Jan Fries Reviews

  1. Reviews of Jan's Books
    1.1 Visual Magick
    1.2 Cauldron of the Gods: a manual of Celtic Magick
  2. Jan's reviews of other books
    2.1 Nema/Way of mystery
    2.2 Mogg Morgan/Thankem : Meditations on Seth Magick

 There have been many excellent reviews but here's a detailed example

Jan Fries, Visual Magick: A manual of freestyle shamanism. Oxford. Mandrake. 1992 & 2000.

Review by Kate Hoolu

“No matter what the medium, a talented priest can communicate … without preaching or didacticism. Art shows rather than tells. All great artists function as priests, whether they think of themselves as priests or not.”

This retrospective review was prompted by the interview on this site with Mogg Morgan http://www.occultebooks.com/resources/interviews/mandrake.htm  where this book is mentioned.

If you are an eclectic magickian or shaman, or have any interest in Austin Osman Spare, this is a book for you. Spare said, “All desire, whether for pleasure, knowledge, or power, that cannot find ‘natural’ expression, can by sigils and their formula find fulfillment from the subconscious”. This book is at least in part a modern view of the sigil magick that derives from AOS. But it is much, much more.

Fries has written on several subjects, including the Tao and Rune magick, but this work shows a very good awareness and ability with Spare’s techniques, cross-fertilised with some of the more well-known methods of shamanism and his own innovations; hence the subheading.

Fries makes the important point that sigils can not only be designed by the operator (for whatever magickal purpose) but also RECEIVED from entities too… and in those cases there is often a useful secret to be discovered within the sigil: “it should be noted that, while the sentience behind these sigils appears independent, their aesthetics are usually suited to the personality of the receiver. The best kind contains a blend of known and unknown…half revealed and half concealed”. This also stands as a beautifully short summary of perhaps what Aleister Crowley and the Book of the Law are about- obviously it is in AC’s writing style, but has so much more within…. And Kenneth Grant’s work on the Tunnels of Set is supposedly largely based on received sigils.

Regardless of occult debate about whether these received messages derive from a neurological or a non-human source, which is not within the scope of this review, it makes perfect sense for them to appear in this ‘mixed’ manner. If they were completely incomprehensible they would be ignored, and if they were completely ordinary and fully known already, then they would be un-remarkable and pass from consciousness as quickly as yesterday’s newspaper headlines. The half-unknown element makes them all the more tempting and interesting to the magickian, like a partly open door….

Avalanches of really good points are made by JF, which are eminently sensible, humourous and useful. Not for him is gibberish pontificating about very fine points of obscure theory; his stance is very much of the Chaos magician- ‘get off your ass, find what works, use it and keep trying new things’ and get out of your conditioned tunnel realities, rather than relying on dogmatic magickal techniques that often descend from book to book, unchanged and without ever being challenged. He makes the very important point that you must allow yourself to make mistakes, and perceive them as that, and not as something else that is kinder to one’s often bloated magickal self-view:

“‘Failure’ is recognized as a threat to ego… the same ego that so happily pretends to have divine power and authority… and so the whole thing is usually considered a ‘challenge’ or ‘ordeal’ in such cases- anything rather than accept that one might be wrong” – Indeed: in magick, strange things happen, to the point where, as Ramsey Dukes http://www.occultebooks.com/essays/rdessays/rdseries/rdessays.htm has said (somewhere): “‘cock-up’ is the word of the Aeon”

As the title suggests, there is a distinctly artistic bent to this work, but you don’t ever need to have sketched anything before to be able to join in with this stuff- it’s not the quality of what you produce, it’s the intent of the experiment:  Fries encourages everyone to experiment with drawing sigils, automatic writing etc, but in all of this to take credit or debit for the works created (and the results of using the sigil magick method): “Frequently people need to insist on the ‘automatic’ origins of their creations (and behaviour) when they dare not assume responsibility for them. It’s so much safer to claim ‘I can’t draw but sometimes the spirit of Leonardo comes over me…’ as if that spirit has nothing better to do!... It’s always easier to blame some spiritual agency than to assume the responsibility of recognizing and developing one’s own talents”

Having dealt at length with visual methods, Fries then describes ‘Chaos language’, a kind of glossolalia, which can be seen as a way of making auditory sigils with the voice. The book is worth the cover price just for this part. Awesome! Jan Fries:- add him to the growing list of ‘people we like’. Superb, inspiring book.

