Aleister Crowley’s Dirty, Dirty Poems
Victorian Gothic on Aleister Crowley’s White Stains:
Readers will likely be familiar with Aleister Crowley, the notorious English occultist, bisexual libertine, recreational drug user, founder of the Thelemic religion, leader of the Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.), and all-around scary wicked person. Those familiar with Crowley strictly through his esoteric writings, however, may be interested to know that one the “Great Beast’s” first forays into publishing consisted of a perverse little volume of erotic poetry entitled White Stains.
It was issued in Amsterdam in 1898 by Leonard Smithers; a leading publisher of English pornography, but also of controversial literature. His clients included Aubrey Beardsley, Arthur Symons, and Oscar Wilde. White Stains was published in a print run of one hundred copies which, according to rumors in the book world, Crowley is said to have white-stained himself. Most of these were destroyed in 1924 by British Customs; the surviving first editions currently sell for around $4,000 – $10,000.
The authorship of White Stains was attributed to…
Edgar Allan Poe Vs. Nico
It’s one of Edgar Allan Poe’s spookiest poem’s — and it’s even spookier when it’s recited by Nico.
In a strange 10-minute video, the Velvet Underground singer recites a disturbing poem about walking on a dark October night, on the one-year anniversary of the death of the lost Ulalume. Someone’s spliced together the audio with eerie footage from a Kenneth Anger movie.
And there’s also a lost last verse to the poem. (Poe originally wrote Ulalume as an elocution exercise, then decided it was also a hauntingly beautiful poem!)
From A Culture Of Money Worship: Plutocrats Can’t Write Poetry
POET.com has absolutely nothing to do with poetry. Can you guess what it is from this video?
