Description
Book SynopsisExploring occultist, magician, poet, painter, and writer Aleister Crowley’s longstanding and intimate association with Paris, Tobias Churton provides the first detailed account of Crowley’s activities in the City of Light.
Using previously unpublished letters and diaries, Churton explores how Crowley was initiated into the Golden Dawn’s Inner Order in Paris in 1900 and how, in 1902, he relocated to Montparnasse. Soon engaged to Anglo-Irish artist Eileen Gray, Crowley pontificates and parties with English, American, and French artists gathered around sculptor Auguste Rodin: all keen to exhibit at Paris’s famed Salon d’Automne. In 1904--still dressed as “Prince Chioa Khan” and recently returned from his
Book of the Law experience in Cairo--Crowley dines with novelist Arnold Bennett at Paillard’s. In 1908 Crowley is back in Paris to prove it’s possible to attain Samadhi (or “knowledge and conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel”) while living a modern life in a busy metropolis. In 1913 he organizes a demonstration for artistic and sexual freedom at Oscar Wilde’s tomb. Until war spoils all in 1914, Paris is Crowley’s playground.
The author details how, after returning from America in 1920, and though based at his “Abbey of Thelema” in Sicily, Crowley can’t leave Paris alone. When Mussolini expels him from Italy, Paris becomes home from 1924 until 1929. Churton reveals Crowley’s part in the jazz-age explosion of modernism, as the lover of photographer Berenice Abbott, and many others, and how he enjoyed camaraderie with Man Ray, Nancy Cunard, André Gide, and Aimée Crocker. The author explores Crowley’s adventures in Tunisia, Algeria, the Riviera, his battle with heroin addiction, his relationship with daughter Astarte Lulu--raised at Cefalù--and finally, a high-level ministerial conspiracy to get him out of Paris.
Reconstructing Crowley’s heyday in the last decade and a half of France’s Belle Époque and the “roaring Twenties,” this book illuminates Crowley’s place within the artistic, literary, and spiritual ferment of the great City of Light.
Trade Review“This final installment of Churton’s expansive and detailed exposition on Aleister Crowley’s life, work, and milieu is a treasure trove of new information and startling revelations. Scrupulously researched and exquisitely written, Churton’s complete six-volume biography of Crowley confirms his position as one of the most insightful, respected, and eloquent scholars on Frater Perdurabo to ever put pen to paper
. Aleister Crowley in Paris is a delight.” * John Zorn, composer *
“The young Crowley was in with the ‘in crowd’ in Paris and knew everyone it seems, who then, like him, became one of the characters that creatively shaped the last century. He was engaged to the great Eileen Gray, and lots of other notable women come to life in this very accomplished biography. Tobias Churton is to be applauded for once again getting rid of the gossip and giving us the facts, this time in ‘gay Paree,’ of the life and aspirations of the greatest magician of the twentieth century.” * Geraldine Beskin, co-owner of the Atlantis Bookshop, London *
“Tobias Churton’s multivolume work examining Crowley’s life and work in key geographical locations is nothing less than brilliant. This time Churton takes us to Paris, an extremely important place for Crowley. It’s a pure joy to travel alongside both Crowley and Churton to the City of Light and Romance and to indulge in both the scandals and miracles of the Great Beast 666.” * Carl Abrahamsson, author of Source Magic, Anton LaVey and the Church of Satan, Occulture, and Reason *
“
Aleister Crowley in Paris recasts the Beast’s biography through the lens of Belle Époque Paris, where its expat embrace of freedom, art, publishing, magick, and romance captured Crowley’s heart. We find the mage returning over the years, seeking fresh inspiration or a safe haven from his woes, whether personal or magical. Throughout this engaging narrative, Churton proves that we cannot understand Crowley without understanding his relationship to Paris.” * Richard Kaczynski author of Perdurabo and editor of Crowley’s The Sword of Song *
Table of ContentsFOREWORD
by Frank van Lamoen
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ONE Sir Aleister Crowley Will Be Expelled from France Tomorrow
TWO One Flame 1883-1898
Mathers in Paris
Mina Mathers and Annie Horniman THREE The Road to Auteuil 1898-1900
FOUR Toward the City of Light
Gerald Kelly FIVE Paris, November 1902
SIX Old Threads and New 1902-1903
Eileen Gray and Friends
The Star and the Garter
Nina Olivier SEVEN Where Soul and Spirit Slip 1903
To Nice
EIGHT
Rodin
NINE Le Chat Blanc
The Upper Room
Maugham on Crowley TEN I Piped When You Danced
A Khan in the City of Light Return to Paris-AloneELEVEN Adonai 1907-1908
Paris, 1908
TWELVE John St. John, or Aleister Crowley’s Great Magical Retirement, 1908
The Thirteen Days THIRTEEN
Ragged and Wilde 1909-1913
Covering Embarrassment FOURTEEN Fiery Arrows 1914
Dennis Wheatley and the Legend of Raising Pan in Paris FIFTEEN The Fool Is a Card 1920
SIXTEEN
Spiritual Poison 1921-1923
SEVENTEEN I Died 1924
EIGHTEEN
Man Is a Gambler 1925-1927 284
NINETEEN The Mortal Kiss 1928
Retirement--May 24-August 29, 1928 TWENTY
Refus de séjour 1929
TWENTY-ONE The Last Time He Saw Paris 1929-1930
The Last Dash NOTES
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
