English Magic: Jung, Mysticism & the Occult Imagination

John Dee put the signs for the Sun and Moon into a single figure and wrote a book about it. What did he think it could tell him? I’ll bring the image along so we can have a look for ourselves.

I’m trying something new with The Ghostlights Collective. For the first English Esoteric Circle, I’d like to get a few people round a table to talk about English magic and the occult, and see how far into the esoteric we can go. Can we ever hope to understand the ineffable?

We’ll follow Dee and Kelley’s story through Kraków and Prague, from their occult investigations to Kelley’s claims about making gold. I’d like to talk about where English magical traditions came from (including how thinkers like Dee tapped into the ancient Greek Platonic idea of a living, ensouled cosmos), what people hoped to learn or change through magic, and what people still practise in England today. There’s room to get into ritual, folk charms, mysticism and the search for the philosopher’s stone.

I’ll bring the figure Dee made from the signs for the Sun and Moon, and an alchemical woodcut that Jung wrote about. Have a look at it before we get into what he thought it could tell us about the unconscious. I’m interested in what draws us to these ideas today and how they find their way into art, poetry and the way we think about and understand ourselves.

I’ve always been fascinated by the occult, and I’m putting this together from my own reading and research. I’ll bring handouts and a few short passages from The Book of English Magic and Colin Wilson’s The Occult.

You can bring a book, poem, image, spell, favourite quote or question if you like. You’re welcome to come on your own and just listen. No advance reading needed. Scepticism and different beliefs are welcome.

Planned venue:
Hotel Motel One Manchester-St. Peter’s Square

This is a new venue for Ghostlights, and I am still exploring its suitability, so the location may change; keep an eye out. I’ll update this page if it does.

Free to attend.

Donations welcome. If you’d like to chip in towards the group’s Meetup costs, you can do so via:

• PayPal here: https://paypal.me/ghostlightscollectiv
• Or Revolut here: revolut.me/dani6t1c