First published in 1876, Art Magic is one of the founding documents of the Victorian occult revival. Published under mysterious circumstances, the book was controversial in its own day, and has intrigued and infuriated students of the occult for nearly 150 years. Regarded for years merely as a supplement to the more famous Ghost Land (1876), Art Magic is actually the more important work: closely connected to the founding and early teachings of the Theosophical Society, to Helene Blavatsky's Isis Unveiled (1877), and to the teachings of the Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor, as well as to the work of J. C. Street, R. Swinburne Clymer and other occult figures.
Emma Hardinge Britten (1823-1899) was one of the most influential Spiritualist and occult propagandists of the nineteenth century. Her work informs modern-day organizations as diverse as the international Spiritualist movement, the Theosophical Society, esoteric Freemasonry, and the Church of Light.
This definitive, corrected edition of the text includes an in-depth bibliographical and historical introduction, as well as extensive annotations to the text, by the curator of the Emma Hardinge Britten Archive.
