Friday, October 24, 2008

Oh Sing Hosannas!

I have finally (finally!) finished reading "The Mystical Qabalah" by Dion Fortune. I've been slogging through it since July, and in the end it became an exercise in pure willpower to pick it up and read it. Only once before, in my life can I remember having such a hard time getting through a book that was on a subject that interested me (Norman F Cantor's "Inventing The Middle Ages"). Neither time was the problem the subject matter nor any difficulty in language. This time it was purely and simply it seemed to be a question of the personality of the author. (with the Cantor book, the reason or excuse may have been pregnancy and stress) "The Mystical Qabalah" is part of the canon, and so it had to be read, but oh I am so glad to be done with it.

2 comments:

Robert said...

Qabala books can be very difficult to read. I'd encourage you to get up the will power to read it again in a few years and see how much more you get out of it. Of course, I've never read it. :OP

Lavanah said...

I don't think that the problem was the subject matter-I've read other kabbalah books, both from WMT and Jewish trads. Purely and simply Dion Fortunes personality (which shines through very clearly in her writing)annoys the crap out of me.