Traditionalism and Eastern Orthodoxy: Call for contributions

The reception of Traditionalism has been better studied in some contexts than in others. This Call invites proposals for chapters in a forthcoming multi-author book to be entitled The Reception of Traditionalism in Eastern Orthodoxy: Mysticism and Politics, edited by Mark Sedgwick. Contributors will be invited to an authors’ workshop in Belgrade in March 2027 to discuss pre-circulated drafts (expenses covered by the organizers).

Topics to be covered include: Traditionalism in interwar Romania: Mircea Eliade and his circles; Traditionalism in Yugoslavia and Serbia; Eastern Orthodox Traditionalism in the West: James Cutsinger, Philip Sherrard, and John Tavener; Traditionalism in late-Soviet and early post-Soviet Russia; Traditionalism in Ukraine, Belarus, post-Communist Romania, and b; Aleksander Dugin and the development of Traditionalist Eurasianism; and perhaps also Traditionalism in Bulgaria, Moldova, and/or Georgia.

Chapters should cover the reception of Traditionalism in the country(ies) and period(s) in question, explaining who transmitted and developed Traditionalist thought, what aspects were stressed, glossed over, and further developed, and how this relates to the context of the place(s) and time(s).

Brief proposals (500 words), including a proposed title, should be sent to Mark Sedgwick (mjrs@cas.au.dk) before midnight CET on February 15, accompanied by a biographical note that mentions relevant prior publications. Feel free to send more than one proposal. On the basis of these proposals, actual chapters will be commissioned as soon as possible, to be researched and drafted before March 2027.

The authors’ workshop will refine the drafts and allow us to discuss how the reception and development of Traditionalism in Eastern Orthodoxy differs from what happened in the Catholic and Protestant West, and in Latin America, and to explore what this tells us about Traditionalism, mysticism, politics, and Eastern Orthodoxy.

“Traditionalism” as used in this Call refers to those working with the idea of an esoteric primordial tradition as developed by René Guénon. The book will not cover forms of traditionalism that have no connection with Guénon.

This project is funded by the Templeton Religion Trust through the Program in the Study of Mysticism (PRISM) at Tampere University, Finland.

Traditionalism and Early Music

A new article has just been published on Marco Pallis (1895–1989), the leading Buddhist Traditionalist, and his involvement with music, especially with the revival of “early music” by Arnold Dolmetsch (1858–1940) and Mabel Dolmetsch (1874–1963). It is David R. M. Irving, “Esoteric Elements in the Early Music Revival: Marco Pallis, Traditionalism, and the Dolmetsch Circle, from Haslemere to the Himalayas,” Acta Musicologica 96, no. 1 (2024): 38-58.

Irving, as the title of his article suggests, argues that the esoteric milieu in general, and Traditionalism in particular, was more important for the Early Music revival than is generally appreciated. Traditionalism was certainly important for Pallis and his understanding of music, as well (of course) as his understanding of Buddhism and Tibet, and Pallis was, as Irving shows, important for the Dolmetsches. The article also shows the importance of the Arts and Crafts Movement and William Morris (1834–1896), which connects with Traditionalism through the person and work of Ananda K. Coomaraswamy (1877–1947).

A fascinating and beautifully written article that casts light on an aspect of Traditionalism that has so far been only little studied.

Evola merch

Evola T-shirts have been available for some time from several suppliers, including the online marketplace Redbubble in the US, who also sell mugs against the modern world, and Motpol in Sweden. Now Evola busts are also on sale. There are currently two suppliers. ProperCrafts in Romania will sell you a bust (see photo) made in a special eco-friendly plastic, in varying heights and colors. Heretic Camp in Ukraine will sell you an enameled plaster bust. ProperCrafts seems to be a commercial venture, and can also sell you busts of Mussolini, Julius Caesar, Boris Johnson, and Joe Biden. Heretic Camp specializes in Black Metal Music tracks, and busts are a sideline. It seems to be connected to the Azov Brigade.

My thanks to AK for pointing me to ProperCrafts.

New book on Traditionalist thought published (coming soon in US)

Mark Sedgwick, Traditionalism: The Radical Project for Restoring Sacred Order is now available in Europe and Canada. Readers in the US will have to wait until July 6. 

Official UK price is £25, but Amazon.co.uk is selling for £22 and £12.99 on Kindle. In Canada, $53.95 and $17.99 Kindle, and in Europe €22.19 and £18.75 Kindle. 

One of the first reviews is in The Scotsman, and says (in part) "This very fine book is a forensic look at the movement and its influence, and has several points where you both realise something and ponder 'why did I never realise that?'” That is rather what I had hoped for.

The book looks at the intellectual foundations of Traditionalism, its application both to various projects, and "post-Traditionalism." Each chapter looks first at the general intellectual background to the issue it discusses, and then at Traditionalist understandings, starting in most cases with René Guénon and ending as much as possible with living Traditionalists.

