THE OCCULT REVIEW

London, England

November 1910

(Page 302)

PERIODICAL LITERATURE.

The Equinox. Vol. I., No. 4, September 1910. 124, Victoria Street, S.W. Price 5s.

This Gargantuan volume contains such a variety of matter that it is only possible to give the merest sketch of its contents in a short notice. There is a long continuation of The Temple of Solomon the King, which, like a stately vessel, winged with pearl and amethyst, is borne majestically upon the ocean of its profound philosophy. George Raffalovich has a story of elusive subtlety. In Mr. Todd, A Morality, there is a symbolism curiously blended of the sinister and the pathetic, as well as shrewd insight into human nature. The Editor and his staff of reviewers sport like young goats among ordered pastures of indifferently and well bound volumes. While some are left standing or held aloft for admiration, others are not only knocked down, but even trampled upon and savagely bitten. The review of The White Slave Traffic is excellent for its bold rebuke of hypocrisy and its healthy outlook upon the whole subject, and Captain Fuller [J.F.C. Fuller] has a long and favourable critique of Albert Churchward’s The Signs and Symbols of Primordial Man which should be read by all lovers of light. Indeed, the notices of books in this number are as characteristic as ever, and when they do not illuminate, they make us laugh or smile, which is no bad thing. Glaziers’ Houses: or, The Shaving of the Shagpat, is designed as a kind of defence of Bernard Shaw. He who wishes to chase the esoteric can do so in two poems by Victor B. Neuburg, who admirably limns the lurching gait and monstrous form of a gnome in the very construction of the lines of his first contribution. Aleister Crowley’s poem Adela has that expression of beauty, that signal power and that fierce desire which we can now at once recognize. “The Violinist” appears to have been written to accompany a series of drawings which Aubrey Beardsley did not live to execute; at least, I am sure that this artist would have hastened to ask to be allowed to illustrate the story. Among the many poems, The Felon Flower, by Ethel Archer, is remarkable for a fine diabolism. But the wonder of the whole book is the noble and beautiful poem, The High History of Good Sir Palamedes the Saracen Knight and of his Following of the Questing Beast. By Aleister Crowley rightly set forth in rime.