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OLLA:

AN ANTHOLOGY OF SIXTY YEARS OF SONG


     

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Title:

Olla:  An Anthology of Sixty Years of Song.

   

Cover/Spine

State (a)

 

Upper Cover

State (a)

 

Lower Cover

State (a)

 

Interior Cover

State (a)

 

Spine

State (a)

 

Top Edge Gilt

State (a)

 

Frontispiece

State (a)

 

Limitation Page

State (a)

 

Title Page

State (a)

 

Upper Cover

State (b)

 

Upper Cover

State (b)

Green Variation)

 

Lower Cover

State (b)

 

Spine

State (b)

 

Dust Jacket

State (b)

 

Dust Jacket Interior

State (b)

 

Dust Jacket Spine

State (b)

 

Frontispiece

State (b)

 

Title Page

State (b)

 

Prospectus

(Front)

 

Prospectus

(Rear)

Print

Variations:

State (a):

20 copies printed on pre-war mould-made paper.3

Top cut and gilt.3

Bound in quarter brick-red/brown native-dyed Niger leather with patterned boards in a four-color Egyptian design.2

The Egyptian-patterned paper was left over from Crowley's Book of Thoth.13

Bound by Sangorski & Sutcliffe.8

Spine has two raised bands and is stamped in gilt vertically down the spine ‘OLLA ALEISTER CROWLEY’.2

11” x 8 1/2”.2

State (b):

500 copies printed on machine-made paper.1

Pages have all edges cut.3 

Bound in brown  or dark green cloth.9

Upper cover stamped in gilt ‘OLLA | [emblem of the Beast] | ALEISTER CROWLEY’.2  NOTE:  The “Mark of the Beast” sigil is printed upside down on the cover.4

Spine stamped in gilt vertically down spine ‘OLLA ALEISTER CROWLEY’.2

Dust jacket in black and white by Frieda Harris.1 

11 1/16” x 8 1/2”.2

 

Publisher:

Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.).3

 

Printer:

W. A. Guy Ltd, High Street, Hastings.3

 

Published At:

121 Adelaide Road, London, N.W.3.3

 

Date:

22 December 1946, 10.54 a.m.3

 

Edition:

First edition.

 

Pages:

128.1

 

Price:

Priced at 15 shillings for state (b).3

Extra copies of state (a) that were not distributed by Crowley to his friends were offered for sale for Ten Guineas.3 

 

Remarks:

Crowley completed Olla on 20 May 1946.11

Crowley had originally entitled the book:  Olla:  A Book of Many Cities.  Each poem would put its author in a new place, that is, an old place, a memory that was not a memory when it was made.10

An alternative title for the book had been The Book of Tears.12

Has a portrait of Aleister Crowley executed by Augustus John during a visit in July 1946 as a frontispiece.1 
The publication address [121 Adelaide Road, London, N.W.3] is that of John Symonds' London flat.
2

Crowley had 50 prospectuses printed and distributed and yielded his first pre-publication sale on 11 December 1946.6

 

Distribution:

State (a)

One copy went to Karl and Sascha Germer with an inscription by Crowley which read ‘To my dearest and best of friends Karl and Sascha with all my fondest love from Aleister Crowley.  June 10 ‘47 e.v.’5

One copy went to Frieda Harris with the inscription ‘To my dearly beloved sister from Aleister Crowley June 7 ‘47 e.v’ (This copy currently resides in the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas, Austin, Texas, Call Number PR 6005 R7 O5)

One copy went to Ray Burlingame with an inscription by Crowley which read ‘To my well loved Roy, Mildred, + Laylah Burlinghame from Aleister Crowley  June 7 ‘47.’8

One copy went to Alexander Watt. It was given to Watt by Karl Germer in the Fall of 1949 and currently resides in the W.D. Jordan Special Collection, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Call Number Watt BF1439.W37tno.108)

State (b)