Forthcoming book on Traditionalist thought

One of the criticisms that have been made of my original Against the Modern World is that I did not pay enough attention to Traditionalist thought. I agree, and therefore a new book will come out in June 2023 focusing on ideas: Traditionalism: The Radical Project for Restoring Sacred Order. The book is a companion to Against the Modern World, not a replacement--it goes over different ground.

The publishers are Oxford University Press in the US (see cover without tree) at $29.95 (pre-order here) and Pelican in the UK (see cover with tree) at £22 or £9.99 on Kindle (pre-order here). Two very different covers, but the text is the same. 

 

The chapters are:

INTRODUCTORY
1. Traditionalism and the Traditionalists  
2. Historical perennialism  
 
PART I: FOUNDATIONS
3. Traditionalist perennialism   
4. Traditionalist history   
5. The Traditionalist critique of modernity   
6. Traditionalism, thought, and society    

PART II: CORE PROJECTS
7. Self-realization    
8. Religion    
9. Politics    

PART III: FURTHER PROJECTS
10. Art    
11. Gender    
12. Nature    
13. Dialogue  
  
PART IV: POST-TRADITIONALISM
14. The radical right   
 
CONCLUDING
15. Conclusion    

Traditionalism and Iranian music

A new PhD thesis discusses the role of tradition, and thus Traditionalism, in Iranian music. It is by Kamyar Nematollahy, entitled “Iranian Classical Music Since the 1970s: The Discourses of Tradition and Identity,” and was submitted at the University of Cologne, from whose website it is available (link here). 

Nematollahy identifies a long-running discussion about tradition and modernity in Iranian music, termed سنت or sonnat (tradition) and تجدد or tajaddod (modernity). He shows that in the musical context, the word sonnat has three distinct but overlapping meanings: one theological, one Traditionalist, and one general. The theological meaning is the same as the meaning of the Arabic word سنة or sunna, meaning the practices of the prophet Muhammad. The general meaning is the same as the English word modernity. The Traditionalist meaning is that given it by Seyyed Hossein Nasr in the early 1970s, and is “the transmission of certain sacred, transcendent, and immutable rules and concepts.” Most of those who use the term in the ongoing debate, however, do not distinguish these three meanings as carefully as Nematollahy does, or indeed distinguish them at all. Perhaps something needs to be added to my standard distinction between “hard” and “soft” Traditionalism: accidental Traditionalism?

Tavener and the Musica perennis

Several chapters in a new collection discuss the Traditionalism of Sir John Tavener (1944-2013), the acclaimed British musician who was a follower of Frithjof Schuon. It is Heart's Ease: Spirituality in the Music of John Tavener, edited by June Boyce-Tillman and Anne-Marie Forbes (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2020).

The collection consists of nine chapters and eight “interludes,” preludes or postludes, distinguished from the formal chapters by being more reflective and less academic, and often very short. The opening “prelude,” by Boyce-Tillman, sets the scene with a short biographical introduction to Tavener and his best-known work. This is followed by a chapter in which Stephen Roberts traces “Tavener’s Musical Theology of Religions,” working through Orthodoxy to arrive at Traditionalism. 

Then comes one of two chapters that deal at length with Tavener’s Traditionalism, “In Search of Truth: John Tavener’s Transition from Western Culture to Eastern Tradition” by Andrzej Kęsiak, a Polish theologian and musician who is currently working in the UK on a PhD thesis about Tavener. Kęsiak starts with Tavener’s rejection of modernism, follows through the “Search for Tradition” that led him to Orthodox Christianity, and ends with Traditionalism and the “Musica perennis,” Tavener’s application to music of Schuon’s understanding of the transcendent unity of religions.

Several further chapters deal with particular compositions: Tavener’s “Prayer to the Holy Trinity,” his “To a Child Dancing in the Wind,” his Requiem, and his “Three Hymns of George Herbert.” Then come three chapters dealing with particular issues: his “Search for an English Orthodox Musical Language”, “Sacred Silence,” and finally the use of his music in therapy. 

Of these chapters, the most important for those who are interested primarily in Traditionalism is the chapter on Tavener’s Requiem, written by Bart Seaton-Said, a practicing musician and former Anglican Franciscan. This is mostly a musical analysis, and shows how the Requiem is a “broadening of the parameters of sacred Christian art” and “manifests outwardly Schuon’s theme of the ‘transcendent unity of relations.’”

The book provides a useful study of Tavener’s music, and of the impact of Traditionalism on that music. Tavener’s project of discovering the Musica perennis is one of the most interesting recent developments of traditionalism, and – arguably – one of the most successful.

The National Bolsheviks as counter-cultural art

The Russian Traditionalist Alexander Dugin first came to prominence in the 1990s as one of the leaders of the National Bolshevik Party (NBP; Национал-большевистская партия). A new book covers these years remarkably well. It is Fabrizio Fenghi's It Will Be Fun and Terrifying: Nationalism and Protest in Post-Soviet Russia (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press: 2020). The title cites an early NBP slogan sometimes cited by an artist who is now a member of Dugin's Eurasian Movement.

