George William Russell (Æ): A Forgotten Irish Mystic
Gabriel Rosenstock gives a poetic response to twelve visionary paintings by the ‘myriad-minded’ writer and polymath, while Jane Clark and Peter Huitson give an overview of his life, work and legacy
Published in BESHARA MAGAZINE by Jane Clark and Peter Huitson
Courtesy of Beshara Magazine: Painting is in The National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin. Image via Wikimedia Commons.
EXCERPT:
”In his spiritual biography The Candle of Vision, he reveals the intensity of what he felt in the Irish landscape:
…Somewhere about me I knew there were comrades who were speaking to me, but I could not know what they said. As I walked in the evening down the lanes scented by the honeysuckle my senses were expectant of some unveiling about to take place… The visible world became like a tapestry blown and stirred by winds behind it. If it would but raise for an instant I knew I would be in Paradise. Every form on that tapestry appeared to be the work of gods. Every flower was a word, a thought. The grass was speech; the trees were speech; the waters were speech; the winds were speech. They were the Army of the Voice marching on to conquest and dominion over the spirit; and I listened with my whole being, and then these apparitions would fade away and I would be the mean and miserable boy once more. So might one have felt who had been servant of the prophet, and seen him go up in the fiery chariot, and the world had no more light or certitude in it with that passing.”
—Æ (GEORGE WILLIAM RUSSELL), The Candle of Vision: The Autobiography of a Mystic (Azafran Books, 2019).(pp. 11–12)