Book Reviews

Solitary Wicca for Life: A Complete Guide to Mastering the Craft on Your Own by Arin Murphy-Hiscock
Solitary Wicca for Life from its first sentence distinguishes itself from Wicca 101 books.  The author establishes from the onset that this book is targeted towards the intermediate practitioner, pledging to delve further beyond the practices and rituals, offering an alternate point of view to challenge the pre-existing assumptions we hold.  With bated breath, I turned to Chapter One, preparing to be thoroughly enlightened and inspired.  To my disappointment, neither occurred.
Murphy-Hiscock provides an outline of the origins of Wicca that for those who are familiar with the debate about whether or not Wicca is, as Gerald Gardner purported, handed down from an ancient lineage, or adapted by Gardner from Co-Masonry and Aleister Crowley’s rituals, this section will seem one-sided.  The author compares Wicca with wisecraft (a vast leap in history and theology) and ponders that it “probably honoured a moon goddess and a hunter/vegetation god” (p. 1).  She then continues to provide the potential etymological roots of the word “Wicca” that has been presented by Wicca 101 books ad nauseum and does little to consider the possibility that the word was formed arbitrarily, and thus all discussions of etymology are perhaps only retrospective prescriptions of meaning.
It is of significance to note that the author is not ignorant of the contentious sources of Wicca’s basic tenets and refers to the similarities with Aleister Crowley’s work and the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in her discussion (but refraining from supporting the idea that Gardner intentionally derived his ideas from them).  However, in a book that explicitly defines its target audience as more advanced practitioners and aspires to become a guide for “mastering the Craft on your own”, I believe it would have been beneficial for the author to undertake even more extensive and rigorous research on the history and origins of Wicca so that she may begin the book on a more solidly intelligent and considered approach.
I understand the value in providing a brief overview of the basics of Wicca although I continued reading to Chapter Seven (almost half the book) and did not gain the impression that the contents were particularly original or novel.  While I would presume that many of the exercises, recipes and visualisations mentioned throughout are composed by the author, I did not find that they would have been either challenging for an intermediate Wiccan or something that they could not have just as easily developed to more personal and rewarding effects over their own years of practice.
As such, for intermediate to advanced readers, Solitary Wicca for Life will most likely not be original or challenging enough for you.  When I think about an ideal intermediate book, I believe it should take a more micro-level perspective of ritual and spellwork to reveal as Murphy-Hiscock promised, “the inner working[s]” (viii).  This is the second self-purported “intermediate” book that has promised to tackle this in its preface only to leave me cold.  The first was Deborah Lipp’s Elements of Ritual.  For example, the author discusses the practice of spiritual record-keeping (p. 80) and includes a list of the details that she counsels ought to be included, comprising of points such as the weather and health (and menstrual cycle if you are female).  Most of these details are widely advised by introductory Wiccan books, however, I would have liked to read Murphy-Hiscock’s impressions on why each of the points she listed is necessary and how exactly these details can benefit future ritual work.  She is prescriptive to the point of noting that the name of the ritual and its type “should be [recorded] at the top of the sheet” (p. 81).  It would have been even more illuminating to understand why because that would have distinguished this book from its countless introductory predecessors that have explicated little more than Solitary Wicca for Life did.
You may wonder then that perhaps the value in this book is not to tell us what to think, but in providing the author’s own framework, prompt us to do the same for our practice.  This is a justified reasoning, however, once more, the explicitly stated purpose of this book as one to challenge the intermediate reader, renders that reasoning insubstantial. Intermediate practitioners can gain an equal amount of inspiration by simply having a conversation with an experienced friend or reading publicly available rituals and recipes online to gain new ideas and adapt their practices, assuming that they have not done so beyond the scope of this book already.
Solitary Wicca for Life would have been much more unique and provocative if it ventured as deep as it established itself to do, leaving fewer statements unjustified, rather than expecting the reader to make the cognitive leap on their own.
Murphy-Hiscock, A. (2005), Solitary Wicca for Life: A Complete Guide to Mastering the Craft on Your Own, Avon, MA: Provenance Press.