The book makes clear that the NBP should not be taken entirely seriously as a political party. Dugin was its ideologue, and its leading figure was the novelist Eduard Limonov (1943-2020). Fenghi's point of departure is Limonov's earlier fiction, especially his most famous novel, It's Me, Eddie (Это я — Эдичка), written in 1976 and published in 1979. This extremely counter-cultural novel was itself influenced by the New York punk scene, as Fenghi argues, and the NBP was in some ways the continuation of the novel. He uses interviews as well as textual sources to show that there was politics, but there was also music, art--especially performance art--and a lot of counter-culture. The NBP owed much of its success to its newspaper Limonka (Лимонка), which can be read as an alternative art and music magazine almost as easily as it can be read as a political newspaper. There was a specific NBP style of dress, and many NBP actions were close to performance art (which is one reason they were so effective). They were, suggests Fenghi, one of the inspirations of the actions of the later (and ideologically very different) group Pussy Riot.

Dugin, as is known, left the NBP in 1998. Fenghi suggests that this was because his and Limonov's political styles were so different. At one point he says that "Dugin and his followers were mostly interested in pursuing cultural and quasi-academic activities" while "Limonov wanted the party to become a ‘real political force,’ with activists who were directly involved in various forms of propaganda and mass mobilization” (p. 116). Later, however, he says that “Eurasianism aims at producing actual political change through mass manipulation” (p. 168), which I think is closer to the truth. Certainly there were different styles, and it might be argued that in the end Dugin was too serious about the content of his politics to keep company forever with Limonov. The Eurasian Movement was very different from the NBP. Fenghi does analyse the aesthetics of the Eurasian Movement  and there doubtless is an aesthetic, and some artists are indeed inspired by Eurasianism, but no-one could argue that the Eurasian Movement is primarily aesthetic or artistic, though it is still in some ways counter-cultural. Fenghi understands its importance in terms of the impact of Dugin's Foundations of Geopolitics (Основы Геополитики) and of the Eurasian Movement's massive internet presence.

The counter-cultural aesthetics of the NBP continued after Dugin left it, and to some extent still continue in the NBP's successor, Drugaya Rossiya (Другая Россия). It still includes artists and poets as well as fighters, despite its close engagement in the conflict in the Eastern Ukraine. 

Fenghi explains why he decides to avoid the discussions of what Fascism is and whether the NBP was fascist, and in this connection notes that in answering such questions it is important to pay attention to a group's relationship with power and with institutions, not just its published ideology. This is a good point.

Sami Yusuf now a Traditionalist

Guest post by Neon Knight

English Muslim singer Sami Yusuf is now a Traditionalist, and almost certainly a disciple of Seyyed Hossein Nasr.

Yusuf, a million-selling artist who regularly fills football stadiums in the Middle East, performed a benefit concert for Nasr's Foundation for Traditional Studies and has collaborated with him on "Songs of the Way," a musical tribute to Nasr which features the latter reading his poetry on six of its twelve tracks. In an interesting interview, Yusuf discusses his Traditionalism. On his website, he describes "Songs of the Way" as follows:

The inspiration that animates this work, its life and soul, is the poetry of Seyyed Hossein Nasr, for it expresses timeless Truth and a life devoted to attaining it. The dimensions of this personal yet universal message evoke a diversity of responses, of spiritual states and perspectives, expressed in the Songs of the Way. The yearning lament of the kamanche and the ney, the interiorizing fervor of flamenco guitar, and the nobility of the classical Middle Eastern Sufi style all express human responses to a Divinity that transcends us. They call us to remember the Sacred within us, and ultimately, like everything beautiful, manifest aspects of Divinity Itself. And amid these tones there is the voice, the sound closest to our heart, which soars to evoke the cadence that we heard before the world was born.

The Sufi albums of Franco Battiato

Franco Battiato was more of a Universal Sufi than a Traditionalist, but some of his songs also referred to Guénon. See my new post on him at westernsufism.blogspot.com.

Coomaraswamy and the Beats

In a new article (see below), David Need draws attention to the importance of Coomaraswamy's The Transformation of Nature in Art and of Coomaraswamy's readings of the Upanishads for the music of the avant-garde musician and artist John Cage. According to Need, it was this and the idea of sabdabrahman--of brahman or being as sound--"led Cage to focus on the spaces between the notes." Hence 4′33″, the famous 1952 composition in which the assembled musicians do not actually play their instruments at all.

David Need, "Spontaneity, Immediacy, and Difference: Philosophy, Being in Time, and Creativity in the Aesthetics of Jack Kerouac, Charles Olson, and John Cage," in The Philosophy of the Beats, ed. Sherin N. Elkholy (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky), pp. 195-210. See especially pp. 204-06.

