The Place of Enchantment

Alex Owen's cultural history of British occultism in the late Victorian and Edwardian period, focusing on the Golden Dawn, Theosophy and figures such as Aleister Crowley. She argues that occultism was bound up with modern concerns about selfhood, rationality, gender and consciousness, rather than being a retreat from modernity. This scholarly study is important for understanding the historical context in which modern Western magic took shape.