“Ioan P. Culianu, professor of the History of Religions, and Romanian history at the University of Chicago.” University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf1-09546, Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library. apf1-09546
people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.
Neil Postman, sometimes falsely attributed to Aldous Huxley, writing “As he [Huxley] saw it”, in the foreword to Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business [Amazon, Bookshop, Libro.fm, Publisher, Local Library]
Witchcraft, the Devil, and Emotions in Early Modern England [Amazon, Bookshop, Publisher, Local Library] by Charlotte-Rose Millar, from 2019, part of the Routledge Research in Early Modern History series
“This book represents the first systematic study of the role of the Devil in English witchcraft pamphlets for the entire period of state-sanctioned witchcraft prosecutions (1563-1735). It provides a rereading of English witchcraft, one which moves away from an older historiography which underplays the role of the Devil in English witchcraft and instead highlights the crucial role that the Devil, often in the form of a familiar spirit, took in English witchcraft belief. One of the key ways in which this book explores the role of the Devil is through emotions. Stories of witches were made up of a complex web of emotionally implicated accusers, victims, witnesses, and supposed perpetrators. They reveal a range of emotional experiences that do not just stem from malefic witchcraft but also, and primarily, from a witch’s links with the Devil. This book, then, has two main objectives. First, to suggest that English witchcraft pamphlets challenge our understanding of English witchcraft as a predominantly non-diabolical crime, and second, to highlight how witchcraft narratives emphasized emotions as the primary motivation for witchcraft acts and accusations.”
“Table of Contents
Introduction: Rethinking English Witchcraft
1. The Devil in Early Modern England
2. The Role of the Familiar
3. Anger, Malice and Emotional Control
4. Sleeping with Devils
5. The Witchcraft Conspiracy
Conclusion”
The Black Cross: A History of the Baltic Crusades [Amazon, Bookshop, Publisher, Local Library] by Aleksander Pluskowski
“A wide-ranging new history of the Baltic Crusades and their legacy
Between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries, crusading armies unleashed a relentless holy war against the last pagan societies in northern Europe, particularly in the Baltic Sea region. Led by Catholic rulers, churchmen, and, most importantly of all, the warrior monks of the Teutonic Order, they sought to expand Christendom through conquest and conversion. In the process they forged a new world with a profound legacy that resonates into the present.
Aleksander Pluskowski traces the broader story of the Baltic Crusades. Pluskowski explores how the construction of castles and towns, and the introduction of new languages, technology, monetary economies, and religion transformed the conquered societies. Moving through the years, we see how the history of the crusades was reinvented in the twentieth century to serve nationalist aims, including those of the Third Reich. This is a fascinating study that provides a fresh look at the impact of centuries of religious warfare across northern Europe.”
Michael Moorcock’s Hawkmoon: The Battle of Kamarg [Amazon, Bookshop, Publisher, Local Library] by Jérôme Le Gris, with Benôit Dellac and Didier Poli, & al., part of The Michael Moorcock Library series
“Moorcock’s Battle of Kamarg sets the stage for an iconic war! Hawkmoon: The Battle of Kamarg adapts Moorcock’s novel with stunning artwork that highlights the amazing worldbuilding in this epic series.
Set in a post-apocalyptic age of primitive technology and strange magic, Europe has been conquered by the tyrannical Granbretan empire led by King-Emperor Huon. When the city of Köln falls under the empire’s iron ire and its Duke, Dorian Hawkmoon is captured, it’s up to one of the last strongholds of civilization to rescue him and end the Granbretan’s evil rule.
Under the thumb of Baron Meliadus and the King Emperor due to the black jewel entombed in his forehead, Dorian Hawkmoon infiltrates the land of Kamarg in order to steal away the Lady Yisselda. But the only man standing between him and his mission is his former ally and leader of Kamarg, Count Brass.
From writer Jérôme Le Gris and artists Benoît Dellac and Didier Poli, Hawkmoon: The Battle of Kamarg is the second in a four-volume epic.”
Hermetic Library Fellow T Polyphilus reviews The Sirens’ Call: How Attention Became the World’s Most Endangered Resource [Amazon, Bookshop, Libro.fm, Publisher, Local Library] by Christopher Hayes
Television newsmonger personality Chris Hayes has written this book about the fact that a small and declining portion of the public can marshal the sustained attention to read it. While the sirens of the title are briefly explored in terms of modern vehicle klaxons, the “call” is of course the one from Homer’s Odyssey. (Although neither song was ever cited in the book, I supplied the Cream tune “Tales of Brave Ulysses” and “Home at Last” by Steely Dan as occasional interior accompaniment to my reading of it.) Hayes makes good use of this classical allusion in his opening and closing passages, but he is less deft in his citation of Plato’s Phaedrus, inaccurately attributing worry over literacy to Socrates while neglecting the actual framing of Plato’s myth in the dialogue’s argumentation (5-6).