** out of 5
October 2008

The Elements of Ritual: Air, Fire, Water and Earth in the Wiccan Circle by Deborah Lipp
This book came highly recommended to me as a model of how Wiccan books should be written.  I was assured that it provides the “why” in addition to the more readily available “how” of ritual, and thus expected an intelligent and well-researched document that enlightened its readers to the origins of Wiccan ritual practices.  While The Elements of Ritual did not meet my high expectations, the book redeemed itself for me with the inclusion of unique and breathtaking ritual styles.
Lipp establishes the tone of the book by providing a detailed, interpretative exploration to the four elements of Air, Fire, Water and Earth.  She further structures her chapters so that each aspect of the Circle Casting ritual of Wicca is examined from a practical (Earth), theological (Air), mythological (Water) and mystical (Fire) viewpoint.  However, it does not always remain in this order.  As Lipp continually reordered the sequence in which the four aspects (practical, theological, mythological and mystical aspects) were explored, the structure lacked consistency, giving the book a generally free-form, interpretative feel that renders it unsuitable for the reference guide she suggested for which it could be easily used.  While some historical or cultural variations to the four elements are briefly mentioned, on the whole, it revolves around the four elements of Wiccan tradition and Lipp’s personal interpretations of them.  After a short introduction, The Elements of Ritual delves into Circle Casting, from preliminary preparation through to its Closing.
The attempt to structure the book with corresponding elements is symptomatic of a broader inclination to conflate disparate traditions and systems of magic.  Most memorably, Lipp jarringly equates the four precepts of the Golden Dawn, adapted by Wiccans and renamed The Witches’ Pyramid—To Know, To Will, To Dare and To Keep Silent—with each of the four elements, forcing congruence and correspondence when there is none.  Lipp’s preference for doing this often meant the distinct traditions and systems she attempted to match were reduced to their lowest common denominators and as a consequence, acknowledgement and appreciation of them as unique practices in their own right were lost.
The Elements of Ritual is frequently praised for its exploration into the “why” aspects of Circle Casting, as Lipp emphasises is a predominant motivation in writing this book (see p. 1).  Her attempts to provide the background on the steps of Circle Casting remained interpretive and intuitive, and having raised the “why” question so early on, the lack of explicit, background information became all the more evident.  For me, Lipp fell just slightly short of achieving that ambitious, although important, goal.
Lipp, D. (2003), The Elements of Ritual: Air, Fire, Water, & Earth in the Wiccan Circle, St.Paul: Llewellyn.

** out of 5
December 2007

The Heart of Wicca: Wise Words from a Crone on the Path by Ellen Cannon Reed
For a small book, The Heart of Wicca contains a big message.  Reed observes the growing trend for Wicca to become a spiritual quick-fix for people who take one Wicca 101 course or reads two or three Pop Wicca books and think they have earned the right to call themselves “Lady Feathersniffwinterwing” and begin initiating witches into their coven.  This short, but beautifully written book will surely guarantee Reed’s passionate cause continues long into the development of modern day witchcraft.
Although Reed is firm in her acknowledgement that misconceptions and false histories (e.g. Margaret Murray’s Neolithic pagans) pervade Wicca, she frequently refers to the “old ways” and states that we have “roots so far in the past” in her introduction and conclusion.  It can appear to be contradictory without explicitly distinguishing between past, as referring to the pseudo-history espoused of the continuous matriarchal religion and past, as referring to the echoes of shamanic practices in Neo-Paganism.
I would recommend this book highly to people who are open to the idea of Wicca but question the words and beliefs of it’s more public practitioners whom they have encountered and question their integrity and honour.  My friends and family have been more frequently exposed to the Lady Feathersniffwinterwing’s or the Lord Darkcrystalspheresnowglobe’s and this is the perfect piece of literature with which to enlighten them of the resilient integrity, honour and passion in the Craft.  Moreover, this book is heartening for those who seek to practise the examined religion but like Reed, have seen the religion they love in the past decade be bent and manipulated to suit the trivial motives of its dabblers.  Reed’s vision that we witches ought to uphold a relentless sense of responsibility, strict self-discipline, and a lifelong dedication to learning, is a noble and worthy one, and I for one, relish her challenge.
Cannon Reed, E. (2000), The Heart of Wicca: Wise Words from a Crone on the Path, York Beach: Samuel Weiser.

