The Writings of Austin Osman Spare: Automatic Drawings, Anathema of Zos, The Book of Pleasure, and The Focus of Life

by Austin Osman Spare

This wonderful book contains four of the most popular writings of Austin Asman Spare, including Automatic Drawings, Anathema of Zos, The Book of Pleasure, and The Focus of Life

Genres: Philosophy, Occult, Magic, Art, Nonfiction, Magick, Witchcraft

94 pages, Paperback

First published November 20, 2007

About the author

Austin Osman Spare was an English artist who developed idiosyncratic magical techniques including automatic writing, automatic drawing and sigilization based on his theories of the relationship between the conscious and unconscious self. His artistic work is characterized by skilled draughtsmanship exhibiting a complete mastery of the use of the line[1], and often employs monstrous or fantastic magical and sexual imagery.

Some of Spare's techniques, particularly the use of sigils and the creation of an "alphabet of desire" were adopted, adapted and popularized by Peter J. Carroll in the work Liber Null & Psychonaut . Carroll and other writers such as Ray Sherwin are seen as key figures in the emergence of some of Spare's ideas and techniques as a part of a magical movement loosely referred to as Chaos magic.

Reviews

[Joshua · Rating 4 out of 5]

Spare cuts right to the quick and strips religiosity from performing hermetic magic for the sake of achieving tangible results when trying to acquire one’s heart’s desire through magical means. He so eloquently describes the clearest simplest route to reaching sorcerer’s apprenticeship by weaving a tapestry of explicit instruction, art, automatic drawing, automatic writing, and inspired rants to reveal techniques for dialing in one’s will to laser-like precision of focus and accuracy.

The single complaint I have may come across as superficial, but the copy I read looked like it was put together in my high school’s print shop back before the thrill of living was gone. The aesthetics component is essential for a book this significant… or maybe that would be contrary to the spirit of Spares’ work whereas he was so adamant about not getting caught up in the trappings of regalities? But then I ask myself, “self, should a Man Ray photograph be displayed in a delectably ornate frame?” The photograph, like Spare’s writing, both require proper accouterments to respectfully honor their works, in Spare’s case his poetic delivery for practical application of the magical techniques he was so brilliant at in distilling into its purest potent form, ready to use at your fingertips, no fuss, no belief, no gods, just knowledge and love of thyself. Which if simplicity was the aim of Spare and the publisher, then I would not question their artistic integrity or principle, but if the bibliophile part of me had its druthers, then this book would be printed on sheets of gampi paper, so Spare’s automatic drawings may be presented on a medium worthy of his talent and effort, and then I would humbly beseech the manufacturers of magical tomes to see this object d’art be bound in goat skin with the most magnadoriforeous sigil emblazoned on the outside of the front cover. Anything less than thereof, the critic in me shall withhold a star.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

As much, if not more than Aleister Crowley, Spare brought magical theory into the post-post-modern age, stripped down and streamlined. There are few other occultists like him. Unlike Crowley, whose magical system seems to have been the result of a synthesis of much that came before him (lacking the qualifiers of so much that had yet to be translated), albeit an ingenius system, Spare breaks ground and offers much of utilitarian value. Of the two, I prefer Spare for being spare in expressing his ideas and for refraining from indulging in Baroque systemization which can limit and shape individual/dyadic exploration. He was the better artist and the more concise occultist. This is a wonderful collection of his best works.

[Juju · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm actually not reading the physical copy of this book. Most of the writings of Austin Osman Spare are posted here http://www.hermetic.com at The Hermetic Library. Strange, visionary prose. Fascinating reading.

[reqbat · Rating 1 out of 5]

This isn't a great edition; one whole section repeats every paragraph. An editor was very much needed.

[nephifiend · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a text that I'll have to come back to sometime and spend a while reflecting on. It's incredibly dense and a bit difficult to understand at first. Very glad to have the internet/Reddit for help in figuring out what all is going on (but then I get to a point where I'm wondering how much I'm relying on the text itself vs someone else's interpretation of it).

Also, echoing what has already been mentioned in other reviews, this particular edition is formatted terribly. One page repeats itself, and there are parts in the section on sigils that have a sentence or two with (example) in parenthesis-- is there supposed to be a sigil pictured as an example?