AEGYPT
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AEGYPT
by Authors:
JOHN CROWLEY
Released: 01 February, 1989
ISBN: 0553345923
Paperback
Sales Rank:
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List price:
$8.95
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(You save: $8.95)
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| Book > AEGYPT > Customer Reviews: |
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Average Customer Rating: 
AEGYPT >
Customer Review #1:
 Crowleys magic sparkles once again
Crowleys early books were definitely in the "SF" genre, but as time has gone by we more and more frequently find him in the "Literature" section of many bookstores. If this is a compliment, it is one that is well-deserved. Crowleys writing has a magical quality that creates a unique atmosphere unlike almost any other (the nearest comparison might be Keith Roberts "Pavane"). "Aegypt" appeared as an individual volume with virtually no clue to the fact that it had a sequel ("Love and Sleep") or that in fact these two books were the first of a four-volume set (the third, "Daemonomania", seems to have been delayed - it appeared in Books In Print in 1998 but has, according to Bantam, been "withdrawn"). The books are set in two worlds - a small-town, modern, north-east US environment and the world of Renaissance magicians like Dr John Dee. At the heart of the series is the idea that great changes of direction in human civilisation - such as the Renaissance or the advent of the Age of Reason - not only place culture on a different path into the future, but also, looking over our shoulders as it were, we see a different past. This is a concept that, in itself, has serious philosophical merit. Thus the past of "Aegypt" is a magical, occult "alternate history of the world" with which modern materialist society has lost touch - or nearly so. Crowley weaves the threads of both realities together in an astonishing and unique way that holds the reader in thrall, wishing it would never end. All his books are worth reading, but this one - and its sequel(s) - especially so.
AEGYPT >
Customer Review #2:
Synchronicity
Initially, Aegypt is an all-out barrage of images and information, in the midst of which it is difficult to assimilate the major themes that are developing. However, as you continue your journey along with Pierce Moffett, this mass of somewhat obscure imagery and information slowly begins to unravel. The miracle of Crowleys prose is that he guides the reader through a series of small revelations along with the main character that culminate in one entire running synchronistic metaphor. His brilliant excerpts from other sources, ie. his own fictional writer Fellowes Kraft, serve as slivers of allegory relating to Pierce and some of the other characters in the books main story. Crowley patiently weaves a web of coincidences, of synchronicity, that serves as a sturdy metaphoric foundation to support all of the synapse-igniting ideas presented to the reader to be delineated and digested. This novel is so cleverly plotted, that I cannot help but wonder if it is somehow based on the ancient geometric principles that are discussed and reffered to throughout the book. This is not even to speak of the potential Jungian archetypes presented by the characters surrounding Pierce. Rosie as anima, Spofford animus, Pierce the ego, Fellowes Kraft the Shadow? Even these archetypes do not do the interconnectedness of the characters justice. In the Prologue in Heaven, when the skryer is looking into the stone, he sees an angel who holds another stone, in which there is a child with yet another stone, and within that stone the immense void, the eternal truth. Just as this ancient knowledge of Aegypt that Pierce is uncovering comes through himself, Kraft, Bruno, and so on. One more running metaphor to drive it all home is the reoccuring imagery of bouncing balls with stripes and stars, croquet balls colliding, and finally the dozens of hot air balloons filling the sky, again synchronicity. Crowley sets his sights high, and does not disappoint.P.S. Pierce (Inverarity) Moffett, Rosie MUCHO. See The Crying of Lot 49. The horn from 49 and the ring symbol in Aegypt. Many similarities.
AEGYPT >
Customer Review #3:
A new World comes into being
With the publication of "Daemonomania",the third part of a projected four part series,it is possible to renavigate the strange ocean of images and themes that is "Aegypt" (the first in the sequence). The coherence of the interpenetrating mosiac of narratives becomes vivid with careful rereading. Crowleys intent is nothing less than a hermetic reenchanting of the modern world, in which the givens of consensual reality are called into question by a great "what if?". What if the old magics of the preScientific Age had actually worked due to our conscious assent...would the forces set in motion by Renaissance mages such as John Dee still reverberate in the present, in rural upstate New York ? Do we then have choices between "realities",both personal and public , that influence the way the world is and will be ? "Aegypt" begins Crowleys examination of the deep implications of this possibility.With deft skill he draws the reader into a familiar yet arcane World in which symbol and substance fuse together.The impact is visceral and engrossing. The historian Pierce Moffett ,presented with the same existential dilemma as the antihero in Sartres "Nausea", is impelled to construct or ,perhaps, rediscover the World.Akin to an allegorical tableaux of the High Renaissance, "Aegypt" has the capacity to amaze and educate, enrich and renew. Taken together, the series may eventually redefine Magic Realism in the same way that "Little,Big" by Crowley redefined (Le Guins term) Fantasy. A casket of rare wonders.
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AEGYPT >
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