Tarot" from Weiser. Some of the reviews are "interesting". Rather on par with one that I read some time ago when I was looking up cataloging information for another title. It said something to the effect that "I 'broadly' categorize my books and then arrange them by color because then my shelves 'look like a rainbow' ". I guess one has to admire the "creativity"?

Crowley’s take on Taoism, rendered in rhyming verse. It is very, very short. Both parts I and II begin: “Lao Kun the master said”. Themes include: not permitting oneself to be thrown into turmoil by desires, the harmonious nature of the Tao (above purpose, process and distinction), avoiding losing oneself in disordered thoughts, not making a show of magical powers.

First published in “The Occult Review” circa 1914; the language shows A.C.s usual eloquence. It divided into two parts.

Part I, The Journey: Outlines the problem of unhappiness caused by inner turmoil and the solution found in stilling thought. Crowley describes the difficulties encountered when making the attempt and the temporary nature of the “cure.” The remedy must be taken again as needed.

PartII, The Desert: Crowley holds forth on the qualities of the desert as a site for spiritual retreats. The seeker experiences the threefold formula of Yoga. At first the novelty is pleasant for a time. Next comes a dark night of the soul with excruciating boredom intensified by solitude. Eventually (if he can persist) the ravings of the seeker are exhausted and he enters the third phase. With calm and peace he becomes newly at home in the desert with its vast, stark vistas, omnipresent sun, moon and wind. Thus a desert retreat can aid in the stilling of the mind, as described in part I. Crowley also comments on the simplicity of casual sexual encounters, saying that all those things often associated with sexuality (romantic love, marriage and other social customs, etc.) are unwholesome accretions on natural simplicity. If he attains exceedingly he will confront a fork in the road as it were: dissolution in the Godhead or turning away, turning back to cling fiercely to the self (though such is ultimately a losing battle).

I listened to this on Scribd but.....it has to be a joke right? This reading is the most unnatural, uncomfortable thing I've ever listened to. The weirdest 9 minutes of my life......

Finally got around to reading this. Amusing and somewhat instructive.

Crowley writes superbly, a surprising conclusion to make about one who was once called “the wickedest man in the world.” His descriptions come at you from an unexpected angle and one is forced to pause, to slow down at the sheer uniqueness of what is being said. A cursory reading will miss his subtlety and, while not deserving of a slow reading per se, we should call it 'slower than normal' reading. Then, we would approach the book properly.

There is a sensuality to the language which is decadent in same way that the music of the Grateful Dead somehow brings to mind the idea of overripe fruit. I have to wonder, however, if I am being slowly corrupted by this book. Crowley writes like a man whose familiar associations arrive from a dimension different from ours. About such folk, we might have once said ". . . not quite right" which only means they don't fit our particular social paradigm. The 21st century reader struggles to accommodate Crowley's phrases and metaphors, whose effect is to gently push one out of a comfortable reality . . . especially since the subject matter is the overuse of cocaine and heroin. If there is an agenda here, it may be precisely to accomplish that gentle push.

The story of Peter Pendragon and his lover Lou Laleham unfolds in three parts, Paradiso, Inferno, and Purgatorio, a take off on Dante's tour of the afterlife. The couple travel through Europe on stipends from Peter's inheritance, gradually succumbing to the enflaming passions created by a heroin and cocaine addiction. As the addiction becomes more pronounced and the propensity for self-knowledge rises, the perspective turns increasingly wild and, for this reason, spiritual. It is an unaccustomed spirituality: that of the liberated mind, the insane mind, a mind that no longer turns automatically from questionable things. There is a coming-to-terms period in the second section of the book, called Inferno, which touches on these mad things. The perspective is utterly fascinating – a good exposure to things beyond the ken of most of us.

Having said that, this reader felt a kinship with that narrator's internal monologue. These voicings ring similar to what form spontaneously on the basis of immediate experience. In some cases, they may be felt only briefly before cultural cues have had their chance to redirect them into more acceptable cliches. We all live inside the gated communities of our expectations. Those gates and walls are quite invisible to ordinary perception. It is from within these walls we knowingly pass judgement on the world "out there. "What is good? and what is bad?” Typically we are supplied with the answers by culture, along with a corresponding judgment. Such judgments. . . in fact, all judgments. . . are (as a bottom line) based on the need to have a reliable handle on the world. They vital to the survival of that squirming little creature we call 'self.'