In the UK; Visual Magick can be got from Mandrake, or your nearest good bookshop. In the USA try Mandrake first, your local supplier or Amazon US.


CAULDRON OF THE GODS: a manual of Celtic Magick by Jan Fries 186992861x
552pp ,Royal Octavo
24.99/$40 uk pounds
172 illustrations

Imagine the forest. As darkness falls, the somber beeches disappear in misty twilight and shadows seem to gather under their branches. Far away, the blackbird’s call tells of the coming of the night. The birds cease their singing, silence descends, soon the beasts of the night will make their appearance. Between tangled roots, hidden by nettles and brambles, the earth seems to ripple. A few humps of earth seem to emerge from the ground. They are the last traces of burial mounds, of mounds, which were tall and high 2500 years ago.

Many of them have disappeared, hidden by tangled roots of beech and oak, ploughed flat by careless farmers, others again show caved-in tops where grave robbers have looted the central chamber. The locals shun these hills. There are tales that strange fires can be seen glowing on the mounds, and that on spooky nights, great armed warriors arise from their resting places. Then the doors to the deep are thrown open and unwary travelers have to beware of being invited into the halls of the dead and unborn. Here the kings of the deep feast and celebrate, time passes differently and strange treasures may be found. Who knows the nights when the gates are open? Who carries the primrose, the wish-flower, the strange blossom that opens the doors to the hollow hills?

Praise for earlier Jan Fries books:
Helrunar: ‘...eminently practical and certainly breaks new ground.’
- Ronald Hutton (author Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles) Recommended by The Cauldron

Contents
0. Welcome to the Nemeton.
1. People of the Mounds
2. Mysteries of La Tene
3. Druidic Dreams
4. Evolution of the Bards
5. A Confusion of Faiths
6. The Filid of Ireland
7. Three Rays of the Awen
8. Taliesin Penbeirdd
9. Enchantment
10. Tales of Transformation
11. The Secret Arts
12. The Ever Hungry Cauldron
13. Trees of Eternity
14. Coda: The bed of Taliesin

The Way of Mystery. Magick, Mysticism & Self-Transcendence.

By Nema. 2003, Llewellyn Publications, US$ 15.95. Review by Jan Fries

  In the early eighties, Kenneth Grant amazed the occult establishment by publishing a book (Outside the Circles of Time) that was based to a major extent on the visions and experiences of a hitherto unknown initiate called Sorror Andahadna, or more briefly, Nema. Nema’s experiences provided a silver key and much needed counterweight to the better known current of Horus, her work being the pre-shadowing, but also the manifestation of the elusive and all-inclusive current of Maat. Nema was channeling Maat, the ancient Egyptian goddess of truth, balance and justice. All of these are subtle and sometimes elusive concepts that seemed a lot more difficult to understand than the more simple seeming formula of Horus, the falcon-headed god of will, force and focused activity. Many Thelemites who felt comfortable with the Horus current found it hard to comprehend Maat, who was always dancing around the focus of their awareness, visible and invisible at once, comprehensible by paradox and enigmatic to the point where reason gives way to laughter. Where the prophet of Horus, Aleister Crowley, offered a number of almost straightforward stratagems of yoga and ritual magick, Nema’s manifestation of Maat seemed cryptic as it was so simple, refined and essentially self-focused. The two approaches to the magick of the Nu Aeon balanced, but only for a handful of dedicated researchers who developed their own methods of blending and manifesting the twinned approach in courageous subjectivity. 

It was not until 1995 that a full book called Maat Magick appeared, a much needed work that offered a full program of experiences leading to self-initiation in a system that was guaranteed to destroy itself upon fulfillment. Nema’s first book seemed a simple system of things that can be done, it’s deep and artistic subtlety remained hidden to the more casual readers, and indeed to all who did not bother to do the exercises and find their own approach to Maat, Truth, in and through their own true will. Maat, however, was not to be confined to a single approach. Eight years later I am delighted to see that another manifestation of the current has appeared which balances the dynamic doing of the first volume with a more subtle approach.

