FoolishPeople

A Load of Old Blather: Unreal Reports from Ireland and Beyond.

My friend Damien DeBarra has his first book out now, and it comes very highly recommended from FP. Damien is an incredibly smart writer, who never takes himself or the subject he's writing about too seriously. His new book covers everything from UFOs to Ancient Irish Astronauts. All the insane dreams of our mad dying species

Eleven years, three convictions, two deportations, ten thousand pints, six barring orders and a legion of leather-clad groupies later, Dave Walsh, Barry Kavanagh and Damien DeBarra (the cheap tarts that brought you Blather.net) bring you their latest labour of love: A Load of Blather: Unreal Reports from Ireland and Beyond.

 

The Book of Hate

To be published late '08

'The Art of Memetics' by Wes Unruh & Edward Wilson

'The Art of Memetics' by Wes Unruh & Edward Wilson is highly recommended by FoolishPeople.
With a forward by Taylor Ellwood and introduction by Joseph Matheny.

"We are all part of social networks that are communicating, interacting. And this allows us to start applying cybernetic principles to psychological and social issues. Memes are not about “communication” or transfer of data. Memes are programming instructions. They are tied to actions. Memes are just the packet on this network. And the packets are usually programs which get installed on the system that accepts them. That system is you and I. Because we are components in a very large system and made up of smaller systems and components the percentage of control we are generally capable of at least at first is really small because we are constrained both by our constituting components and the system of interactions within which we are embedded."

You can read an introduction on Key64, which also features Joseph Matheny's introduction to 'The Art of Memetics'

“The Art of Memetics is a much needed text on memes and how ideas grow might and power and spread as if by magic. There is more actual magic in memes than I ever saw before reading this master text by Edward Wilson and Wes Unruh. If you want your ideas to spread, you’ll read this book twice.”
Jay Conrad Levinson
Father of Guerrilla Marketing

"’The Art of Memetics’ flows through every version of who you were, are and will be, with a strength and purity of signal that is eager to assist you in becoming all you were born to be.”
John Harrigan
Artistic Director:
FoolishPeople

“Not since Philip K. Dick and Robert Anton Wilson have I read a book that fundamentally altered the way I see and process media. The Art of Memetics extends the work of Marshall McLuhan into a media ecology of sympathetic coexistence, a model worthy of exploration if a sustainable equilibrium is valued.”
Ben Mack
Magician, Memeticist Author:
Think Two Products Ahead

Available now for a limited time period only: The Mastermind Edition

The Book of Hate

Coming>2008 - Yiri T. Khol - John Harrigan

The Deep

Fallen Nation Audiobook

The Fallen Nation Audiobook is now available at:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/fallennation
Recommended by FoolishPeople

Fallen Nation

Just in time for the second edition, the Fallen Nation website is now live. Next stop the Apocalypse.

 

Institute of Contemporary Arts : Reaktion animals : Cat

Link: Institute of Contemporary Arts : Reaktion animals : Cat.

Cat traces the relationship between humans and the cat from its original domestication in ancient Egypt c. 2000 BC, where it enjoyed high status, through its centuries as a mere utilitarian rodent catcher, its gradual acceptance as a charming and amiable pet, and its present status as a companion on a par with the dog.

Cats' ease of negotiation in the dark, their silent movements, their self-detachment even as they live in our homes, their refusal to defer to humans, seem to indicate strange, even supernatural powers. At first these attributes seemed sinister, but for later cat lovers they add to the animals' fascination. They have inspired writers from Poe to Lewis Carroll to imaginative creations. But cats can also be the embodiment of a happy home and good friends, whether they sustain a lonely old woman like Hall's Fräulein Schwartz or chat pleasantly with an old man in Murakami's Kafka on the Shore. The peculiar fascination of the cat, indeed, is the diversity of images it projects - sweet and ferocious, affectionate and independent, elegant and earthy, cosily domestic and eerie.

ONLY REVOLUTIONS

Link: ONLY REVOLUTIONS.

Untitled page from 'Foundling' - Lili Spain

© Lili Spain 2007

Stella Damiana: 'Sex Spells'

Confessing to having read only half of the book before you meet for the first time the author you're going to be interviewing is something very shameful indeed, especially when you are reviewing said book - however having spoken to Stella a few times beforehand, and from what little I'd gleamed from the first chapter of Sex Spells: A Guide To Erotic Bliss, I felt sure she wasn't going to mind; she seemed entirely centred and evidently too gloriously satisfied to care.

The first meeting with Stella was at Treadwell's Bookstore in Covent Garden to celebrate the UK launch. More so than ever, Treadwell's supplied the perfectly decadent environment for such an event, packed to the rafters with folk all there to celebrate and support the author in her first publication. Having noted the massive cross-section of attendees I began to wonder exactly who the book had been aimed at because there was certainly no pervading age, genre or academic type coming forth as being the common denominator.