One copy went to Karl and Sascha Germer with an inscription by Crowley which read ‘To Karl and Sascha an ordinary copy to amuse ‘em while the h.m.p. one is being bound—Love Aleister’5

—One copy went to Clifford Bax.7

—One copy went to Vermond Symonds.7

—One copy went to the curator and writer James Laver.7

—Michael Houghton of the Atlantic Bookshop agreed to buy fifty copies.7

 

Pagination

State (a):2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pagination

State (b):2

Page(s)

 

[1-4]

Blanks

[  5]

Half-title

[  6]

Quotation

[  7]

Title-page

[  8]

Limitation notice

[9-10]

Contents

[11-13]

Apologia

[  14]

Blank

[15-128]

Text

[129-132]

Blanks

 

 

Page(s)

 

[  5]

Half-title

[  6]

Quotation

[  7]

Title-page

[  8]

Limitation notice

[9-10]

Contents

[11-13]

Apologia

[  14]

Blank

[15-128]

Text

[129-132]

Blanks

 

Contents:

 

 

Apologia

1.

 

Epigrams

 

 

   (1) “Who Loves the Truth” — München

 

 

   (2) Optimist — Washington D.C.

2.

 

My First Poem — Cambridge, England

3.

 

The Happy Man — Mexico, D.F.

4.

 

The Tyler — Cambridge, England

5.

 

The Purple Mandarin — Yung Chang

6.

 

On Garret Hostel Bridge — Cambridge, England

7.

 

The Dynast — Great Eastern Erg

8.

 

An Oath — Marseilles

9.

 

Styx — Copenhagen

10.

 

The Jolly Barber — Naples

11.

 

The Balloon — Llyn Idwal Farm

12.

 

Prayer at Sunset — Tali Fu

13.

 

Penelope — Hango

14.

 

Panacea — Hastings

15.

 

On Waikiki Beach — Waikiki

16.

 

Knight Takes Bishop, Check ! — Stockholm

17.

 

The Arhan — Akyab

18.

 

The Jungle of Elizabeth Arden — Chicago

19.

 

La Verge — Sousse

20.

 

Pacific Surf — Oahu

21.

 

Figure Genethliacal — Rangoon

22.

 

On the Mindoon Chong — On the Mindoon Chong

23.

 

The Owl — Cefalû

24.

 

In Vera Cruz Harbor — Vera Cruz

25.

 

Puss-in-Boots — El Oued

26.

 

Hong Kong Harbour — Hong Kong Harbour

27.

 

Rosa Decidua — Coulsdon Park

28.

 

The Spring of Dirce — 3-3 — Paris

29.

 

Kali — Kalighat

30.

 

A Slice of Mortadello — Café Riche Paris

31.

 

Almira — Detroit

32.

 

El Fatihah (From the Arabic) — Mish

33.

 

Reasoner and Rimer — Heidelburg

34.

 

The Eyes of Pharaoh — Al Kahira

35.

 

The Beauty and the Bhikkhu — Kandy, Ceylon

36.

 

The King-Ghost — China

37.

 

Beri-Beri — The Inland Sea

38.

 

The Sevenfold Sacrament — Montigny-sur-Loing

39.

 

Forty Years On — Brighton

40.

 

Dionysus — Boleskine

41.

 

In My Harem — Fontainebleau

42.

 

Sarcoma of the Tibia — New York

43.

 

Sunset of Romance — Tunis

44.

 

The Jealous Patriot — Richmond, Surrey

45.

 

White Hope — London

46.

 

The Tent — W’aint t’ Aissha

47.

 

Verses for an Antichristmas Card — Chipping Campden

48.

 

Happy Dust

49.

 

Logos — Hastings

50.

 

The Baboon — Tolga

51.

 

The Camel — Rawal Pindi

52.

 

Canoe Song — Oesopus Island, Hudson River

53.

 

Epithalamium instead of a Present — Maidenhead

54.

 

At Touggourt

55.

