Are hardcover occult books worth the cost?

Hmm, I am a little slow some days--I still not be able to figure out who said what.

One of the latest bits of news is that the ROGD is almost out of signed hardbound copies of Pat Zalewski's Golden Dawn Rituals and Commentaries. The few remaining copies are currently for sale through the HOGD site.

This got me thinking about something--are hardcover occult books really worth the cost?

In this case of this particular book, I brought a signed hardcover shortly after they came out. I picked my favorite number (the sum of the traditional planets). For me, it was worth the cost. I brought a copy of the previous edition from Pat years ago. It is a book that I consult quite often; it is also a book that I have inflicted bits and pieces of onto my fellow and lady lodge members. Given the amount of use that I have gotten out of the previous edition, I figured that spending some extra money on a hardcover copy was well worth it.

My friends who are familiar with my magical practices can tell what books that I use; they are the books held together with packing tape, or which have fallen out of their covers with the pages now residing in three-ring binders. The exceptions are the books that I own in hardcover...and even they show some wear and tear if they are among the books that I actually use. There is a red hardcover that I own that is blackish with fingerprints.

777 and Other KBL Works (Crowley), Golden Dawn (Llewellyn edition--has been replaced twice), Godwin's Cabalistic Encyclopedia, Modern Magic (the old edition--Kraig), a couple of reference books by Scott Cunningham, a couple of books by Pat Zalewski, and a book by the Ciceros: all of these are taped and falling apart. There are a few others.

On the other hand, I have got some books that show absolutely no wear and tear at all.

"This book is in mint condition. How long have you had it?"
"Since it came out. Karen special-ordered it for me."
"Huh. So in ten years, you have opened it how many times?"
"About two dozen. It is a pretty useless book."
"Yes, I can tell--it is still in mint condition. Still you could probably sell it."
"I will, once I find someone who is willing to submit to highway robbery."

Of course, that is the potential problem with hardcover occult books. Especially those from unknown writers or source books you have never actually seen. You could end up with an expensive hardcover that is good only for weighing down papers that you are gluing together (an actual use of heavy hardcover books in my house).

But overall, I will admit that hardcover editions--the limited editions, that is--tend to hold their value, at least from a collector's viewpoint. And occasionally, even one of the useless ones will leap up in value--provided that you can locate the right buyer--making the investment worthwhile. If you can actually use them, it is a bonus (though in all fairness, you should never use a copy that you brought solely for investment purposes--use of a book wrecks its resale value).

Thoughts about academics and documented proof

Between the blogosphere's hot zone over Ronald Hutton v Ben Whitmore and someone asking for proof that the original Golden Dawn did an 180 positioning during the purification and consecration, I have been giving a lot of thought to the burden of documented proof and academics lately.

A long time ago, I came to the conclusion that no amount of proof about certain practices, including a signed, dated, and notorized letter from Westcott and Mathers, is going to convince certain people who believe that certain ideas and procedures were not part of the system. It is that simple. The stronger a person believes that certain things are one way and one way only, the less likely that you are going to be able to convince them otherwise. The same goes for trying to convince people to try new procedures and ideas out when they believe that only the ancient techniques should be used.

I have also came to the conclusion that the esoteric world needs to have both the mythical history and the actual history. Mythical history provides us with emotional support, while being able to talk about the actual history makes us less likely to look like loons.

We are not likely to ever know the absolute truth about anything. The best that we can do is assign a percentage of probability to any given fact or statement based on our current knowledge and resources.

Now I will admit that I find the flame/witch war raging around Hutton v Whitmore amusing; it reminds me of some of the mudslinging that I have seen sitting on the sidelines of academia. Yes, even an undergrad gets to see politics and mudslinging. I think that in my case, with my goal of getting at least a masters degree (history or literature or maybe both), and my past experience in the witch and flame wars (1980's Denver---yeah!), makes me more attuned to seeing how academics treat one another.

Hutton when he published knew that he was opening himself up to criticism. And he knew that not all of it was going to come from trained professionals. There is no law that says that only trained professional academics can review and nitpick the work of professional historians. (The same rule applies to professional occultists and writers.) Rebuttals can come from anyone. Just assign percent values to the original work and the rebuttals and reviews and MOVE ON!

In fact, I hate to say this (sorry to everyone)---but this flame war over Hutton's and Whitmore's works might actually be good. One of the harsh realities of book publishing is that people have to be aware of a book if it is going to sell any copies. It is word-of-mouth that sells books. While I wish there was less name-calling, I am glad that people are becoming more aware of these books.

Expensive but unused occult books

Yesterday, I was looking though my email, and opened the latest advertisment from New Falcon Publications. New Falcon is offering for sale five leather bound copies of The Complete Golden Dawn System of Magic, one for each element (complete with an unique symbol), signed by Lon Milo DuQuette. They are going to retail for $999 each.

(There is a discount if you buy one before June 5, 2010.)

And my first thought was "Here are five copies of the book that are never actually going to be used."

At a certain price level, occult books hit the point where they are so expensive that their only purpose is as collector items; no one is ever crack the them open to actually use them because to do so would devalue them.

(It reminds me of comic books. There are people who buy comic books, seal them in plastic, solely for their investment value.)

The only exceptation to this tends to be books that a few people use for their "super secret initiated knowledge." And then they will sell you the information for a (large) pretty penny, though they will say it is "freely provided to the members of their Order."

(By the way, if you wrote the book in question, this is ok. I only find this really wrong when a Chief is ripping off the work of other writers and charging outrageous sums for access to the informatio. If you are the one that did the work, assembling it and expending it, you deserve the opportunity to try to make a profit from your own skull sweat.)

In general, expensive occult books do not get used. It does not matter how great a book is, if you put a large enourgh price tag on it, no one will dare open the book in fear of damaging it.

Fortunately for me, and the occult community in general, we now have a ground leveler---the almighty PDF. Say what you will about PDFs, but they allow everyone access to the expensive books without anyone having to worry about damaging the investment value of their expensive copy.