This looks beautiful!  I'll be ordering mine Mon.!

Playing the Fool,
N.O.X

Thanks for the kind words N.O.X and for the support - this was a very complex piece and took A LOT of man hours to accomplish. We're very proud of it.

The Standard Edition started shipping yesterday (June 29th) - the Deluxe is due to start shipping in around 2 weeks time. We'll post some signing pictures when we have them.

Michael Staley signing copies of the deluxe edition of The Fool

I'd just like to take up a criticism from the News Item a few weeks ago:

I have to eat to live, so like most people I'll always be interested in "making money". This is an essay, not a book, and it's based on rather more than "one sentence", though the opening quote is a brief passage from Crowley's Liber Aleph.

You seem to imply that when it comes to The Fool, it was all said and done long ago, and therefore anything else is just pointless regurgitation. The publisher invited me to write an essay based on what the card meant to me, and that I've done. The essay takes in Thelema, advaita, and other considerations such as Gurdjieff's concept of waking up and how artistic inspiration bears on this.

Initiation is not a matter of swallowing wholesale what this, that or the other illustrious person has said at some time or another, but of making it real, of arriving at your own understanding. We take influences from diverse sources, whether it be Grant, Crowley, Spare, Blavatsky, Gurdjieff, Ramana Maharshi - to name but a few - and synthesise their work via the catalyst of our own experience, creating thereby an understanding and a body of work that is intrinsic to us. People who come after us will do likewise, again from a diversity of sources. In this way, knowledge and experience is passed down, and this is one meaning of parampara or spiritual lineage.

If however you'd prefer to bend the knee in awestruck reverence before a body of work which you have set in stone, be my guest.

Tell 'em Mick!

Mystique of Money

The artist Nomi Chi with a grizzled grandad, in a London restaurant last month.

She's clearly managed to make an old man very happy, Michael.  🙂

Great photo Mick. Looking forward to seeing the deluxe once the sled-dogs make it up the mountain with my parcel of books, oil and sliced giraffe. 

Looks good, nice feel to the eye (the picture I mean), the other stuff on landofzos also, thanks for the link.

So when will the next trump be completed?  I think I shall use this trump as a doorway because it invites the eye to journey through as I mentioned.

There are no plans, Philip. I was discussing the possibility of a future project with the publisher when he was over recently from New York, but I'll leave it to him to announce that once we've worked out the nuts and bolts, as the actress said to the car-mechanic.

Many thanks to those on Lashtal for the kind comments and also to those who emailed us directly. The deluxe editions should be shipping quite soon we'll leave a note here when they do.

To just add to Mick's post - we're very proud of what Mick and Nomi achieved with this item and the reaction so far. For us, the entire endeavor is a mark of Mick's eagerness to try new things and to look at things in a new way and to experiment. We are not, in any sense, an ''occult'' publisher - rather, we publish art, in various formats and various contexts. Of course, one can enter into debate over what is magic, and what is art etc but the point is that Mick and Nomi have created something very unique and done so in a fresh and interesting context, free from the some of the more traditional trappings but also with a firm eye on certain practices that don't happen so much anymore, in our view.

I'm a little late noticing this but wanted to say I'm glad I did being that I have always had an affinity for the the Fool. I ordered myself a copy. Beautiful work. Looking forward to seeing it up close.:)

Many thanks NKB, we do hope you like it - Mick's interview in particular is insightful.

The Deluxe is now sold out

The Deluxe is on schedule to ship next week. We still have copies of the Standard edition in stock.

Below, Nomi Chi signing copies in Vancouver.

Perhaps I timed my noticing this just right. That was probably me snagging the last one. 8)

That last picture reminds me of The Wicker Man or some David Lynch-style excursion.

Did this ship this past week?

Hi NKB, it started shipping in batches, should be fully out by mid-week  🙂

Great. Thanks for the update.

I haven’t seen or read this fine looking book yet - which seems to be a splendid production - but could anyone tell me out of curiosity whether “Amphordias” relating to the Eleventh Path is discussed (much) within it, and if not indexed give page references?

Muchos thankos,
Norma N. Joy Conquest

It's an essay, not a book, and not indexed. There's nothing about Amprodias there.

Thanks for responding, Mick - I was just wondering (in view of the relevance of Amphordias in Nightside of Eden, which deals there with the opposite side of The Fool)

Cheers!
N. Joy
Jamie

Apologies for getting the Sentinel’s name wrong – I have gone back to the book and checked the text & yours is of course the correct spelling (as I would expect it would be!)  However aside from that, I was hoping you may also have raised this aspect somewhere in your essay in the context of polarity & Kenneth Grant’s ongoing world-view about the reversed/ qliphotic Tree of Life, and that you would maybe able to enlighten (if not endarken) the reader in your capacity as KG’s pamparic successor & carry-onner of his Typhonian Order, if not in a further reflection of your own scholastic studies in the matter.

