Was Aleister Crowley really as bad as depicted?

I haven't read the book, but I believe you. Most people are dull when you pull back the curtains of their reputations. But it's sad, really, that although we revere men like Elijah who is one of the greatest martinets in the Bible, and also others who were so deeply committed to their causes to the exclusion of everything else, our society can't really handle intensity of thought like that, unless they divest their energies in keeping the status quo, never to change it.

closrapexa said:

I haven't read the book, but I believe you. Most people are dull when you pull back the curtains of their reputations. But it's sad, really, that although we revere men like Elijah who is one of the greatest martinets in the Bible, and also others who were so deeply committed to their causes to the exclusion of everything else, our society can't really handle intensity of thought like that, unless they divest their energies in keeping the status quo, never to change it.

Click to expand...

Yes. Which is why we (as a society) can't handle Crowley. Which is hard on him, as he had an awful lot going for him - and the much touted drug use is DAMNED unfair - the heroin, in particular, was PRESCRIBED for him for asthma, and he stopped taking it for years, until his asthma was so bad he could hardly breathe - but it is held up as shock horror. You don't hear people saying that stuff about Queen Victoria - who was a regular laudanum user...

And a lot of what people say about him tied to his use of words - Great Beast, and the rest - he used words differently from the rest of us. He was anti-Satanism (according to Perdurabo) - but he is still pilloried as a Satanist... Which just shows how little the people who want to blacken him actually know about what they say. If you are going to try and blacken someone's name, at least get your facts right.

Deleted

Actually - just a correction of fact - it is the BEST painkiller for some forms of cancer, and makes life liveable, as opposed to unbearable, for those needing it - that's mind food, in my book.

deleted

Actually, I can think of one he didn't harm, and actually kept on loving him until the end of his life, when she was with him, Lady Frieda Harris herself. She shows no harm that has come to her from him in her letters, only love and a high regard. Of course, those times being what they were, it would be safe to say she was at least a little criticized for her friendship with him, but that, too, is discussed in their letters. She was a rebel in her own way, and made her own choices.

In fact, years after his death, she was being courted by a certain man, she wrote to a friend how she wished he were more like AC.

As to what he thought of her, he was at times critical of the position she had to maintain in society, being so out of society himself, but held her in the highest regard, and thought of her Thoth paintings as almost mystically inspired. He certainly didn't view her as a slave, or inferior in any way.

Thanks for that closrapexa. Because I too am not an ex-fan !

I haven't read any of the biographies, but I have read their letters, which makes for fascinating reading, and I most highly recommend them to anyone wanting to learn about their relationship, the deck, him, and her.

Plus, she really wasn't afraid to talk back to him, in one letter she tells him that his books are somewhat dull and difficult

In reference to your books--I suppose you know that most of them would be easier for a Beginner written in Sanscrit & that anyone reading them would go off their heads. Therefore the Wise ("like myself") take them in snappy bits & only when they are feeling strong.

Click to expand...

As I see it, anyone who loves anyone who could say that to them, can't be all bad

I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when they met, telling dirty jokes, ragging on one another, disparaging everyone they know and calling everyone fools

gregory said:

Actually - just a correction of fact - it is the BEST painkiller for some forms of cancer, and makes life liveable, as opposed to unbearable, for those needing it - that's mind food, in my book.

Click to expand...

From what I've read about the drug, that is undeniably true.

deleted