Anarchist Traditionalism: Hakim Bey

Arthur Versluis's recent interview (see below) with the American anarchist Peter Lamborn Wilson, who also writes as Hakim Bey, suggests that Lamborn Wilson’s anarchism is a leftist form of Political “Soft” Traditionalism.

Lamborn Wilson was born in 1945, and after developing an interest in Sufism in New York, dropped out of Columbia University and left the US in 1968. He settled in Tehran in 1970, and stayed there until 1978, editing the journal of Nasr’s Imperial Iranian Academy of Philosophy, Sophia Perennis. It is unlikely that someone in this position would not have been a Maryami, and although Lamborn Wilson has never described himself as a former Maryami, everything about his biography suggests this. Lamborn Wilson certainly became Muslim, and still describes himself as a Shi’i Muslim, if only on the basis that he sees himself as still being everything that he has ever been. It seems, however, that he does not now follow mainstream Muslim practice.

Lamborn Wilson left Iran at the revolution, as did Nasr, and over the next seven years moved from the Maryamiyya to anarchism, publishing CHAOS: The Broadsheets of Ontological Anarchism in 1985 under the pseudonym Hakim Bey, which he still uses. Quite what happened between 1978 and 1985 is unclear. Part of the explanation is evidently intellectual, and Lamborn Wilson’s later views on Traditionalism are considered below. Another part of the explanation is evidently personal, as Lamborn Wilson participated in the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBA), and his first use of the pseudonym Hakim (though not yet Hakim Bey) was in 1983, when he published Crowstone: The Chronicles of Qamar, a Sword and Sorcery Boy-love Tale (Amsterdam: Spartacus). Although the Maryamiyya is reported to have tolerated some sexual behavior that mainstream Islam forbids, there are no reports of the Maryamiyya considering “man-boy love” acceptable.

Although some critics of Lamborn Wilson dismiss his work as no more than an attempt to justify his own practice of “man-boy love,” in my view that work is too substantial and influential to be so dismissed.

In the Versluis interview, Lamborn Wilson makes clear that what he now values in Traditionalism is its critique of modernity, not its “proposal” for responding to modernity. As an anarchist, Lamborn Wilson gives the state–and especially the all-powerful contemporary state–a prime position in his own critique of modernity. His own proposals lead in a number of directions, none of them revolutionary in the normal sense, given his perception that the state always manages to co-opt revolutions. He stresses that his proposals should be taken in a poetic as much as a literal sense. The most famous of them is the Temporary Autonomous Zone (TAZ),“an uprising which does not engage directly with the State, a guerrilla operation which liberates an area (of land, of time, of imagination) and then dissolves itself to re-form elsewhere/elsewhen, before the State can crush it” (TAZ, quoted in Sellars 2011). A less famous proposal, more emphasized in his interview with Versluis, is a form of “even more traditional Traditionalism” reminiscent of that of Khozh-Akhmed Noukhaev: to go back even further into the past, to before the state, to the tribe, and to the form of religiosity associated with it: individual spirituality. The tribe, Lamborn Wilson, admits, is not perfect: “Violence is real, and it will always be real, and disappointment and death are always there.” But at least the tribe is not the state.

Lamborn Wilson distinguishes between religion and spirituality, between the organized and the individual. He associates organized religion with the state, as “part of the Babylonian scam.” Individual spirituality, in contrast, is associated with the tribe, and with the ever-present rebellion of the individual against the state, which produces “countertraditions or alternate traditions,” some of them spiritual, often Hermetic. Among these  alternate traditions he counts Sufism, which is anarchist in that it  understands that “this social world is illusory.” Lamborn Wilson thus prefers Henry Corbin’s vision of “the medieval manyness of Islam” to “the rigid systems of Neotraditionalism that stem from Guénon.” Guénon, then, stands with organized religion, and so does not stand against the state, and thus Lamborn Wilson stands against Guénon and, by extension, the Maryamiyya.

Although I have described the more traditional of Lamborn Wilson’s responses as separate from the more famous TAZ, the two can in fact be reconciled: the archetype of his TAZ is the  “Republic of Salé,” an autonomous Moroccan city that flourished in the seventeenth century. Salé may be seen as a small-scale human society that resembled the tribe more than the state, and the TAZ may be seen as a transitory tribe.

Lamborn Wilson, then, is Traditionalist in his probable Maryami origins, and partly Traditionalist in the terms in which he sees the modern world–including, though this is not much emphasized, a general pessimism about the direction of history, and an apocalyptic vision of a possible future of “centuries of hideous darkness.” Rather as Evola sees the spiritual as the proper root of political action, Lamborn Wilson says that his proposals ultimately have their origin in “mystical inspiration” and “direct experiential perception.” If not the proper root of political action, the spiritual is the accompaniment of anti-state resitance.