 

The Return of Messalina — Rome

56.

 

L’Etincelle — Querouaille

57.

 

The Secret — Moscow

58.

 

Song of the Regular Fellow — Baltoro Glacier Camp XI

59.

 

La Gitana — Granada

60.

 

The Bean Pedlar — Palm Groves beyond Nefta

61.

 

Thanatos Basileos — Hastings

62.

 

The Garden of Janus — Da’leh-ad-Din (A Mountain near Bou-Saada)

63.

 

Hymn to Pan — Moscow

 

Author’s

Working

Versions:

 

 

 

Other

Known

Editions:

   

Bibliographic

Sources:

1.

Gerald Yorke, A Bibliography of the Works of Aleister Crowley (Expanded and Corrected by Clive Harper from Aleister Crowley, the Golden Dawn and Buddhism:  Reminiscences and Writings of Gerald Yorke, Keith Richmond, editor, The Teitan Press, York Beach, ME, 2011, p. 48.  

2.

Dianne Frances Rivers, A Bibliographic List with Special Reference To the Collection at the University of Texas,  Master of Arts Thesis, The University of Texas, Austin, Texas, 1967, pp. 150-151. 

3.

Personal observation of the item.

4.

J. Edward Cornelius, The Aleister Crowley Desk Reference, The Teitan Press, York Beach, Maine, 2013, p. 239.

5.

Bill Heidrick, Thelema Lodge Calendar, November 1997, Internet resource last accessed on 27 November 2015.

6.

Anthony Clayton, Netherwood:  Last Resort of Aleister Crowley, Accumulator, Press, London, 2012, pp. 140-141.

7.

Ibid., pp. 161-162.

8.

Weiser Antiquarian Books, Catalog # 2, “The Ray Burlingame Collection & Other Books by Aleister Crowley.”

9.

Weiser Antiquarian Books, On-Line Catalog #1 – “Aleister Crowley (Part 1)”.

10.

Tobias Churton, Aleister Crowley:  The Biography, Watkins Publishing, London, 2011, p. 399.

11.

Ibid., p. 414.

12.

Lawrence Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt:  A Life of Aleister Crowley, St. Martin’s Griffin, 2002, p. 415.

13.

Timothy d’Arch Smith, The Books of the Beast, Mandrake, Oxford, 1991, p. 34/p. 126, note 127.

 

Comments by

Aleister

Crowley:

 

 

Reviews:

     “Olla,” an anthology of sixty years of song, is a handsome volume (published in a limited edition and with a portrait frontispiece by Augustus John) of poems by the well-known writer, Aleister Crowley, who for the past few years has made his home at Netherwood, The Ridge, Hastings.
The poems cover the period from 1887-1946, and include the opening lines of what the author believes to be his first published effort in verse. Written on many themes and in all parts of the world from Moscow to Granada, New York to Chipping Campden, these works reveal their creator’s ability—mentioned by him in his entertaining foreword—to put himself into the soul of various types of men and women and identifying himself “with their inmost creative Word.”

     Mr. Crowley rejoices in the music, not to say the clangour of words, which he uses sometimes with violence and always with power. He is at his most characteristic when (to borrow his own phrase) “scourging smug piety . . . the stubborn stupor of the Government,” but he is not always in a fighting mood. Of his more tranquil style, nothing in the book is a more beautiful example than the sonnet “Logos,” written at Netherwood in 1946, and he infuses intense warmth and colour into his love poems, though, as in the last line of the rapturous “La Gitana,” he cannot always escape a lapse into bathos.

     These poems have tremendous vitality, an Oriental richness of imagery, and many jewel-like passages of description which contrast strangely with the brutal and astringent touches which likewise abound. Satire goes to an amusing extreme in “Panacea,” the twelve lines of the word “money,” repeated forty-two times. Mr. Crowley will have his bitter little joke.

The Hastings & St. Leonard's Observer, 4 January 1947.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
       
   

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