By our second meeting I had read it cover to cover, twice, and had my answer - Sex Spells is an appropriate read for anybody who opens it.

Stella and I enter into a conversation about a chance meeting she had with Morrighan at the top of an ancient burial mound: Croham Hurst. This was to be the very beginning event that perhaps kicked the book from a publicist's ideas shelf into the hands of a committed and very experienced magic practitioner. An event that we should be grateful for, as Stella has poured years of trial, error and success into these pages with such aplomb that the result should be in itself read as ritual.

Aside from the beautiful illustrations and quaint layout, Sex Spells vibrates with passion and eloquently written basics before it begins to tackle more complex workings with a surprising lucidity. The first half of the book is dedicated to magic for sex and the second dedicated to sex-magic (though with not quite as many 'A male child of perfect innocence and high intelligence is the most satisfactory victim' references as our dear Mr. Crowley's previously terrifying works of a similar nature).

It is truly remarkable how the author has made this piece so duplicitous in its guise as both a beautifully crafted literary trinket and a sound, knowledge packed text suitable for the complete novice right through to experienced practitioners.

Please make no mistake, don't pick it up thinking you've just found Aunt Carole's novelty birthday gift, Stella has successfully integrated time old practices and hideously misconceived beliefs with mainstream appeal in a work that has all the potential to undo the perception created by the plastically written and mass produced monstrosities that claim to be commercially leading books.

This inspirational guide is deficient in no other way than perhaps in length - it was after all, a book I had wished wouldn't end.

First Post

So this is my first proper post on the FP Blog and to be honest I have no idea what to say! Despite being hard to shut up at times and writing copious amounts of verbiage on email groups like the DIGlist, on being asked to write something every Thursday for the Blog has got rather stumped. So I'm basically sitting here with a laptop wondering what to say. I guess there's an almost infinite amount of material I could share but what would interest people and could I be arsed. Well the first thing on my mind today was the excellent book launch yesterday of Stella Damiana's amazing Sex Spells book, those who know who Stella really will know what I mean when I say its always a pleasure to share a space with one of the most insightful, talented, and downright gorgeous women in the occult scene today, and so we were all pleased to see her get the recognition she's long deserved. But an even greater attraction that night was the crowd that gathered there. Treadwell's has for a long while had the reputation of a place to be to meet the most interesting people in the London occult scene, I lost count of the number of fascinating conversations I've had there, but a Treadwell's packed with Stella's friends, lovers and colleagues was one step beyond even that, an evening with some of the most stimulating company anywhere. The event of course was centered on the Sex Spells book, and naturally this lead me to contemplate the thorny question of magic and sex, not just the efficacy of sex spells in obtaining a desired result, or even LHP Tantra so favoured by old school groups like the OTO, but the very nature of the relationship between sex and magic itself. I'm no Freudian but have long recognised the fact that sexual energy is by far the most powerful psychological force in the modern psyche, partly no doubt to the sexually repressive nature of contemporary society and because of this it is also the most powerful energiser for magic, its no accident that Chaos magicians decided to wank over their sigils to energise them (even though thats just one of many ways to do it) and its not surprising that sex magic spells are some of the most effective and well suited for an introduction to the reality of magic. Tantra is one of the most obvious manifestations of sex in magic, and despite the fact it is too often used as an excuse for a fuck, I can vouch for its efficacy in consciousness transformation both in terms of accidental effects of an active sex life and the more controlled use of sex in Taoist practice. But given that sex is such a powerful tool in magic it is not without its problems, the sexual dynamics of working occult groups is a typical case of this. If sex is being deployed as a tool in such groups as it inevitably always is, even if not openly, the free flow of sexual energy is a crucial factor in the success of the groups working. However while our ancestors probably lived much as the Bonobo chimpanzees do, contemporary society while both sexually freer and slowly evolving beyond such archaic and malign cultural institutions, such as monogamy and romantic love, is still plagued by both an anti-sex ethic, as well as a corresponding over-valuation of what is an essentially recreational past time. Thus the free working of sexual energy, crucial though it is, can open a can of worms in the context of this reality. We may all think we are evolved beyond such problems, but alas we are products of the dysfunctional society we have been born into and so cannot help but internalise its pathologies.

Unfortunately this is an area that has barely been addressed by occultists, outside of the ground breaking but horrendously bigoted writings of Dion Fortune on the sexual dynamics of such groups. The issues in this area (and I've been deliberately vague because the actual issues are many, involving diverse sexualities, tensions, hang ups, jealousies, emotional problems, past histories and gender issues to name a few) are  I think resolvable, though a few may always be problematic due to the imperfections of the world we have fallen into. But this will not happen without a fuller exploration of the many and diverse issues that are raised by this situation. For my part I hope to dedicate part of the forthcoming F.U.C.K website (1) to tackling these issues and will post links to here as they arise.

