Reading Colin Wilson
A lot on my mind and in my heart these days but not really ready with words to say it.
And with that bit of cryptic bs we are off.
I’ve been reading on and off – Colin Wilson’s book The Occult – which is a history (sort or) and an attempt (sort of) to put together a working theory of Occult practice and why it works or doesn’t.
Truth be told I’ve be interested in this book since oh 1978 or so when I was taking a class in college on Science Fiction writing (we did H.G. Wells, Herbert and some others) one of whom was Colin Wilson’s The Mind Parasites which is loosely linked to H.P Lovecraft’s Culthu Mythos (Lovecraft is a writer who is best read if you are in your teens – any older and the purple ness of his prose “that hand the window! The Window!” undercut his best stories which until the last bit were written in an almost drab report style which helped the suspension of disbelief. But I digress).
Anyway what I remember was the professor talking about Colin as one of the last of the English eccentrics and talked about his book “The Occult” in which she said, he managed to get just about everything wrong.
Now for some reason I remember thinking “this is the book for me.” A friend once called this boblogic and I’ll own up to it. Once I was watching a TV show about Lou Reed and one of the commentators called Reed’s Album “Berlin” ‘the most depressing record ever mad’ my immediate reaction was “ I have to hear this” so it’s a pretty long term quirk (among others – including wanting to wear the right hat at Mets games (and the lest said about Willie’s firing the best – if they had a contest to find the worst way to handle this they couldn’t have done much worse – if they had made him manage in a rabbit suit first but even then – great now I’m digressing from digressions).
As I was saying …I wanted to get my hands on this book – it turned out to take a long time – until this year. I wasn’t on a full time hunt just time to time “oh yes” and then nothing. Finally some company reprinted the damn thing and I managed to get it home.
I’m not all of the way through the book – and in the passing years I’ve read enough of Colin Wilson to know what I’m getting into – he’s a weird guy with a lot of odd ideas running about his head (I say this with full knowledge that I’m a weird guy with lots of odd ideas running about my head) and like all of us the ideas can make us think funny. He suggests that Homer’s Wine Dark Sea line meant that early Greeks couldn’t see all the colors which makes well no flipping sense for example.
Anyway I wasn’t even going to write about it other than I find myself hiding the cover the book (which says “THE OCCULT” in very very big red letters) while I’m reading it on the subway. For two reasons I guess – one, it’s a kind of on edge world these days and there are people who might get a bit nervous if they see this guy wearing a black shirt reading a book with “THE OCCULT” with big red letters on it, they might start worrying about him going for their throat the instant the lights in the subway give out or some such. I’d rather not subject innocent bystanders (albeit over stressed innocent bystanders) to that sort of thing.
Two – as a sub set of the above set – I don’t want my ride interrupted by someone trying to ‘save me from the clutches of the devil’ while I’m trying to read.
Well – back to the mines – off to see Laura Alt tonight – should be good.
Peace Love Boo!
And with that bit of cryptic bs we are off.
I’ve been reading on and off – Colin Wilson’s book The Occult – which is a history (sort or) and an attempt (sort of) to put together a working theory of Occult practice and why it works or doesn’t.
Truth be told I’ve be interested in this book since oh 1978 or so when I was taking a class in college on Science Fiction writing (we did H.G. Wells, Herbert and some others) one of whom was Colin Wilson’s The Mind Parasites which is loosely linked to H.P Lovecraft’s Culthu Mythos (Lovecraft is a writer who is best read if you are in your teens – any older and the purple ness of his prose “that hand the window! The Window!” undercut his best stories which until the last bit were written in an almost drab report style which helped the suspension of disbelief. But I digress).
Anyway what I remember was the professor talking about Colin as one of the last of the English eccentrics and talked about his book “The Occult” in which she said, he managed to get just about everything wrong.
Now for some reason I remember thinking “this is the book for me.” A friend once called this boblogic and I’ll own up to it. Once I was watching a TV show about Lou Reed and one of the commentators called Reed’s Album “Berlin” ‘the most depressing record ever mad’ my immediate reaction was “ I have to hear this” so it’s a pretty long term quirk (among others – including wanting to wear the right hat at Mets games (and the lest said about Willie’s firing the best – if they had a contest to find the worst way to handle this they couldn’t have done much worse – if they had made him manage in a rabbit suit first but even then – great now I’m digressing from digressions).
As I was saying …I wanted to get my hands on this book – it turned out to take a long time – until this year. I wasn’t on a full time hunt just time to time “oh yes” and then nothing. Finally some company reprinted the damn thing and I managed to get it home.
I’m not all of the way through the book – and in the passing years I’ve read enough of Colin Wilson to know what I’m getting into – he’s a weird guy with a lot of odd ideas running about his head (I say this with full knowledge that I’m a weird guy with lots of odd ideas running about my head) and like all of us the ideas can make us think funny. He suggests that Homer’s Wine Dark Sea line meant that early Greeks couldn’t see all the colors which makes well no flipping sense for example.
Anyway I wasn’t even going to write about it other than I find myself hiding the cover the book (which says “THE OCCULT” in very very big red letters) while I’m reading it on the subway. For two reasons I guess – one, it’s a kind of on edge world these days and there are people who might get a bit nervous if they see this guy wearing a black shirt reading a book with “THE OCCULT” with big red letters on it, they might start worrying about him going for their throat the instant the lights in the subway give out or some such. I’d rather not subject innocent bystanders (albeit over stressed innocent bystanders) to that sort of thing.
Two – as a sub set of the above set – I don’t want my ride interrupted by someone trying to ‘save me from the clutches of the devil’ while I’m trying to read.
Well – back to the mines – off to see Laura Alt tonight – should be good.
Peace Love Boo!
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