Rating: 
Summary: Demystifying a Mystic
Review: "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law."This is definitely the definitive biography of Aleister Crowley. Anyone who is even remotely curious about "...one of the greatest thinkers of our time."(Jimmy Page) will definitely enjoy this book. Not only was it a personal inspiration for me (I found it to be quite liberating), but for the general reader it is: informative, insightful and comprehensive. Lawrence Sutin (for the most part) understood the important aspects of Crowley's teachings and of his life. Three or four sections of this book in particular stand out in my mind as being profoundly illuminating and transcendently insightful. This book did something that I have long looked to have done: it put Crowley's life and thus his works in to an understandable and comprehendible context -- it makes the study of those works possible. Thank you Lawrence Sutin; thank you Frater Perdurabo. "Love is the law, love under will."
Rating: 
Summary: The Tragedy of the Beast
Review: (actually, 31/2 stars) The story of Mr. Crowley is one of the most poinant tragedies I've ever come across. Niechze's descent into madness is the only adequate paralell I know of. Madness would have been a kinder punishment for the Beast. He had to live out his life in total awareness of his pain. A great magus he was, but his Vision was to big for the small Victorian ego it inhabited. Crowley was unable to overcome his arisitcratic training, and thus his revelation became as poison unto him. In a Just-the-facts biography, Lawrence Sutin chronicles the Tragedy of the Beast. The work is well done, doing its best to avoid rumor and vitriol condemnation. Much of the information comes from Crowley's own diaries and the words of the people who knew him. I also appriciated the fact that Sutin does not end with any sort of Asopian Moral to the Story. The tale provides its own moral as the reader interprets it. There are a few stylistic problems, however, marr what is otherwise a wonderful book. First, Sutin throws around terms like Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram without suspecting that some readers might not know what he's talking about. Throughout, he assumes a primer knowledge of the rites of Ceremonial Magick that the reader may not posees. Also, his endnotes are confusing and referance to them hampers the flow of reading. I recomend this book for any who want to understand the Master Therion. It is a tragedy on par with Promethius.
Rating:
Summary: The Definitive Crowley Biography
Review: A superb work; the definitive Crowley biography. Objective, thorough, and eye opening. Perhaps some Thelemites would prefer hagiography to biography, I for one would not. "Veil not thy vices in virtuous words."
Rating:
Summary: The Beast Laid Bare
Review: Aleister Crowley is important as a cultural icon; he is on the cover of "Sgt. Pepper," and has served as a model for characters in plenty of twentieth century novels. Lawrence Sutin has tried to make his importance clear in _Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley_ (St. Martin's Press), and to a large part has succeeded. It is a big, readable biography, and Sutin has done his best to be sympathetic to his subject. That must not have been easy. Whether or not Crowley was "The Wickedest Man in the World," as the tabloids liked to call him, he was often a jerk, although an entertaining one, and his life makes for entertaining reading. Crowley was known, to his pleasure, as The Beast, identified with 666 and the Antichrist. He pursued magic (or Magick, as he spelled it) all his life, saying, "The adventure of the Great Work is the only one worth while; for all others are but interludes in the sinister farce of Life and Death, which limits all merely human endeavor." This extreme seriousness was to mark all his efforts (which also extended into writing novels and a huge amount of poetry, as well as mountain climbing). The seriousness is also the thing that is funniest about his life, at least to me; I am skeptical about a lot of religious beliefs, but Crowley served his up with some real silliness. One of his titles in his beginning magickal career, for instance, was "Lord of the Paths in the Portal of the Vault of the Adepts and an Adeptus Minor of the Second Order Rosae Rubeae et Aureae Crucis." He was able to enter the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and various other mystical sects, founding his own along the way. He studied the ancient lore of alchemy and magick with fervor. He practiced spells and magic rituals with complete sincerity, ... in various ceremonies. He crucified a frog. He incorporated mystical ... experiences into his rituals, using ... different variants of... couplings to elevate his learning to higher planes. This work led to strange occult books attempting to unify his huge knowledge of ancient lore. His _The Book of the Law_ has had a persistent life since it first emerged, and continues to influence thousands of believers, and these days, their websites. This silly, unsuccessful man founded a new religion that may well be regarded as the wellspring of "New Age" nonsense. His work influences Scientology and Wicca, which are going strong. As such, whether scoffers like me like it or not, he will continue to have enormous influence. Sutin's biography may have a little too much deference, but he certainly does not shy away from the many unpleasant aspects of Crowley's life and character. There is so much enigmatic material presented here that the main effect of studying the life of Crowley is a huge puzzlement. Crowley would be delighted that even Sutin's careful delineation has failed to humanize The Beast.
Rating: 
Summary: Do what thou wilt Book of the Law
Review: Aleister Crowley started off 1875 son of a orthodox preacher but was called BEAST by his mother early in life. His path in esoteric knowledge turned to the left early and he pursued art of magic and became known as the beast and the black magician. Wrote several books on magic and was quite a womanizer. Book extremely detailed. All in all, as a student in western esoteric tradition, I would not pursue further inquiry about the man or his writings.
