A Dark Muse: A History of the Occult

by Gary Lachman

The occult was a crucial influence on the Renaissance, and it obsessed the popular thinkers of the day. But with the Age of Reason, occultism was sidelined; only charlatans found any use for it. Occult ideas did not disappear, however, but rather went underground. It developed into a fruitful source of inspiration for many important artists. Works of brilliance, sometimes even of genius, were produced under its influence. In A Dark Muse, Lachman discusses the Enlightenment obsession with occult politics, the Romantic explosion, the futuristic occultism of the fin-de-siècle, and the deep occult roots of the modernist movement. Some of the writers and thinkers featured in this hidden history of western thought and sensibility are Emanuel Swedenborg, Charles Baudelaire, J. K. Huysmans, August Strindberg, William Blake, Goethe, Madame Blavatsky, H. G. Wells, Edgar Allan Poe, and Malcolm Lowry.

Genres: Occult, History, Nonfiction, Religion, Magic, Esoterica, Cultural

384 pages, Paperback

First published December 8, 2003

About the author

Gary Lachman is an American writer and musician. Lachman is best known to readers of mysticism and the occult from the numerous articles and books he has published.

Reviews

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the type of book I wish I had stumbled across many years ago. A guidebook to the history of the ideas of spirituality.

As a student of esoteric thought and spiritual development, I'm interested in the members of our species that have achieved a particular state of enlightened knowledge, a direct contact with wisdom. Many claim to have visitations from spiritual beings or to have received revelation through direct mystical experience. Yet, a true read of their work will reveal the presence of wisdom.

While Gary Lachman's A Dark Muse: A History of the Occult tackles many of the important writers that have made these claims, it still falls a bit short of the book I wish it was. And my disappointments aside, this is still an amazing work. Divided into two halves, the first is a series of essays on the specific eras of western esoteric development and the key players that defined it, the second half containing excerpts from important writings by the authors introduced in the first half. This volume is keenly focused on authors and writers, and Lachman admits in the beginning that an equal number of pages should be devoted to musicians and other fields.

Within A Dark Muse the esoteric enlightenment is broken into five eras: Enlightenment, Romantic, Satanic, Fin de siécle and Modernist, each highlighting Lachman's penchant to expose under-appreciated contributors to western thought. If you want to find a reading list for the next year and a half, this is the book to pick up. I've discovered quite a few writings that I will explore in depth over the next few months. While the public believes that 'the occult' and 'satanism' are synonymous, a simple survey of the ideas in this book will reveal quite the opposite. Occult studies are truly a deeper look at the hidden wisdom present in many of the holy books, cultures and humans on the planet. Most of the authors featured by Lachman deal with esoteric Christianity, the nature of God, metaphysics and spiritual practice (my areas of interest). The chapter on Satanic Occultism, while the most shocking, is also the shortest, simply because there aren't many writers along those lines. This is a grab bag and a good one at that. Read and find the teasers you'll need to dive further into many deeper ideas.

Where the book fell short is in the failure to acknowledge some major influences of the 20th century in their own right. Rudolph Steiner, G.I. Gurdjieff, Israel Regardie, Manly P. Hall, the first two being mentioned and the last two entirely left out. Other important thinkers, such as Krishnamurti, while not being explicitly occult, was still the center of Blavatsky's Theosophical movement and would deserve more than the brief mention he receives. However, omissions make sense, jamming this much into 380 pages requires at least a few to be left aside.

The reason for the focus on occult writers becomes apparently early on in the piece on Romanticism as Lachman states,

"It's not surprising that the mage and the poet should be linked. Both used words in order to produce a desired effect, and as magic moved more and more away from the medieval sense of controlling angels and demons, and closer to the visionary powers of William Blake, the distinction between the two became one of mere terminology."

