Solve

Following his Conjunctio and Coagula, Orryelle DeFenestre Bascule has now released the third book of his Tela Quadrivium. Printed mostly on black pages, this is a darker vision than presented in the first two books. My first impression is that this is not as good as the first two books, Conjunctio in particular. This is possibly because Conjunctio used a few works that Orryelle had made previously, whereas Solve appears to be mostly art prepared solely for this book. On the whole, I find his images fascinating, largely, to be honest, because he has no compunctions about presenting nudity and sexual images. I mean, let's face it, if you're an occultist of any worth whatseoever, you're going to want to deal with things that bring primal energies to bear, and sex certainly has a primal energy. However, its one thing to include sex, its something completely different to do it in a way that heightens the energy, not simply give cheap thrills.  Orryelle in his books gives a flavor of his life as an artist, running amok across the globe, expanding his horizons in every direction possible.
Fulgur, of course, is the perfect publisher for this important work; they have pushed the limits of what it is possible to accomplish, in terms of using gold ink, black paper, and very much co-creating the works with Orryelle. In Solve, for example, I remember one page with shiny black ink on a more matt black page; you can only really see the text if you tilt the page. Robert Ansell is to be heartily congratulated on getting this together. Another fantastic collaboration.

I'm not going to comment on the text, because its going to take me some time to come to grips with the series. The images, however, sink easily into the layers of one's subconcious. Sabbaths worth attending. Note that the large bright patch in the image is an artifact of my photography; buy the book to see the unadulterated version.

Lux Haeresis

Once again, the wonderful folk (Daniel Schulke) at Xoanon have been perpetrating their own particular brand of Spare-ist confusion, this time resulting in the lovely shimmering gray LUX HAERESIS. If you go to the source, you may be able to find a copy for $100 plus shipping.
Like its forebears, this is no easy read, as the author loves writing in strange words. Something charming in "the Focus of Life" and "The Logomachy of ZOS", it is a habit that can get tedious when handled by lesser people. The late Andrew Chumbley was a master, where it comes across as a mask to hide the light from the unworthy, but for lesser mortals like Pharaon and others, it can come across as derivative and childish. Schulke treads a middle zone, sometimes getting it right, and sometimes appearing pretentious.
However, language aside, Schulke continues a very valuable tradition, that of the Cultus Sabbatai, which is more of a successor to Austin Spare than the late Kenneth Grant ever was with his qlippothic typhonian OTO - largely an exercise in turgidity.
There are few people out there who cater to intelligent adults, and Cultus Sabbatai is about the only one that I'm aware of (Clearly, I dont get invited to the right sort of parties). The rest are either PC or reactionaries with the mindset of rebellious teenagers.
My greatest regret is that Cultus Sabbatai is a closed order, so you can look but not touch (i.e., read, but not participate).

Unfortunately I cant recommend this book as a practical guide, anymore than I could the works of Austin Spare, due to the language barrier. However, it is a worthy grimoire, few indeed of which are being published these days. If you enjoy well-made books that are classics, and have the money available for this kind of purchase, I recommend buying a copy today, before it sells out and prices start escalating. Contact the publisher at the snailmail address they use, and take it from there, or find a good bookseller (they recommend Field's books in SF or Caduceus in the UK, both of whom I would also recommend) and pay a little more.

In rank, I'd place this after Azoetia and Viridarium Umbris, but before Ars Philtron which appeared somewhat clumsy by comparison (if more practical).

Book Piracy

In response to a comment on "Satyr's Sermon" below, I tried but failed to leave a comment in reply. I'll have to work that out later. But here is my reply:


"Anonymous said... how do you come to terms with the fact that these kind of books are now being pirated as pdf versions?"

Mixed feelings on this one. On the one hand, I generously support the publishers by buying these quite expensive books whenever possible. However, there is a problem when I want to read a book that is unavailable except at exorbitant prices - like "Qutub" was until a couple of years ago. I was grateful to stumble across a pdf, then went to some trouble to convert this to text and rebind, matching the upside-down and back-to-fronting needed to sew into signatures. By the time I was finished, I think this could be covered under "derivative works" use, but I figured nobody would mind as the publishers werent being put out (the book was out of print, so they werent losing a dime) and this was only for my personal use. When the new edition came out, I bought a copy for $100 or so.

Although I had some issues with Scarlet Imprint coming out with second editions of limited runs on a regular basis, I think they have solved the issue since - providing hardbacks for book afficionados, but with a cheaper paperback version for those who are purely interested in the text.

