Stephen Sennitt

This volume contains two component works, the first of which is itself composite as an anthology from the British "dark side" magick periodical NOX, which covered the overlapping ranges of Chaos Magick, Satanism, "Creative Occultism" (i.e. the "Typhonian" flavor of Thelema), and Lovecraftian sorcery in the 1980s. Stephen Sennitt, the editor of NOX, was the sole author of the second section Liber Koth.

The NOX anthology (previously published in its own volume as Nox: The Black Book) is divided into three sections. The first section is concerned with the Satanic ideology and magical practice of the Order of Nine Angles, and primarily authored by Anton Long and David Myatt. (Readers have proposed that the former is merely a pen name of the latter.) The ONA is probably the most extreme Satanist group to attain its level of organization in recent decades. The second section treats another late-20th-century manifestation of Satanism, Nicholas Schreck's Werewolf Order, which, like the ONA, attempts to activate mythic elements of radical right-wing political movements within an occultist framework.

The third section of the NOX anthology is dedicated to "The Nameless Sodality," and in fact represents no organized group, but rather an eclectic mixture of modern occultism, drawing on Thelema, Voodoo, Yog-Sothothery, humanistic psychology, and other materials. The contributions from multiple authors are of variable quality, with the most competent and interesting pieces being from the pen of editor Sennitt himself and Chaoist Phil Hine. The co-opting of Thelemic symbolism and doctrines in this section is mostly of the promiscuous and incoherent sort promoted by Kenneth Grant.

Liber Koth is characterized by Sennitt as having been "received" from "its provenance in the Pits of the Outer Yuggothian Spheres." It adopts an interesting mixture of narrative invocation, technical instruction, and documentary anecdote to present an eightfold ritual for astral exploration/creation in the framework of the "Cthulhu Mythos." Although it is much shorter that the other text with which it is bound in this volume, as a matter of practical interest and magical value, I found Liber Koth far more worthwhile than the contents of NOX.… (mehr)