The Way of Mystery, originally entitled Wings of Rapture, provides a counterweight to the first volume by offering initiation into the way of mystery, or mysticism, as you might call it.

What is mysticism? The concept may or may not appeal to you, depending on what you have learned to associate with this subject. Most people in modern magick seem to believe that mysticism means ‘doing without’. The publisher, Llewellyn, obviously subscribed to the popular and totally misleading idea that mysticism is something practiced by doddering elders who have given up on life and decided to transcend the world, the flesh and the devil, as they are not up to them any more. If you see the cover of the book, you will understand what I mean. Instead of making use of the brilliant and illuminating paintings of the author, the publisher decided to cater to the public opinion, and printed a picture of a monk who might have come from a cheese advertisement.

This is exactly the sort of mysticism which you will not find in Nema’s brilliant book. Mysticism is not for senile recluses; The Way of Mystery is for people who are very much alive and enjoy it. This is a book of magick, discovery and self-exploration. It focuses on aspects of magick which are conveniently forgotten  by the result-hungry and shows that mystery is the counterweight to magick. Where magick is the weaving of illusions (maya), mystery is the freedom to transcend them. To use a simple metaphor, we could propose that mystery means going up the Tree (or the spine, if you prefer Kundalini yoga), a process that means leaving the limitations and confines of everyday life, everyday consciousness and everyday belief in reality, in a process of continuous refinement and simplification. Mystery is very much being yourself, once you have come to understand how all-inclusive Self has ever been. Magick is coming down the Tree again, bringing change and transformed awareness into the world of phenomena. More simply, you have to get out before you can come back again. Most modern magickians desire to work change in this world, but unless they embrace mystery, there is little chance that they will get out far enough to come back again with a laugh, a word, and a fire in their eyes that will set the world aflame. Where medieval mystics practiced abasement and denial to the point of stupidity, Nema’s Way of Mystery means adventure, rapture and the wild joy that comes from meeting the Forgotten Ones, unfolding Self in its totality and doing will in ways that are far beyond Crowley’s modest achievements. This is a very practical book. Its center is You, and as you read, do and discover, you will find that there can be no magick without mystery, and no mystery without magick, as the twinned forces shape the flow of evolution. For the beginner, The Way of Mystery offers a system of excellent and useful practices that work in shaping awareness and identity to transform the personality into a stream-lined vehicle of True Will. The experienced mage will find some of the practices familiar, and be delighted to discover the depth and subtlety that is woven into the seeming simplicity. Nema is a very methodical and well-organized philosopher, behind each of her lines you can discern a lifetime of courageous self-exploration that is well worth contemplating in depth. For the advanced adept, The Way of Mystery is one of those rare and priceless works that can be read again and again without coming to an end of its many levels of meaning. This is a book to explore, embrace and enjoy through a lifetime of self-evolution.

Tankhem. Meditations on Seth Magick. Mogg Morgan, Mandrake of Oxford, 2003

I was delighted to read this book. Its author, Mogg Morgan aka Katon Shual is not only one of my favourite magickal writers but also a good friend. Perhaps it doesn’t sound very convincing when one friend sets out to praise the work of another (it looks like a conspiracy) but then, Tankhem is such an important contribution to the continuous development of magick that I simply had to write this review.

Mogg Morgan likes to call his personal approach to magick Tankhem, but in this book you are treated to much more than that. To begin with, Tankhem is not a single magical system but many, and the essays that make up the book cover a wide range of exciting subjects. The main emphasis is on the hidden and half forgotten side of Egyptian magic, on the long pre-dynastic periods when Seth was a respectable, though dangerous god and ritual was closely concerned with stellar worship. When I say emphasis I am talking about more than inspired theory and good
scholarship: you are invited to experience what the author is talking about.