Another important area of magic is the confrontation with the unknown of course, a degree of awe and even fear is a crucial element of any ritual magical practice. There  is considerable evidence that in more sex positive times in the distant past this factor was probably the most prominent energiser of magic. Such powerful factors are rarely found in the tamer climes of modern magic however and have largely been taken up solely by the more avant garde of the arts, such as Surrealism. One of the things that first impressed me with Foolish People productions was there awareness of both of these energising elements and their reincorporation from art back into popular magic.

Fear of course is also a weapon and one we see all too often used against us in the current political situation, with its false alarms and pseudo-terrorism, here used as a generator of insecurity and a foundation for an oppressive form of government. Such fears also need to be faced and overcome and by facing our own internal fears and using those as a springboard we can transform ourselves in this area too.

I apologise for the rambling nature of this post today, but my recent drifts have been rather chaotic as many may know.

I'll end on a slightly lighter note with a little self plug if I may and announce that my Wyrd Walks project will be exploring another aspect of fear and magic on the 22nd October, when I explore the East End of London and the history of the infamous Spring Heeled Jack, the phantom Terror of London.

The walk is scheduled for that Sunday starting at around 4:30 outside Bow tube station (details to be announced).    

(1) F.U.C.K the Foundation for Unrestricted Carnal Knowledge, is the Sex Poll section of the Dionysian Underground and its website should be appearing in the coming weeks.      

Sex Spells by Stella Damiana

Sex Spells, by Stella Damiana -- Launch Party
11 October (Wednesday) – from 7.00 pm.

Tomorrow evening at 7:00pm at Treadwells See's the official launch of Stella Damiana's - wonderful tome - Sex Spells (published by Michael O'Mara). Stella will be at Treadwell's signing copies.

This book and event comes highly recommended by FP. So much so that Vittoria (Who I have dispatched the flying monkeys to find as she is once again missing in action) will be interviewing Stella for Foolish People.com

Hope to see you tomorrow ingesting cake and pink bubbly.

Treadwells Events

Treadwells once again have a diverse list of events in the coming months, including the launch of FP's dear friend Stella Damiana new book Sex Spells on the 11th of October.

Exhibition of the Art of Roland Spottiswoode
Ongoing through 11 October – in the downstairs gallery of the shop
Anglo-Irish oil painter with an interest in literature, occultism, theatre and the unseen worlds. Unusual portraits of Robert Graves (of White Goddess fame) and Yeats (of the Golden Dawn) as well as greats from theatre like Noel Coward, Tennessee Williams. Open daily at Treadwells until 11 September. For more, see our website on http://www.treadwells-london.com/art.asp. Extended by popular demand for another month!

Memories of a philosopher... Deleuze and Sorcery
13 September (Wednesday) Matt Lee, University of Greenwich 7:15 for 7:30 £5.00
Matt Lee introduces some key concepts in the thought of Gilles Deleuze and considers their implications for contemporary magic. Deleuze challenges much of received wisdom, including many ideas pervasive in occultism. He takes concepts of the individual, of reality, of perception and of imagination – and shifts them radically as he attempts to destroy an 'image of thought' -- a mind-set that constrains thought itself. Matt Lee looks at how this applies as much to occultists as it does to philosophers, and proposes that Deleuze can open up a radically different conceptual basis in magic. If one follows Deleuze, a reality arises in which the entities and forces of the world take on an enfleshed and formless life, more terrifyingly real than anything previously imagined except in the dark corners of a few broken minds. Matt Lee is a lecturer in philosophy at Greenwich University and a practising chaos magician from Brighton. He publishes the 'chaos majik' magazine Razorsmile (http://razorsmile.org) and works in a small eclectic coven and in a goetic working group.

Treadwells Events

Christina and Kathy, our friends at Treadwells have a new list of upcoming events. Some really fine stuff coming over the next couple of months.

Exhibition of the Art of Roland Spottiswoode
Ongoing – in the downstairs gallery of the shop
Anglo-Irish oil painter with an interest in literature, occultism, theatre and the unseen worlds. Unusual portraits of Robert Graves (of White Goddess fame) and Yeats (of the Golden Dawn) as well as greats from theatre like Noel Coward, Tennessee Williams. Open daily at Treadwells until 11 September. For more, see our website.

