NEWS: The Lost Occult Books of Victor Neuburg

'We will leave the silver moon-flowers of old thought for the gold sun-flowers of our true Apollonian theme ... It is before Dionysus, the maddening one, the disturber, came rudely in the twilight to make the fair, even world, odd and fantastic; the horns thrusting apart the twin thighs of duality.  Out of that odd, wild, Bacchic art came Unity, for the order of the old tie was as a chaos to the goat-god...' 

- from 'Dionysus and Diana'

Coming soon - with your help - from the resurrected Vine Press is a fascinating sounding collection of 'lost' occult poems from Victor B. Neuburg.  Languishing, mostly unread, for over  a century this first publication is being marshalled into being by Justin Hopper (author of 'Old Weird Albion'), designer Stefan Musgrove and Neuburg's granddaughter Caroline who dedicated her life to preserving and promoting her grandfather's work.

 

Justin contacted me recently to help promote the Kickstarter they've set up to fund the publication -

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/oldweirdalbion/lost-occult-books-of-the-1920s-relaunching-vine-press

 

- and kindly provided the information below...

Victor Neuburg (almost certainly), Rites of Eleusis,
London, 1910. (From The Bystander, 1910)

In 1924 the poet, publisher and occultist Victor Neuburg was visited by unidentifiable spirits in his cottage in a small Sussex town. As he later put it, these voices ‘dictated’ poems to him – streams-of-consciousness pieces of prose steeped in esoteric symbolism. He wrote them down, nearly 100 pieces of writing, into the form of a book he called The Water Bearer. 

 

And no one would touch it. None less than Ralph Shirley, the editor of The Occult Review, told Victor that these were unique, wholly original, works, but ‘what publisher would risk it?’ 

For the next 100 years these poems sat, mostly unread, in a family chest. Until now. 

 

Victor Neuburg is best known as the magical (and sexual) partner of Aleister Crowley; as the man who discovered the poet Dylan Thomas; as a funny name that comes up when mentioning just about any aspect of early-20th century British counterculture. (An anarchist who advocated for gay rights and prison reform; the living connection between the Decadents and the Surrealists; friend to Austin Osman Spare and inspiration to Peter Warlock; early champion of nudists and yoga; the list continues.) 

 

‘Stan’, Dion Byngham, Victor Neuburg, ‘Frank’, 
late-1920s likely The Sanctuary, West Sussex. 
Photo copyright Justin Hopper. 

His published poetry books now sell for hundreds or even thousands, but perhaps his greatest-ever works – those which best espoused his bizarre hodge-podge of occult and spiritual beliefs – have been read by almost no one alive. 

 

We’re publishing these works as one of the last wishes of Caroline Neuburg, the poet’s granddaughter, who dove deeply into them – her copious notes on the symbolism in the works will act as introduction to the book The Water Bearer and Other Lost Works of Victor Neuburg. 

 

You can pre-order, and help make it all happen – a century in the making – through the 30th of October at www.vinepress.co.uk

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