Page 1 of 1

Gary Lachman , Michael Staley lectures - London , April

PostPosted: Thu Mar 18, 2010 6:08 am
by semper occultus
Critiquing the Counterculture: Occult Revival of the Sixties and
Seventies
Gary Lachman

Gary Lachman reflects on the Occult Revival of the Sixties and early
Seventies, tracing the core themes that arose from it which remain
relevant today. His book Turn off Your Mind achieved a cult status and
was acclaimed by both Christian Fundamentalists and satanists alike
(now just reissued, expanded, as The Dedalus Book of the 1960s: Turn
Off Your Mind). Tonight he gives his current thoughts on that Occult
Explosion, when rejected and ridiculed beliefs took centre stage,
reaching the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, saturating the the
hippies and flower power. Gary Lachman, as Gary Valentine, was a
founder member of Blondie, and co-wrote many of the group's early
hits. He is now a writer and literary critic, author of numerous
books, and contributing to broadsheet newspapers and literary
journals. Price: 7.00 Time: 7.15 for a 7.30 start
More information :
http://www.treadwells-london.com/lectures_and_launches.html#315

08 April 10 (Thursday)

The Incoming of the Aeon of Maat: Frater Achad and Gerald Yorke in
1948
Michael Staley (Starfire)

Shortly after Aleister Crowley died in late 1947, his long-term
friend and colleague Gerald Yorke wrote to Charles Stansfeld Jones
(Frater Achad), at one time Crowley’s collaborator and Magical Son.
The correspondence which arose dealt with Crowley’s relations with
Achad, interpretations of the Book of the Law, and other aspects of
Crowley’s work. Achad also here asserted the incoming of the Aeon of
Truth and Justice in April 1948, foreshadowed in Achad’s published
work of the early 1920s. Kenneth Grant referred to these exchanges in
his Outside the Circles of Time and elsewhere as ‘Official and
Unofficial Correspondence Concerning the Incoming of the Aeon of
Maat’. Michael Staley discusses this fascinating material, and looks
into Achad's intended meaning of the incoming of the Aeon of Truth and
Justice, how this relates to the concept of a succession of aeons, and
its relationship to the Aeon of Horus. Michael Staley is the founder
of Starfire Publishing, which will be publishing the correspondence in
summer 2010. Price: 7.00 Time: 7.15 for a 7.30 start
More information
http://www.treadwells-london.com/lectures_and_launches.html#256

Re: Gary Lachman , Michael Staley lectures - London , April

PostPosted: Wed Jan 04, 2017 5:06 pm
by brekin
Busy bee Gary Lachman has a new book coming out and one on the way.
Both sound good. He's become quite prolific (not quite Asimov level yet) on topics that RI folks may find interesting.

I’m sure you all have much better things to do today than to read this, but when you get a chance I’d like to mention that I’ve just finished my twentieth book. It’s called The Lost Knowledge of the Imagination and it will be published by Floris Books in spring 2017. Floris publishes three of my books in the UK: Rudolf Steiner, The Quest for Hermes Trismegistus, and The Caretakers of the Cosmos. The Lost Knowledge of the Imagination develops an idea that runs throughout The Secret Teachers of the Western World, namely that the imagination is not, as we tend to believe it is, a means of evading reality and of entering a world of ‘make believe’, but a faculty first and foremost of knowing and influencing reality. I try to bring this message across by looking at the work of Goethe, Owen Barfield, Henry Corbin, Kathleen Raine, Ernst Junger, and others who understood that the imagination is a unique faculty we possess that enables us to reach ‘inside’ reality and know it from within. I will post an excerpt as we get closer to the publication date.

I’ve also just received a commission from my US publisher, Tarcher Penguin, now Tarcher Perigee, for Dark Star Rising: Magick and Power in the Age of Trump. The book will look at the influence ‘mental science’ and ‘positive thinking’ has had on Trump’s rise to power, and will explore the links between the new ‘alt.right’ movement within the political far right and the political philosophy of the Italian esotericist Julius Evola. I will also look at the influence Alexandr Dugin, a radical political theorist influenced by Evola, ‘chaos magick’ and Martin Heidegger,has on the Russian President Vladimir Putin. In different ways both Trump and Putin seek to destabilize the west and reshape the political and economic map of Europe. With this in mind I will look at the possible connection – if any – between the European Union and a strange political philosophy that began in the late nineteenth century and according to some reports had a hidden but effective influence on European politics. This is what is known as Synarchy, the complete opposite of anarchy. Anarchy means no government; Synarchy means total government. I write about Synarchy in Politics and the Occult and Dark Star Rising will pick up my account of the occult influence on modern politics from where I left it in 2008.

And speaking of Politics and the Occult, I’ve recently heard from Javier Sierra, author of the bestselling The Secret Supper that the Spanish publisher Planeta has bought the translation rights to that book! I’ve learned that Javier is a reader of my books, and he is sending me a copy of his latest, The Master of the Prado, which I look forward to reading in the new year.

And let me say a very big Thank You to the people who make writing a worthwhile, even necessary occupation: You. The Secret Teachers of the Western World has done very well in the year it has been out. Not a bestseller, but a decent one and a book, I hope, that people will go to if they want to get a good idea of the esoteric history of the west. And I have to thank my editor Mitch Horowitz, author of One Simple Idea and other books, for taking a chance on Beyond the Robot: The Life and Work of Colin Wilson, a book that is very important to me and which it was an honor and pleasure to write. All the best for the time ahead.

https://garylachman.co.uk/