Also an illustrated talk coming up in London on Thursday 6 November on Mansion of Gloom: the Unsettling Legacy of Poe's 'The Fall of the House of Usher'. It will take place at one of my favourite talk venues the Lecture Theatre (recently refurbished with upgraded equipment) of Kensington Central Library. See here.
See here for details. The £3 entry fee includes a glass of wine or non-alcoholic drink.
Copies of Mansion of Gloom will be on sale.
Details should appear here in the next few days. I shall probably be starting around 4pm. A real variety of performers including Anthony Moore, Owen Hatherley, Vlad Miller and many more. The full event runs from 2 to 6pm.
More information and tickets here.
I've forgotten to mention that an interview I did some months ago for a German radio podcast Das Grosse Beast is available online here. It's a 4-part documentary on Aleister Crowley in German. My contribution, recorded at the site of Netherwood on the edge of Hastings, is in Part 4. Gary Lachman can also be heard.
There's a cheaper copy of Mansion of Gloom for sale on eBay at the moment. See here.
At a recent screening of Monty Python and the Holy Grail at the Electric Palace in Hastings the film's producer Mark Forstater took part in a Q&A in which he said that he is currently putting together a film set in Hastings with an Aleister Crowley theme (something to do with AC's supposed 'curse' on the town). Watch this space.
I'm enjoying the music of London-based musician, composer and producer DoomCannon at the moment - the Renaissance album draws inspiration from early 1970s fusion and spiritual jazz. Also two reissued albums by Joe Henderson Power to the People and Multiple.
Two gigs I was going to have been postponed Throwing Muses at the White Rock and Lost Crowns in Brighton (I suspect this gig will never happen). Next up is The Warlocks at The Piper in St Leonards, see here and here.
The next event I'm involved in is a walk for the Sohemian Society about William Burroughs' time in London in the early 1970s in the company of Bill Redwood and Jim Pennington. Half the tickets have already sold (it was first advertised yesterday) so may be time to get a ticket now to avoid disappointment.
Tickets here. Sunday 12 August starting at 2.30 outside Westminster Reference Library in St Martin's Street WC2. We'll finish outside the block in Bury Street where he lived and entertained friends such as Brion Gysin.
More events on the way.
So there I was, sitting at my laptop last week, when I suddenly started to receive a lot of online orders for Mansion of Gloom, scrolling down the screen.
The reason for this flurry of activity was a positive and astute review in this month's (July) Fortean Times by Roger Luckhurst, who kindly awarded it 5 STARS.
Here are some extracts: 'It is a grand exercise in obsession and textual hoarding that feels typical, perhaps, of one of Poe's own slightly unhinged neurotic protagonists.' (I take this as a compliment).
Antony Clayton has published erudite and beautiful limited-edition books through his own Accumulator Press . . . The Poe book is more recognisably an outsider scholar's massive work of sifting and sorting Poe's likely influences on Usher . . It feels at once a strange folly of the collector's completist mindset and an indispensable volume for the Poe reader.'
'Scholarly and eccentric, for Poe readers this is essential. Snap one up before the limited run sells out.' (my underlining)
Also for those who buy from me at talks or through Big Cartel you also receive a limited edition artist's print, although there are only around 20 of these left as of June 14 2025.
As I type this another order has come in, so get them while you can.
You can buy Mansion of Gloom here - I've dropped the price for a limited period. Click on Accumulator Press online store.
Roger Luckhurst himself has written some wonderful books that overlap with my interests which you can check out here. His book on the Mummy's Curse was very useful for one of my folklore pieces on this blog. Link here.
Mansion of Gloom is also available from these bookshops: Watkins, Atlantis, Treadwells, Hare & Hawthorn Hastings, Courtyard Books Glastonbury.
Jonathan Rigby: 'A stupendous tome'.
More details and booking here
The Whistler walk for the Sohemian Society on Sunday 8 June has sold out.
Copies of my latest book Mansion of Gloom: The Unsettling Legacy of Edgar Allan Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher can be purchased here.
Further events to promote the book are in the pipeline.
Upcoming gigs:
Jazz Hastings at East Hastings Sea Angling Association: Byron Wallen's Four Corners (great musicians including brilliant Rob Luft on guitar and Rod Youngs on drums. See here
I was intending to see Throwing Muses in Hastings last night but the gig has been rescheduled owing to Kristin Hersh losing here voice. See here
Lost Crowns at Alphabet Brighton see here
More information and ticket booking here.
Limited places so book early. It will take 90 to 120 minutes and involve a fair amount of walking. Hope to finish at a pub for those interested.
Mansion of Gloom is now available from Courtyard Books in Glastonbury, a friendly esoterically-minded bookshop I visited a while ago.
Have a look here.
Thursday talk here