Learning more about Swedenborg, Cazotte, Mesmer, Saint-Martin, Eckharthausen, Blake, Goethe, Balzac, Poe, Bulwer-Lytton, Blavatsky, Blackwood, Bucke, Ouspensky, Milosz and Lowry is an eye-opening experience. To think that most of the ideas being touted as new age or evolutionary have originated in these men is refreshing. A coming rapid evolution of the human race via 2012 or other catalyst? Bulwer-Lytton has already covered it. Ascending states of cosmic consciousness? Bucke has dissected it. Spiritual science? Goethe, Steiner, Ouspensky and many others have laid the framework. The excerpts section was filled with gems.

The essay included by Ouspensky included some of the most beautiful poetry I've seen to describe the human condition.

Some of the most cutting edge theories of modern physicists were hinted at (with a slightly more spiritual tone) by writers like Poe in the early 1800's:

...there are gradations of matter of which man knows nothing; the grosser impelling the finer, the finer pervading the grosser. The atmosphere, for example, impels the electric principle, while the electric principle permeates the atmosphere. These gradation of matter increase in rarity or fineness, until we arrive at a matter unparticled-without particles-indivisible-one; and here the all of impulsion and permeation is modified. The ultimate or imparticled matter not only permeates all things, but impels all things; and thus is all things within itself, this matter is God. What men attempt to embody in the word "thought", is this matter in motion.

Poe was also the first to state the reason why the sky is black and not saturated with the light of stars. An insightful man. And he also stated, "Positive pleasure is a mere idea. To be happy at any one point, we must have suffered in the same."

Saint-Martin was filled with equally brilliant insights,

There is not a man in possession of his true self for whom the temporal universe is not a great allegory or fable with must manifest the truly divine pleasures... the overwhelming misfortune of man is not that his is ignorant of the existence of truth but that he misconstrues its nature...man is the visible expression of divinity...we have not the courage to work to justify [that we are the highest in the universe:]... the learned describe nature, the wise explain it...as a proof that we are regenerated we must regenerate the world.

Wow. Powerful stuff.

The down side of A Dark Muse: I now have a reading list longer than I can ever hope to tackle.

[Steve Cran · Rating 4 out of 5]

 Dark Muse does not exactly cover a history of the occult as that would go back to the beginnings of mankind. Rather what proceeds is how the occult and occult ideas influenced some of the great artistic minds of Europe. Occult ideas have always influenced the way certain writers write. Sometimes it effects the plot of their story, other times the author is putting forward an occult idea. Occult means hidden. There are different time periods or occult periods and they are in order they are enlightenment occultism , romantic occultism, satanic occultism , fin de siecle occultism and modern occultism.

During the enlightenment period when it seemed that science and rationalism have completely overcame magic and superstition one could find street vendors selling book on the Kaballah , alchemy and astronomy. Indeed it could be argued that these occult arts were treated like a science and subject to many experiments. Swedenborg was one such individual. Before some mind bending dreams shattered his picture of reality he was a hardcore scientist who accomplished a lot. But a prophetic dream changed all that and he became a cartographer of the inner dimensions .

The period of Romantic Occultism. If something is Romantic it is often times seen as imaginative or unrealistic. Romantics saw the imagination as the central source of existence, the fundamental creative power, and the most god–like of human faculties. One writer that evinced this quality was Goethe, the German poet. His work Faust , which was based on a real personage, dealt with pacts being made with the devil. There have been earlier telling if Faust but it is the Goethe version that stand out.

The next period is Satanic Occultism . Now Satanism is kind of a recent development and only a very minor branch of the occult. Satan is really only mentioned extensively in the book of Job. Later on the Christians would matnify his position and make him real Important. Further on in Christian history dissident groups would be accuse of being in league with the devil. Gnostic held the view that the devil or an evil god created the world we live in and the god of light who created the universe wanted to rescue us. There were earlier embodiments of a dark principle. Ahriman, in Zoroastrianism the enemy of Ahura Mazda, is a kind of prototype Devil. Indeed to embrace the devil is to embrace rebellion. Charles Baudelaire would be an example of this. He was a poet born to a rich man and he lived a decadent life. Good food, lots of unsanctioned sex dresses well etc. his writing were filled with decadence as well along with many elements that would be found in a horror story.

