By Psyche | March 15, 2010
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My review of Frances Yates and the Hermetic Tradition, by Marjorie G. Jones is up on SpiralNature.com.
Though I had of course heard of Frances Yates before, I didn’t know much about her, having only read Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition
, and that only recently.
Published by Ibis Press, Jones’ Frances Yates and the Hermetic Tradition is the first full-length biography to be written about Yates, and it’s a fascinating read.
@djninjastar also pointed me in the direction of this interview with Jones about the book on the Occult Sentinel podcast.
Though allusions to her not being a properly trained historian are frequent, not being any kind of historian myself I’m still not clear on what the distinction is. Help with that?
Either way, I’d now like to read the rest of her works, The Art of Memory especially, as it’s been called one of the most influential books of the twentieth century.
Check out my review, and let me know if you’ve read Yates, and what your thoughts were about her work.
By Psyche | January 13, 2010
Ok, so I received this copy of 
Abraxas back in September during my visit to Treadwell’s. This review has been a long time in coming. What took so long?
Mostly, I wanted to do it properly. I didn’t want to rush reading bits and pieces here and there, I wanted to really sit down and savour it.
Abraxas isn’t just “An International Journal of Esoteric Studies”, this first issue is also an art book. At 290mm x 232mm it’s a large quarto, beautifully bound, and printed on high quality paper, including a handtipped sheet. Richly coloured paintings are beautifully reproduced, along with many lovely illustrations in monochrome. And then there’s the text.
This first issue focuses largely on witchcraft, and while I can’t detail every essay that appears, I would like to highlight several that I felt stood out in this already exceptional collection. Continue reading »
By Psyche | November 22, 2009
Back in August I posted about My Mother’s Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding, a new musical I’d heard about that debuted at the Toronto Fringe Festival earlier in the summer.
It had just been announced that Mirvish was going to host a production of it at the Panasonic Theatre in November, and that I simply must see it based on the name alone.
November came, and indeed I did go to see it. And I’m surprised to say it was genuinely awesome and I loved it.
MMLJWW is narrated by David Hein, the co-author along with his wife Irene Carl Sankoff, and is based on the true story of how Hein’s moms got together.
Hein’s mother Claire (played by Lisa Horner) was an atheist who came out to her son is as a lesbian after falling in love with Jane (Rosemary Doyle), a Wiccan. Claire later comes out a second time to her son, this time as a Jew. It’s funny and it’s clever, but it’s also sensitive and genuinely touching. Continue reading »
By Psyche | August 11, 2008
Enochian Vision Magick: An Introduction and Practical Guide to the Magick of Dr. John Dee and Edward Kelley, by Lon Milo DuQuette
Weiser Books, 9781578633821, 261 pp. (incl. appendices, notes, bibliography and index), 2008
Lon Milo DuQUette is the author of more than a dozen books on esoteric subjects, and has served as the OTO’s United States Deputy Grand Master since 1994 This is his second book on Enochian magick, his first being Enochian World of Aleister Crowley: Enochian Sex Magick
co-written with the late Christopher Hyatt.
Enochian Vision Magick opens with Continue reading »
By Psyche | August 4, 2008
On Being a Pagan, by Alain de Benoist
Ultra, 0972029222, 240 pp. (incl. notes and index), 2004
Originally published in 1981 as Comment peut-on etre paien?, the book was translated into English by Jon Graham and republished in 2004 by Ultra as On Being a Pagan.
I can only imagine that new title and cheesy image of Odin on the cover are intended to lure neo-Pagans and newagers anticipating fanciful stories harking back to the good ol’ days of yore, yet the paganism of de Benoist is decidedly not a “return to the past”, nor an attempt to regain some “lost paradise”. Instead this book offers something far more profound. Continue reading »
