World’s Fanciest Men - Aleister Crowley
Some men bring new meaning to the word ‘fancy.’ They make it mean ‘badass.’
ALEISTER CROWLEY
BORN: 12 October 1875
DIED: 1 December 1947
OCCUPATION(S): Member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, Leader of the Ordo Templi Orientis, mountaineer, poet, playwright, spy for the British government.
FANCIEST THING HE EVER DID: Spent his honeymoon night INSIDE the Great Pyramid of Giza where he claims his wife was possessed by a spirit. Riiight…
FANCIEST QUOTE: “There is only one really safe, mild, harmless beverage and you can drink as much of that as you like without running the slightest risk, and what you say when you want it is ‘Garcon! Un Pernod!’” [TRANSLATION: He’s ordering absinthe…in french!]
The Victorian Age in England was so fancy that it produced some of the fanciest men of all time - Oscar Wilde, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Alfred Lord Tennyson… It was also an age of extreme sexual repression and political oppression. It was only natural that there would be a backlash and that backlash is personified in Aleister Crowley.
Crowley was an Cambridge educated bisexual hedonist who experimented with drugs and practiced ‘black magic.’ He did all of these things with the elegance and style of a dedicated dandy. He was a member of the secretive Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an organization of rich socialites who got together to study magic. It seems like most of their time was spent discussing whether people should be admitted to the group and revoking the membership of people who were already in it. Crowley eventually started his own religion, Thelema. The main tenet of Thelema was “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.” He’s basically saying, in fancy-speak, “Let’s get drunk, get sexy, and party down.” Even if you’re not a fan of religion you have to admire the gall of a guy who starts a religion with the primary commandment “Do whatever you want.” This was especially controversial in his time when the current rhetoric was: join the church of england, get married, have kids, have tea every day at 4pm.
Crowley was one of those gents who had enough money to indulge in whatever weird interest struck his fancy. He was an accomplished mountaineer and ascended several challenging peaks. He traveled the world and visited the United States, Mexico, Japan, China and Africa. For a while he thought he’d dedicate himself to being a Chess master, but later said he had a mystical experience at a chess tournament that brought on this astounding revelation: “I perceived with preternatural lucidity that I had not alighted on this planet with the object of playing chess.” I submit that there is nothing fancier than mystical visions that tell you to stop considering chess as a career.
His mystical beliefs are a little too convoluted to get into here. Pyramids were important. Wearing pyramids on your head, doubly important. Spirits were involved. I think Atlantis came into play. All of it seems pretty absurd, but at one point Crowley defended his beliefs thusly:
“Because since all theories of the universe are absurd it is better to talk in the language of one which is patently absurd, so as to mortify the metaphysical man.”
So, on some level at least, he was just doing all that absurd stuff to annoy philosophers and religious scholars. His entire belief system was kind of a giant middle finger directed to the heavens.
Crowley died old and alone in a boarding house, addicted to heroin. So I guess the experimenting with drugs thing didn’t really work out for him. According to one account his last words were “Sometimes I hate myself.” But in his day he was a magical fellow, a truly diabolical rake with the charisma that inspires a cult of personality.
ANOTHER FANCY THING HE DID: Under the psuedonym “Oliver Haddo” he accused Somerset Maugham of plagiarism in a truly scathing Vanity Fair article!
SECOND FANCIEST QUOTE: [on changing his name] “For many years I had loathed being called Alick, partly because of the unpleasant sound and sight of the word, partly because it was the name by which my mother called me. Edward did not seem to suit me and thediminutives Ted or Ned were even less appropriate. Alexander was too long and Sandy suggested tow hair and freckles. I had read in some book or other that the most favourable name for becoming famous was one consisting of a dactyl followed by a spondee, as at the end of a hexameter: like Jeremy Taylor. Aleister Crowley fulfilled these conditions and Aleister is the Gaelic form of Alexander. To adopt it would satisfy my romantic ideals. The atrocious spelling A-L-E-I-S-T-E-R was suggested as the correct form by Cousin Gregor, who ought to have known better. In any case, A-L-A-I-S-D-A-I-R makes a very bad dactyl. For these reasons I saddled myself with my present nom-de-guerre—I can’t say that I feel sure that I facilitated the process of becoming famous. I should doubtless have done so, whatever name I had chosen”