Foolishly yours (as ever!),
N. Joy

I was invited to write an essay on a Tarot card of my choosing, and I chose The Fool since this is the card that has interested me the most over the years. Although I have the highest regard for Kenneth Grant's work, it is not the be-all and end-all; nobody's work is, whoever they are. To quote more or less on this matter from the essay:

Initiation is not a matter of swallowing wholesale what this, that or the other illustrious person has said at some time or another, but of making it real, of arriving at your own understanding. We take influences from diverse sources, whether it be Grant, Crowley, Spare, Blavatsky, Gurdjieff, Ramana Maharshi - to name but a few - and synthesise their work via the catalyst of our own experience, creating thereby an understanding and a body of work that is intrinsic to us. People who come after us will do likewise, again from a diversity of sources. In this way, knowledge and experience is passed down, and this is one meaning of parampara or spiritual lineage.

I'm not a scholar or an academic, so it's best not to hold your breath waiting for any "scholastic studies" from me on this or indeed any other topic.

Mick, your quote from the essay there struck me as familiar. Has it been previously published elsewhere or have you written something similar to in another one of your essays?

I'm sure I've said something similar elsewhere over the years, NKB, and I'm sure that others have voiced something on those lines.

Funny I just noticed where I've read that before... earlier in this thread. Haha! I feel a little like the Fool at the moment.:)

I received my copy of this yesterday. Very satisfied with it. Beautifully executed... not sure what to really do with it but I'm glad I have it.:) I don't have anything to nitpick or even say about the essay and interviews other than I found them all to be very to the point and I enjoyed reading them. More little projects like this would be welcome.

I do have a couple of questions about it though. First for Mick, in the deluxe edition there is the inclusion of an extra card with a sigil. Do all copies contain the same sigil card or is there a different one in each? If they are the same what does this particular sigil signify? If you don't mind divulging that information of course.

Also there was another little card in mine with a picture of a pot of roses, the number 52 and the title La Maceta which of course means "the flower pot". Why the inclusion of this card? What kind of deck does it come from? It actually reminds me of the kind of card one would find in the children's game concentration.

I will assume that the skull sticker (looks like a sticker) and extra postcard-like art print are just some bonus things thrown in.

To Von Zos, have you considered pairing up different artists and writers for each card and perhaps covering the entire 22 trumps in this fashion? Each card would be a unique collaboration.

I'm glad that you like the publication, NKB. Most of your questions I'll leave to the publisher, Von Zos, since he designed, put together and despatched the whole thing. So far as I'm aware, the card with the sigil is the same in each deluxe; it's my Magical Name and Number expressed in a simple shape, but rendered by Nomi Chi since my original drawing of it was somewhat lacking.

There will be further collaborations between the publisher and myself, and we're discussing what they might be.

I'm putting mine on my bookshelves w/attached Altar with the rest of my "Objects d'Art Noir"!  🙂

NKB, we're delighted you like it so much and thanks for the kind words. The small card you refer to you is just something we put in orders, its a Mexican ''Lotería'' card - a card 'game' from Central America that is a few centuries old.

As Michael said, we do plan on working with him again but right now, it's unlikely we'll do another tarot project (though, of course, this might change). We worked with Michael out of a long-standing friendship and the project came about through our desire to do something of an occult nature that was (in our humble opinion) very, very different and unique. The unusual format was a way of expressing some complex ideas and perspectives and not just those contained within the accompanying texts.

N.O.X, you have the right idea  😉

Thanks for clearing that up. I was just curious about what I had in front of me.

Now that all the deluxe editions are out, plus quite a few standards, if anyone had any feedback or thoughts, we'd love to hear  🙂

I think Nomi's rendition of The Fool card is really quite lovely, and Mick's essay is very insightful!  I'm extremely happy with the purchase, and I'm looking forward to further collaboration(s) between Von Zos and Michael Staley!

Can you please tell me what the physical differences between the deluxe and standard editions are?

NOX - many thanks  🙂

Hello Mazus - all that information is contained in the item description on landofzos.com

Just a quick note for those interested. We are releasing a new item by Nomi Chi in the coming weeks which is a companion piece of sorts to The Fool. Full details and a chance to pre-order will be available in our newsletter issuing this week for which you can sign-up here bit.ly/1h5lPUp

We will post details on Lashtal when it is generally released.

I would enjoy reading and pondering on this essay of yours Michael Staley, when I look at thoth fool I see you visually and I see a journey of being fooled and being a fool inside