A strange book, possibly a 'gateway' book (to further questionable activities), and a worthwhile reading experience. You're a reader. Have some courage.

Nearly sixty years have elapsed since I was first introduced to Part I of Book 4, Crowley's first little masterpiece on Yoga. It thoroughly debunked the entire subject and then laid down some firm notions as to what Yoga consisted of without the usual claptrap found in the work of those who should know better. That little book has actually become a classic. If it is not now so regarded by some of his over-critical enemies, the passage of time will undoubtedly make it so.-Israel Regardie

With humor and penetrating wisdom Crowley has produced a work which should uplift the heart of all enthusiastic students of Yoga. I originally received this book as a gift from Israel Regardie in 1975. It has been my constant companion.-Christopher S. Hyatt

This book is timeless. Aleister Crowley has masterfully translated the Eastern method and tradition of Yoga into a form easily understood by the Western Mind. I highly recommend this book to the neophyte and adept alike.-Baron Peter von Gundlach

Contents

Yoga for yahoos
First lecture First principles
Second lecture Yama
Third lecture Niyama
Fourth lecture Asana and pranayama
Yoga for yellowbellies
First lecture
Second lecture
Third lecture
Fourth lecture

I found 3 editions of this in the GoodReads database - 1 of the others calls it an "autobiography" & one just calls it "The Confessions of Aleister Crowley". "Autohagiography" means "autobiography of a saint" so reducing that to a mere "autobiography" is completely out of the spirit of the bk. I was tempted to create a new bookshelf here esp in this bk's honor: "megalomania" - but that's too easy a shot. Crowley was far from stupid & there's plenty of humor in his writings. &, besides, I read all, what was it?, 1300 pages?, of this so there was plenty in it to keep my attn.

This is another example of something non-fiction that I read a long time ago that I still remember substantial details from - once again demonstrating that I sortof escape into fictional worlds & then forget them but I remember things that somehow resonate more w/ 'real life'.

Crowley had inherited wealth & lived it up as a result - gradually living the high life less & less as the money ran out & he had no self-support skills other than parasitism to pull him thru - a not-too-atypical trajectory of the rich-&-useless. Reading his description of his early yrs as a failed mountain climber are (apparently unintentionally) a hilarious look at the imbecilic egomania of British aristocrats. Crowley's full of self-praise & then ridicules the sherpas who're assisting him. W/ apparently no self-irony he writes about how one of the sherpas wdn't've died if they'd only listened to his great genius & wisdom. Somehow it doesn't seem to've occurred to him that maybe if he'd carried his own voluminous luggage & slept outside, like the sherpas did, instead of climbing in relative luxury & sleeping in a heated tent, he might not have survived the trip either.

Later one gets to read about Crowley's being the greatest poet of the turn of the century. Funny, he seems like a complete hack to me. Of course, Crowley's reknowned for doing things like leaving piles of cocaine around to prove that he can refrain from using such things if need be. Then he died a heroin addict. Nice try, Aleister. In later yrs, he was in the US before &/or during WWII & connected to a German society connected w/ nazism. His claim? That he was a spy for the Brits. Somehow, I'm not convinced.

Still, don't get me wrong. I like Crowley. I've read quite a few of his bks. I wonder if he was really as insufferable a megalomaniac in person as he comes across here. In a bk of mine I reference this as "pompous blatherings" but at least Crowley didn't lead a dull life.

For the last twenty-nine years this book has resided on my shelf, unread. So many reasons to procrastinate: the paper is acidified, it was edited by persons with potential axes to grind, a new and full edition is in the works, it is 923 pages of small print, &c., &c. The dog-faced demons were manifold and cuddly. Yet, the last magical advice I received from a very dear mentor was to read this book. Still, I awaited publication of The Spirit of Solitude. It occurred to me how silly this strategy is, as if a still, small voice whispered in my ear, “You aren't reading books you do have because you're waiting for ones you don't?”

And thus, I heeded the voice on the Saturnian return of my ownership of the book.

There is much mountaineering, and many trips to the dictionary, and Google searches of certain phrases lead back to online versions of this very text. And yet, scattered throughout the text are important insights into other of Crowley’s works, as well as guidance on particular magical practices. For these alone, reading the book is well worthwhile. More detail in this last respect cannot be easily given, as the insights are surprisingly personal.