Rating:
Summary: "insighting" an intellectual riot
Review: an intelligent, revealing probe into the madness and genius of Crowley. Sutin paints a vivid picture filled with insights not found in other sources. The author weaves together a web of intriguing, thoughtful and penetrating ideas that make for amusing and satisfying reading. To take on such an "overly written-about" subject and pull it off with flair requires a mighty pen indeed. Sutin exceeds all expectations in this powerful, eloquent work.
Rating:
Summary: Psyche is probed in depth in this coverage
Review: Any who think of Aleister Crowley is a psychic alone will find Do What Thou Wilt to be an in-depth biography packed with revelations about the man: he was an upper class Englishman who not only had a psychic knack, but was a gifted poet and visionary. His psyche is probed in depth in this coverage.
Rating:
Summary: His reputation preceded him...
Review: Apart from being a first class scoundrel, there are some notable qualities about this man, and Sutin manages to portray these qualities, along with Crowley's defects with admirable equilibrium. As Lawrence Sutin points out, Aleister Crowley was a genius at self-promotion, but most of his life received the wrong kind of publicity to sell his books. (Which apart from his spiritual pursuits, was his major motivation in life) It seems, above all else, Crowley wanted to be a recognized 'man of letters' in the 19th century sense of the term. That is, in the Romantic tradition, positioning himself with the likes of Shelly and Byron. If one can ignore the hoopla that continues ad nauseam about the man, and takes the time and trouble to read his voluminous works, can recognize these Romantic influences. He was also a Modernist writer that ranks with the authors we associate with that tradition: Ezra Pound, D.H. Lawrence and many others. The problem with Crowley, however, is that his reputation always preceded him, influencing the public into premature and hasty judgements. This is a common problem with large personalities. Granted, though, 'the beast' deserved some of the slanderous publicity that was continually thrown his way -he also, at times, consciously created it. As is the case with many famous and infamous personalities, such as Sigmund Freud, Aaron Burr, and R.F. Burton, for example, is that the public will cast judgement on them without investigating their lives or reading their works. I cannot even count the numerous instances where people would dismiss Freud and his works, without having read anything about psychoanalysis; basing their judgements on some personal bias or dubious secondary source. Sutin's fair biography of Aleister Crowley gives the reader the opportunity to investigate the many facets of the man, and at last dispel the 'tabloid' generated myths surrounding him. Aleister Crowley was an eccentric of the first order. His unusual personality evoked fascination, awe, puzzlement, disdain and pure hatred from many noteworthy people of his time. Any way you look at it, however, his 'spiritual-calling' was quite real; remove the innuendo and gossip mongering, he truly believed that his 'Book of the Law' was the spiritual message for a new age. And the message is a simple one: "...devoting oneself earnestly to one's true work on earth, which could be discovered through self-examination guided by advice of wise men." (P.370) Through dogged persistence and intense self-examination, one may discover their true will, and by following it, will develop as a human being. This of course echoes the advice of the philosopher, Socrates - "Know thy self", which is one of our main tasks in life. As Socrates went on to say, "The unexamined life is not worth living." Interestingly, Crowley's 'Book of ther Law', essentially proposes the same thing. This is a wonderfully detailed account of one of the most notorious characters of the twentieth century. Sutin has approached the subject in a scholarly and balanced manner, giving us the chance to assess Aleister Crowley at his best and diabolical worst - an excellent biography.
Rating: 
Summary: how'd he do that?
Review: how do you take the fascinating life of a fascinating man, one of the most colorful figures of the entire 20th century and reduce it to a tediously boring academic yawn fest? i dunno, but Sutin sure does. ask him.
Rating:
Summary: After Fifty Years of Waiting, a Fair Assessment of Aleister
Review: How many people imagined, I wonder, huddled together in the dismal damp of the British crematorium in which Aleister Crowley's bodily remains were cremated, that the significance of Aleister Crowley's literary and spiritual legacy would still be being debated more than half a century after his death in 1947? He died, bankrupt, disreputable, ostracized and virtually friendless, a prematurely aged asthmatic heroin addict. The lesser of his spiritual organizations, the Ordo Templi Orientis, fell apart after his death (his major organization, the A.'.A.'., had fallen apart decades earlier). Since John Symonds, Crowley's literary executor, tried to complete the job of the tabloids by completing vilifying his subject in a series of brilliantly researched but abjectly bigoted revised biographies, culminating in the now hard to find *King of the Shadow Realms," we have been waiting for a biography which actually does what a biography is supposed to do: understand its subject. Our wait has not been in vain. Lawrence Sutin's biography, *Do What Thou Wilt*, somewhat tediously titled, perhaps, is nevertheless an accurate, insightful, and well-researched expose of a complex and brilliant man whose contribution to the contemporary counterculture cannot be underestimated. Only Sutin's account rivals the meticulous factual research of John Symonds, but, unlike Symonds, Sutin looks at both sides of Aleister Crowley, and actually seeks to communicate, so far as possible in a biographical rather than an intellectual study, the meaning of Crowley's message without ignoring or understating the complexities of the man himself. Whereas John Symonds pompously declares that Aleister Crowley was merely a psychotic, thus begging the question of why he has written so profusely about him and published several editions of his most important works, Sutin takes his subject seriously and in the process provides numerous original insights and new factual information concerning Crowley's life which makes *Do What Thou Wilt* an invaluable addition to the Crowley legacy.
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