***½ out of 5
December 2007

Witchcraft and Paganism in Australia by Lynne Hume
Lynne Hume is an Associate Professor in Studies in Religion at the University of Queensland.  Witchcraft and Paganism in Australia was the result of six years of fieldwork, in which she participated in Pagan rituals with covens in both Australia and Canada, gathered archival data from Pagan newsletters, as well as conducted interviews and questionnaires.  The book was published in 1997, and it is its age that lends itself to some of its greatest weaknesses.
A surprisingly large portion of the organisations, festivals and societies that Hume references are either defunct, or have continued to remain in obscurity with lukewarm reception through these past ten years, such as the Pan Pacific Pagan Alliance, Church of Wicca and the Church of All Worlds, just to name a few.  Consequently, the datedness of the book limited its relevance.
Another point of discomfort about this book was in addition to the obsolete groups she cites, the same could be said about the generalisations she makes about Paganism and Wicca.  Take for example, on page 93, when she draws the connection between Paganism and ‘green politics’ and their offspring, Creation Spirituality, or on page 97, when she refers to Pagans’ screening process for aspiring coven initiates where they may reject a person on the basis that they are “psychically stinking” to suggest that they have “attracted unwanted psychic elements”.
I began practising Wicca in 1998 and didn’t really begin to network with other Wiccans and Pagans in the community until 2001, however, I could not believe how many discrepancies there existed between Hume’s experiences and mine, considering we were both involved in the local Australian community.  Like the two examples I mentioned earlier in this paragraph, there were numerous observations she made that I have never heard any Pagan even mention in my life.  This disconcerting matter left me pondering two possibilities, that firstly, the Australian Pagan landscape has evolved dramatically since 1997 from factional, individualised interpretations featured in Hume’s book to a more cohesive, collective coherence, or secondly, her research subjects were the exception, rather than the rule, and provided her with data irrelevant to what Wiccans and Pagans by large practised.
Before delving into Witchcraft and Paganism, I also read Hume’s conference paper Compendium Beneficiorum: Beliefs and Practices of Modern Witchcraft in Australia delivered at the 19th Annual Conference of the Australian Association for the Study of Religions in Adelaide, in 1994.  Having done so, I am more inclined to believe the former.  Her approach differs from Hutton’s in the respect that Hutton, a historian, makes an argument in Triumph of the Moon to dispel the myth that Paganism is the surviving remnants of a continuous, ancient religion.  Hume, an anthropologist, is situated more in the present, and fights for a cause to dispel the myths that Paganism is a religion equivocated with Satanic cults and made the subject of persecution.
After Hume outlines the cultural premise of Paganism in Australia, she begins to present the more fascinating insights into how Pagans have sought out the religion as a path towards meaningful, spiritual experiences, and the second half of the book improves exponentially.  Her research on shamanistic practices and Rosaleen Norton, a notorious Australian artist commonly associated with witchcraft, was thoroughly interesting, even if their relations to Paganism remained tenuous.
In sum, I would most likely not recommend this book, as there are much more relevant and in-depth books out there since the publication of Witchcraft and Paganism unless you have a specific interest in the attitudes of witches and Pagans, and society’s attitudes towards them, during the mid to late 1990’s in Australia.
Hume, L. (1997), Witchcraft and Paganism in Australia, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.