The Japanese Ministry of Magic
29 August (Tuesday) Laura Nakagawa Miller 7.15 for 7.30 pm start £5.00
This illustrated talk introduces and illuminates an unknown chapter in the history of occultism: the demon craze of Japan’s late Heian era (10th and 11th centuries), which was a time of morbid superstition, when aristocrats lived in mortal dread of the supernatural. Laura Miller looks at the unique combination of religious and folk beliefs which produced a fearsome pantheon of demons. She also talks about the extraordinary frenzied campaign against the demonic forces, a campaign that included the formation of a ‘Ministry of Magic’. You meet trickster foxes, the bloodsucking ‘neck lady’, some dangerous pond life, demon muggers and Japan’s most famous sorcerer, Abe no Seimei. In a strange coincidence, the symbol of the pentagram appeared at this time in Japan in connection with Abe no Seimei . Prepare to be astounded, amused, enlightened. Laura Nakagawa Miller holds a degree in Art History from Cambridge University. She lived for several years in rural Japan where she taught and painted, holding her first one woman show last year. She has lectured on various subjects in Japan, studied calligraphy for several years and was associated with a Japanese Zen Temple.

Treadwells - A More Unusual Book List

Treadwells have just released a new list of thier more unusual titles. Some very interesting titles are to found amongst this list. See below for full details.

ANTHROPOLOGY OF MAGIC AND BELIEF

Clodd, E, Myths and Dreams, 2nd ed. revised, Chatto & Windus 1891, Cr8vo, maroon cloth,10 +251pp incl. index+ 32pp publisher’s catalogue. Important study of primitive man’s use of myth and dream. V.good £28

La Barre, W, The Ghost Dance: The Origins of Religion, 1st U.K ed. G Allen & Unwin 1972, lge 8vo, mauve cloth, 18 + 677pp incl. indices. Important and monumental study of the origins of religion through the rites of the dead through shamanic contact. Bookplate and ownership inscription to F.f.e.p. Near fine in v.good (edgeworn with chip to foot of front panel) d/w  £18

Lonsdale, S, Animals and the Origins of Dance, 1st u.k ed. Thames & Hudson 1982, lge. 8vo, brown cloth, 192pp incl. index, illus. in text + 32pp plates. Fascinating study of animals in dance and ritual in tribal life from prehistoric times onward. Fine in v.good + ( slightly faded in places) d/w £14

Goldberg, B Z, The Sacred Fire- The Story of Sex in Religion, 1st u.k ed. Jarrolds 1931, 8vo, 287pp incl. index, illustrated. Classic study, worldwide in scope. Binding worn, slight splitting to joints, horizontal closed rear to foot of spine without loss, good. £18

Tylor, E.B, Primitive Culture, 1870, 4th ed. revised, John Murray 1903, 8vo, binders orange cloth, 2 vols. 12 + 502pp & 8 + 471pp incl. index. Standard anthropological work on magic, folklore and religion. A major influence on Frazer's Golden Bough. Ex lib. usual bookplates and stamps. File numbers to spine, still a good +, tight, largely clean set. £30
Frazer, sir J.G Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild, 3rd ed, 4th imp 1925, 8vo, 2 vols. gilt decorated green cloth, 18 +319pp and 12 +371pp incl. index. Part 5 of the monumental complete edition of 'The Golden Bough'. Covers damped, d/ws soiled, contents clean. Good + in like d/w. £30
Churchward, A, The Origin and Evolution of Religion, 1st ed. G.Allen & Unwin 1924, lge. 8vo, red cloth with gilt design on upper cover, 15 + 422pp incl. index, illus. in text + 68 plates. An important study of the origins of magic and religion, including large sections on solar, stellar and lunar cults, following on from the work of Gerald Massey. Like Massey, Churchward's work is referenced by Kenneth Grant in his Typhonian trilogies. Covers rather faded and soiled. Contents tight and largely clean, with just some very minor foxing. Still a good sound copy of the scarce first edition, £38.

Williamson, H.R, The Arrow and the Sword- An Essay in Detection, 1947, 2nd ed. Faber 1955, 8vo, red cloth, 24 +182pp incl. index. An enquiry into the deaths of Thomas Beckett and William Rufus, seeing them in terms of  the divine sacrificial rites of Margaret Murray, taking in Gnostic ideas and Mithraism along the way. Fine in v.good + d/w £18

The Book Of Hate: Returned

Returned Returned to the moment we dropped from the map. Fallen in a moment of longing. First anti-time. The first time I experience your life whilst separated and guessing. Feeling cut but missing all the blood.

Returned to myself. Alone. Still the weak person I was before I found something else to be. Hiding amid a scattered life. In ghostly caravans that stink of the echoes of a life shattered and perfect for someone who felt.

Returned to the knowledge that I hurt to become, I die to have and I need to be. Fucking Illumination is ambivalent and boring. The more I know the less I care. Yes its spiritual, yes its still unfulfilling.

Returned to people that say I help. To hope given to strangers who have a 1% integrity ratio. To children who wish death upon an old man.

Regurgitated on a hilltop watching orbs dance around your truth. Your solid trust and hope. Your belief in my willingness to fail and a family snatched from you.

Return me to my maker, faulty in my construction, a waste of flesh and will. Wrong in all I do. Dead in all those that really loved, still taking, still negating, still a fucking set four retard in a slow community full of fake housing and vacant prams.

