Occult Literature: A Brief Examination on Occult Literary Works Including the Grimoires, Magickal Books, and the Occult Tradition in Literary Works

Occult traditions are often so obscured by mystery, both real and imagined, that the interest in these arts is one that has been predominant throughout the ages. For millennia, human beings have sought to identify the mysterious happenings which occur around them on a day to day basis by way of occult means. Especially during eras where there is much economic and social upheaval, does there occur a festering of occult and magickal interests. Humans seek to grasp on to the fleeting and mysterious world which lays beyond their comprehension, and which may seem unattainable yet very close at hand. The Occult arts can be seen as an outlet of humanity’s need for something hermetic and secret, a need for a science and art which lies beyond the grasp of everyday experience, yet which humans use to express their deep desire for contact with that which they do not understand.
Similarly, literature has acted as a catalyst and medium for humanity's various streams and emotions. The recording of experiences, the writing of tales, and the plethora of how-to books is a fine example of this. Literature and writing has served as a solace as well as the medium for exposing that which is dark and hidden, a prime example of this being the occult. It is for that reason that the two arts are so closely linked and inter-related. Many famous works of art in literature are heavily influenced by occult thought, and many writers who are well known are also the authors of books on magic and occult practices. These authors can vary from Jean Bodin to, surprisingly, the author of the standard Christian Bible himself, King James the first. But is this a surprise? Various Popes have been said to have written books on the occult as well, one of the most famous of which is the Grimoire of Pope Honorius, though many question the legitimacy of the claim that he was actually the writer of this work on the conjuring of spirits and daemons. In the Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology by Rossel Hope Robbins, there is in fact mention of witchcraft directly in the bible. There are examples in "Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Samuel, Kings, and Isaiah." (46)
This paper, within its small parameters, will seek to study briefly just a few of these works about occult practices. The amount of information available to the researcher is very large and diverse, and one may feel unable to make sense of the various archaic methods and terms used in some of the works. However, the writer of this paper will seek to examine a few of these texts briefly, and outline their importance in the occult tradition.
As mentioned earlier, it may come to a surprise to many that famous individuals who are known for their contributions to literature are also viable practitioners and authors of books dealing with the occult. Yeats, the famous poet and Nobel Prize laureate has made a contribution in his own right by writing poetry dedicated to the lodges of ritual magick of which he was a member of (e.g. the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn), and Shakespeare, one of the most famous literary geniuses to have ever grasped a quill, is known to have made allusions to magickal practices. Andre Nataf, in his book The Occult, makes this sufficiently clear, when he states;
"In the Tempest, we see a magician fighting against the forces of evil and putting young lovers thru an initiation ritual. However, alchemy has pride of place, especially in a Winter's Tale. The play is saturated with alchemy philosophy and symbolism." (45)
Nataf makes clear that the Bard from Stratford-Upon-Avon used a significant amount of occult allusion in his works, as do many authors throughout the century. Because interest and the practice of occult sciences are so ingrained in the human psyche, there have always and will always be material which deals with the occult. As societies develop there is always a need for something ancient and mysterious which humans seek to fall back on, and occult books, which exemplify this need, will always be written.
However, aside from the reflection of occult thoughts in literary works of fiction, which ranges from works by Stephen King to HP Lovecraft -whose mythical Grimoire, the Necronomicon of the Cthulhu Mythos, continues to fool readers into believing that text is genuine-, to erotic novels popular in the nineteenth century, there are books which precisely deal with the practice of the occult. The most significant of this body of work are the so-called Grimoires. Lewis Spence, in his very insightful Encyclopedia of Occultism, explains Grimoires thus; "A text book on Black Magic. The three best known Grimoires are the Grand Grimoire, the Grimoirum Verum, and the Grimoire of Pope Honorius. The great object of the Grimoire is to invoke the infernal powers, and at the same time trick them." (114). Thus a Grimoire can be seen as a manual on ritual magick for the purpose of the invocation of spirits from hell to do the biding of the conjuring magician. However, many have written, including Mathers, one of the founding members of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (HOGD), that Grimoires can also be used in order to develop magickal powers which would also enable the practitioner to employ the rituals therein for the purpose of white magick, as is opposed to works of black magick of the left hand path.
However, many practicing magicians dispute this, amongst which another founding member of the HOGD, Arthur Edward Waite, who states that the use of the Grimoires in ritual Magick relates only to the invocation of daemons from hell, and how this process should be done. Waite, himself the author of a very practical and insightful magical handbook, The Book of Black Magic and Ceremonial Magic, gives many examples of Grimoires and their various uses. Waite explains that many or all of the Grimoires are the fruit of one ‘Head Grimoire’ if you will; the Clavicula Salomonis, or the Keys of Solomon, said to have been recorded by King Solomon, and which, as Waite puts it, is the "...chief inspiration of all latter handbooks of infernal ceremonial" (65)
