Apocalypse in England
A Critical Study of Frederick Carter
by Richard Grenville Clark
Finally the life-story of a neglected and fascinating artist who mixed with key figures of the British Occult and Decadent milieu can be told…
“Monographs on forgotten artists are important things, and in an increasingly mainstream world they are becoming too rare. It is valuable to rescue seemingly minor artists, especially when they are as good – and, in various ways, as revealing of their era – as Frederick Carter.” – Phil Baker, from the Introduction
Up until now the mystical quester Frederick Carter has been merely a footnote in other biographies, notably those of Austin Osman Spare and Arthur Machen. Carter’s oeuvre was formed by a plurality of influences and interactions extending to the occult, philosophy, and religion. Now he moves centre-stage to have his story told and his achievements accessed.
Clark's volume features unprecedented access to the artist/writer's rich personal archive of diaries, memoirs, sketch books, and artworks, and provides first-hand encounters with many figures from the esoteric London circles of Bohemian artists, writers, publishers and intellectuals, including a dinner party with Aleister Crowley, which ends in a venomous spat between the Beast and his jilted lover; a visit to Austin Spare to meet W.H. Davies, the Welsh poet, and a drug experiment with George Raffalovich, Crowley's friend and disciple.
Carter was a devotee of art as expressed through the power of the subconscious, and his experimentation with automatic drawing between 1915 and 1924, along with fellow symbolist Austin Osman Spare, confirms his deep interest in the method, which he hoped would prove a means of releasing suppressed associations and images from the subliminal world. Also, his deep interest in alchemy, and all aspects of the supernatural and occult, led him to produce works of sublime esoteric symbolism, especially his masterwork, The Dragon of the Alchemists.
Richly-illustrated throughout with unpublished examples of Carter’s exquisite line-drawings, etchings of London, mystical woodcuts, and over 300 black and white illustrations.
“His images resonated and danced across a range of genres… this book presents us with a new perspective on a figure who has hitherto been seen as marginal to cultural debates of the period, and shows him to be of central significance.” – Richard Grenville Clark
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Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Foreword — Phil Baker
Introduction
PART ONE — BIOGRAPHICAL CONTEXT
The Context
Biographical
Chapter One
Fred in Bradford 1883–1900 — Getting kitted Out
The Brothers
Chapter Two
Foundations
London
Chapter Three
Englishmen in Paris
The Red Light District
Chapter Four
George Raffalovich and the Ukraine
Chapter Five
Carter’s World War I Cartoons for The Herald
Chapter Six
Marriage and Divorce
Chapter Seven
Cecil Court
Chapter Eight
An Air Raid Warden’s View of War-Torn London
Chapter Nine
The Truefitts and Other Friends
PART TWO — GLADIATORS OF THE MIND
Chapter Ten
Austin Osman Spare
Chapter Eleven
A Visionary Irishman in London and a Mystical Englishman’s Tower
Aleister Crowley
Chapter Twelve
Modernists, Traditionalists, and Bohemia
Poetry Wars
Hesperides
Chapter Thirteen
Thomas Burke and Arthur Machen
Flânerie in the Côterie
Arthur Machen
Chapter Fourteen
John Gawsworth
An American in Paris: Henry Miller
PART THREE — THE COSMIC HIGHWAY
Chapter Fifteen
Carter’s Cosmogony: Mystical, Religious and Philosophical Writing
Carter on the Apocalypse in the Revelation of St John the Divine
Chapter Sixteen
D.H. Lawrence and Frederick Carter
Notes on the Pontesbury Days: Apocalypse in Shropshire
Chapter Seventeen
Carter’s Quest — The Game Of Destiny
Carter and Astrology
The Game of Characters and Destiny with Astrological Charts and Drawings
The Cards
The Tables
The Houses of Heaven
The Table of Destiny: The Square of Seven Sevens
The Twelve Cards of the Body
Chapter Eighteen
The Writer
Appendix
I A Theory of Automatic Drawing
II Form and Idea
III Drama and Apocalypse: Revelation and Drama
IV Signs and Symbols (Prognosticating)
V Frederick Carter’s Unpublished Notebooks
VI A Selection of Carter’s Unpublished Poetry
VII Collaborative Works by Gawsworth and Carter
VIII Contemporary Scholarship on the Apocalypse
IX Of Good Character
X Two Unpublished Essays:
The Guide or Steps in the Dark
Sherlock Holmes and the Strange Case of Watson-Doyle (The Problem of Survival)
XI Apes, Japes, and Hitlerism
Afterword
An Historiographical Aside
Bibliography
Index
Colophon
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Extensively illustrated with a splendid litho printed colour-plate section, and over 300 black & white images throughout the text.
A hand-numbered facsimile of Fredrick Carter’s ex-libris is included as an insert.
Hardcover Edition - Limited to 400 numbered copies
380 pages. Plum purple cloth-bound hardcover with illustrated dust-jacket, silver foil blocking to front cover and spine. Litho printed, sewn, custom illustrated endpapers, red & grey head and tail bands, and purple silk ribbon bookmark.
ISBN: 978-1-17384086-1-0
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About the Author
Richard Greenville Clark is a British biographer, novelist and writer on art. He studied History and English for a B.A. joint honours, then read History for his M.A. He became Frederick Carter’s literary and artistic executor in the 1990s when Carter’s daughter gave him all of her father’s papers and manuscripts to help with his projected critical study of Carter as artist and writer. Fredrick Carter A.R.E. 1883—1967 A Study of His Etchings was published by Apocalypse Press, Guildford, in 1998. Clark’s mission has been to restore Carter to his rightful place in the historical record.
About the Artist
The late Frederick Carter (1885—1967) was a British painter and etcher, who abandoned an early career as a civil engineer and surveyor to study art in Paris (1904), Antwerp (1909-10), and London (1908-11). In 1910–1916, and again in 1922, he was elected A.R.E. (Associate of the Royal Society of Etchers and Engravers), and between 1922 and 1927 he taught etching at the Liverpool School of Art.
A great believer in the power of the subconscious, Frederick Carter had experimented with automatic drawing between 1915 and 1924, along with his friend and fellow artist Austin Osman Spare. He hoped that this might prove to be a means of releasing suppressed associations and images from the subliminal, through which he, like the early alchemists, might discover the essence of life itself.
Frederick Carter’s deep interest in alchemy and the occult led him to produce an esoteric symbolism which is apparent throughout his work. His intricate wood engravings have always been considered to be the artist’s greatest works. Their inspired designs brought him three successive gold medals for book illustration in the National Competition, South Kensington - the most prestigious award of his day. Carter also worked on illustrations for D.H. Lawrence’s book, Apocalypse, that had begun its life as an introduction to Carter’s own book, Dragon of Revelations, published 1932, and which Carter had sent to Lawrence in New Mexico. Today, Carter’s work is in the collections of the British Museum and V&A. A retrospective exhibition was held at the 20th Century Gallery, Fulham, London, 1998.