Should have saved a lot of time and Retro-Active pain. Dug a small grave, or opened his fresh one. Let me climb upon the originator of my echo, let me put my young arms around his dead flesh and hold him tight and go to sleep forever. Returned.

Away

I'm away for the next week. A short working break, finishing off The Book of Hate whilst spending a few day's in passive mode. I will be back on Friday to finish off preparations for Uncon 06, which the rest of FP will be working on all this week.

So I will not be dialed in.

The Great Beast and The Great Beast: Crowley at Loch Ness

In 1899 a flamboyant character arrived in Inverness. He purchased the brooding Boleskine House on the shores of Loch Ness for twice the amount the building was worth, becoming the laird of Boleskine. The man was Aleister Crowley and he had good reasons for paying over the odds for the remote foreboding house.

Crowley was born in Lemington, Warwickshire, in 1875. Rebelling against his ultra strict Christian upbringing he became the most flamboyant and colourfull character in British occult. His magickal and sexual experimentation shocked the prudish Victorian society. Crowley reveled in this and wove an intricate web of mythos about himself.

He chose Boleskine on account of its occult architecture. Previously he had scoured Britain for an abode to suit his needs and found none. Once in Boleskine he intended to carry out the ritual of Abra-Melin, an ancient rite that took 18 months to perform.

The ritual harkened back to the 1400s. The ritual was translated by a Jewish scholar called Abriham the Jew from a North African manuscript. Abriham was wandering the Middle East looking for true magicians from which to learn. He finally came upon a wizened mage called Abra-Melin whom passed the rite onto him. It dealt with the summoning of demonic forces. The ritual demanded idiosyncratic architecture and Crowley had previously tried to replicate this in his London flat. Though not having the desired effect strange things happened there. In the Great Beast’s own words…

“During this time magical phenomena were of constant occurrence. I had two temples in my flat; one white, the walls being lined with six huge mirrors, each six feet by eight; the other black a mere cupboard in which stood an alter supported by the figure of a Negro standing on his hands. The presiding genius of this place was a human skeleton, which I fed from time to time with blood, small birds and the like. The idea was to give it life, but I never got further than causing the bones to become covered in a viscous slime.”

Miltons Paradise Lost to become Film

Legendary Pictures is developing a live-action film version of Paradise Lost, John Milton's epic poem, with Scott Derrickson (The Exorcism of Emily Rose) attached to direct, Variety reported.

Vincent Newman (A Man Apart) will produce along with Legendary. Paradise Lost, published in 1667, tells the story of Lucifer's failed rebellion in heaven and subsequent role in Adam and Eve's fall from grace.

Auditions

Auditions take place today for Cycle IV and Uncon. Next week I escape to self imposed exile. Whilst the rest of FP prepare for Uncon.

The glamorous Bognor is where Cycle IV shall materialise in my mind and will then be transferred on to the page. I also want to get the final few pieces of the Book of Hate finished. Should have some news on how FP will be delivering publications this year.

The Book of Hate

Experimental live art is not all we are about, as you may or may not know. We currently have a number of other projects in the works. One of these is the Book of Hate. The Book of Hate is a book of combined prose, art and photography.  We have five artists working on individual chapters which will link with individual pieces of prose.

One of these artists is the immensely talented Ryan Svendsen of Skerror fame. His artwork is so applicable to the end book we are creating. The picture above is the first completed by Ryan and is entitled Happy Day Remembered.

I'm really looking forward to the other nine pieces to Ryan's chapter.

The Book of Hate: The Special Playtime

A despair of loss groups together for safety. It forms the gap between what I am and what I need to become.

The Hunger I feel drifts between the future and the past deleting the connections that my nerves have made to ensure my sanity.

Still. I rest and hide among the lattice of life, created from a billion of numb blips of life. I pray my secrets will never be found here.

A super predator with no eyelids watching for a day longer than forever, its eyes fixed with a gaze of solid death. Its sighs create holes through to the vacuum of nothing. So dark it returns me to a time of unequal hell.

Faith for me is a relic, dirty and worn by my history.
My memories are filtered though a child’s special playtime spent in a graveyard full of selfish ancestors. They will away my youth next to their white stone faces. A Childs soul full of guilt because I hate my dead grandmother as much as I hate my dead grandfather but never as much as I hate and despise my dead father for leaving me forever alone with her.

I can feel James Harrigan decomposing beneath the ground. I can even hear his tattered lips wishing away my life with a wraiths immortal hatred.

© John Harrigan 2006 All Rights Reserved

Treadwells Placed in Top Thirty Independent Book Stores by Time Out

Treadwells was recently placed in the top thirty independent book shops in London by Time Out.

