The Triumph of Pan : Hermaphroditism and Sexual Inversion in Victor Benjamin Neuburg's Poetry
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| Year of publication | 2015 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
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| Description | The Graeco-Roman god Pan was particularly significant for late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century literature, especially that produced by the Decadent movement in England and abroad. This is not surprising, given the features that Pan shares with the Decadent movement, features that proved oppositional to the moral and social norms that developed during the Christian period. For the Decadents, this mirrored their own defiance against mainstream values, intentionally breaching the border between the sacred and the profane. Pan also had special significance for the occult and homoerotic practices that dominated the relationship between the famous magician, occult writer, Decadent poet, and general contrarian Edward Aleister Crowley (1875-1947) and his apprentice in the art of sexual magic, Victor Benjamin Neuburg (1883-1940), who was himself a Decadent poet, one whose memorable collection of poems is entitled The Triumph of Pan (1910). In the eroticized rituals that Crowley and Neuburg performed together in the Algerian desert in late 1909, Neuburg was figured as the god Pan. The present paper focuses on the motifs of hermaphroditism and sexual inversion that dominate Neuburg's title-poem "The Triumph of Pan," motifs that aptly characterise the ritualized relationship that existed between himself and Crowley. |
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