The Cambridge Magazine, Vol. 4, No. I. Saturday October 10, 1914.
Cambridge UK: The Cambridge Magazine, 1914. First Edition. Softcover. Large Quarto (12 x 10 inches). 28 pages plus printed covers, b&w illustrations. Original wrappers. A journal founded and edited by Charles Kay Ogden. This issue quotes in full a letter "in a London contemporary" by former Trinity College man Aleister Crowley. The letter is of particular interest in that - in constrast to his later wartime writings, Crowley takes a distinctly anti-German viewpoint. Referring to the destruction by German shelf-fire of the famous cathedral of Notre-Dame de Rheims, Crowley suggests that: "Poetic justice to Rheims is possible. It is well within the power of modern builders to transplant thither Cologne Cathedral [in Germany], stone by numbered stone. Let this be the symbol of the monument of our victory. Yours Faithfully, Aleister Crowley." His 33 Avenue Studios, South Kensington address is given. The letter is published under the heading "Suggestion by an Old Trinity Man." Oddly, exactly two weeks later Crowley boarded the Lusitania to sail to New York, where a few months later he published his first article in the pro-German weekly "The Fatherland." In May 1915 the Lusitania was sunk by a German submarine, causing international outrage and providing one of the key justifications for the US to enter the war.
It is perhaps interesting to view Crowley's subsequent claims that his propaganda writings were those of a sort of literary agent provocateur or saboteur, aimed at subverting the German cause by overstatement or ridicule in the light of this letter. From the collection of Clive Harper with his discreet book-label neatly tipped in at the rear. Harper is well- known as the bibliographer of Austin Osman Spare, for updating the Aleister Crowley bibliography in the 2011 Teitan Press collection of Gerald Yorke's writings, and as someone who has lent his expertise to numerous other publications. Very light shelfwear, fore-edges a bit darkened and with a few short tears, pages lightly browned at margins, unmarked. A VG+ copy of this scarce periodical. Item #67164
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