Colin Wilson

Describes Rudolf Steiner's development from shy scholar to the international figurehead of Anthroposophy, his break with Madam Blavatsky's Theosophy, his struggles to find a voice, and the essence of his insights into the supersensible world. Of all the important thinkers of the twentieth century, Rudolph Steiner (1861-1925) is perhaps the most difficult to come to grips with. For the unprepared reader, his work presents a series of formidable obstacles, from the dauntingly abstract style to the often bizarre pronouncements on the nature of man and his cosmic destiny. And yet, Steiner was perhaps the most influential and charismatic occult philosopher of his generation and the movement he launched, Anthroposophy, with its educational, agricultural, and artistic applications, still has many thousands of followers worldwide. No one interested in esoteric thought can ignore Steiner, but until now there has been no genuinely accessible introduction to his ideas. This lucid and sympathetic account describes Steiner's development from shy scholar to the international figurehead of Anthroposophy, his break with Madam Blavatsky's Theosophy, his struggles to find a voice, and the essence of his insights into the supersensible world.

The classic study of alienation, creativity and the modern mind'Excitingly written, with a sense of revelation' GUARDIAN

THE ULTIMATE 2000 AD MIX-TAPE HAS ARRIVED! Best of 2000 AD is a landmark series from the cult comic, bursting with our greatest stories for a new generation of readers. Every Best of 2000 AD contains a mix of modern classics and gems from the vault. In each edition you'll find an explosive new Judge Dredd adventure, fresh essays by prominent popular culture writers, a graphic novel-length feature presentation by global legends and a vintage Dredd case. In this volume: Judge Dredd hunts untraceable assassins firing Magic Bullets by Al Ewing and Colin Wilson; even robots get the Red Planet Blues from Alan Moore, Steve Dillon and John Higgins; not even Mega City One’s brightest can escape The Vampire Effect; join the front line of the resistance against intergalactic bigots in Gothic masterpiece Nemesis The Warlock! Boasting brand new covers from an all-star line-up of artists including Becky Cloonan (The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys) and Charlie Adlard (The Walking Dead) with designer Tom Muller (X-Men), Best of 2000 AD is the essential gateway into the Galaxy’s Greatest Comic.

In this intense and revealing essay, Wilson analyses our literary heritage from the standpoint of existential criticism. Using specific examples and detailed biographical data, he reveals a fact that we tend to ignore: that almost all modern literature is an ode to despair, a stubborn cult to the man in the street, to the defeated, the loser. The prevailing romantic disability we suffer has diminished the stature of man to unforeseen levels. The imagination to which Wilson appeals in this book is a power capable of transcending the immediate, of freeing us from the limits of what is possible. Those who can imagine in this way have dominion over the earthly world and for that reason alone are liberated from the futility of the ordinary. To imagine is to invoke the impossible, to reject things as they are and dare to shape them as they should be. "...art in the twentieth century - literary art in particular - has ceased to take itself seriously as the primary instrument of existential philosophy. It has ceased to regard itself as an instrument for probing questions of human significance. Art is the science of human destiny." Colin Wilson "Existential criticism is therefore the attempt to judge works of art by the contribution they make to the science of living, to judge them by standards of meaning as well as impact." Colin Wilson

In The Age of Defeat, the third volume of the Outsider Cycle, Colin Wilson introduces his New Existentialism as the basis for the revolution in thought that we need to bring about; a revolt against insignificance and ordinariness. The New Existentialism is a practical and strong-willed philosophy that will renew the concept of Man as hero. It emphasises the extraordinary in us.The Age of Defeat examines the loss of the hero in Western culture and the implications of that loss for humanity. When it was written in the middle of the 20th century, it was the idea of the hero that was endangered. Today it is Man, his identity and his masculinity, who is verging on extinction. The concept of Man is one of the most ambiguous and puzzling in our culture. It might be a good moment to remember what to be a Man used to imply.

First published in 1965, this iconic collection by a great philosopher contains essays on David Lindsay, L.H. Myers, George Bernard Shaw, Ayn Rand & Henry Williamson, among others. Wilson's eclectic style is displayed in essays that range over John Cowper Powys and Ernest Hemingway, Nietzche and the modern novel. In print again for the first time, this edition brings to light new studies in existentialism from a great master. Colin Wilson's The Occult and The Outsider are best-selling classics.