The Keys of Solomon, also known as the Lemegeton, is comprised of four parts; the Theurgia, the Theurgia Goethica, and the Pauline Art of Almadael. Each book of the Lemegeton deals specifically with a particular aspect related to the invocation of daemons and the practice of ceremonial magick as it relates to this context. Waite says that "The highest ambition of the Clavicles is identical with that of the Grimoires -to become master of the treasure said to be possessed by spirits." (63), and that the Keys or Clavicules "...deploys all hierarchies and deploys spirits by Milliards" (64). It is therefore safe to say that the Keys of Solomon were primarily used in a ritual context to invoke spirits of an infernal nature, and that these ceremonies are very precise and should be executed to the smallest detail as is laid forward in the books. As mentioned, each book deals specifically with a topic regarding the invocation of the spirits, this includes, as an example, which day the spirits should be called, which time of day, what ritual is to be used, how the ritual should be executed, any specific marks and sigils which should be used for the ritual, and the list goes on. Also mentioned is the specific names of each demon which is to be invoked and what that specific demon should be summoned to do. The Keys of Solomon the King are still continuously in use, and have inspired writers such as Deon Fortune and Alistair Crowley to walk the path which they have chosen.
There are other, more obscure books which fall also in the category of Occult handbooks, if not specifically as Grimoires. The work of Agrippa Von Netesheim, Three Books of Occult Philosophy, is amongst a number of obscure texts -though they are now available on Amazon.com- which deal specifically with the execution of rituals, the summoning of demons, and practices related to the Mystical Kabala.
Another very obscure text is the Heptameron. There is very little information available on this text, but Waite explains that this is an introductory text to be used by those just starting out with Occult Practices. "The Heptameron, or Magical Elements Ascribed to Peter de Abano, is an attempt to supply the want and to offer the neophyte a complete wizard’s cabinet." (89)
Also, books such as the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage, attributed to the magickal instructor of the Biblical Abraham; the Praxis Magica Fausti, said to have been used by Faust in his famous intercourse with the Devil; The Black Pullet, which has as "its chief occult interest the series of talismanic signs" (Waite, 113) as well as scores of texts which have been written over the course of roughly a thousand years, have all served as contributions the this large and diverse body of work.
There are also books used as evidence in the European Witch Trials against those accused of witchcraft and which are said to have been widely distributed in 17th century Europe. C.H L’Estrange Ewan writes that "...it is to be expected that ambitious practitioners of sorcery would keep books..." (83). There is also an account of a fifteenth century which who used a book to make rain and a certain "John Walsh (who) had a book of great circles by which he could raise familiar spirits" (83). Whether or not these texts were any of the above mentioned Grimoires or maybe recordings of the practitioners own experience is unclear. What is clear is that they belong to the Occult Literary Tradition.
Many of the above texts are hundreds, and if one were to believe the claim that the Clavicula Solomonis was written by King Solomon himself, if not thousands of years old, there continues to be a profusion of materials which deal with this subject, and many of them have become important texts in this genre. Books such as The Mystical Kabala by Fortune, and the Book of Law by Crowley, are on the shelves of many magicians seeking a resource for a particular body of knowledge. Few of these books have been as influential as those by the creator of theosophy and occultist Madame Blavatsky.
Blavatsky was born in the Ukraine to Nobility, and from an early aged showed that she had some psychic ability. After years of traveling and learning occult and esoteric methods from all over the world, she founded the Theosophical Society and wrote two works which are regarded as some of the most important texts in occultism, Isis Unveiled and the Secret Doctrine. Dan Burton and David Gandy explain these two works in their book Magic, Mystery, and Science. They state that "While the earlier Work (Isis Unveiled) relied more on western thought as it pertains to the occult, The Secret Doctrine was decidedly eastern in its provenance and outlook." (212). The Secret Doctrine marks the beginning of the introduction of Eastern Concepts in Occult Traditions. Sadly, Blavatsky’s works have also been used by the Nazis as one of their bases for their doctrine of Aryan supremacy.
As mentioned, the occult tradition in literature varies widely in subject matter and genre, but all express the need for humanity to express their need for ancient and secret wisdom which would enable them to make sense of a decidedly mysterious world. From Dracula training in a terrorist camp in Germany led by the Devil and a book on the conjuring of Daemons by a Pope, to works on magical circles and familiars, the occult has been evident in popular fiction and dark obscure texts with same enthusiasm and veracity. Because human beings are constantly faced with the development of new threats to their established world view, and as they continue to encounter instances of mysterious and unexplainable events, they will seek to define the world in occult terms and hence in occult texts. There will be a recurrence of Crowleys and Blavatskys in the future. Occult Literature is in no way something that died in Crowley’s drug ridden mind, but something which is part of the human collective. It will be interesting to see which new trends and currents will become part of new occult tradition, as will it be interesting to see how this information is disseminated, a process which started with the printing press in Germany almost six hundred years ago. The Occult is as much a part of human life as religion, a discipline in which it is closely related to in more ways than one. The Dark, Mysterious, and Obscure arts which make up the occult tradition will continue to inspire and terrify by making the reader aware that there is always more out there.
This is also clearly evident in books which are decidedly part of the main stream. With the current popularity of books such as Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code and J.K Rowling’s Harry Potter Series, both of which contain a large amount of occult elements, enough in fact to garner official condemnation by the Roman Catholic Pope, the trend of occult literature will continue throughout the ages. As humanity is faced with the age old question of who and what we are, we will use this incredible body of knowledge to help identify ourselves within the realm of the cosmos.


Works Cited
Burton, Dan and David Grandy. Magic, Mystery, and Science. Indiana U.P.: Indiana, 2004.
L’Estrange, C.H. Witchcraft and Demonianism. Barnes and Noble: New York, 1970.
Nataf, Andre. The Occult. Chambers: Toronto, 1966.
Robbins, Rossel Hope. The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology. Crown Publishers: New York, 1970.
Spence, Lewis. An Encyclopedia of Occultism. University Books: London, 1976.

Waite, Arthur Edward. The Book of Black Magick and Ceremonial Magick. Causeway Books: New York, 1973..