Random Insane Facts About Aleister Crowley, Perhaps Most Unique Person (22 items)

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  (#13) He Married His Wife To Save Her From An Arranged Marriage, Then Fell In Love With Her

  In 1903, Crowley married his first wife, the widow Rose Edith Kelly (the sister of his friend Gerard), in order to save her from an unwanted arranged marriage. It was intended to be only a marriage of convenience. However, during their long honeymoon voyage around the world, he fell in love with Kelly, writing her a series of love poems.

  Kelly would become instrumental in his mystical work. The pair had two children, Nuit Ma Ahathoor Hecate Sappho Jezebel Lilith (called "Lillith") and Lola Zaza. They would remain married until 1909, when they finally separated over the strain caused by Kelly's alcoholism and Crowley's infidelity.
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  (#10) He Worked For Allied Interests During World War I

  Crowley spent parts of World War I in the United States, a nation that was notably neutral for the majority of the war. While there, Crowley acted as a kind of spy for Allied interests. He used a cover as an ardent Irish nationalist, since Irish nationalists would appear to be anti-British and pro-German. Using this cover, Crowley published what initially appeared to be pro-German propaganda in America. On closer inspection, however, it's clear what Crowley's intentions really were: the writings were so over-the-top that they actually ridiculed the German cause.

  Historians have suggested that he also encouraged the Germans to sink the Lusitania, assuring them it would intimidate the Americans and discourage them for joining the war effort, while in fact knowing that the exact opposite would occur. In addition, he took several trips to Russia that some biographers think were covert missions for the British secret service.
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  (#15) He Had A Rotating Cast Of Female Partners He Dubbed His Scarlet Women

  Throughout his life, Crowley would dub female partners his Scarlet Woman, or Babalon. The Scarlet Woman was essentially an embodied goddesss who represented the Feminine Divine, including sexual power and fertility. Crowley dubbed seven women Scarlet Woman, including his first wife, Rose Edith Kelly, and his lover Leah Hirsig (whose vagina he described as "the Hirsig patent vacuum-pump" in an explicit poem).
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  (#1) He Practiced Sex Magick - And Believed That Consuming Body Fluids Was A Sacrament

  An important part of the rituals of Thelema, this so-called "sex magick" was supposed to be transformative and clarifying. Even body fluids were important to Crowley and his religion. In the Mass of the Phoenix, for example, participants had to consume a Cake of Light. What was the Cake of Light? It was a kind of twist on Catholicism's wafers: Cakes of Light contained either male fluids or menstrual blood.

  As a member of the occult society Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO), Crowley also added a new ritual based on "taboo positions" to be practiced by members of the 11th degree.

  It is also important to note that Crowley had scores of intense, passionate affairs throughout his life. He considered himself to be bisexual, as he had both male and female partners. Crowley's belief in the power of the act was thus a guiding force in his personal relationships. 
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  (#8) A British Earl Hired Crowley To Protect Him From His Own Mother

  By 1907, Crowley was officially using his beliefs professionally. One client was George Montagu Bennet, 7th Earl of Tankerville. Tankerville, a paranoid drug addict, was convinced that his own mother was trying to use witchcraft to kill him. So he turned to Crowley for help. Crowley provided Tankerville with a talisman, tarot readings, and a vacation away from his family. The vacation to the continent also gave Crowley the opportunity to help Tankerville with his drug addiction using the rituals of Thelema.
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  (#9) He Once Faked His Own Death Just To See What Would Happen

  Crowley loved the spotlight, and so he was curious what his death might reveal. So in 1930, while he was in Portugal, Crowley sought to fake his own death. He turned to his friend, the Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa, for help. The two staged Crowley's death to appear as if he had jumped off a cliff. For effect, Crowley left behind what appeared to be a suicide note. As papers reported on the death of Aleister Crowley, the man was alive and well.

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