Aleister Crowley

## Portrayal

### Series

The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, The Whisperer in Darkness, The Shadow over Innsmouth, The Haunter of The Dark

**Aleister Crowley** (12 October 1875 – 1 December 1947) was an English occultist and magician. Crowley's occult interests were very broad and this means there were a number of occasions throughout his life when he encountered Nyarlathotep - in various forms - or his followers. Historian of witchcraft, Dr. Eleanor Peck, broadly assessed Crowley to be a typical example of the occult community at the time - a manipulator of people.

Crowley's politics are difficult to know with any certainty. He was rumoured to be working undercover for British Intelligence while consorting with a number of people that would later be labelled as outright fascists. For example, Crowley befriended a man called J. F. C. Fuller after the latter published a book called *The Star in the West* in 1907 that was essentially a praising of Crowley's poetry. They went on to found an occult group, the A∴A∴ but their association fractured because of Fuller's intolerance of Crowley's pride as an openly bisexual man. Fuller would later advance through the ranks in the British Army and develop tank tactics that would form the basis for the German tactic of Blitzkrieg. Through Fuller, Crowley also met Ernest Gladwin, who would later become a key member the British far-right. Crowley even joined Gladwin in Berlin in 1931 during Gladwin's honeymoon with Abigail Fisher.

Crowley, as a devotee of Abdul Alhazred and Ipqu-Aya, and dedicated much time throughout his life searching for the *Necronomicon*. One rumoured vessel of Ipqu-Aya was a woman called 'Old Dorothy' who was part of the New Forest Coven. However, when occultist, Gerald Gardner, an associate of Crowley, invited him to join the New Forest Coven and the wicca movement more generally, Crowley is reported to have replied "There's no money in it." Dr. Eleanor Peck saw Crowley's rejection as strong evidence that he wasn't convinced that Ipqu-Aya was part of the Gardner's coven.

Nonetheless, throughout Crowley's colourful life there are a number of other potential encounters with Nyarlathotep. For instance, Crowley was an important member, for a time, of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, which counted amongst its members Edward Landsdale, a theosophist and vessel of Ipqu-Aya in the lead up to the First World War. A few years later, while living in New York City in 1918, Crowley's attempts to conduct a ritual known as the Amalantrah Working resulted in his summoning an entity called Lam. His drawing of the entity bears a striking resemblance to the image of the classic grey alien made famous by the Roswell incident many years later.

In the early 1920s, Crowley founded the Abbey of Thelema in Sicily. Amongst his pantheon of gods and goddesses in Crowley's new religion of Thelema was Babalon, an earth goddess, the idea for which was derived from the 16th century Enochian magic being performed by John Dee and Edward Kelley. Crowley described Babalon as an entity that could be summoned into the body of a human woman although this is not something Crowley is believed to have ever achieved. By 1922, he had moved to Paris having developed something of a heroin addiction, and in 1925, Crowley was joined by a number of occultists, many of whom were acolytes. Ernest Gladwin, for example, joined Crowley for this gathering, as well as Edwin Lillibridge. However, the most important guest of this gathering was Obed Marsh.

While never successful in summoning Babalon himself, near the end of Crowley's life, another of his acolytes, Jack Parsons, attempted such a thing with the Babalon Working at the end of 1945. Crowley strongly discouraged Parsons and his associate, L. Ron Hubbard, from attempting the ritual, possibly having a strong suspicion that Babalon, like Lam with the Amalantrah ritual, would only serve to summon Nyarlathotep. However, Parsons soon met Marjorie Cameron and interpreted this as a successful product of the ritual.

## External Links

Aleister Crowley at Wikipedia

1. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister\_Crowley
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 TCoCDW: "Episode 4"
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 THoTD: "Episode 3"
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 THoTD: "Episode 7"
5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 TCoCDW: "Episode 7"
6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 TWiD: "Episode 4"
7. ↑ THoTD: "Episode 4"
8. ↑ TWiD: "Episode 6"