Date: Thu, 31 Jul 2003 15:32:43 +0100
Subject: (urth) Crowley
From: "Joshua A. Solomon" 

I recently talked with other Wolfe-fans who didn't enjoy Little, Big
(including Nigel, who is swamped with work at the moment; he'll be back
soon). I did. Thanks to Alga and Mantis etc. for turning me on. I started
with The Deep, read Beasts, Engine Summer, Little Big, Novelty, =C6gypt, Love
& Sleep and I'm now halfway through D=E6monomania. At one point, I noted that

>>Little, Big can be especially bewildering if
>>you are not familiar with the symbolic devices
>>he develops in his earlier novels.

Decoding (or at least, attempting to decode) this symbolic language is half
the fun for me.

Going back through our correspondence, the only other (possibly) relevant
thing I said was

>>Although Crowley is certainly intrigued,
>>if not obsessed, with occult matters
(you urthlings have convinced me that Gnostic
themes in particular are explored in his novels),
>>I find it hard to pinpoint
>>where his actual sympathies lie. Smoky, like
>>the protagonist of the =C6gypt series, frequently
>>encounters strange goings-on--even falls in love
>>with a semi-fantastic creature or two--but never
>>really buys into the whole supernatural mindset.
>>I suspect that one of the reasons Crowley mines
>>the occult so heavily is because it is such a
>>convenient metaphor for fiction in general. If
>>there is a single dominant theme in Crowley's
>>work it is the creation and perpetuation of
>>stories. Crowley may believe in certain things
>>that others consider fiction; he may not. I dunno.

bee


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