New Crowley Biography?

[gregory]

Aeon - you know how much many of us value Crowley and his works. Why do you seem to need to rebut anything any of us might actually find distasteful about him ?

This is where I get my feeling that Perdurabo is some kind of rehab effort too - is it not permissible to see his feet of clay (or as someone I know who also values him said, his feet of shit) and still think he was a damn fine thing overall ?

I know some of my food animals personally. I well recall the day I and a friend went to a field, picked out a cow in a field,I said I'll have the right side and she'll have the left and then it was butchered for us. And when I was a kid, we had chickens. The only time I was upset by having one for Sunday lunch was when my father told us we were eating Albert Sidney. That was mean. Once or twice I wrung their little necks. But I was crap at it - my hands are too small.

But however cruel little boys may be - what he did with animals was not in any way nice and is still, today, the kind of thing that people find very shocking.

 

[Laura Borealis]

Attitudes from non-Western cultures are not even relevant, so I'm not sure why you keep bringing it up, Aeon.

 

[Aeon418]

Aeon - you know how much many of us value Crowley and his works. Why do you seem to need to rebut anything any of us might actually find distasteful about him ?

Actually so far I've tried to provide a wider context because this is often something that is absent in Crowley discussion. Frequently incidents in Crowley's life are "cherry picked" to prove some point or other. For instance one of your own examples was Crowley's apparently "iffy" behaviour towards Victor Neuberg. Viewed in isolation that episode does not reflect very well on Crowley. But add the context that they were in a sado-masochistic relationship and it all looks very different.

 

[Aeon418]

Attitudes from non-Western cultures are not even relevant, so I'm not sure why you keep bringing it up, Aeon.

You raised an objection based on a local Western view of cats that is not universal.

 

[Laura Borealis]

You didn't read what I said very carefully then.

 

[gregory]

You know what ? I think Crowley was a fascinating person and I don't find him that awful, not even based on Symonds. I HATE Perdurabo because it is BORING. Crowley wasn't boring. I will finish the book. But it is SO not Crowley.

That said - I don't particularly WANT to keep debating like this. Because I don't feel a need to attack Crowley and so I don't need to hear that he wasn't x, y or z. Yes, I know the camel/zebra story very probably never happened at all. It's still a good story. And he loved a good story - hell, he started a load of false ones, I'm sure.

So I shall abandon this thread - I have in any case no more to add. I MIGHT read this new book some day - if Ross likes it - and I shall read Sutin some day, as I have it. But I expect I will only ever read Symonds again, as it is a GOOD READ and Crowley's life deserves a good read. I think it is the sort of read about himself that he would have rather enjoyed.

 

[Aeon418]

I HATE Perdurabo because it is BORING. Crowley wasn't boring. I will finish the book. But it is SO not Crowley.

If you hate Perdurabo because it's, in your opinion, a boring white-wash you might not want to bother with Churton either. He is very clear in his distinction between the factual Crowley and the legend of infamy created by the early biographers like Symonds. Churton's opinion is that Crowley's life has not been written, it's been written over.

 

[mac22]

Quibbles aside I still think it's a great bio and would be happy to recommend it to anyone. Churton may not be as detailed as Kaczynski, but he is better than the yawn inducing, Sutin IMHO.

As I closed the book for the last time my final thoughts were, "Wow! What a life!" To me that's the sign of a good Crowley bio.

Many thanks! Your review has made me decide I want to read this biography of Crowley, so it's on my book list!


Mac22

 

[Grigori]

I'm about 1/4 of the way into the new biography, and am really enjoying it. It's by far the most enjoyable read out of the biographies I've read. Less detail and some wild speculations just for fun, but a really good read. I'd recommend it as a first Crowley biography for sure, and even for third or fourth as I'm getting new material from it.

I have to share this closing statement from my last chapter about Crowley's Scottish home near Loch Ness. It's not a bad example of the tone of the book overall.

...we may be forced to conclude that the 'ultimate end' of the investigation must hold nothing less than this: that the Loch Ness Monster was never anything more than Aleister Crowley's potent penis.
They won't find it with sonar.

 

[inanna_tarot]

sounds like an interesting perspective on the Crowley mythos