Lamborn Wilson is furthest from Guénonian Traditionalism in the anarchism in his proposals, which derive also from thinkers in whom the Guénonians have no interest, notably Charles Fourier (1772-1837). He criticizes Guénon’s own proposals to the point of dismissing them. But even so, Lamborn Wilson can probably be seen as a Soft Traditionalist.

Leftist Traditionalism is rare, if only because the left generally stresses the practical sovereignty of the whole people, while Traditionalism stresses that the people as a whole are mostly wrong. Though a leftist more than a rightist, Lamborn Wilson does not see the whole people as mostly right, however. Membership of the TAZ is self-selecting, not universal.

Lamborn Wilson links up to two further aspects of the phenomena in which this blog is interested. One is the music scene, or rather the rave scene: for some, a rave is a TAZ. Another is contemporary Western Sufism: Lamborn Wilson is enthusiastic about the possibilities of the “Green Hermeticism” project, in which connection he has good relations with Zia Inayat Khan, who helped produce Green Hermeticism: Alchemy and Ecology (Great Barrington, MA: Lindisfarne, 2007, ed. Lamborn Wilson, Christopher Bamford, and Kevin Townley), for which he also wrote the introduction.

The main sources for this post are Arthur Versluis, “A Conversation with Peter Lamborn Wilson,” Journal for the Study of Radicalism 4, no. 2 (Fall 2010) pp. 139-165, from which all quotations are taken unless otherwise indicated, and Simon Sellars “Hakim Bey: Repopulating the Temporary Autonomous Zone,” Journal for the Study of Radicalism 4, no. 2 (Fall 2010), pp. 83-108. Most of Lamborn Wilson’s writings are available at http://hermetic.com/bey. My thanks to Jean-François Mayer for bringing the Versluis interview to my attention.

After the Traditionalist Conference in Moscow

As previously announced, a major Traditionalist conference was arranged in Moscow by Natella Speranskaya, 15-16 October 2011. This featured the leading Russian Traditionalists, Alexander Dugin and Gaydar Jamal.

As can be seen in the photograph, among the guests were Abd al Wahid Pallavicini and his son Yahya, of the of the CO.RE.IS (Comunità Religiosa Islamica, Islamic Religious Community). Although Italian "political" Traditionalists such as Claudio Mutti (who was also in Moscow) have been interested in Dugin for some time, interest in Dugin on the part of "spiritual" Traditionalists with their origin in Schuon's Maryamiyya is new. Perhaps a sign that Dugin's influence is now so great that the spiritual and political branches may not always remain as separate as they have been in recent decades?

As well as something new, something old: the verse of Yevgeny Golovin, one of the leading figures in the Soviet-era dissident circle from which Russian Traditionalism emerged. Among the cultural events arranged in connection with the conference was a "rock ballad" using the Golovin's verse, performed by Alexander Sklyar.

Topics discussed are reported to have included eschatology, the postmodern situation, neo-Platonism, chaos, Kabbalah, and "the sacredness of authority and metaphysical horizons of the revolution."

Round-table on "Traditions and Traditionalism," Donetsk National Technical University

Another conference, or rather a round table, on "Traditions and Traditionalism," scheduled for November 11, 2011, at the Donetsk National Technical University, Ukraine. The Call follows normal academic protocol, and the round table is sponsored by the Department of Philosophy and the Center for Religious Studies, but is actually organized by a group called Aghlaqin that describes itself as "Thelemic"--i.e. inspired by Aleister Crowley. Conference languages are announced as Ukrainian, Russian and English, but the Call is only in Ukrainian.

There seems to be quite an interest in Tradititionalism in Ukraine. One of the websites carrying the Call is that of the Ukrainian Traditionalist Club, based in Kiev.

Rebellion, Tradition, and Complex Cultural Systems

A new article by Kennet Granholm on "Heathen Influences in Black Metal and Neofolk Music" (its subtitle), with the title "Sons of Northern Darkness," has just been published in Numen 58, no 4 (2011), pp. 514-544. The article is about Black Metal and Neofolk rather than Traditionalism, but does cover Traditionalism, and provides an interesting answer to the question of the relationship between Traditionalism and these two music scenes.

The argument is that we should think of Black Metal and Neofolk not just as music scenes, but as "complex cultural systems." Otherwise, it is hard to explain why two scenes that are so different in musical terms should partly overlap. The article traces in detail the development of the "esoteric" content of these scenes (or systems). Rock music is inherently rebellious, it argues. This is why Black Sabbath toyed with Satanism in the 1970s. When Satanism lost its power to shock, musicians moved on and went deeper, ending in some cases in what might be called classic heathenism, and in other cases in "Radical Traditionalist" heathenism. The article also charts a parallel process for Neofolk.

