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Correspondence from Bertram Rota, Ltd. Booksellers to Philip Kaplan
Bertram Rota, Ltd. Bodley House, Vigo Street, London, W.1. REGent 3860
8th May 1958
Dear Mr. Kaplan.
We wonder if you would be interested in some Crowley material which has just come into our hands? First, there is a fine 8-page autograph letter, written from Cefalu in 1921, on bright red notepaper. The letter is addressed to "Dear Sister Gwendolen [Gwendolen Otter]" and begins "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law". It goes on to speak of "The Beast's" health—"It's not good enough to spend one's nights coughing one's lungs out". There follows a long passage about Francis Thompson "No, I am not crazy about Frankie McThomp. He has many fine lines and a few good ideas; but he lacks virility. He said nothing after all. Great men always stand for something very definite, etc., etc.". Then Crowley speaks of his financial difficulties "I can find no publisher, even for my detective stories, and I am hopelessly broke. Leila Waddell stole my last £1,000 and vanished. . . .""I am very sad sometimes; I have done so much work and there seems no chance of ever getting it published. I have been driven to writing scenarios for the movies. . . . I think, too, that my pictures may be a success; they are really getting pretty good". The letter is signed "The Beast 666" and is also initialed A.C.
With the letter are two quarto sheets of Crowley's holograph manuscript, compromising a complete prose poem beginning "The Voice of my Higher Soul said unto me". With the letter and manuscript is an announcement of an address that Crowley gave on "The Philosophy of Magick" at one of Foyle's Literary Luncheons in 1932.
Our price for all this material is $21.00 or £7.10s and we will keep it on the side until there has been time to hear if you would like to have it.
Yours sincerely,
Anthony Rota
Philip Kaplan, Esq., 47-17, 39th Avenue, Long Island City 4.
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