The Fin De Siecle period of occultism would nite the bringing about of new age ideas along with a preoccupation of a mythologized past. Notions of prehistoric lost civilizations and evolutionary supermen shared the same intellectual space as a profound rediscovery of magic and a dizzying preoccupation with higher dimensions. Madame Blavatsky would be part of this movement. Having starting Theosophy there were legends of super developed humans in underground civilization which are lead by ascended beings.

The last period is Modern Occultism treats everything in the art as a symbol for something spiritual. “In all the poets of the modern tradition, poetry is a system of symbols and analogies parallel to that of the hermetic sciences.” Fernando Peso was a Portuguese’s poet recently rediscovered . He has done some major translations of some really well known work. Pessoa work was found posthumously in a trunk with scattered bits of poetry. He was known for writing in Heteronyms, literally assuming a different identify when writing his works. It was as though he were a different person doing he writing. These non acquaintances had their own identify, history and biograph. Pessoa was in a word obsessed with defracturing the personality and dissolving identity.

The last half of the book contains written passages by various authors. Crowley’s Hym to. Pan is included along with some works by Baudelaire, Poe and Rimbaud just to name a few. There were many popular authors who were influenced by the occult. Read up and find out more about them.

[Chris Browning · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m a complete novice in all matters of the occult, beyond growing up in a deeply religious household (who would be having my absolutely conniptions about me reading this). So I am a healthy sceptic, but one who felt that reading something about this sort of secret history that has bubbled under several books I’ve been reading of late might be worthwhile. And thank goodness I read this history because I’d have probably spent the whole time of more “heady” books rolling my eyes repeatedly. Instead Lachman is a thoughtful, clever and nimble historian of occultism in a very general way. As such the meaning I grew up with - the devil - is essentially a minor element of his general thesis

Instead Lachman guides us through centuries of writers who were looking for *something* that was other and found it very different ways. There’s an abiding sense of mysticism that I’m far more sympathetic to, but Lachman is more interested in how these ideas influence these wildly different and disparate thinkers and writers. And it’s an absolutely fascinating and very much not of the more absurd streak of Wheatleyesque baddies dabbling in what they don’t understand. There’s some of that - Crowley hovers over several sequences - but Lachman is more interested in poetry and art and how literature has benefited from people who think differently and, essentially, see their muse as a sense of exploration

I’ve not really engaged with his selection of writings and examples that make up the last third of the volume yet, but will undeniably dip into these on another occasion. Instead it’s brought into focus a bunch of ideas simmering under many books I’ve enjoyed in the last few years. I am still absolutely an agnostic in these things, but if anyone is going to guide me through such thought I’m glad it’s Lachman

[Oscar · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is certainly a book that could had benefited from a different title, and while we are at it, a different cover. Hiding behind a stereotypical ‘creepy and occult’ cover is an examination of the occult, starting from the Renaissance age towards the modern age. The book defines the occult as a long standing tradition that offers to understand what cannot be simply explained by science or logic. The book examination of the occult, then, seeks to integrate ideas and philosophies incorporating a broad array of religions, philosophies, and cultures. And while the book does make some good on its promise is dealing with the darker side of the occult, the discussion here presents the occult as something broader that has been studied and has influenced the arts, particularly, writers. The book’s focus, then, ultimately is about how the occult and those who have studied/pushed such ideas have influenced a variety of writers.

What the book does well is that it sets up a variety of ideologies existing within the occult tradition by focusing on particular occultists and their beliefs. Furthermore, the book then looks at specific writers which include writers as diverse as Balzac and Poe, and how their work was shaped by the occult. These writers may or may not have been occultists, but where aware of certain ideas, and incorporated them in their work in order to examine human psychology and more specifically spirituality.

