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The Beast
From the cover:
"The Scandalous Life of Aleister Crowley who
* practised "sex magic" and worshipped Satan
* founded a religion based on drugs and debauchery
* branded his 'wives' and drove them insane
Almost a genius, not quite a madman, Aleister Crowley shocked the world for 50 years as 'the Great Beast.' His spiritual descendants are still practising today."
"The Scandalous Life of Aleister Crowley who
* practised "sex magic" and worshipped Satan
* founded a religion based on drugs and debauchery
* branded his 'wives' and drove them insane
Almost a genius, not quite a madman, Aleister Crowley shocked the world for 50 years as 'the Great Beast.' His spiritual descendants are still practising today."
- GenresNonfiction
140 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1959
19 people want to read
About the author
Daniel P. Mannix
44 books61 followersDaniel Pratt Mannix IV was best known as an American author and journalist. His life was remarkably different from other writers of his generation. His career included times as a side show performer, magician, trainer of eagles and film maker.
The Grest Zadma was a stage name Mannix used as a magician. He also entertained as a sword swallower and fire eater in a traveling carnival sideshow. Magazine articles about these experiences, co-written with his wife, became very popular in 1944 and 1945.
As an author Mannix covered a wide variety of subject matter. His more than 25 books ranged from fictional animal stories for children, the natural history of animals, and adventurous accounts about hunting big game to sensational adult non-fiction topics such as a biography of the occultist Aleister Crowley, sympathetic accounts of carnival performers and sideshow freaks, and works describing, among other things, the Hellfire Club, the Atlantic slave trade, the history of torture, and the Roman games. His output of essays and articles was extensive.
The Grest Zadma was a stage name Mannix used as a magician. He also entertained as a sword swallower and fire eater in a traveling carnival sideshow. Magazine articles about these experiences, co-written with his wife, became very popular in 1944 and 1945.
As an author Mannix covered a wide variety of subject matter. His more than 25 books ranged from fictional animal stories for children, the natural history of animals, and adventurous accounts about hunting big game to sensational adult non-fiction topics such as a biography of the occultist Aleister Crowley, sympathetic accounts of carnival performers and sideshow freaks, and works describing, among other things, the Hellfire Club, the Atlantic slave trade, the history of torture, and the Roman games. His output of essays and articles was extensive.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 13, 2017
This is a short and entertaining book. There are probably better books about the life of "The Beast," but they would require a deeper interest than I have in the subject matter. (For example, Lawrence Sutin, who wrote a well-researched biography of Philip K. Dick, has also written an extensive bio of Aleister Crowley. But I'm not sure that I'd have sufficient endurance for all the sordid and tedious details.)
Crowley comes off in this biography as a narcissistic freak and megalomaniac who forged a path of destruction across multiple relationships and through several different countries. His attempts to create an enduring mystical order under his leadership all ended in failure.
Just when you think he's bitten the dust for good, he'll meet a rich widow, seduce her, drag her across several continents, and drain her bank accounts. She'll be discarded like garbage when the next potential patron comes along to save him from his latest disaster.
Nevertheless, Mannix depicts Crowley as a highly intelligent man who could write decent poetry and who had near super-human strength. I was surprised to discover that Crowley, for a time, was an accomplished mountain climber who held records for climbs on K-2 and Kachenjunga.
Perhaps the most striking thing about Crowley, however, was his sexual appetite. He was openly bisexual (both illegal and highly scandalous at the time) and had some kind of strange magnetism that inspired utter devotion in a series of self-effacing female companions. (Crowley married a few of these women, and several of them died of drug abuse or ended their days in mental hospitals after enduring Crowley's regimen of drugs and orgies.) Crowley's hold on these women is hard to understand, because he was extremely misogynistic and selfish. Crowley must have been particularly good a sizing up his victims and expertly manipulating them before moving in for the capture. Sadly, he left a string of burnt out women and orphans in his wake.