Everyone at FP would like to congratulate our very special friends on this incredible and well deserved recognition. Christina and Kath along with everyone who works at Treadwell are fullfiling a crucial Cultural role by providing a unique and important book store. Although of course Treadwells is so much more than a Book Store.

Its a gateway between worlds.

To celebrate Treadwells success FP have a list of their more select wares below. Enjoy.

Ancient Egypt

Nicholson, Sir Charles.  AEGYPTIACA, comprising a catalogue of Egyptian Antiquities…together with an account of some remains of the ‘disk worshippers’: as also of some funerial hieroglyphic inscriptions found at Memphis…
First Edition (1891). £200.00
Content. The Nicholson Museum at the University of Sydney hold Australia's most important collection of artefacts from the land of the pharaohs. Many pieces were acquired in 1856/7 during a trip to Egypt by one of the university's founders, Sir Charles Nicholson, who gathered together an eclectic group of objects drawn from many sites and periods of Egyptian history. This book is the account and detailing of that expedition

06 Events at Treadwell's

Treadwell's have some very interesting event's between now and May 06, if your finding 2006 a bore already then you should be able to find at least one event below that take's your fancy.

Treadwell's Vs Anti-Christmas

Just found out that Phil Hine is selling many of his overstocked books via Treadwell's. Some of these title's are extremely rare and interesting, and they will no doubt be disappearing fast. The list below is also an invaluable tool for anyone looking for details on the contents of specific Magick Book's and periodical's.

So especially for all you Magickal entities out their who are looking for the perfect gift for Anti-Christmas here is the full list along with some other specialties that Treadwell's have before Christmas.

Chaos Magic and Related

CHAOS AND SORCERY
Author: Hall, Nick
Price: £650.00 (reduced from £800.00)
Published: Nicholas Hall, 1992.
Format: Paperback in good condition. 111pp.
Notes: Extremely rare first edition, self-published, with the distinctive black cover with demon and chaosphere. This copy signed by Nick Hall to Phil Hine, also signed by Phil Hine. Also signed by the illustrator, Robert Taylor. This copy is from Hine’s personal library. This is one of the great classics of chaos by the nexus of UK practitioners in the 1990s. Sorcery, as defined by the book, is "the art of using material bases to enhance a magickal conjuration, the outcome of which is determined by the sorcerer's will. It has been described as "sharp, fast, unsentimental". Chapter Titles: 1) Tools of Sorcery. 2) Techniques of Sorcery. 3) Malicious Doll Magick. 4) Beneficial Doll Magick. 5) Word Weaving. 6) Chaos and Sorcery.

CHAOS SERVITORS, A USER'S GUIDE
Author: Phil Hine
Price: £60.00
Published: Pagan News Publications and Chaos International Publications, 1991
Format: A5 Booklet, paper covers. Good condition. Content: Phil Hine tells you, in his inimitable style, all his thoughts in servitors. Collectible -- and with reason.

IS THERE LIFE AFTER DEATH? TRESPASS AND FIND OUT
(TOPY magazine)
Contributors: TOPI Nomads, Ray Sherwin, Malchick Nostra, Coyote 182, Eden 304, Coyote 144.
Price: £30.00
Published: Temple ov Psychick Youth, 1991.
Topics: sigilisation, revolution, Kali, 'action sigils', Aleister Crowley's last Will and Testament, Thoth Tarot divination, sodomy as spiritual fulfilment, Dream Sigil Sex. TOPY was flourishing in the UK during the era when this was produced; now it is active in the USA, with things somewhat moribund in the UK by comparison to the 1990s heyday. This booklet shows how much creativity and verve TOPY are capable of!
Format: A5 Booklet, paper covers. Fine condition.

DARE TO MAKE MAGIC
Author: Edwards, David
Price: £40.00
Published: Rigel Press, 1971
Notes: this copy is from the personal magical library of Phil Hine.
Format: Hardback with dust cover in good condition.
Phil Hine recommends this book as a really good work on a subject that produces great amounts of substandard work: real magic. One of the formative influential texts that inspired the first wave of chaos magic. Want to see who and what inspired Carroll, Hine, et al?  Look no further.

SSOTBME: An Essay on Magic, its foundations, development and place in modern life.
Price:  £12.00
Published by: The Mouse That Spins, 1977.
Topics covered:  One of the classics of experimental and chaos magic by the much-revered master of the Art, Ramsay Dukes.  It is a concise account of the disciplines of magic, art, religion, and science.  The book explores the interrelationships between these disciplines, whilst stressing the different premises upon which they are founded.  This copy comes with the original pink advertising flier bound into the back of the book.

