The Book of Lies (Crowley)
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| Author | Aleister Crowley |
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| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Occult |
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Publication date
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1912 |
| Media type | Print (Paperback) |
| Pages | 200 pp |
| ISBN | |
The Book of Lies (full title: Which is also Falsely Called BREAKS. The Wanderings or Falsifications of the One Thought of Frater Perdurabo, which Thought is itself Untrue. Liber CCCXXXIII [Book 333]) was written by English occultist and teacher Aleister Crowley (using the pen name of Frater Perdurabo) and first published in 1912 or 1913 (see explanation below). As Crowley describes it: "This book deals with many matters on all planes of the very highest importance. It is an official publication for Babes of the Abyss, but is recommended even to beginners as highly suggestive."
The book consists of 93 chapters, each of which consists of one page of text. The chapters include a question mark, poems, rituals, instructions, and obscure allusions and cryptograms. The subject of each chapter is generally determined by its number and its corresponding Qabalistic meaning. Around 1921, Crowley wrote a short commentary about each chapter, assisting the reader in the Qabalistic interpretation.
Several chapters and a photograph in the book reference Leila Waddell, who Crowley called Laylah, and who, as Crowley's influential Scarlet Woman, acted as his muse during the writing process of this volume.
The title page contains the following quotation from Tennyson:
''Break, break, break
At the foot of thy stones, O Sea!
And I would that I could utter
The thoughts that arise in me!"
An explanation of the title on the facing page ends with the sentence, "There is no joke or subtle meaning in the publisher's imprint." This seems to be an ironic joke-reference to the fact that every word on the frontispiece apart from the name of the publishing-house had been subjected to tortuous qabalistic self-exegesis, yet according to Robert Anton Wilson in his 1977 book Cosmic Trigger I: The Final Secret of the Illuminati:
This might have been a veiled warning about what will follow, but is actually the first lie in the book; occult historian Francis King has carefully determined the date on the imprint is inaccurate by at least a year.
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Wikipedia