Some parts of Confessions are repetitive, and at times Crowley refers back to incidents not described or foreshadows events not related. I lay this at the feet of the editors. Also, there is a strange deja vu to other parts, perhaps owing to their being quoted in introductions of other Crowley works. This also underscores the importance of reading Confessions. Poignantly, Crowley’s main confession is that he trusted people too much.

On a minor note, the oblique references to gay society were entertaining. In referring to George Rafflovitch, for example, Crowley relates,

They saved a few thousand for the fool and kept him on short commons to teach him sense. He had snarled and become a socialist. I met him at the Gargotte off Holborn, being the only man there who looked at all like a gentleman. I paid him special attention. This suited him down to the ground. He saw a chance to cadge. He agreed with me about socialism. It appeared that his motive in frequenting that milieu was identical with my own.
(p. 633.)

It is too bad, however, he wrote so generally about Cefalù. It is unclear whether this was his choice, or that of his editors. Regardless, those incidents are covered in other biographies, from both outsider and initiated points of view.

It's an important work, though this edition's importance will be eclipsed once the Spirit of Solitude is published.

Bit confused on the ending to this. If i got it right i'm unhappy, if i got it wrong i'm stupid and unhappy. The evil guys are so over the top. So much so that when someone was nailing a live cat to the floor, i burst out laughing (or maybe i have issues.. ;) ). Great atmosphere though.

Aleister Crowley contando sobre como funcionam as leis no macrocosmo e no microcosmo. experiência transcendente.

The extremely wide assortment of tales in The Drug and Other Stories includes some with a double role as technical instruction in magick or significant mythopoeia for Thelemic culture. These include Liber XLV “The Wake World,” a qabalistic fairy-tale; Liber LXI, “Tien Tao,” a political and psychological parable; Liber LI, “Atlantis: The Lost Continent,” an antediluvian mystery, and Liber LIX, “Across the Gulf,” a tale of Ankh-f-n-Khonsu in ancient Egypt. Many of the stories with contemporary settings and conventional narrative style feature actual persons and anecdotes from Crowley’s life only superficially fictionalized.

I love this book. Meant to be taken in small doses, it's the best and worst of Uncle Al, with jokes, puns and outright snarkiness on so many levels. Many of it is inside jokes, so if you don't have a background in Western Hermetic Qabalah and/or general Crowley, it wont be as much fun. I'd always recommend his Autohagiography first

** Review in Progress **

First, the edition itself receives ***** for its design and clarity of print. Perhaps it would have been better, however, if the works were presented in chronological order. But perhaps that wouldn't compel one to go on reading...

Diary of a Drug Fiend **
This should be called "Diary of Two Drug Fiends" since it concerns a former World War I pilot, Sir Peter, who has come into great wealth through an inheritance and his love, Lou, whom he meets at a party. He and she then proceed to consume more cocaine than Al Pacino's Scarface and much more heroin to boot. Along the way, they encounter various friends and acquaintances, some of whom try to take advantage of them. Looming behind it all is King Lamus--a stand-in for Crowley himself--who keeps telling them "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law." The book has three sections, with Sir Peter narrating the first and last, and Lou narrating the middle part, where things hit rock bottom for the couple (they even try to conjure up demons). This is no "Requiem for a Dream", however, because King Lamus offers salvation if only they can learn to listen to him and adopt his religion of Thelema! Perhaps the world would have been a better place if Crowley's made-up religion occupied the space later assumed by L. Ron Hubbard's made-up religion, but that is a subject for a long, long book. In any case, "Diary of a Drug Field" is overwritten, melodramatic, and full of some of the most ridiculous dialogue (and even more ridiculous poetry) you have ever encountered. Still, it is a bit of fun, and as a way to experience Crowley's philosophy (and his high opinion of himself), perhaps it is better than his more 'serious' works. If it were about 100 pages shorter, it would be a better book by far. There's nothing else like it, however, that I know of at this point.

As to be expected from Aleister Crowley, a short, lyrical romp through pagan imagery and double-entendres, some Greek and Roman god cameos, and an appearance by Randy Pan the Goat Boy. Something about confusing lust with love, perhaps.

I thought this was going to be full of juicy drama because, well, Aleister Crowley...but it was blindingly boring.

Not giving this one a rating because I really don't know what to think. Some passages of real beauty intermingled with things I don't understand at all. Will have to reflect on this text and see if it offers up more meaning with time.

Apparently people study this text for years to make heads or tails of it. There's some lovely language, but ultimately I feel more confused than enlightened.

Being of the angels of the 30 Aethyrs