Hi, Caroline,

If you're interested in the ways that Neo-paganism has
drawn on folklore materials, have you read Hutton's
"Triumph of the Moon" yet? It's more recent than his
"Stations of the Sun" and has a whole section on this
topic, plus much else that is of top-grade interest.

For folklore in itself, of course, the reading list
would be huge, even for Britain alone.

Jacqueline




--- Caroline Tully <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Hi Sabina...
> 
> You said...
> >>Thanks for the fan letter!  It's always nice to
> know one's books are read
> and appreciated, that they don't just go out there
> into the ether, or the
> Romulan Neutral Zone of unread academic books, or
> (the worst of all
> horrors!) the remainder bin at the used book shop.<<
> 
> I am very enthusiastic about academic works that are
> informative, in a new
> way, about Neo-Paganism and broader subjects - for
> the benefit of
> practitioners, as well as for those studying them.
> Without sounding like a
> sychophant (how can a fan *not* sound somewhat
> sychophantic however!?!) I
> think your book is on the level of importance for
> the Neo-Pagan movement's
> looking-at-itself as is, say, "Ronald Hutton's
> Triumph of the Moon" - your
> book is different to his, sure, but still very
> informative in its
> highlighting and analysis of components of
> Witchcraft-Neo-Pagansim that we
> may have not seen, or looked at, or been aware of
> before. I liken it to
> contributing to what I think of as "The Continuing
> Detective Story About the
> Origins of Modern Paganism". Your folklore angle is
> really, really
> interesting - I became interested in folklore's
> relationship to modern
> Paganism a few years ago when I read that last
> chapter (I think it was) in
> Hutton's "Stations of the Sun" and so I'm pleased to
> read something else
> that is even more folklore, or
> folkloristics-informed (because I know hardly
> anything about folklore but am interested in it). I
> was also led to Pagan
> Reconstructionism in part via your Streghe & Aradia
> articles, it went
> something like this... thinking about Wicca,
> thinking about C.G. Leland's
> contribution, thinking about Raven Grimassi's
> claims, thinking about your
> articles regarding Italian Witchcraft, thinking
> about Leland's Etruscan
> book, thinking about ancient Roman religion, leading
> to ancient Greek
> religion etc.
> 
> I notice in the Introduction in "Witching Culture",
> which I hadn't read as
> of my last post but have now, that you mention
> aesthetics and creative
> expression as some of what you're looking at
> regarding Neo-Paganism. (Now of
> course can't find citation). I've been toying with
> the idea that religion,
> so-called religious experience, is really aesthetic
> experience, an "art
> experience" if you will - even when it involves
> aniconic religions, it's
> still an aesthetic.... I need to think about this
> more to elucidate exactly
> what I mean here.. but I am inspired in this by the
> grumpy atheism of
> Richard Dawkins, which I find liberating, but my
> simultaneous attraction to
> Pagansim which I think may be aesthetic, I'm not
> sure if it is primarily
> aesthetic or not, and by "aesthetic" I mean not only
> visual, but literary,
> bodily...
> 
> >>I've been enjoying your posts to the magic list,
> and I really loved your
> essay in Laura Wildman's edited book, which I got
> for Christmas; you made
> your experiences with birth and death very vivid and
> embodied, which is
> something I strive for in my own writing.<<
> 
> Oh thanks. That book's got lots of interesting
> stories, with a lot of the
> "miraculous" in them. My favourite chapter in that
> book is K.A.Laity's
> "Ancient Texts and Venerable Tales". As for my
> chapter, (sorry to other list
> members who might be bored by me talking about
> myself, I won't keep doing
> it, but...). Yeah, it was a sad experience, very
> traumatic actually. I am
> kind of self conscious about that chapter, because I
> don't want it to look
> like I'm coming across as "poor me"... "pay
> attention to poor old me"... Its
> not meant to be a "poor me" chapter, even though it
> sort of is. What I think
> was interesting is how that experience led me to
> having a real "crisis of
> faith" regarding some of what I'd previously
> believed regarding "women's
> spirituality", and how that's kind of led me on to
> researching the gulf
> between popular use of, and belief in, aspects of
> archaeology, like say,
> paleolithic "Venus" figurines, versus academic
> approaches to the same
> figurines - which are quite different to popular
> approches ie/ in academic
> archaeology at the moment, prehistoric female
> statues are *not* regarded as
> being Goddesses at all - sure they *might* be
> Goddesses, but they might be
> something else entirely... There's no evidence for
> divinity etc.... Also, at
> the time of that experience, I was genuinely baffled
> because I guess I'd
> spent years kind of believing that being a "Goddess
> woman" ensured me to be
> "biologically successful" in reproduction.. all that
> girly womb stuff which
> I'd been under the impression about for years that
> biological female =
> goddess worshipper = successful at reproduction...
> does that sound like it
> makes any sense? I guess what I'm saying was that in
> the 1980's, when I
> started mixing with Wiccan-types - mostly they were
> about 10 years older
> than I was and they had children - they kinda
> believed (and conveyed to me)
> that Wicca and Goddess stuff was *about*
> reproduction... I think its called
> "biological determinism" these days...... Plus, I'm
> not really *that*
> maternal anyway... Simon, who I live with, is more
> maternal than me. So
> that's another thing... do I have to fit into this
> 'Mother Goddess' mould?
> 
> >>The Neoplatonic origins of Craft are something I
> may re-think.  It's one
> of my HP's favorite rants, and part of his party
> line, and I do think there
> are some common points, in the sense that
> Neoplatonism served as a
> foundation for so much of late antique and medieval
> thought.  But there are
> also significant differences, and the line of
> succession may be broken, or
> mediated by the Renaissance magi -- something I only
> brushed past in WC.<<
> 
> Oh yes, most likely the line of succession would be
> broken, but an
> interesting idea anyway. What do you think about the
> idea prevalent in a lot
> of Wicca about "apostolic succession" from Gerald
> Gardner? Why should this
> kind of "direct" succession be important?
> 
> B*B
> ~Caroline.
> 



	
	
		
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