Dramatis Personae:
Aleister "The Great Beast 666" Crowley - a Wizard
JFC "Jesus Fucking Christ" Fuller - a Fascist
Jack "Motherfucking Antichrist" Parsons - a Rocket Scientist
Numerous Crazy, Useless and Dead Thelemites
L Ron "Xenu" Hubbard - a Science-Fiction Writer
Arnold "Younghusband" Crowther - a Ventriloquist
Gerald "Old Gerald" Gardner - a Civil Servant
Dorothy "Glove Puppet" Clutterbuck - an Alleged Witch
Kenneth "Fhtagn" Grant - a Lovecraft Enthusiast
Thomas "Witchcraft Act" Brooks - an MP
Numerous Spiritualists, Witches, and the Like
Cecil "Witchcraft Research Centre" Williamson - an MI6 Agent
The Ghost of Dr. John "Sixteenth Century Swinger" Dee - an Alchemist
Edith "Dafo" Woodford-Grimes - a Witch
Doreen "Red Pen" Valiente - a Witch
The Narrator - an Overly Honest Occultist
Silver RavenWolf - an Ass
Scene One: A Hotel, 1947
Crowley: Blergh. I am dying, and everything has more or less gone to shit. Also, pretty much all my followers are crazy, useless, or dead.
*Fuller, Parsons, Hubbard, and assorted Crazy, Useless and Dead Thelemites wave through the window. Crowley throws a book at them, and they scatter. There is a knock on the door.*
Crowley: Enter!
*Enter Crowther and Gardner.*
Crowther: Evening, Al. Here's the chap that I wanted you to meet.
Gardner: Hello, Al. I'm Gerald Gardner, Royal Arch Mason and naturist, and I would like to join your cult.
Crowley: Which one, I have, like, eight?
Gardner: The err... Ordo Templi... um... *reads smudge on back of hand* Origami.
Crowley: *shrugs* close enough. I hear you're a witch or something.
Gardner: Yep.
Crowley: Can you prove it?
Gardner: Certainly. *produces puppet of Dorothy Clutterbuck* This is the woman who initiated me, who I most certainly have not just made up.
Crowther: *speaking through the puppet as Gardner moves his hand* I an Gorothy Gluttercuck and I acsolutely will attest to Goctor Gardner geing a witch. We gid nagic and stocked the Nazis grom invaging ang everything.
Crowley: Aah, Frau Sprengel, good to hear from you again.
*Gardner and Crowther look at each other, and shrug.*
Crowther: Huh?
Crowley: Never mind, I think that joke's going to be in a later post. Anyway, whatever, you appear to be quarter-competent. Think of a number.
Gardner: Err... seven?
Crowley: Sure. *scribbles something on the back of an envelope, hands it to Gardner* Congratulations, welcome to the 7th degree of the OTO.
Gardner: What does that mean?
Crowley: [This OTO grade secret removed on legal advice]
Gardner: *aghast* Really? But that's anatomically impossible!
Crowley: Only if you don't lubricate the kazoo. And here's a writ of authorisation for you to start up a new OTO lodge. *Hands over another piece of paper*
Gardner: *confusedly reading the document* This is literally the title deeds to a field in Surrey.
Crowley: Turn it over.
Gardner: *does so; reads from document* "Do what thou wilt shall be the law, We Baphomet X degree Ordo Templi Orientis, Sovereign Grandmaster General of all English Speaking Countries of the Earth do hereby Authorise our beloved son Scire, (Dr. GB Gardner), Prince of Jerusalem, to constitute a camp of the Ordo Templi Orentis in the degree of Minerval. Love is the Law, Love Under Will. Witness my hand and seal, Baphomet X." Thanks, Al!
Crowley: Let's face it, you can't do any worse than that idiot *points out of window, to where Kenneth Grant is performing some kind of ridiculous Black Mass*
Grant: Ia! Ia! Hail Yog-Sothoth!
Gardner: I'll certainly try.
Crowley: Thanks. And now, I'm afraid I'm dreadfully sorry but I've got some very important trolling to attend to. I'm going to see if it is actually possible to scandalise Brighton.
*Crowley dies. His funeral is, indeed, quite scandalous*
Scene Two: Outside Parliament, 1951
Brooks: And t'Witchcraft Act of 1735 has now been repealed.
Spiritualists, Witches and the Like: Yay!
Gardner: At last! Now I can complete my dream of moving to the Isle of Man and opening a museum!
Williamson: At last! Now I can complete my dream of moving to the Isle of Man and opening a museum!
*Gardner and Williamson look at each other, and grin*
Gardner: I see the beginnings of a beautiful friendship...
Williamson: Indeed, I see no way that this could go wrong. Let us open a museum together!
Scene Three: A Museum, 1952
Williamson: This has all gone terribly wrong, and it's your fault. I'm going back to England.