I did enjoy the book and its strength lies in the book ability to place the occult as largely driven by the need in some people to believe that there is something more beyond the physical. The author’s ability to connect the occult with writers usually works well, but there is something to say about the fragmented structure of the book, that is, the fact that the book is largely divided by sections dedicated to a specific writer. I felt that some more integration between sections could have strengthen the book and supported the writer’s overall argument of how the occult and art influence each other. Overall, I really enjoyed the book, and it provides an interesting lens to reexamine literature dealing with the supernatural and occult.

[Hilary "Fox" · Rating 5 out of 5]

My full review can be found here.

Needless to say, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and found it an enthralling, well-researched primer on the history of the occult. It is worth noting that this book focuses primarily upon writers rather than scientists or pure magicians. It is also worth noting that the latter half of the book provides a rich sampling of sections from the most pertinent texts mentioned. It's a fun exercise to read the samples while focusing upon the author's section.

[Steve Cran · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dark Muse does not exactly cover a history of the occult as that would go back to the beginnings of mankind. Rather what proceeds is how the occult and occult ideas influenced some of the great artistic minds of Europe. Occult ideas have always influenced the way certain writers write. Sometimes it effects the plot of their story, other times the author is putting forward an occult idea. Occult means hidden. There are different time periods or occult periods and they are in order they are enlightenment occultism , romantic occultism, satanic occultism , fin de siecle occultism and modern occultism.

During the enlightenment period when it seemed that science and rationalism have completely overcame magic and superstition one could find street vendors selling book on the Kaballah , alchemy and astronomy. Indeed it could be argued that these occult arts were treated like a science and subject to many experiments. Swedenborg was one such individual. Before some mind bending dreams shattered his picture of reality he was a hardcore scientist who accomplished a lot. But a prophetic dream changed all that and he became a cartographer of the inner dimensions .

The period of Romantic Occultism. If something is Romantic it is often times seen as imaginative or unrealistic. Romantics saw the imagination as the central source of existence, the fundamental creative power, and the most god–like of human faculties. One writer that evinced this quality was Goethe, the German poet. His work Faust , which was based on a real personage, dealt with pacts being made with the devil. There have been earlier telling if Faust but it is the Goethe version that stand out.

The next period is Satanic Occultism . Now Satanism is kind of a recent development and only a very minor branch of the occult. Satan is really only mentioned extensively in the book of Job. Later on the Christians would matnify his position and make him real Important. Further on in Christian history dissident groups would be accuse of being in league with the devil. Gnostic held the view that the devil or an evil god created the world we live in and the god of light who created the universe wanted to rescue us. There were earlier embodiments of a dark principle. Ahriman, in Zoroastrianism the enemy of Ahura Mazda, is a kind of prototype Devil. Indeed to embrace the devil is to embrace rebellion. Charles Baudelaire would be an example of this. He was a poet born to a rich man and he lived a decadent life. Good food, lots of unsanctioned sex dresses well etc. his writing were filled with decadence as well along with many elements that would be found in a horror story.

The Fin De Siecle period of occultism would nite the bringing about of new age ideas along with a preoccupation of a mythologized past. Notions of prehistoric lost civilizations and evolutionary supermen shared the same intellectual space as a profound rediscovery of magic and a dizzying preoccupation with higher dimensions. Madame Blavatsky would be part of this movement. Having starting Theosophy there were legends of super developed humans in underground civilization which are lead by ascended beings.

The last period is Modern Occultism treats everything in the art as a symbol for something spiritual. “In all the poets of the modern tradition, poetry is a system of symbols and analogies parallel to that of the hermetic sciences.” Fernando Peso was a Portuguese’s poet recently rediscovered . He has done some major translations of some really well known work. Pessoa work was found posthumously in a trunk with scattered bits of poetry. He was known for writing in Heteronyms, literally assuming a different identify when writing his works. It was as though he were a different person doing he writing. These non acquaintances had their own identify, history and biograph. Pessoa was in a word obsessed with defracturing the personality and dissolving identity.