That to me could be applied to the general schism between the wealthy and poor; the poor are accommodated with basic necessities, while the rich get exclusive versions with a few extra knobs and whistles thrown in.

In short, pirating is OK in my opinion, so long as it does not interfere with the legitimate interests of the creator of the works. If you're not going to buy the work, because you cant, then it is pseudo-legitimate to obtain a crappy copy for personal use. However, if you can reasonably afford to purchase the product from the creator, one is obliged to do so or forego the privilege.

Legally, of course, corporations can and do patent the use of turmeric and other things they never created. I'm talking morally here, not legally. And the publishers I'm talking about here, in the main, are moral people who understand the issue.

A side issue is that some corporations like the OTO consider some books to reveal "their" secrets (although they did not write the rituals on which these are based). If someone writes something they have a right to restrict its distribution. If they inherit it, I personally feel not.

ARARITA

A detailed breakdown of the Star Sapphire ritual, this is not a book for the novice. Detailed associations are drawn to the Tree of Life and the Tarot. The author, 'a Traveller in Darkness', ascribes the ritual to the general arena of 'crossing the abyss', giving large amounts of space to describing why that is so. For my taste, perhaps a little too much so, but then, to write a book about a one-page ritual, its necessarily going to go into a lot of detail.

Nevertheless, this book does what far too few others do: delve into the technical details of HOW the ritual works. It's not sufficient to say that a certain ritual is a "banishing" ritual, one should explain how it banishes, and, in fact, exactly what banishing is. How the material on the page is designed to affect the operator and why. Anyone attending a catholic mass, for example, comes out transformed, refreshed (depending on the skill of the priest), and that is because various elements in the mass were designed to create specific effects on the mind (perhaps also on reality, but as we cant know reality except through the mind, its irrelevant - if the mind has been changed, everything has been changed).

Anyone looking to put this ritual into practice is given specific recommendations as to how to perform it, whereas Crowley only gave veiled hints. These practical elements may go beyond what Crowley himself intended and performed, but they certainly appear congruent with Crowley's intentions, and if they do go beyond Crowley, I would suggest that the author has done a valuable service.

I concur with the author that various groups that claim to have inherited from Crowley may beg to differ, but if that us their position, the answer would be to develop their own expansion.

Blocked in genuine gold on purple cloth, this limited edition (250) book will also look somewhat grand on the shelf, all the more because its not draped in some crappy dustjacket that cant be thrown away because it would halve the value in years to come. Not for children.
8/10

Brother Curwen, Brother Crowley

A new book by the Teitan press, BCBC is an account of correspondence between Netherwood Crowley and a 50-yr-old Jewish Furrier who had some experience of his own under his belt. Like many, Curwen had read many books, but wanted to 'see some magic' as it were, so he wrote to Crowley: "I want someone to show me practical magic.."
After a life of reading and some instruction in the Vama Marga under an Indian Swami, he was anxious to see whether it was all a waste of time. Being Jewish was bad enough, but to demand Crowley to perform his profession in front of him had expected results. Nevertheless, Curwen managed to maintain a fairly long and somewhat friendly (if testy at times) relationship with Crowley by massaging his ego at times, by hinting at hidden knowledge of his own, and by either appearing or being a dupe to Crowley's moneygrubbing. Hard to tell on the latter. He paid some money to find out Crowley's "supreme secret" of ingesting sperm, but paid in installments, and refused to pay after the first, when he had been told what it was. Of course, Crowley felt gypped. But so too did Curwen, not considering the secret worth the first installment.

For anyone wishing to see what was probably a typical interaction between Crowley and a 'seeker', and to get further insights into Crowley's character and what he was or was not able to show to Curwen as an example of his magickal skill, this is an interesting book. It didnt take long to decide where this went in my library: right next to "the progradior correspondence" and "magickal diaries of Aleister Crowley".

A good read, fairly easy, enjoyable. Three stars out of Five.

Disclaimer

I'm now including affiliate links on my blog, and adding them to some old posts. Most posts on this blog will not have them, simply because they are uncommon books. Dont feel any pressure to use the links; they are more for your benefit than mine. But yes, I will financially benefit of you buy via the link. I'm not going to recommend anything just to make cash though.

Datura

Well, Scarlet Imprint is making another bid for my pocketbook; they are releasing: "Datura, An anthology of esoteric poesis". On the plus side, its only forty UK quid, which of course means more than that dollars, but on the downside, its a book of poetry, not my usual cup of tea. I'll have to think carefully if this is where I break my Scarlet Imprint collection. Maybe they will have more info up on their website soon.