A Walking Flame: Selected Magical Writings of Ithell Colquhoun (Book Review #107)

A Walking Flame: Selected Magical Writings of Ithell Colquhoun
Amy Hale
Strange Attractor Press

I went to the Tate Britain, and as a member I enjoy free entry to all the paid exhibits (well its not free, I had to pay to be a member). I went for the Lee Miller exhibition and her surreal reportage photographs, along the way I popped into the Edward Burra exhibition with his theatrical and noire satire paintings. Then onto Ithell Colquhoun, I admit, because I’m not ashamed to admit it, I’d never heard of her before.

In the second room of her gallery and facing me was the Glyph of the Tree of Life from Qabalah. I was taken aback. And there was more. Tarot symbolism. Mystical paintings, divine feminine. Why have I not heard of her before? This seems to be a theme that author Amy Hale stresses at the beginning of this collection of Magical writings. Ithell, in her time “was not given the credit and attention she deserved.” Ithell colquhoun was an artist and also practitioner in the artes-sacrae. Unwavering Ithell didn’t bow to pressure to tone things down, to be more acceptable. To moderate her language. Perhaps she would have fared better in the era of punk rock. It’s a sad state of affairs that she was side-lined because of her passion, because of her ‘ways’.
Hopefully that will change, she is becoming more recognised for who she was, enthuses Amy.

For my part of this first introduction in the Tate GAllery, I was mesmerised by her work, absolute occultism and esoteric nature throughout, her resilience and autonomy, and also sometimes to the point of loneliness and outcast.
… Ithell produces work much like, I hope, our own methods. Analysing and adapting, copying, restructuring. There will be ideas I don’t agree with, not because they are false, but subjectively, for me, I work differently. Such is the nature of the arte. As is Art.
Is Blue for Boys who act this way and Pink for girls who act that way. How does a boy act, how does a girl?
( I was reading this book and it has an attached pink ribbon bookmark, “that’s a nice pink ribbon” said my pisstaking work colleague. ” Do you like it ?” I offered, ” I thought you would.” ~ In these statements in fact, both of us roleplay a prejudice, even in irony.)
Likewise in terms of correspondence and how we create our symbology, it is both subjective and speculative. What colour empowers me, what smell brings me to a reverie, what music makes me focus~ If someone tells you “it is this” and “that, beyond question and beyond doubt”, then they mistake personal resonance for universal law. Things change, things adapt.
“Air belongs in the East not Fire”, says Agrippa pointing his little stick at the glyph reference of Alchemical qualities.
“The Rising Sun in the East gives birth and breath, and Fire at the height of its inclination in the South,” says the nature botherer pointing his stick to the descending chakras from the throat~ Air, to the Heart~ Fire and so on.
We can argue until we argue over the language we actually articulate with.
Every commentator and occult writer will suggest a ritual that does not feel right, somewhere, sometime with us. It is why Andrew Chumbley, Cochrane and even Crowley avowed to ensure we create our own system. Alas, everyone studied those same authors relative systems and became fundamental with it, missing the point entirely. Its a wobble head, head slapper all at once.
I say all this at the outset because Ithell Colquhoun delivers her praxis, her methods and some of us may squint, shake our head, perhaps disregard and dismiss it outright, because it doesn’t fit with our system, because someone wears a red tie and must therefore vote labour and must therefore only have those views, they have a job to do, to promote the manifesto.
If we are treading water for the first time, we are influenced by what we read, sooner or later we will witness some disparity with another writer. Who’s right? do we side with the more famous? Is the King right or the pauper? Can the apprentice chastise the master? Do we side with the first lesson we are taught or the last? In many respects, we should always be at odds ( critical )with any book that seeks to tell us, what is, and what isn’t, for that is the path of self-gnosis;-

“Do not go upon what has been acquired by repeated hearing; nor upon tradition…”
“Do not go upon rumour, or upon scripture…”
“When you yourselves know: these things are wholesome… enter and abide in them.”
“When you yourselves know: these things are unwholesome… abandon them.”

Adapted from Kalama Sutta Aṅguttara Nikāya.of the Pali Canon.

Reading Ithell texts clearly shows she studied the ‘western tradition’ and also assimilated other eclectic paths, which is what most wayfarers do. Strict governance to one path blinkers the whole.
Her texts do read with a dated edge, and despite many commenting that she never achieved because of her unwavering maverick ways much of what she writes feels edited and perhaps that is her style, writing for the sake of others rather than self penning, musing for our own sake.
It is no coincidence that she wrote for Prediction Magazine. Many articles in that publication all read as if written by the same author, such is the editing and style required for mass consumption. Whether the articles included have been edited by a.n.other or not, there is an element that she writes in ‘ the style of’, and it is, to repeat, as if she writes For someone.

Her work is eclectic, substantial, she is a polymath true, bordering between creative and analysis without either having her head fully immersed in the clouds or feet unmoving on terra firma.
My initial concern, as with any book that says ‘ Selected writings’, is a cause of inner angst, more perhaps a root disfigurement of autism and need for completion. I feel cheated and wonder what nuggets I’m missing out on. It would be impossible to give us the ‘Complete and Unabridged Writings’ given her prolific nature, so I assure myself the author, Amy Hale, knows what she’s doing.
The text themselves are somewhat chronological, spanning lectures, articles and musings. Many repetition of ideas, or a broader approach, and despite the style- that she writes so someone can understand-there are elements of the surreal, the artistic, which is far more engaging to me, far more individual and.. enlightening than work which fits a standard template of conformity.
Selected Writings is, The Grimoire of Ithell Colquhoun, or perhaps akin to the Equinox journal, Crowleys 10 volumes encompassing articles, poetry, and occult ‘lore’. The best thing for me about these collected works, are the ability to wander off and read something else, do something else, come back to the next article later rather than try to finish the whole book in one sitting. There is enough varied and different elements in Ithell’s selected writings and each deserves contemplation.
I do prefer her writing and style in her singular works The Living stones and The Crying of the wind, and also by the same author of this book;- Genius of the Fern loved Gully. It may well be because much of what is included in these collections are subjects I have read elsewhere and it’s my mind that’s not seeing them as they should be seen, fresh! and work that has inspired.
My admiration and continuing exploration of Ithell Colquhoun has not abated, as such this is a worthy addition not just to the growing pile of her work I have, but to an occult/esoteric library in general, and will be rechecked and analysed for study and contemplation.
She is of course, a much better artist than Crowley and far less didactic that Dion Fortune, More forgiving, but I’m at odds as to find where in her writing or style she was seen, apparently, as being overtly rebellious and too risky to be given the limelight, if anything I think she was quite safe, that of course could be because lived through punk~ nothing shocks anymore.
She hasn’t got the credit she deserves. Tomorrow was always too late. The long denied light at last reveals the visionary. The observers witness the observer, a qantam complex enigma.

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