Colin Wilson's great classic work is a comprehensive history of mystery and magic. His genius lies in producing a skilful synthesis of the available material; clarifying without simplifying, seeing the occult in the light of reason and reason in the light of the mystical and paranormal. It is a journey of enlightenment – a wide-ranging survey of the whole subject and an insightful exploration of Man's latent powers. Republished two years after the author's death and with a new foreword by bibliographer Colin Stanley, Wilson brings his own refreshingly optimistic and stimulating interpretation to the worlds of the paranormal, the occult and the supernatural. The Occult is the most interesting, informative and thought-provoking book on the subject I have read Sunday Telegraph

The Stature of Man: An Essay on the Concept of the Hero is a non-fiction book written by Colin Wilson. The book explores the concept of the hero, a figure who embodies the highest ideals and values of humanity. Wilson argues that heroes are essential to the human experience, as they provide us with a sense of purpose and meaning, and inspire us to strive for greatness.The book is divided into several chapters, each of which examines a different aspect of the hero. Wilson begins by tracing the history of the hero, from ancient mythology to modern literature and film. He then explores the psychological and philosophical dimensions of the hero, examining the ways in which the hero reflects our deepest desires and fears.Throughout the book, Wilson draws on a wide range of sources, including literature, psychology, philosophy, and mythology. He also includes numerous examples of heroic figures, from ancient Greek heroes like Achilles and Odysseus to modern-day heroes like Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King Jr.Overall, The Stature of Man is a thought-provoking exploration of the concept of the hero, and the ways in which it has shaped human history and culture. It is a must-read for anyone interested in mythology, psychology, or the human condition.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.

Inspired by the revelation that the Sphinx had been weathered by water and not by wind-blown sand and was, therefore, thousands of years older than the oldest civilisation known to man, Colin Wilson sets out to explore the remote depths of history. The compelling argument of this bestselling book is that, thousands of years before Ancient Egypt and Greece held sway, there was a great civilisation whose ships travelled the world and who possessed some knowledge system that offered a unified view of the universe, alien to modern man. In this fascinating exploration of the world at a time when, according to Plato, the 'lost civilisation' of Atlantis was destroyed, the author makes a ground-breaking attempt to understand how these long-forgotten peoples thought, felt and communicated on a universal plane.

One of the most original thinkers of the twentieth century, Pyotr Demianovich Ouspensky was a complex and romantic soul. His work on accessing a higher level of consciousness beyond everyday reality is a valuable legacy well worthy of consideration. This work sheds light on this gentle man and deep thinker. Ouspensky's work on accessing a higher level of consciousness beyond everyday reality is a valuable legacy well worthy of consideration today. One of the most original thinkers of the twentieth century, Pyotr Demianovich Ouspensky was a complex and romantic soul. A promising young intellectual in Tsarist Russia, he won recognition as a novelist and philosopher, yet descended into self-chosen obscurity as a teacher of 'the Work', the system of his great contemporary Gurdjieff. Today, it is as Gurdjieff's chief disciple that he is remembered, yet Colin Wilson argues convincingly that he is to be considered a major writer and man of genius in his own right. A nostalgic melancholy Russian, on of Ouspensky's deepest instincts was that man can find his own salvation, yet towards the end of his turbulent life he lost faith in the System and drank himself to death. With sympathy and admiration, Colin Wilson throws new light on this gentle man and deep thinker.

Carl Gustav Jung is one of the seminal figures in the history of depth psychology. An enormously influential and original thinker, Jung was for some time Freud's principal disciple, but he became more and more critical of the Freudian emphasis on repressed sexual tendencies and after the publication of "Symbols of Transformation" in 1912, Jung broke away from Freud to develop his own technique of 'analytical psychology'.

The seminal work on alienation, creativity, and the modern mind-set. "An exhaustive, luminously intelligent study...a real contribution to our understanding of our deepest predicament."--Philip Toynbee.

