Chronicles the notorious life of the self-styled poet and sorcerer Aleister Crowley, looks at his experiences as a magician, mountaineer, and artist, and places him in the context of his times Aleister Crowley was a blustery coward, an arrogant, misogynistic racist with fascist leanings, and a callous user, as often threatened by his sexuality as he claimed to be liberated by it. But he was also a groundbreaking poet and an iconoclastic visionary whose literary and cultural legacies extend far beyond the limits of his reputation. This controversial individual, a frightening mixture of egomania and self-loathing, has inspired passionate--but seldom fair--assesments by historians. Sutin, by treating Crowley as a cultural phenomenon, and not simply a sorcerer or a charlatan, convinces skeptic readers that the self-styled "Beast" remains a fascinating study in eccentricity. Acknowledgments vii Introduction An Overview of the Magical Tradition, in Which It Is Suggested that the Raging Battle Between Jesus and Satan Be (For the Moment) Set Aside in Order that the True Nature of the Magus Be Understood 1(14) The Strange Transformation of One Edward Alexander (``Alick'') Crowley, a Pious Christian Boy of the Late Victorian Upper Class, Into Aleister Crowley, Poet, Gent., and Magical Adept in Waiting (1875--98) 15(34) In Which Aleister Crowley Takes the Magical Name Perdurabo (``I Shall Endure to the End'') But Appears to Lose His Way Amidst the Schisms of The Golden Dawn and the Temptations of the Vale of Tears (1898--1900) 49(31) Years of Wandering in Which Crowley Pursues the Heights of Magic and Mountains, Embraces Buddhism, Then Abandons All for the Love of A Woman and the Life of Country Laird (1900--04) 80(37) The Birth of the New Aeon (1904--05) 117(31) The Assault on Kanchenjunga, the Establishment of a New Magical Order, and the Wanderlusts of a Magus (1905--08) 148(44) The Creation of The Equinox, the Rites of Eleusis, and a Confrontation in the Sahara with the God of Chaos (1909--14) 192(50) In Exile in America, Crowley Endures Poverty and Accusations of Treason as Ordeals Necessary to Becoming a Magus (1914--19) 242(36) The Founding and the Ruin of the Abbey of Thelema (1920--23) 278(32) Years of Exile and Wandering---and the Publication of a Masterwork (1923--30) 310(41) A Staged Suicide, an Unavenged Libel, and the Equinox of the Gods (1930--36) 351(31) The Final Years of a Magus in the Guise of a Disreputable Old Man (1937--47) 382(39) Epilogue An Assortment of Posthumous Assessments and Developments 421(4) Endnotes 425(40) Selected Bibliography 465(2) Index 467