Hayes supplies a diagnosis of the consummated contemporary trade in eyeballs, i.e. the commodification of attention through digital media. He freely admits to his own vulnerability from both sides of this exchange, as a social media user and a performer looking to reap “attention as a resource.” He draws out a constructive analogy between the alienation of labor power in the industrial age and the alienation of attention–which is also volition, individual and social–in the information age.
The alienation of individual attention results in psychological distress, while the alienation of social attention eliminates the patterns and preconditions–what Hayes calls “regimes of attention”–that could result in public discourse like the Lincoln-Douglas debates. I’m not sure that the phrase “attention span” even occurs in the book, but certainly the shortening of that span is part of the fragmentation and Hobbesian anarchy that Hayes describes as the results of the obsolescence of regimes of attention. The social media platforms that purport to facilitate community actually dissolve it.
“The promise of the information age was unparalleled access to every single last bit of human knowledge at every moment, and the reality is a collective civic mental life that permanently teeters on the edge of madness.” (248)
There is an attempt at a call to action in the final pages, where Hayes refers readers to https://www.friendsofattention.net/. He also derives some hope from the revalorization of media once deemed extinct, like vinyl LPs. Partly inspired by this book, I have made John William Waterhouse’s painting Pandora (1896) the wallpaper for my smartphone.
Here’s my newest anthology news, plus a couple other things, also new, below the fold!
Blasting Rod posted an archive of a recent live show Blasting Rod Live at El Puente on 2026-02-01.
Xemporium released They tryin’ 2 wreck up my life oh no no no bassman and We’re In, Come Open by PaDaHa; and Stupidity Factor and pspace syche by PDH.
Logickal’s Offnominal released aperion by fadeddata.
Michael Idehall released Six Million Ways To Resist (Remixes) by Various Artists and, also, a zine, The Set Machine.
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Plus, here’s more, but less-anthology related, news items to check out!
Mysterious Rose: The Life and Work of Althea Gyles by Sally North
“The first dedicated book on the life and work of Anglo-Irish artist and poet Althea Gyles. Contains an extended essay on her artistic career which includes her collaborations with W. B. Yeats and Joseph Holbrooke. Incuded are previously unpublished poems and prose, and a lost artwork discovered by author Sally North.
A cloth-bound limited edition of 200 copies only, with exclusive bookmark and three postcards showcasing images from Gyles’s work.
90 pp with 17 illustrations.
Cloth bound with headbands and foiling and decorative endpapers.
122 x 150 x 12 mm”
No Man’s Land #1: The Set Machine by Michael Idehall
“A Qliphotic bomb to loosen Creation and move the assemblage points!
10 pages of magic and collage by Michael Idehall.
– Storm Antenna
– Holy Interference
– Red Noise
8.5″x11″ w/ yellow card stock covers, saddle stich booklet.
Edition of 23.”
The Glam Reaper’s Guide to Slaying: Life Lessons for Rebellious Souls [Amazon, Bookshop, Libro.fm, Publisher, Local Library] by Bill Crisafi, due August 2026
“From popular Instagram artist Bill Crisafi (@Billsafi), an irreverent and uplifting illustrated guide to slaying your inner demons, with the fan-favorite and wickedly funny Glam Reaper and her fabulous friends.
When we’re plagued with self-doubt, we need someone to remind us that we put the “bitch” in “obituary.” Enter the Glam Reaper, our guide to killing negativity and becoming a certified diva.
As the Glam Reaper moves through the world beyond, she finds her friends are dealing with problems we’ve all faced:
Miss Phillip, a demon with her own inner demon, grapples with negative self-talk.
Orange Frog doesn’t feel confident after her friends mocked her outfit.
Miss Rotten tears down the other pumpkins in the patch because she’s afraid of rejection.
Sexy Ghost is being haunted by the embarrassing mistakes in her past.
Babushka Toad struggles to tend to her garden and give each flower the care it needs.
The Glam Reaper, with her trademark wit and sass, helps each of them overcome their troubles with practical tips (“Tell those voices in your head to drop dead”) and uplifting mantras (Look in the mirror and say, “I’m a hot bitch,” three times).
Written and illustrated by Instagram artist and fashion designer Bill Crisafi, The Glam Reaper’s Guide to Slaying is a funny, cheeky, and insightful handbook to self-love and self-acceptance for any ghouls gone wild.”