The last half of the book contains written passages by various authors. Crowley’s Hym to. Pan is included along with some works by Baudelaire, Poe and Rimbaud just to name a few. There were many popular authors who were influenced by the occult. Read up and find out more about them.

[Bruno B · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a collection of short essays on secret societies and "occultists" (mostly writers). Some of the facts seem to be a bit off after a quick googling, but it does point to interesting literature. The selected texts at the end do not contain any information about the edition nor the translator, which is a very weird omission.

[Lissa Notreallywolf · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book actually addresses a broader occult span than alchemy, but it is nonfiction, so no shelf for that yet. It's very well written, especially since it could have read as an encyclopedia, a who-is-who of the occult. Relationships between various people are made clear, without being a list of begats. It begins with Enlightenment Occultism, moves to the Romantic era . I admit I skipped the chapter on Satanic Occultism, and skimmed over Creepy Crowley. Fin de Siecle was one of my favorite chapters and the Modern Occultist was an interesting one, where I met the Portuguese poet who changes his name and identity repeatedly, just like a character I met in another fiction-Passeo. Part Two are selected texts, which is a blessing because he lights a fire in one to read more. Another good book by Mr. Lachman

[Tim Pendry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of Gary Lachman's lighter weight excursions into the history of the esoteric but it is well worth having in the Library.

In effect, it is a series of suggestive and rather entertaining biographies from the Enlightenment world of Swedenborg, Mesmer and Cagliostro to the modernist occultism of the much less well known Daumal, Milosz and Lowry.

There are just over 40 of these pen portraits under five occultist headings (Enlightenment, Romantic, Satanic, Fin de Siecle and Modernist), with good short introductions to each section. It is a book that can be usefully 'dipped into' whenever one of the 40 pops up somewhere else.

The last quarter or so is a smattering of original texts, perhaps somewhat hard to fathom out of their full context and in an order that may have its own occult meaning but which passed me by, but useful to have available nonetheless.

Certainly, for all its lack of depth, this is well recommended as an enjoyable reference source and the starting point for further study into a cultural phenomenon that still acts as a strong undercurrent in European life and literature.

[Bill Wallace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lachman treads some familiar ground from his other books here but the purpose is much different. Dark Muse is a history -- more accurately a series of short biographies and studies -- of writers from the Enlightenment to the early modern era whose works are influenced by various occult schools. In some cases, Madam Blavatsky, Bucke, and Ouspensky for example, the writers are proponents of their own esoteric doctrines, while others, Machen, de Maupassant, and Rimbaud among many, are writers who used the occult or the satanic to inform creative work. In all cases, and typical of Lachman's books, the accounts are lively, well researched, and fascinating. Even the familiar names like Bulwer-Lytton shine fresh in the context of the historical narrative. I'm fascinated with the evolution of genre fiction and always on the trail of trying to understand the origins and evolution of weird fiction, so this material is all part of the story, though only a few of these writers wrote works that would be even remotely described as "horror." Dark Muse rather begs for a second volume, continuing the muse's story through the modern era and beyond.

[Cecil Lawson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been a fan of Gary Lachman's work since I read his Turn Off Your Mind about 10 years ago. In this book he traces the influence of occult ideas on literature from the late 1700s through the early 20th Century. He has, since this was published in 2004, completed biographies on several of those figures touched upon in the book, included Emmanuel Swedenborg, HP Blavatsky, and Aleister Crowley. I like the way he focuses on less well-known writers. My biggest frustrations with his book included a certain vagueness early in his discussions of the Rosicrucians, Illuminati, and Freemasons, and I didn't like the way the main narrative abruptly ends after a section on Malcolm Lowry and segues into selections from the writers themselves. Overall useful and readable, and a unique perspective on Modernist literature.