Tankhem offers much that is highly practical, such as a detailed description of the temple of Sety I which is well worth visiting by dreamers, visionaries and astral travellers. But Tankhem also offers a modern perspective, we learn of Crowley’s incorporation of Sethian lore in Thelema, including some errors made by the Great Beast, and even of the recent revival of Seth in a number of supposedly ‘satanic’ cults, most of which got things dead wrong. What I like best about these chapters is, apart from their factual content, the way of thinking that lies behind them. Even for those who do not care much about ancient Egypt this is worth exploring. Here magick is discussed as an experiment in thought and belief, there is much on the nature of the gods and all reflects the lifelong dedication of the author to the hidden realm of inspiration and true insight. In these issues,

Tankhem is one of the most open-minded, provoking and refreshing works I have ever encountered. I would only wish for two things to improve it: a more thorough proof-reader (there is a bit of misspelling in the text, some of it quite creative) and a lot more pages. This book is so good, it should go on for longer. What we have in Tankhem is of course more than just Egyptian magick. It is more to the point that pre-dynastic Egypt with its Sethian worship is an expression of a current that informs many other traditions, such as the Tantric lore of India, in which the author is highly competent, and the so-called Western occult tradition, which incorporated a lot of Indian and Egyptian lore in original and syncretistic form.
There is a long chapter on sexual magick that is well worth reading, especially when you have enjoyed the author’s earlier opus Sexual Magick, perhaps the most lucid and straight-from-the-heart treatment of the subject I have ever come upon. Mogg Morgan does without the silly secrecy that usually sticks to the subject and offers a highly personal, readable and humorous view. In Tankhem you can find him celebrating the genitals in an Ode to the Cock and the Fanny which is not only good Tantric poetry (someone should translate it into Sanskrit and fake a few hundred pages of initiated commentary) but also reminds me of the final chapter of Joyce’s Ulysses (YES!).

There are practical hints on how to celebrate multiple orgasms, how to perceive the power within the landscape by seeing it as an erotic body, and how to include playfulness, flirtation and seduction in the divine game of making love. Real sexual magick is a lot more than just technique, it is an attitude, a point of view and one (or several) ways of life. In the industrial world, result orientation is such an obsessive delusion that few are aware that lovemaking does not have to be something that starts in bed and ends when both partners have come. A more organic approach is suggested by Mogg Morgan, who proposes that we are dealing with at least two trance states, pre-orgasmic and post orgasmic, and Both can be moments in which ancestral memories, dreams, meditations and archaic god forms can break through into your sensitised body. That is sexual magick. I’m really glad this point has been made at last. Too many books on sexual magick are focused on relatively minor issues such as ‘results magic’ (i.e. visualising your desire while you come). Just look at the frequency of Crowley’s experiments to attract money, popularity and exploitable friends, and consider how often they failed. Where many people see orgasm as the dramatic climax and end of the fun, Mogg Morgan celebrates lovemaking as continuous. This is much like the difference between European rituals of the Hermetic Tradition, where energy is built up and released at a dramatic moment, and say, public Indian rituals where the energy moves in waves, the profane and sacred alternate, just as the human and the divine do, and there is no precise beginning and end of anything.

For those who want to find perspectives that go beyond simple male-female role-play and a simple journey ‘from here to there’, this chapter is a must. But there is more to Tankhem. I was delighted and highly impressed by the chapter on the personal magic of W. B. Yeats, whom I had hitherto assumed to be a rather uninteresting and hesitant sorcerer. Assuredly the younger Yeats was not a very original magus, and honestly his early poetry bores me to tears. But after his dull years (specifically the period when messing around in the Golden Dawn) and well into his fifties, he transformed like a larvae crawling out of the morass to become a scintillating dragonfly. This is what marriage can do to a shy and somewhat prude fellow, all of a sudden he finds that he has a sex life and begins to produce thousands of pages of automatic writing with his wife (nick-named ‘George’ for mysterious reasons) that transformed the magic of both and turned Yeats, at long last, into a fine and inspired poet. Mogg Morgan gives a brilliant account of this transformation and adds a ritual for the consecration of a dream talisman that is well worth trying out. There is more to Tankhem yet. But as I know that the more determined magickians will devour it anyway, it simply remains to say: buy your copy and enjoy.