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Acolyte, v. 3, issue 2, whole no. 11, Summer 1945
Page 29
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FANTASY FORUM E. Hoffman Price reacts to Lee Baldwin's researches, as outlined in the last issue: I'd like to see Baldwin's research on the dooms of weird writers. That he is not trying to prove anything is the best guarantee that he's offering something interesting, even though it does not lead to any conclusion. In the terms of Charles Fort, the writers may have achieved the Positive Absolute. On the other hand, it's half-cocked to give much weight to the notion that weird writers "know too much". The weird writer either borrows established superstitions (vampire, werewolf, etc.), or cooks up a mythos, or creates setups which, while derivative, have their derivation skillfully concealed through a process of "individualizing"--as in The Willows. While certain weird writers may well have occult knowledge and powers, such knowledge and power is not apparent in their writing! Nor even a reasonable facsimile. They may "know too much", but their disappearance can't be because of their revelations. The first warning to students of the occult is that SILENCE IS BEST, and the knowledge is in itself the best proof of the soundness of that injunction. I don't refer to the occult mumbo-jumbo (including some published under my own by-line) which we read. I refer to the real McCoy. If any of the weird writers I've met--and I've met a good many more than has the average writer, or reader--had any occult knowledge or power, he kept it marvellously secret (as of course he should have, except when dealing with a fellow occultist.) It is commonly held, and, I believe, rightly, that anyone who is able to write a narrative sufficiently realistic to keep a reader awake to the climax, and leave him with his mystery-drama appetite satisfied, is more advanced psychically than the average; and that the author of any notably powerful and convincing narrative, weird or otherwise, has "made contact" with forces not thus far defined by science. For instance, it was held by an occult student that the author of a mundane historical novel had (consciously or otherwise) been en rapport with "Chinese" Gordon, who fell when the Mahdi of Allah took Khartoum by assault; either this, or else that author had read the "Akhashic records". He'd functioned on "the Asekha plans". But these "functiionings" are largely unwitting, unplanned, intuitive; that is, not the result of occult knowledge, though the author may have latent abilities in that direction. However, granting all that, it still is laying it on pretty heavily to assume that the persons Baldwin discusses went to their several dooms because of "knowing too much". Please note, I do not give Baldwin the razzberry because he mentions "knowing too much". He's entitled to consider that possibility, as much as he's entitled to condider any other hypothesis. And if anyone desires, as a bit of weird whimsy, to accept the notion, that's OK too; why shouldn't we pretend and speculate? I merely submit that a lack of knowledge, rather than an excess, is far more plausible reason for one's "removal". A list of persons who know too much is likely to be brief! Nonetheless, Baldwin's discussion promises to be very well worth reading, and I for one look forward to that pleasure. Just one more thought: judged by his output, the author of weird and fantasy fiction is just about as close to "knowing too much" about the occult, as is the writer of science fiction to "knowing too much about science"! In neither case does he have to know much to be entertaining, that is, to serve his purpose; if only because in neither group of readers is there more than a negligible few who know the diff- -- 29 --
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FANTASY FORUM E. Hoffman Price reacts to Lee Baldwin's researches, as outlined in the last issue: I'd like to see Baldwin's research on the dooms of weird writers. That he is not trying to prove anything is the best guarantee that he's offering something interesting, even though it does not lead to any conclusion. In the terms of Charles Fort, the writers may have achieved the Positive Absolute. On the other hand, it's half-cocked to give much weight to the notion that weird writers "know too much". The weird writer either borrows established superstitions (vampire, werewolf, etc.), or cooks up a mythos, or creates setups which, while derivative, have their derivation skillfully concealed through a process of "individualizing"--as in The Willows. While certain weird writers may well have occult knowledge and powers, such knowledge and power is not apparent in their writing! Nor even a reasonable facsimile. They may "know too much", but their disappearance can't be because of their revelations. The first warning to students of the occult is that SILENCE IS BEST, and the knowledge is in itself the best proof of the soundness of that injunction. I don't refer to the occult mumbo-jumbo (including some published under my own by-line) which we read. I refer to the real McCoy. If any of the weird writers I've met--and I've met a good many more than has the average writer, or reader--had any occult knowledge or power, he kept it marvellously secret (as of course he should have, except when dealing with a fellow occultist.) It is commonly held, and, I believe, rightly, that anyone who is able to write a narrative sufficiently realistic to keep a reader awake to the climax, and leave him with his mystery-drama appetite satisfied, is more advanced psychically than the average; and that the author of any notably powerful and convincing narrative, weird or otherwise, has "made contact" with forces not thus far defined by science. For instance, it was held by an occult student that the author of a mundane historical novel had (consciously or otherwise) been en rapport with "Chinese" Gordon, who fell when the Mahdi of Allah took Khartoum by assault; either this, or else that author had read the "Akhashic records". He'd functioned on "the Asekha plans". But these "functiionings" are largely unwitting, unplanned, intuitive; that is, not the result of occult knowledge, though the author may have latent abilities in that direction. However, granting all that, it still is laying it on pretty heavily to assume that the persons Baldwin discusses went to their several dooms because of "knowing too much". Please note, I do not give Baldwin the razzberry because he mentions "knowing too much". He's entitled to consider that possibility, as much as he's entitled to condider any other hypothesis. And if anyone desires, as a bit of weird whimsy, to accept the notion, that's OK too; why shouldn't we pretend and speculate? I merely submit that a lack of knowledge, rather than an excess, is far more plausible reason for one's "removal". A list of persons who know too much is likely to be brief! Nonetheless, Baldwin's discussion promises to be very well worth reading, and I for one look forward to that pleasure. Just one more thought: judged by his output, the author of weird and fantasy fiction is just about as close to "knowing too much" about the occult, as is the writer of science fiction to "knowing too much about science"! In neither case does he have to know much to be entertaining, that is, to serve his purpose; if only because in neither group of readers is there more than a negligible few who know the diff- -- 29 --
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