[Alison Armstrong · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review of A Dark Muse: A History of the Occult by Gary Lachman:

In our increasingly materialistic time, when art, literature, and music have become commodities, while the earth is plundered for profit, we often disregard the inner world of the imagination as well as the elusive wonders of Nature. Gary Lachman’s comprehensive history of the occult from the so-called “Enlightenment” to the modernist era discusses the often maligned exploration of metaphysical realms. Including writers, philosophers, and mystics William Blake, Edgar Allan Poe, E. T. A. Hoffman, Algernon Blackwood, J. K Huysmans, William Butler Yeats, Goethe, Rimbaud, and Baudelaire, as well as occult practitioners such as Cagliostro, and Le Comte de Sainte Germain, Lachman’s discussion reveals an enduring fascination with subjective realities and unseen worlds.
For those of us who, like myself, feel estranged from the reductive rationalism and utilitarianism of contemporary society, Lachman’s book offers a sense of connection with other seekers of mystery.

[Thomas Molesky · Rating 3 out of 5]

pretty good - nothing I have never read before elsewhere

[Graham Grimes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting read

[Evan Suggs · Rating 5 out of 5]

More an encyclopedia of occult authors than a traditionally structured history. It remains a brilliant overview even for those mildly familiar with the subject.

[Sheila · Rating 3 out of 5]

And to think, I won't even go near a Ouija board.

This book opens a door to a world I don't plan on visiting, although it's interesting to glimpse from afar. Sure made me understand how much I don't know about it. One could drown in the depths.

The setup makes it rather hard to get through, but on the other hand so much information is packed into it that I don't know how else it could have been approached.

The pioneers listed in the book are hardly salesmen for the occult; unless, of course, "discovery is happiness" - most do not seem to have achieved it in any other way. Their methods led them to a sense that they were giving shape to the world; to what they saw around them, and what they could not see.

But I can't see where it made them happy; indeed, it seems like most felt they had entered hell in the course of their search.... was it the hell of feeling like the final Answer was just out of reach? Or the hell of having found (the perceived) Answer? They bit the apple all over again, so to speak. So the demons that pursued them... externally wrought or internally sought? (lol)

However, there's so many different facets of "occult" addressed in A Dark Muse that I'm only picking up on the broadest of themes. The book really kind of exhausted me in its breadth of information.

[Cypress Butane · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an amazing overview of many diverse figures in occult history. It doesn't just gloss over figures, every person represented seems to get at least a fair representation. Divided into 'Enlightenment', 'Romantic', 'Satanic', 'Fin de siècle', and 'Modernist' Occultism, this is definitely a good reference that will come in handy later on. I haven't read the 'Selected Readings' section in the back, but it pulls from various writers discussed in the book as examples of their mystic and occult investigations and experiments. It is a great overall introduction and I'll definitely be buying a copy to keep as a reference source. Very well written and engrossing.

[Linda · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was really disappointed in this one. I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting but the author (who was a founding member of Blondie) gave a short review of several different eras of "occultism" and then basically reviewed some mostly authors who were interested in or displayed some hints of occult followings. I guess I expected more explanations or actual examples of the authors' writing analyzed for how they showed occultism.

[Cynde Moya]

A representative survey of biographies of occult figures from literature and philosophy. Divided into sections Enlightenment, Romantic, Satanic, Fin de siecle, and modernist. Each era is also outlined and its occult forces described. I found this introduction engaging and at times surprising as to who was included as an occult thinker. Useful too for providing light to the genealogy and relationships between the figures and their teachings.

[Stuart · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decently written collection of short biographies of western occultists from the late renaissance to the early modern era. Hews a shade too closely to the author's idiosyncracies. Nice contextualization of themes, movements and politics across several hundred years of European thought and history.

[Garek Druss · Rating 3 out of 5]

totally goth

[K · Rating 4 out of 5]

wow wow wow !

[Jessie B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting introduction, covering a wide number of important figures in the occult world. It doesn't go into great detail but is an excellent start on the topic.

[David Rappoport · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent history of the occult during the last few centuries focussing on key figures. Of great biographical interest and a source for additional reading.

[Jay Rothermel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very measured and concise. [10/2/2021]

But... No index?! [01/20/2022]

[Nate]

Fine if you're into this sort of thing.