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Welcome to The Last Wizards!
Magical combat is a struggle between storytellers in which each mage
tries to define a common reality in terms of the story that best serves
his or her purposes. The medium of magic is consciousness -- one's own
consciousness, that of other people, and (more controversially, at least
within the worldview of modern industrial culture) that of
other-than-human entities of various kinds. The tools of magic are will,
imagination, and the innate structures of consciousness itself,
constellated through formal patterns of symbol and ritual. The goals of
magic are defined by the individual magician.
- John Michael Greer
There are many stories that underlie the systems that shape our world,
stories that often times have buried histories and unexamined assumptions.
Sometimes the myths and rituals that shape our experience of reality are
invisible, like the ones and zeroes of computer code. In a very real sense
many of the most powerful stories are invisible, even dismissed by most
people as being in any way influential on daily affairs.
You're both traveler and author(ity) of these invisible storied
landscapes. Much of what is termed 'magic' by modern practitioners and
scholars can be understood as narrative spellcraft.
Narrative Spellcraft - to
transform symbols, images, language and ritual into story. This new
narrative then gets incorporated into an audience's everday life and
manifests change through their actions.
Welcome to The Last Wizards. The stories below, and in our archives, explore visible and invisible realities from many beliefs and
viewpoints.
Hobbit Sighting...
Occult
Tolkien readers assume that he "created" the word "hobbit", yet the word hobbit appears earlier in a very long list of folkloric supernatural creatures in the writings of Michael Aislabie Denham (d.1859). There is no evidence that Tolkien had access to this very scattered collection of works. Tolkien even said he pulled the word out of thin air:
"On a blank leaf I scrawled: 'In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.' I did not and do not know why." [Tolkien, letter to W.H. Auden, dated 1955]
Denham was an early folklorist who concentrated on Northumberland, Durham, Westmoreland, Cumberland, the Isle of Man, and Scotland.
The nature of Durham's passage in which the word hobbit appears reads like spam from the underworld, or keywords for a website on the occult that launched in the early 1800's...
Five Years Since Bush's infamous "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq Speech
Take Action
Tomorrow is the fifth anniversary of Bush's infamous "Mission Accomplished" speech announcing that the war in Iraq was over. There's no better time to remind the public that, as John McCain himself said, "no one has supported President Bush on Iraq more" than he has.
A multidisciplinary, peer-reviewed print publication, covering all areas of magic, witchcraft, paganism etc; all geographical regions and all historical periods.
"A wide and deep view of magic - rating 9" - Fortean Times 176
"A must-read for all those interested in an academic approach to the magical arts." - The Cauldron
The Art of Narrative Spellcraft - By James John Bell
Occult
Much of what today's occult practitioners and scholars define as 'magic' can be understood as storytelling - the art of narrative spellcraft. The mage turns symbols and ritual into a narrative, and then spellbinds their audience in the telling. The audience goes on to incorporate the new story into their everday life - and the spell is cast when they bring it to life through their actions.
"Magical combat is a struggle between storytellers," writes the mage John Michael Greer, "in which each mage tries to define a common reality in terms of the story that best serves his or her purposes. The medium of magic is consciousness -- one's own consciousness, that of other people, and (more controversially, at least within the worldview of modern industrial culture) that of other-than-human entities of various kinds. The tools of magic are will, imagination, and the innate structures of consciousness itself, constellated through formal patterns of symbol and ritual. The goals of magic are defined by the individual magician."