** out of 5
December 2007

Practising the Witch’s Craft: Real Magic under a Southern Sky edited by Douglas Ezzy
Douglas Ezzy introduces to us to a host of Australian Witches who share with us their first magical experiences, philosophical beliefs, and lessons in spellcraft and divination.  Practising the Witch’s Craft reflects the diversity of Witches in Australia.  While some might find its fragmentation of various voices disconcerting, where each chapter moves from personal journal entry, to guide and primer, with little coherence for its sequence, it is on the other hand, absolutely necessary to provide a colourful cross-section of modern paganism in Australia.
Ezzy’s introduction to the book, ‘What is a Witch?’ presents an informative and straightforward overview of the basics of Wicca and Witchcraft.  Ezzy’s unpretentious style reveals his genuine appreciation of and respect for his own experiences in Witchcraft, which is a clear breath of fresh air by which to begin the book.  The air gets denser as the book progresses and only improves slightly towards the later chapters of the book, by which I had long found myself drowning in a sea of hermetic occult references and postmodern narrative styles.
With such a unique opportunity for ordinary, everyday Witches to share their stories with the wider Australian audience, it is no surprise that its contributors embraced their charges with fervour.  However, the majority of the chapters presented Witchcraft with a stilted air of importance and intrigue, which in my experience is quite unlike how liberated revivalists of pagan ideals tend to write.  There was a recurring theme of referencing old(er) cultures as the source of inspiration to somehow both legitimise and enhance the romance of its practices.  Furthermore, it was uncomfortably evident when chapters became platforms for forms of self-aggrandisement that deteriorated the original appeal of the book as a personable, even heart-warming, exploration of the community in which the editor had “come to see life in a new way”.
As previously mentioned, I did not find the diversity of writing styles of the contributors to detract from the book, rather, the assorted collection of stories meant each chapter was a cool pond into which I could casually dip my toes for a brief moment in time and be drawn into the world of its particular author.  Some chapters favoured the inclusion of prose to supplement the ‘drier’ details of their beliefs and practices however, it is apparent that the attempts at creative writing in Practising the Witch’s Craft was the book’s greatest weakness and offered little in comparison to the insights into modern Witchcraft that this book sought to provide.  The fragmentary chapters, in what was already a fragmentary book, rendered the book more difficult to follow and relate.
I would recommend this book for Wiccans and Pagans who have been practising for some time as an example of the figures out there in the Australian community. I would probably not recommend this book for non-Australians as an accurate representation of Australian practitioners as firstly, this was not the book’s intention, and secondly, it lacks the humility and magnetism to accomplish this task (as those two qualities are so ever-present in us Australians).
Ezzy, D. (2003), Practising the Witch’s Craft: Real Magic Under a Southern Sky, Sydney: Allen & Unwin.

**½ out of 5
November 2007

The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft by Ronald Hutton
As a scholarly book written by a professional historian, I did not expect to ’swallow this book whole’, but I was mistaken.  The Triumph of the Moon exceeded its already lofty reputation for me as it wove a rich tapestry of the sociocultural context from which modern pagan witchcraft emerged.  Hutton presents a detailed overview of historical movements and shifts in ideology, which set the precedence for the pagan revival of the 1950’s.  He gently but firmly breaks down the myth that modern day Paganism is the continuation of a surviving practice of Goddess worship, an assertion that contradicts the claims of Gerald Gardner and many other prominent Pagans, and is likely to vex a fair few practitioners of the Old Ways.  However, his tone remains respectful, his argument compelling, and his style idiosyncratic throughout.
Hutton’s training as an academic is evident in the best ways, namely, his use of referencing where each contention is backed by a hearty serving of supporting evidence.  The Triumph of the Moon changed the way I thought about my religion.  It serves a refreshingly three-dimensional understanding of modern paganism, coupled with a renewed appreciation of its modern inception that enhances, rather than delegitimises, its beauty and mystique.
The first half of the book on Macrocosm was exceptionally captivating.  In particular, the chapters on Finding a Goddess and Finding a God revealed the various mythological figures, most notably Diana and Pan, that captured the inspirations of writers and artists throughout the past few centuries.  It was particularly interesting to discover how Western thinking has idealised and romanticised pagan ways for many decades before sensationalist media painted Wicca in a Satanic light during the mid 20th Century, the negative stereotypes of which many Pagans still live with today.
I would recommend to this book to almost anyone, but especially Wiccans and Pagans who would like to consume a critical and yet liberating perspective on modern pagan witchcraft.  Contrary to how one would expect to feel about a book that dispels the very romantic myths on Wicca and Paganism and portrays both the formidable pioneering efforts as well as the imperfections of its founders, The Triumph of the Moon charged me with a sense of elation borne out of illumination.  Nonetheless, it can be quite dense, and may be more palatable for those with an academic background.
Hutton, R. (1999), The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft, New York: Oxford University Press.

****½ out of 5
November 2007

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