SSOTBME:  An Essay on Magic
Price:  £30.00
Published by:  The Mouse That Spins, 1979.
Topics covered:  One of the classics of experimental and chaos magic by the much-revered master of the Art, Ramsay Dukes.  It is a concise account of the disciplines of magic, art, religion, and science.  The book explores the interrelationships between these disciplines, whilst stressing the different premises upon which they are founded.  The illustrations, only found in this edition, are by Austin Osman Spare, and constitute the first full republication of his A Book of Satyrs since its original appearance in 1907.  In MINT condition, from Dukes’ own personal collection. Signed by Ramsay Dukes on the title page.

SSOTBME:  An Essay on Magic Revised
Price:  £15.00
Published by:  The Mouse That Spins, 2001.
Topics covered:  One of the classics of experimental and chaos magic by the much-revered master of the Art, Ramsay Dukes.  It is a concise account of the disciplines of magic, art, religion, and science.  The book explores the interrelationships between these disciplines, whilst stressing the different premises upon which they are founded.  In MINT condition, signed and dated by Ramsay Dukes on the title page.

I-Was: A Journal of Arcadian Disturbances - No. 3 (n.d)
Limited Edition of 70 copies; this copy out of series
Contributors:  various anonymous. Large format, card covers 80pp.
Price:  £15.00.   Thelemic stream of consciousness. Wow. Worth it for the content alone.

DREAMTIME IS UPON US! THE SECOND ANNUAL REPORT OF THE ASSOCIATION OF AUTONOMOUS ASTRONAUTS
Author: Various contributors.
Price: £15.00
Published: London and Watford: AAA, 1997 Format: Paperback in good  condition
Content: an amazing cult flowering of a group pushing out the limits of the bizarre. Their stated aim? Dreamtime. What is it? An alternative reality, the reality of outer space. This book was reviewed by The Guardian, who said of it, ‘Equipped with no money but big dream, the AAA have a simple programme: space travel in the community by the year 2000’.  They say of themselves on their current website, the following: The Association of Autonomous Astronauts is a non-hierarchical network of local, community-based space exploration programmes. Disconaut AAA was set up to explore the potential of dance cultures for autonomous space exploration. Everybody is a Star!, is named after a 1979 track by Sylvester (1946-1988), also responsible for such otherworld explorations as "Dance Disco Heat", "Do you wanna funk" and "You make me feel mighty real". Seriously collectible.

The Grimoire of Pharaon:
Sorcery, Chumbley, Spare, Chaos

Liber Niger Legionis, The Grimoire of Pharaon
£350
First Edition: Octavia Press 2005. Hardback 162pp. Author: Pharaon. This copy is Number 4 of the numbered limited edition of only 36 copies. It is signed and sigilised by the author. In this first edition, sigils to 36 daemons were individually produced.  Copy 4 is dedicated to Samael; this unique sigil is starkly remarkable. The book’s content consists of an original grimoire, though it is evident that inspirations are drawn from Austin Osman Spare, Kenneth Grant and Andrew Chumbley. The grimoire  presents an original system of Gnostic sorcery, which is both practical and cosmological. Eschewing the traditional esoteric cosmology that describes the Supernal or Divine that is in opposition to the Infernal, it  instead it regards the ‘hostile’ or ‘demonic’ forces as being inherently illusory, indeed that which is the illustory itself. The response to this insight is the spiritual aim, what Pharaon calls ‘Black Gnosis’. In it, the sorcerer apprehends mystically the transience of identity. As the infernal (illusory) nature of reality is identified, one is enabled to ford the currents that underlie it, recognising their sentience and power.  In this system, the sorcerer becomes a mirror for that which is beyond.  As the author draws upon the entire magical tradition, the Daemons summoned are traditional ones, ones that  most will recognize. It is their relevance to postmodern reality that is emphasized, however. The author is transgressive, fiercely iconoclastic, and solitary; despite the fact that  Infernal Sorcery is explicitly referred to as Cainite and relates to the work of Andrew Chumbley,  the author is not a member of his Cultus Sabbatai, but instead works independently. The book, after outlining and instructing the system of Gnosis and magical practice, lists the 36 daimons, with their natures, their meaning and relevance to the system and sigil.  The first edition, in which only 36 copies were printed, has become highly sought after even within the first six months after its release. Issue points distinguishing it from the second edition are the upright direction of the cover pentagram, and the particular decoration of the endpapers.

Liber Niger Legionis, The Grimoire of Pharaon
Author: Pharaon
£60.00
Second Edition: Octavia Press 2005. Hardback 162pp. This copy is Number 22 of the numbered limited second edition of only 72 copies. It is signed and sigilised by the author.  This second edition features a different decorated end paper to the first edition. Also, compared to the first edition, the pentagram on the cover is inverted, which in fact was the author's original intent.

Liber Niger Legionis, The Grimoire of Pharaon
Another copy of the second Edition: Octavia Press 2005
£60.00 - Number 36, of the numbered limited edition of 72 only copies
Like all copies in this limited second edition, it has the author’s sigil and signature, hand-drawn.