So, some might say: it's just posing, using Traditionalism (and/or heathenism) to very un-Traditional ends. Not so, in effect replies Granholm. Firstly, something either is or is not part of a cultural system, and if it is, it doesn't matter how and why it got there. Secondly, even if the root of the interest in Traditionalism (and/or heathenism) is rebellion, something similar is also true for esotericism as a whole. Rebellion against, or rejection of, the modern world is actually an integral aspect of all esotericism. And:

The key characteristic of Traditionalism, as well as the later Radical Traditionalist movement, is the rejection of dominant Western cultural and societal values and norms. Instead, the attention is shifted away from the modern West, and to what is considered to be more authentic culture and uncorrupted expressions of eternal wisdom. While the common “tradition” of choice for the original Traditionalist school was mystical  expressions of Islam, mainly Sufism, later developments of Traditionalism — in particular Radical Traditionalism — have often turned to European pre-Christian traditions. (537-38).

I am not 100% certain that this is the last word on the subject, but I think we are getting there. And I suspect this argument helps explain more than the music scenes that are its topic. It could also perhaps be developed to cover the political: the young Evola of the 1930s, the Evolians of the 1970s, and even parts of today's New Right.

Apoliteic music

In his new article, "Apoliteic music: Neo-Folk, Martial Industrial and 'metapolitical fascism'" (Patterns of Prejudice 43, no. 5, December 2009, pp. 431-457), Anton Shekhovtsov suggests that there are two types of radical right-wing music that are cultural reflections of the two different political strategies that fascism was forced to adopt in the ‘hostile’ conditions of the post-war period.

While White Noise music is explicitly designed to inspire racially or politically motivated violence and is seen as part and parcel of the revolutionary ultra-nationalist subculture, he suggests that ‘metapolitical fascism’ has its own cultural reflection in the domain of sound, namely, apoliteic music. This is a type of music whose ideological message contains obvious or veiled references to the core elements of fascism but is simultaneously detached from any practical attempts to realize these elements through political activity. Apoliteic music neither promotes outright violence nor is publicly related to the activities of radical right-wing political organizations or parties. Nor can it be seen as a means of direct recruitment to any political tendency.

Shekhovtsov’s article focuses on this type of music, and the thesis is tested by examining bands and artists that work in such musical genres as Neo-Folk and Martial Industrial, whose roots lie in cultural revolutionary and national folk traditions.

Euro-Paganism: One or many?

By Joshua Buckley, editor, TYR

In a recently published article, “The Euro-Pagan Scene: Between Paganism and Radical Right," (Journal for the Study of Radicalism, 2007), Stéphane François deals with a phenomenon that has only rarely been analyzed by outsiders – especially in the Anglophone world: what he calls “Euro-Paganism.” Covering a dizzying array of controversial music groups representing a wide-range of counter-cultural expression, the article makes for fascinating reading. The problem is that the sheer diversity and ambiguity of the material presented defies the author’s attempts to fit it into a meaningful framework. Unfortunately, it also suffers from some considerable shortcomings.

It is extremely difficult for a non-participant to write about youth subcultures. Unlike more conventional political or religious groupings, these subcultures do not present the researcher with much useful textual evidence. The subculture is expressed primarily through music and fashion, both of which are open to myriad interpretations. On the basis of my own experience of such subcultures, I would contend that the majority of participants in these subcultures are largely attracted by music and fashion, and that any ideological component is strictly secondary–even in the case of explicitly political subcultures (e.g. Nazi skinheads or anarchist punks). When ideological positions are expressed, there may be little concern that these positions are consistent or coherent, and one must always question the extent to which they reflect real convictions. More often than not, they may be motivated by considerations of style.

François’s article finds a subculture where, it could be argued, none exists. He identifies certain tendencies (pagan, revolutionary conservative, ecological) which he sees present to varying degrees in the work of music groups identified as part of the “Euro-pagan” scene. While it is certainly the case that some of these tendencies are apparent in some of the groups discussed, it is far less certain that these groups collectively represent anything like a cohesive “movement”–Euro-pagan or otherwise. In attempting to construct a history of the Euro-pagan scene, to define it as a more or less monolithic entity, and to trace the origins of a Euro-pagan ideology, François runs into problems of chronology, categorization, and the flow of influence. He also makes some factual errors. More importantly, it may be a project doomed to failure, especially if–as I would argue–no such “scene” really exists.

One would expect that a music-based subculture would consist of music groups with an identifiably similar sound. This is certainly the criterion for defining music genres like bluegrass, rhythm & blues, or country/western. Yet the vast majority of groups François refers to play wildly divergent styles of music. He describes the groups NON and Changes as precursors of the scene, yet anyone who has heard their music would be hard-pressed to identify any similarities. While Changes played lilting, lyrically poetic folk music akin to, say, Cat Stevens, NON is famous for helping develop power electronics or noise music. NON’s sound is visceral, atonal, and (often) brutal. Such music would have come as quite a shock to the crowds that once gathered to hear Changes play for packed coffeehouses and art galleries in the early- to mid-1970s.

