Reviews for The Occult: A History

The average rating for The Occult: A History based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2008-05-26 00:00:00 Susan Mallcott As a Christian, I was so afraid to even touch a book like this. But I knew who Colin Wilson was and enjoyed his intriguing style. I read the Occult and could not put it down. It is a really excellent book and it shows you what the human psyche is capable of, which brings to mind books of Tony Buzan who wrote the BBC use your mind series. You will not sin if you pick up such a book and plunge into it and see what the word "OCCULT" really means, apart from the phobia and hysteria that is attached to it in conservative Christian circles.

Review # 2 was written on 2015-07-05 00:00:00 Gino Coelho Any trained historian will be able to see the problem with writing a comprehensive history on a topic so steeped in subjectivism, rumor, and limited sources. Wilson, perhaps to his credit, does not try to simulate academic historical methodologies, but rather lets his poetic soul wander as it will, looking for connections between past-life-experiences, shady secret societies, and ancient systems of divination. Where his narrative falls down for me is his “hypothesis” of “Faculty X,” which is the mysterious “something” that connects all of these threads, and which he insists that humanity “must” understand for its growth and survival. It’s an interesting enough idea, but it’s too undeveloped to place so much significance upon. In the end, this book is a New Age reinterpretation of magical/spiritual history, and one which will seem dated to most people today. What keeps it interesting is Wilson’s imagination and prose, which takes fragmentary information and turns it into a narrative of human potential. Looked at as a poetical project, similar to his mentor Robert Graves’s writings. Most of the science is dubious at best, and it should not be taken as a guide to any kind of practice.