Aleister Crowley

Born Edward Alexander Crowley in England in 1875, he became known as Aleister Crowley and gained lasting notoriety as an occultist, poet, and prolific writer. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, but left before taking a degree and soon devoted himself to spiritual study, esoteric practice, and writing.

Crowley is most closely associated with Thelema, the religious and philosophical system he said grew out of a revelatory text, The Book of the Law. Over the years he published a wide range of works including poetry, magical texts, criticism, and autobiographical writing. His life also included extensive travel and mountaineering, which added to the larger-than-life image that surrounded him.

During his lifetime he was often treated as a scandalous public figure, but his influence continued to spread after his death in 1947. Today he is remembered as a deeply divisive but undeniably important figure in modern occult history and in the literature that grew around it.