Of course, one might argue that the groups François discusses are bound together by a common worldview or aesthetic. If the various tendencies he elucidates were all present in all of the groups mentioned, he might make a convincing case. However, many of the groups in the article display only one or two affinities–and often only in the most superficial sense. As an example, François describes the Slovenian outfit Laibach as “one of the first Euro-pagan groups.” To my knowledge at least, Laibach have never made reference to paganism at all. According to François’s definition, however, it is Laibach’s utilization of Fascist and other totalitarian imagery that qualifies them for inclusion in the subculture. But besides having nothing to do with paganism, Laibach’s Fascist style has nothing to do with Fascism. It is, rather, part of a larger strategy of post-modern cultural redirection, described at length in Alexei Monroe’s 2005 book Interrogation Machine (MIT Press). François insists that his analysis of Euro-pagan music reveals “the consistency of the message.” Yet one wonders how a subculture which apparently incorporates nostalgia for antiquity with the hyper-modernism of Italian Futurism, and a polytheistic, pagan worldview with the atheistic individualism of the Church of Satan, can be described as “consistent.” What we are really dealing with are multiple subcultures, or groups and individuals that defy categorization–like the aforementioned Laibach.

François sometimes mistakes similarities between groups or ideas for proof that these groups or ideas have had a direct influence on one another. As mentioned above, the group Changes existed in the early- to mid-1970s in the United States. They never released an album during that time, and they disbanded before many of the musicians François discusses were even born. It is true that Changes has since been rediscovered by fans of neofolk music (and have now reformed), and that the group has distinct similarities to some of the bands in François’s article. However, it is virtually impossible that the first incarnation of Changes actually influenced these groups, who could scarcely have discovered Changes’ work until the late-1990s. Even more problematic is François’s discussion of the European (mainly French) New Right. ENR thinkers like Alain de Benoist do have a relatively cohesive ideology that incorporates the pagan, revolutionary conservative, and ecological tendencies François equates with Euro-pagan music. However, while these themes are sometimes present in some of the music under consideration, they are not exclusively so. Moreover, relying on New Right texts to interpret a musical subculture arguably unconnected with the New Right is risky. It is like trying to understand Madonna’s music in terms of Catholic theology, since the singer sometimes wears a crucifix and calls herself “Madonna.” As with the music of Changes, it is unlikely that the first wave of bands François describes (who were mainly English) could have been exposed to New Right texts written mainly in French, and published in scholarly periodicals. Admittedly, some of these texts have been translated in the journal TYR (which I co-edit) but this has only occurred in the last few years. And despite the fact that the journal may appeal to fans of neofolk and other purportedly Euro-pagan music, it can hardly be said to speak for any particular subculture (especially one based primarily on music and fashion). Additionally, if TYR has influenced the development of a Euro-pagan scene, such influence would have to have been retroactive–since almost all of the groups in the article existed before the journal ever appeared.

Certainly, there are various music groups influenced by paganism (who might justly be described as “Euro-pagan”), just as there are music groups influenced by their flirtation with Fascism, an interest in Traditionalism, ecology, the Church of Satan, or the Italian Futurism of F. T. Marinetti. These groups, however, cannot be lumped together and characterized by a “consistent message”–especially when the author must derive that “message” from sources outside the supposed subculture itself. These groups play a variety of music, from folk, to power electronics, to neo-classical, to heavy metal. Many also utilize themes François never mentions, from an interest in psychedelic drugs to deviant sexuality. Some have real political convictions, others are apolitical. The majority use political or historical or religious or occult imagery for purely aesthetic reasons. What all of the groups François mentions have in common is that some of the imagery they use defies the Left/liberal consensus view of what is acceptable, and is therefore troubling for outsiders. François is undoubtedly correct when he describes these fascinations as a sort of “black romanticism”–not unlike the Goth subculture’s antinomian embrace of the macabre. In fact, the influential Goth magazine Propaganda was infamous for its frequent use of Nazi imagery, which jostled for place amongst a more pervasive interest in vampires and the editors’ pronounced homoeroticism. At a certain point, though, trying to explain such things as an “identitarian” response to “globalization and immigration” (except, perhaps, in very specific cases) raises serious questions of credibility.

The Euro-Pagan Scene (Stéphane François)

An interesting article has just been published in the new Journal for the Study of Radicalism: "The Euro-Pagan Scene: Between Paganism and Radical Right," by Dr Stéphane François (vol 1, no. 2, 2007, pp.35-54). It deals in part with what I have called "Music Scene Traditionalism."

François sets out to analyze and explain what he calls the "Euro-pagan" music scene–a term he proposes to cover both the dark folk and pagan sections of industrial music. The Euro-pagan music scene includes America as well as Western Europe and the former Eastern Bloc: "European" is used in an ethnic rather than a geographical sense. My Music Scene Traditionalism is part of his Euro-pagan music scene.

François argues for understanding the Euro-pagan scene as "an identitarian construction" that is "nourished by the fears of a population with European roots faced with a rising influx of immigrants and an expanding globalization that puts cultures and their diversity at risk."