Mannix repeatedly underscores Crowley's declared hatred of conventional Christianity and bourgeois values. But he also suggests that Crowley's own doctrines (if they even merit the distinction of being called "doctrines") gradually tended to converge with the conventional Christian religion and values that he had claimed to repudiate. If Mannix's account is credible, then Crowley's main frustration was that he was not worshiped as the prophet of a new and wide-spread religion, as he felt he deserved. Apparently, Crowley wanted to be worshiped as a prophet or a god (even as the new Jesus, if that could be arranged), and this desire was more important to him than any particular set of principles. Nevertheless, by the time Crowley reached his end, only a handful of devotees had any interest in him or his ideas.
Mannix doesn't seem to place much credence in Crowley's purported magic powers, and even suggests that most of the time, Crowley thought of himself as little more than a P.T. Barnum-style charlatan. Despite his skepticism, Mannix leaves the door open a crack to the possibility that Crowley did, from time to time, exercise some mysterious powers. At the very least, Crowley earnestly wanted to believe in magic and spent much effort performing complex rituals with hopes they would prove to be effective. I'm not sure, however, if his goals very often went much beyond the summoning of demons and the foiling of his rivals.
As far as I know, this book appeared only as a paperback original published by Ballantine in 1959, and has never appeared again in any other form. So it's only available through used booksellers and copies are somewhat scarce. It's well worth tracking down if you are a vintage paperback hound, though.
Crowley comes off in this biography as a narcissistic freak and megalomaniac who forged a path of destruction across multiple relationships and through several different countries. His attempts to create an enduring mystical order under his leadership all ended in failure.
Just when you think he's bitten the dust for good, he'll meet a rich widow, seduce her, drag her across several continents, and drain her bank accounts. She'll be discarded like garbage when the next potential patron comes along to save him from his latest disaster.
Nevertheless, Mannix depicts Crowley as a highly intelligent man who could write decent poetry and who had near super-human strength. I was surprised to discover that Crowley, for a time, was an accomplished mountain climber who held records for climbs on K-2 and Kachenjunga.
Perhaps the most striking thing about Crowley, however, was his sexual appetite. He was openly bisexual (both illegal and highly scandalous at the time) and had some kind of strange magnetism that inspired utter devotion in a series of self-effacing female companions. (Crowley married a few of these women, and several of them died of drug abuse or ended their days in mental hospitals after enduring Crowley's regimen of drugs and orgies.) Crowley's hold on these women is hard to understand, because he was extremely misogynistic and selfish. Crowley must have been particularly good a sizing up his victims and expertly manipulating them before moving in for the capture. Sadly, he left a string of burnt out women and orphans in his wake.
Mannix repeatedly underscores Crowley's declared hatred of conventional Christianity and bourgeois values. But he also suggests that Crowley's own doctrines (if they even merit the distinction of being called "doctrines") gradually tended to converge with the conventional Christian religion and values that he had claimed to repudiate. If Mannix's account is credible, then Crowley's main frustration was that he was not worshiped as the prophet of a new and wide-spread religion, as he felt he deserved. Apparently, Crowley wanted to be worshiped as a prophet or a god (even as the new Jesus, if that could be arranged), and this desire was more important to him than any particular set of principles. Nevertheless, by the time Crowley reached his end, only a handful of devotees had any interest in him or his ideas.
Mannix doesn't seem to place much credence in Crowley's purported magic powers, and even suggests that most of the time, Crowley thought of himself as little more than a P.T. Barnum-style charlatan. Despite his skepticism, Mannix leaves the door open a crack to the possibility that Crowley did, from time to time, exercise some mysterious powers. At the very least, Crowley earnestly wanted to believe in magic and spent much effort performing complex rituals with hopes they would prove to be effective. I'm not sure, however, if his goals very often went much beyond the summoning of demons and the foiling of his rivals.
As far as I know, this book appeared only as a paperback original published by Ballantine in 1959, and has never appeared again in any other form. So it's only available through used booksellers and copies are somewhat scarce. It's well worth tracking down if you are a vintage paperback hound, though.
wish-list
August 1, 2012Early biography of Aleister Crowley. Full title:
The Beast: The Scandalous Life of Aleister Crowley (1959)
The Beast: The Scandalous Life of Aleister Crowley (1959)
September 12, 2011
couldn't finish
July 15, 2023
Obviously some outdated language but an interesting story and narration
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews