Magick and Divination

Kathryn Huxtable's Pagan Bibliography

("An it harm none...")

With the exception of Agrippa and Regardie, I'm not including much pre-revival magick. Though I think it's important to understand where we came from, medieval magick is not particularly central to most of modern Pagan/Wiccan practice, though it may be to ceremonialists. In particular, it's not central to my practice. And while Aleister Crowley has some good quotes, he's not, in my opinion, worth reading.

I don't do astrology. I know enough about it to find it interesting, but I don't really know much about it and so I only have one basic source.

Agrippa, Henry Cornelius. Three Books of Occult Philosophy. Translated by James Freake, edited by Donald Tyson. Llewellyn, St. Paul, 1993.

This is one of the foundation books of the western occult tradition. The Golden Dawn draws heavily upon this material and others. It's very Christian in its theological outlook. Published in sixteenth century Europe, how could it be anything else? Unless you're really interested in medieval magick, or are interested in a historical perspective, I think this is too wooden to slog through.

Amber K. True Magick. Llewellyn, St. Paul, 1990.

Excellent basic introduction to spell-casting. If I hadn't come to it late, this might have been my foundation book. As it is, that honor goes to Starhawk's The Spiral Dance.

Beyerl, Paul. The Master Book of Herbalism. Phoenix, Custer, Washington, 1984.

Divided into two parts, remedial and magickal. Good material, reasonably complete, but with a pseudo-archaic style which I found rather wooden. Contains more oils than Cunningham (q.v.).

Bonewits, Isaac. Real Magic. Revised. Samuel Weiser, York Beach, Maine, 1989. First published in 1971.

An overview of different philosophical approaches to magick. This is a classic, written by one of the neo-pagan movements early theoreticians.

Cunningham, Scott. Earth Power. Llewellyn Publications, St. Paul, 1983.

Folk magic: natural magic of the earth and day-to-day living. Spells of the sea, rivers and springs, the Sun and Moon, storms and rain, trees and knots and mirrors.

________. Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs. Llewellyn Publications, St. Paul, 1985.

Listing of herbs and other plants, with an eye toward their use in magick. As with anything Scott Cunningham did, it's an excellent overall source.

Farrar, Janet and Stewart. Spells and How They Work. Phoenix, Custer, Washington, 1990.

Introduction to basic spell-casting, with a description of several types of magickal alphabets, plus the making of sigils. A bit of cabalistic lore.

Gray, Eden. Mastering the Tarot. New American Library, New York, 1973.

Good quick reference to the interpretations of the cards in the Rider-Waite deck. This frequently comes packaged with the Rider-Waite deck.

Greer, Mary K. Tarot for Your Self. Newcastle Publishing, North Hollywood, 1984.

A workbook for personal transformation. Lots of good meditation material, plus a sort of biorhythm-ish technique for tracking significant events via your birthdate and various cards it relates to.

Judith, Anodea. Wheels of Life. Llewellyn, St. Paul, 1987.

A user's guide to the chakra system. The basic western introduction to this very eastern system of magickal energy.

Pollack, Rachel. Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom. Parts I & II. Aquarian Press, Northamptonshire, 1980.

In depth analysis of each card in the Rider-Waite deck from a psychological perspective. Since this is how I use Tarot, this is more useful to me than the Eden Gray. Her take on Tarot is a bit different from the usual. I like it.

Regardie, Israel. The Golden Dawn. Llewellyn, St. Paul, 1982.

The complete Golden Dawn course of study. Includes introductory knowlege lectures, initation rituals for grades up to Adeptus Minor, and a collected encyclopedia of occultism. Yes, I've read this. It's important background to the western occult tradition. It doesn't really inform my practice, though.

Waite, Arthur Edward. The Pictorial Key to the Tarot. U.S. Games Systems, Stamford, Connecticut, 1992. Originally published in 1910.

The master himself, cryptic and arrogant as always. Still, the Rider-Waite tarot was designed at his direction, and though I'm all for reinterpreting things, we should know what their original intent was.... The edition I have is printed on nice, white, opaque paper. The black and white drawings reproduce very well, should you need an image.

Woolfolk, Joanne Martine. The Only Astrology Book You'll Ever Need. Scarborough House, Lanham, Maryland, 1982.

Introductory overview of the first human science, with and eye toward getting you able to cast a simple chart and interpret it. The only problem I have with it is that it uses the Equal House system, and most astrologers I know use Placidus. It's fairly superficial, but if you're curious as to what astrology is all about and how it works, this will satisfy that curiosity.

Contact kathryn@kathrynhuxtable.org with questions or comments about this page.

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This file was modified Wednesday, 15-Dec-2004 12:54:16 PST