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Post by merlin on Nov 1, 2017 9:52:39 GMT
I was wondering, was Kenneth Grant aware of Rosaleen Norton's work? Is there any mention of Norton's in Kenneth Grant's published works?
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Post by N0T 2 on Nov 3, 2017 9:06:18 GMT
I was wondering, was Kenneth Grant aware of Rosaleen Norton's work? Is there any mention of Norton's in Kenneth Grant's published works? There is no reference to Roie in any of Grant's published work. He may have been aware of her indirectly, though, given their mutual connections, and mutual admirers.
Her work's exposure was mostly limited to Australia during her lifetime, despite her international underground notoriety amongst independent occultists of her day, but I would expect that her work was brought to Kenneth's attention at some stage during his. However, how much of it he was able to be aware of at the time, I don't know, and they didn't correspond as far as I can tell.
There is no reference to Grant in the main bulk of her surviving [unpublished] papers and materials, but there may be a document somewhere out there to prove me wrong and I would be very happily corrected on this. There is much about Crowley, though, and bits on Gurdjieff. She would have loved Grant, but I am not sure how much of his work she knew, either.
Given what we now know about her (shared interest in Lovecraft and Crowley, for example), it's truly one of the great missed connections - her work is deeply Typhonian, would perfectly glow as a colour plate in any of Kenneth's books. All of her art is redolent with gateways to other realms, antediluvian witchcraft and Thelemic Luciferian themes. She walked the walk like very few. I've even found a tight contour in her autobiography with one of the key episodes in Kenneth's work.
Letters survive of her correspondence with some foreign occultists (including Gerald Gardner) from an early date (1940s on), and Gardner knew everyone, including the young Grants and Spare, but whether Gardner mentioned her to Grant, or vice-versa, is unknown as far as I am aware.
Edit: I asked these very questions in this thread ( theprimalgrimoire.proboards.com/thread/172/rosaleen-norton ) - a while ago, to no avail - nice to know I'm not the only one asking it
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Post by merlin on Nov 3, 2017 14:52:24 GMT
Thanks for your answer, NOT 2, it's good to hear that you asked this question, too, a while back. Let's see if there are any developments, or if this is definitely a missed link.
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Post by N0T 2 on Nov 3, 2017 23:39:29 GMT
Thanks for your answer, NOT 2, it's good to hear that you asked this question, too, a while back. Let's see if there are any developments, or if this is definitely a missed link. Thank you for the question, merlin. I asked a similar question of Nevill Drury* a few years ago, not long before he left this world. He was unaware of either person being aware of the other's work (i.e. he thought they probably weren't).
I also asked Michael Staley a similar question in an email once too. As I recall, the gist was that the Grants probably knew of her indirectly, given the pond, but no positive or overt links were established. It's testimony to her misrepresentation and obscurity during her life - I can't imagine Kenneth being lukewarm about Roie if current resources were available to him, but the information and material on and by her available now, indicating the depth of her position, was not publicly accessible until very recently. She got the tabloid treatment in trashy local press in the 50s, 60s and 70s, none or little of which would have particularly attracted him I would imagine.
I would be very, very curious to know more of Sir Eugene Goossens' links in London and Paris in the 1940s and 1950s, though. Far from the tabloid narrative ("respectable conductor disgraced by crazy bohemian drug slut"), it now appears he was teaching her the most intense practices, and he moved in or very near Crowley's circles at one time, apparently, before moving to Australia, and he maintained his connexions. His legacy was whitewashed by a lady who associated with him after his fall from grace, a Protestant, she managed to get legal power to shut down any discussion of his occultism, or any presentation of his correspondence, that did not fit with the twee image she wanted people to have of him. Nevill was quite disgusted by all this, naturally. The awesome expanded and revised edition of Pan's Daughter released shortly before he died was an attempt to straighten [sic.!] the record. I think the old lady is dead now, so hopefully more will become known, although sadly it is likely she destroyed or made impossible much of what could have been. ___ *Incidentally, Nevill, one of the first authors to champion Spare following Grant, always vehemently supported Kenneth Grant's position on the OTO matter, and had a lot of respect for his and Steffi's work. And, I've never known anyone more chill with the knowledge he only had months of life left.
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