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CROWLEY, ALEISTER. 1905-07 The Works of Aleister Crowley. 3 vols. in one. Inscribed.
CROWLEY, ALEISTER. The Works of Aleister Crowley. 3 volumes in one, as issued. 8vo, original gilt-lettered white flexible buckram, spine darkened, ends bumped, some soiling on covers; minor foxing on endpapers; top edges gilt, others uncut. London: Foyers Society for the Propagation of Religious Truth, 1905-07
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Notes: first collected edition, in the one-volume "Essay Competition" issue. In an attempt to bolster lagging sales Crowley offered a prize of £100 for the best critical essay on his writings. The sole entry came from Captain J. F. C. Fuller, whose essay gained him Crowley''s friendship and publication in Crowley''s Equinox, though not the prize money.
With the ownership inscription of the literary critic and editor Raymond Radclyffe and with a signed inscription from crowley dated 26 May 1942 to the BBC broadcaster and author Collin Brooks:
"I am sad, for he [arrow drawn to Radclyffe''s name] was one of the very best that ever lived; a City Editor, straight as Euclid before Einstein attacked him, and one of the best literary critics and friends in the world. But now I am glad, for Collin Brooks to whom I give this copy (which is not mine to give) has restored me to that ''too much love of living'' which I had thought I had parted (?)."
The praise of Radclyffe may be due to his having written a rare positive review of Crowley''s Collected Works nearly 30 years earlier. The inscription is a sad illustration of this dark period of the author''s life, when he suffered from poverty, old age, and a daily heroin habit intended to alleviate his respiratory difficulties.
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