Peter J Carroll

“The most original, and probably the most important, writer on Magick since Aleister Crowley."
Robert Anton Wilson, author of the Cosmic Trigger trilogy.

Peter Carroll began his career in Magic at London University where the Chemistry proved so tedious that he settled on a pass degree in that and an unauthorized first in Magic, with Liber Null & Psychonaut emerging as his postgraduate thesis over the next several years whilst teaching high school science.

He then set off around the world wandering in the Himalayas, building boats in India and Australia and seeking out unusual people.

Then after a stay in Yorkshire, he headed back to the Himalayas for a while again before returning to settle in the west of England to found a family and a magical order. Appalled by the compromises made by so many magi to make a living out of their writing or teaching, Carroll decided to make his fortune with a natural products business so that he could write and teach only what had value and interest for him.

He maintains a personal website at specularium.org and acts as Chancellor to Arcanorium College arcanoriumcollege.com.

  • Past Grandmaster of the Magical Pact of the Illuminates of Thanateros

  • Chancellor of Arcanorium College

  • Acting Marshall, Knights of Chaos

  • A Bard of Dobunni Grove

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The Octavo CoverThe Octavo: A Sorcerer-Scientist's Grimoire

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(Roundworld Edition) A Sorcerer-Scientist's grimoire:- Every universe potentially has its own Supreme Grimoire containing the spells which define its reality and the magic which you can perform within that reality. In this Octavo we have assembled scattered secrets for a Supreme Grimoire for Roundworld, the universe in which you're standing. To this end we have taken some inspiration from Pratchett's Discworld, and a lot from Theoretical Physics and Practical Chaos Magic.
 

Paperback: 186 pages
Publisher: Mandrake; Roundworld ed edition (25 Oct 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1906958173
ISBN-13: 978-1906958176


The Octavo is remarkable in the finest sense of the word: a great and indeed unique achievement, making a genuine physics of magic’.

Professor Ronald Hutton - Fellow of the British Academy


Of course, the very name of the book The Octavo comes from that parallel Pratchett universe the Discworld. Just as its namesake contains the eight spells which hold the Discworld together, so too does this Octavo hold us in Roundworld. But it also liberates us. What can one say about a book that redefines our understanding of our existence: original, essential, with far-reaching implications? All of the above and much more. Expect a journey through the aeons as well as around the universe, and a tantalising invitation to create our future. By the end of the book, phrases like "vorticitating hypersphere" and "immanentising the eschaton" will seem like your everyday vocabulary. But mind when and where you use them: don't forget what happened to those who first challenged the flat world theory.

Don't read this book if you want a list of how-to instructions about casting sigils or whatever, but if you want to see the work of someone who's really trying to examine the wiring under the board of how and why esoteric techniques work, then this book is a must. Personally I feel Pete's analysis could do with a dash more psychology or phenomenology. After all magick isn't just a science it's also an art and that requires a different, though complimentary language to describe it. However all magicians should strive to be technicians of the sacred and with The Octavo they may finally have the first-steps towards a manual for the operating system of the universe.

Read it from cover to cover in five hours. Pete Carroll writes with definitive erudite, while maintaining a humble, practical, sensible, and reasonable approach to understanding reality. This could be a difficult read for most people but the formulas have far reaching implications upon our potential futures and I would encourage anyone desiring an understanding of truth and reality to take a stab at this book. It is slightly whimsical, fun, while explaining advanced mental concepts that are directly applicable and therefore potentially beneficial for everyday life. Most common persons could find this book to be radically liberating and more mind altering than any drug.