A Fascinating Look into the Psychology of Serial Killers and the Men Who Hunt Them DownColin Wilson opens this illuminating psychological discussion with the development of the 1977 Behavioral Science Unit at the FBI, which was set up in order to answer the many questions surrounding serial killers:• How does someone become a serial killer?• How do they choose their victims?• Why do they not feel remorse?• How are they caught?Wilson interviews FBI Special Agent Robert Ressler, coiner of the term “serial killer” and one of the pioneers of criminal profiling, as well as Ted Bundy and Charles Manson in order to figure out the motives behind their grisly actions.In Hunting Serial Killers, by tracking the BSU’s development of psychological profiling and genetic fingerprinting, Wilson reveals the forensic investigations that caused the seizure and arrest of some of the most vile and villainous people in the world, including Jeffrey Dahmer, William Heirens, Peter Sutcliffe, John Duffy, Jerry Brudos, Wayne Williams, and many more.As he divulges the details of each case, the murderers’ fantasy worlds, sadistic motives, and monstrous psychological tendencies emerge. For anyone who wants to understand the motives, investigations, and eventual arrests behind fifty serial-killing sprees, Hunting Serial Killers will not disappoint.

Almost two decades after writing his famous The Occult, Colin Wilson re-examined the whole spectrum of the mystical and paranormal, producing a general occult theory that remains as compelling as the evidence of atomic particles. Originally published in 1988, Beyond the Occult contains a huge amount of new material and evidence, which came to light following publication of The Occult. It combines scientific thinking on the nature of physical reality with a wide range of fascinating case studies, from the Swiss dowser who located the body of a missing woman to the lucky American whose dreams foretold the winning horses in multiple races to scores of accounts of mystical experiences of the Divine, of spirit possession and of poltergeists. Part One covers the amazing hidden powers of the human mind: ESP, clairvoyance, psychometry, precognition, psychokinesis, and dowsing. Part Two considers the more mysterious forces for good or evil – poltergeists, spirit possession, and reincarnation – that convinced Colin Wilson of the reality of disembodied spirits. In Beyond the Occult, Colin Wilson puts forward a convincing case that our so-called 'normal' experience may, in fact, be subnormal, and that evolution may have brought us near the edge of a quantum leap into a hugely expanded human consciousness. This new edition includes a foreword by Colin Wilson's biographer, Colin Stanley.

London is in the grip of a terrifying serial killer who is murdering women in Whitechapel in a manner reminiscent of the Jack the Ripper slayings 70 years earlier. Against this backdrop, Gerard Sorme, a lonely young Londoner, is at work on his first novel, in which he intends to express his belief in the meaninglessness of life. His own life begins to change in unexpected ways when he begins an intimate friendship with Austin Nunne, a wealthy and charming gay man with violent sexual desires. As the murders continue and the investigation unfolds, Gerald suddenly finds himself haunted by a terrible suspicion: could his new friend have anything to do with the crimes?Colin Wilson's classic first novel, Ritual in the Dark (1960), remains a chilling page-turner, a brilliant fusion of thrilling murder mystery and existential philosophy. This edition features a foreword by Wilson scholar and bibliographer Colin Stanley and the author's introduction to the 1993 edition.'Brilliant . . . Magnificent Murder mystery raised to major art ' - Chicago Sun-Times'Exhilarating reading' - The Listener'What an unforgettable, really great evocation. Terrible and tragic insight ... an important book' - Sunday Times

'A major work ... an extraordinary tour de force, [this book] will materially help to bring both sides (science and paranormal studies) together in a way which could lead to real and important advances in our view of the universe' – New Scientist First published in 1978, Mysteries is the powerful and enlightening sequel to The Occult, continuing Colin Wilson's investigations into the paranormal, the occult and the supernatural. The experience of his own panic attacks gave Wilson his insight into the concept of the ladder or hierarchy of selves with which we are all associated. In this book he fully explores this idea of multiple selves, explaining how our lower, childish selves are linked to depression and anxiety. The book offers an optimistic message to counteract our contemporary tendency towards pessimism and nihilism: purposeful activity will always allow us to call on our higher selves and bring concentration, control and a sense of meaning into life. Wilson uses the concept of the multi-personality to explain a wide range of paranormal phenomenon, from dowsing and demonic possession to precognition and spoon-bending, and he analyses the work of all the big names in 20th-century supra-rational research (from T C Lethbridge to Margaret Murray to Carl Jung) from this perspective. The story ranges widely, from the stone circles to 1960s LSD adventures, and Wilson's analysis is woven with hundreds of entertaining paranormal anecdotes and case studies taken from throughout history, including his own experiences of dowsing at the Merry Maidens stone circle and of visions and lucid dreaming.