Gardner: Bugger. How didn't I see this coming?
Williamson: Unrelatedly, ever noticed how, like, 90% of occultists have worked for some manner of intelligence agency at some point?
*The Ghost of Dr John Dee fades into view and waves*
Scene Four: The house of Edith Woodford-Grimes, 1952
Gardner: Aah, hello Doreen, and welcome to the Bricket Wood Coven. I see you have met Edith, my fellow witch from the New Forest Coven, which-was-totally-the-last-remnant-of-an-ancient-witch-cult-and-not-something-made-up-by-some-bored-Rosicrucians-honest.
Woodford-Grimes: *resignedly, with the puppet of Dorothy Clutterbuck* It's totally true. Ask Nargaret Nurray.
Valiente: Thank you, Uncle Gerald. I'd like to join your cult.
Gardner: Good good. Tell me, how are you with nudity?
Valiente: Fine, I guess?
Gardner: How about... rope.
Valiente: Er, sure...
Gardner: Flogging?
Valiente: I...
Woodford-Grimes: Gerald, is this an actual coven or one of those "Specialist Clubs"...
Gardner: Yes. Now, Doreen, how about knives?
Woodford-Grimes: Sod this. I quit. *Drops the Clutterbuck puppet, storms out*
Gardner: Bugger. How didn't I see this coming?
Valiente: Um...
Gardner: Never mind all that. Blah blah, I initiate you into the Seeeecrets of Witchcraft. Here's your complementary Book of Shadows. *He hands Valiente a large leather-bound tome*
Valiente: *flicking through the tome* Ooh, this is intere... wait, this is literally a copy of Crowley's "Liber AL vel Legis".
Gardner: *whistling innocently* No it isn't.
Valiente: Yes it is. You've literally crossed out "Nuit" and written "Aradia" in this bit.
Gardner: *grabbing the book back* No! Total coincidence! Can't prove a thing! Authentic ancient document, very sacred.
Valiente: It was written in the margins. In crayon.
Gardner: Look, nobody else has noticed yet, so let's just keep it between us, shall we?
Valiente: Fine. But at least let me rewrite it so it's a little less... Crowley.
Gardner: Deal.
Scene Five: A coven gathering, 1957
Valiente: Gerald, we need to talk about all this ridiculous publicity-seeking.
Gardner: Sorry, can we talk about this later? I'm running late for my interview with Witching Today magazine...
Valiente: Gerald. This is an intervention. We're worried about you. Also, I'm High Priestess now, so you're probably meant to listen to me.
Gardner: Urgh, whatever. Make it quick.
Valiente: I've written these proposed rules of the Craft, which I would like you to read... *hands over a sheaf of papers* Now, these are just a draft, but...
Gardner: *chucking the papers over his shoulder* Pft, never mind with that. I've got the ancient and authentic Wiccan Laws here, which say that you're wrong. *He reaches into his pocket, and hands a piece of paper to Valiente*
Valiente: *reading* "Item One: Doreen is wrong, and also she smells." Seriously?
Gardner: Remarkably prescient, the ancients.
Valiente: This is literally written on the back of a gas bill.
Gardner: As is traditional.
Valiente: In crayon.
Gardner: Sacred crayon.
Valiente: Whatever, fuck this shit. I quit. *storms off*
Gardner: Bugger. How didn't I see this coming?
Scene Six: A Pub, 2016
Narrator: And things pretty much spiraled out from there. Doreen Valiente got involved with various other Gardnerian offshoots, such as Cochrane's Craft, and continued to go down the "anything but Crowley" route. Various other Gardnerians like Alex Sanders and Raymond Buckland developed their own variant traditions, which crossbred with various other ceremonial magic groups and New Age movements. Sooner or later, "Wicca" became near synonymous with paganism, much to the consternation of the few remaining "True" Gardnerian initiates. But nobody really paid any attention to them, especially after Janet and Stewart Farrar published the vast majority of Gardner's Book of Shadows - the core texts of Wicca - in the 1970's. There are a few claims that there is a "secret" doctrine of Gardnerian texts that have never been published openly - which, in all likelihood, are probably variations on a theme of OTO doctrine. And then, there are people like this...
*Enter Silver RavenWolf*
Silver RavenWolf: One cannot be a Satanic Witch, because Witches do not believe in Satan! Society has encouraged the negative view of menstruation that has many feeling weak, tired and disorientated because they think they are supposed to feel this way! Astarte is a Greek fertility goddess! Lilith was a Star Woman who bred with Adam!
*As she speaks, the ground begins vibrating*
Narrator: Those are all actual quotes, by the way. Now, what's that rumbling noise?
Crowley: *speaking as a disembodied voice, spinning rapidly under the ground* DAMN IT RAVENWOOOOLF....
Fin.
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