Liber Niger Legionis, The Grimoire of Pharaon
Another copy of the second edition: Octavia Press 2005
£90.00 - Number 36 of the numbered limited second edition of 72 copies
This copy has the author’s sigil and signature, hand drawn (like all copies in this limited edition). In addition it also has a special sigil individually drawn for Treadwell’s: the elaborate invocatory seal is appended by the caption, ‘Our Name is Legion, for we are Many’. The anonymous author is a regular at Treadwell’s, and produced this artwork at the request of the owner, herself a magician.

 

Pristine

We have a new Author joining us on FoolishPeople.com this week. I wont ruin the supprise. Lets just say that I havent been this impressed by a human in a long time.

FP along with Lucifer Benway and Adam Lammiman from Key 23 are off to the Generation Hex book launch at Treadwell's tomorrow.

I'm looking forward to getting to know a couple of the Key 23 brood in the meat while enjoying the company of our friends at Treadwell's.

This week has been spent channeling that Bastard Bleach. Can feel his words swilling around in my brain like a virus. Hardening my mind up for the 12/11/05. He's currently sitting cross legged and naked, whilst playing with himself in the pristine section of my mind where the very last fragment of innocence from my youth is cowering in fear.

Fuck it, who needs innocence these days.

Wierd and Occult

Jinn & Jitters

Beowulf

Angelina Jolie has been set to star in Beowulf, the animated Robert Zemeckis movie based on the Old English epic poem, and the project is close to securing distribution through Paramount and Warner Brothers, Variety reported.

Jolie will play the queen of darkness, who tempts the Viking hero as he makes his way in the quest to become king.

(This looks set to stick closely to the epic poem. With Neil Gaiman on writing duties you know it will be treated wwith respect)

Dragons: More Than A Myth?

I recieved my copy of Dragons: More Than A Myth? by Richard Freeman this morning.

My what a beautiful book. Its just been put together very well.

I'm very much looking forward to delving into this. Hope to have a review for you sometime after Weird Weekend.

Dragons: More Than A Myth?

FP's co-conspirator, Richard Freeman, scales the dizzy heights of myth and fact to bring us an incredible glance at the fantastical legend of Dragons.

‘More Than A Myth?’ is the first detailed look into dragon lore in years, amazingly modern day dragon sightings occur on a regular basis all over the world; there are stories of teenage boys dragged to their deaths by a sea dragon, a winged dragon that threw an American town into a panic, giant lizards that terrorized villages in New Guinea killing natives and the dragon worship cult that practiced human sacrifice in the north-east of England, well into the 20th century.

Chapters look at the varying theories of what dragons might be, including giant unknown reptiles, thought forms, interdimentional creatures and prehistoric survivors.   

Richard also writes of his own experiences hunting serpent dragons in the jungles of Indo-China and experimenting with thought form creation.

Expect a full review in the coming weeks.

I'll have some existential fries with that please

Eric Schlosser and Richard Linklater (Before Sunrise/Sunset, Waking Life, Dazed and Confused, Slacker, A Scanner Darkly etc etc...!) are joining forces to make a film based on Schlosser's non-fiction novel 'Fast Food Nation'.  Ebay founder Jeff Skoll is financing the production and former Sex Pistol's manager Malcolm McLaren is to produce.  The film will star Catalina Sandino Moreno (Maria Full of Grace).  Shooting is set to begin in the Autumn.

I was reading 'Fast Food Nation' this time last year.  My eye wasn't just opened, I believe it was slit open and surgically examined, or something like that.

Lovecraft is....

Charles Baudelaire had Edgar Allan Poe, Albert Camus had James M. Cain, and Michel Houellebecq, poet of sour libertinage, has . . . H.P. Lovecraft. Houellebecq's 1991 monograph H.P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life reinvents the preeminent pulp horror writer of the '20s and '30s according to a familiar pattern: A French author discovers and adopts an American primitive. Lovecraft, however, had primitives of his own.

Gaunt, pallid, and lantern-jawed, Howard Phillips Lovecraft (1890-1937) was born in Providence, Rhode Island. His parents were emotionally unstable; he suffered from nightmares as a child, had a nervous breakdown at 18, and developed into a reclusive, nocturnal creature. He was also a writer's writer, who composed tens of thousands of letters and whose stories, published mainly in Weird Tales and Astounding Stories, were posthumously anthologized by his acolytes. In 1945, Edmund Wilson considered HPL's newly constituted oeuvre and cracked that their real horror was "the horror of bad taste and bad art." But then Wilson didn't care much for the cult writer Franz Kafka either; in any case, HPL has been welcomed into the Library of America, to sit on the shelf alongside Nathaniel Hawthorne and Ralph Waldo Emerson, while Wilson yet remains a thing on the doorstep.

Full article can be found here, but was sourced through the ever effervescent Disinformation.