When Colin Wilson died in December 2013, one perceptive obituary writer suggested that, despite the seemingly diverse subject matter of his books, Wilson's legacy lay in the field of consciousness studies. This is undoubtedly true. In Super Consciousness (first published in 2009), Wilson, nearing the end of his creative life, decided to succinctly summarise the ideas he had developed during years of research first as an existentialist philosopher and a psychologist, and later as an explorer of the occult. In the Foreword Wilson states: “I am now 75, and most of my life has been devoted to a search for what might be called ‘the mechanisms of the Peak Experience’, or ‘power consciousness’. This book might be regarded as a kind of DIY manual of how to achieve it.” Peak Experience – the experience of sudden overwhelming happiness – is a concept coined by the American psychologist Abraham Maslow (1908–1970), but while Maslow believed that Peak Experience could not be induced, Wilson thought otherwise. He points out that boredom and lack of purpose are among the most destructive states we can experience, and instead emphasises the importance of acknowledging the reality of free will and actively evolving our own consciousness to find deep meaning and joy in every part of life. In this fascinating and optimistic work, Wilson looks at what we can learn from the Peak Experiences of Yeats, Blake, Sartre, Nietzsche, Robert Graves and other luminaries, revealing the process of how we too can gain incredible insight into the deepest mysteries of existence. This new edition includes a foreword by Colin Wilson's bibliographer, Colin Stanley.

The best of Colin Wilson in one fantastic volume. Containing extracts from Wilson's work on existentialism, criminology, psychology and the occult, this is an invaluable introduction to one of the late twentieth-century's most incisive thinkers. This is a new edition of the classic Colin Wilson collection The Essential Colin Wilson (first published in 1985), updated and introduced by Wilson's bibliographer Colin Stanley. It is the only book to contain extracts from Colin Wilson's most important work in one volume, including The Outsider (1956), A Criminal History of Mankind (1983), The New Existentialism (1966), The Occult (1971), New Pathways in Psychology (1972) and Mysteries (1978), as well as three of his novels and many other texts. Subjects covered include existentialism, criminology, psychology, consciousness studies, the occult and much more. This second edition includes all of the original volume plus six essential post-1985 essays and chapters chosen by Stanley and other Colin Wilson experts including Gary Lachman. These essays provide a much needed update covering aspects of Wilson's work from the 28 years that followed the publication of the first edition to his death in December 2013. This is an invaluable introduction for those approaching one of the late twentieth century's most incisive thinkers for the first time and also a timely reminder, to Colin Wilson's many fans and scholars worldwide, of a unique and challenging body of work.

"The New Existentialism consists of a phenomenological examination of consciousness, with the emphasis upon the problem of what constitutes human values. Existentialism is romanticism, and romanticism is the feeling that man is not the mere creature he has always taken himself for." In this book, Wilson claims Nietzsche as the true founder of the new existentialism because it was he who heralded the coming of the superman, with his valiant optimism and zeal, so utterly removed from passivity, complacency and herd-following. Whereas the optimism of the new existentialism entreats us to achieve a state of constant awareness, to become conscious of every thought that comes into our heads, every belief that underpins our personal value system, every act that expresses our most intimate, truest self. This is what Husserl meant when he said that consciousness is intentional. The new existentialism is pure attention. Wilson proposes that we make a science of our happiness and fulfilment. By applying ourselves, by bringing our willpower and attention to bear, every day will become a site of potential, an adventure, that is, a chance to put our abilities to the test. Because as with science, the premise of the new existentialism is optimistic, which is to say, it believes in the success of its mission, of its quest. The new existentialism is the philosophy of the future because its goal is to create the ideal man. The man yet to be born. It urges us to recognise the active part we play in constructing our lives, reminding us that we do not need to go on suffering the "passive fallacy". The new existentialism empowers us, awakens our ontological ambitions and brings awareness of all that we can achieve.

Colin Wilson revitalised existentialism with a completely new approach to the philosophy. The six volumes of his ‘Outsider’ series created an existentialism that is not paralysed by its own nihilism. This book, first published in 1966, is a clear summary of the ideas of the ‘Outsider’ cycle, and also develops them to a new stage. Wilson’s ‘new existentialism’ sees philosophy as an intellectual adventure that aims at a real command and control of human existence, and this book is its clearest exponent.