He puts the Euro-pagan scene in the context of Western neo-paganism since the 1970s. He emphasizes that many or perhaps most neo-pagans are on the extreme left, and that "radical ecologist ideas" are more prevalent and more important than Euro-pagan ones. However, "despite the diversity of political beliefs," he finds "a profound doctrinal unity" among all neo-pagans. This consists of

• "the praise of radical differentialism"
• "using communitarianism as a solution to multiculturalism"
• "criticism of western thought, [as] individualist and standardizing"

François notes a number of "fascinations" among the Euro-pagan section of neo-paganism, notably fascinations with

• "bravery and virility"
• "the warrior"
• "the North"
• "the dark pages of European history"

Interest in Evola, along with definite but less important interest in Ernst Jünger and Corneliu Codreanu, is placed within the context of these fascinations. For many, the point of entry to Evola is not his Traditionalism, but his "idealization of the Indo-European."

This raises the question of which comes first–what François calls "black romanticism" or ideas (including Traditionalism). François does not directly address this question, but does observe that the esoteric content in the scene is sometimes "diluted," "merely make use of esoteric themes and symbols, without adhering to this metaphysical way of thinking." The same might well apply to the political content, but–as he observes–interest in radical politics often preceded involvement in the scene, as in the cases of Tony Wakeford of Sol Invictus, who was once a member of the British National Front, and Michael Moynihan of Blood Axis and Tyr, who was a radical communist at the age of 14.

How much all this matters is a question the article does not ask (though it does observe that the scene "opens up new perspectives" for existing rightist groups). It does, however, provide one approach to an answer, by convincingly identifying the scene with two wider phenomena that clearly do matter–ecology, and concern with immigration and globalization.

TYR vol 3

Joshua Buckley and Michael Moynihan announce the third issue of TYR (and are asking for pre-orders to elecampane@bellsouth.net).

Contents:

Thomas Naylor on “Cipherspace,” Annie Le Brun on “Catastrophe Pending,” Pentti Linkola on “Survival Theory,” Michael O’Meara on “The Primordial and the Perennial,” Alain de Benoist on “Spiritual Authority and Temporal Power,” Nigel Pennick on “The Web of Wyrd,” Thierry Jolif on “The Abode of the Gods and the Great Beyond,” Stephen Flowers on “The Spear of Destiny,” Joscelyn Godwin on Philip Pullman’s “Dark Materials” trilogy, Ian Read on “Humour in the Icelandic Sagas,” Geza von Neményi on the “Hávamál,” Gordon Kennedy on the “Children of the Sonne,” Michael Moynihan on “Carl Larsson’s Greatest Sacrifice,” Christopher McIntosh on “Iceland’s Pagan Renaissance,” Jónína Berg on Sveinbjörn Beinteinsson, Selected Poems by Sveinbjörn Beinteinsson, Vilius Rudra Dundzila on “Baltic Lithuanian Religion,” James Reagan on “The End Times,” interviews with the stalwart folk singer Andrew King and the modern minnesinger Roland Kroell, Collin Cleary on “Paganism Without Gods,” Róbert Hórvath on Mark Sedgwick’s “Against the Modern World,” and extensive book and music review sections.

I am told that the book review section contains a review of Against the Modern World by Joshua Buckley which "represents something of a dialogue with" Róbert Hórvath's review, printed in this issue of TYR in "a somewhat amended version" of that which has been on the Internet for some time.

I wonder if Mr Hórvath's review still contains the statement that "Some presume that [Mark Sedgwick] is a kind of Euro-Atlantic spy, whose official task is to hunt for all the anti-modernist conceptions that have fertilised the contemporary Islamic world. According to others he has not been allowed to enter an initiatory order with 'Traditionalist' connections, and has written this book as revenge"?

As a general rule, I don't generally enter into dialogue with such suggestions, though I did think of putting "presumed Euro-Atlantic spy" on my CV. However, for the record I'll just mention that I am not and never have been a spy of any sort, and that I was never refused entry into any initiatory order, and that the speculations about my motives in writing Against the Modern World that are to be found in various places on the Internet are without foundation. I'm just a historian doing the job of a historian to the best of my ability.

More important is Mr Hórvath's statement that "expressing the references to Hungary numerically, it transpires that out of 21 pieces of information 13 are false." He should know! I once emailed him and asked for corrections, but got no reply. I now renew my appeal, to him or to anyone else! I do not know Hungarian, and so could put only a little in my book about Traditionalism in Hungary, but it seems to be important, and it would be good to know more.

Eurasia on RU Tube!

Alexander Dugin's associates have once again shown their considerable media talents. A number of excellent video clips are available on Ru Tube (not to be confused with YouTube!). Excellent photography, and some very interesting music. A few clashes with the police, some speeches by Dugin, outings in the woods... essential viewing, actually. Try the classic style, and the postmodern style. Also visit Eurasia TV.