An Open Thank You Letter to Paul Huson

Dear Paul Huson,

Today is your birthday and I wanted to take this opportunity to thank you profusely for your work. I want to thank you in particular for writing Mastering Witchcraft. At a time when Wicca was fast becoming synonymous, you wrote a book that presented a Witchcraft that was everything that Wicca was not. When Wicca was hastening to weed out any trace of Christianity from folk magic, you embraced it, using Christian names for the Sabbats, treating the Grigori as Witch ancestors, and noting the connection between the Sator square and the Pater Noster. At a time when Witches the world over were trying to explain that they were not Satanists up to no good, you included a dedication rite where you say the Lord’s Prayer backwards and a whole Chapter on Vengeance and attack. At a time when publishers and practitioners were widening the divide between ceremonial magic and witchcraft, you had Witches evoking Vassago by the power of the Decans.

As the 70’s turned into the 80’s and the Satanic panic set in, I am sure the criticisms just kept mounting. I myself visited shops in 1989 that actually placed warning stickers on Mastering Witchcraft to let readers know that “This is not REAL Witchcraft. REAL Witches don’t curse or believe in demons”.

As the new millennium dawned, those of us who read your books as kids started producing our own work, much of it openly embraces those aspects of Mastering Witchcraft that were once forbidden. I cannot tell you how many of us list Mastering Witchcraft as their first book on magic. Even if it wasn;t literally the first book we encountered, it was probably the first book that mattered. You were our Gerald Gardner. When I was younger and people asked “what kind of a witch are you?” I used to answer “Husonian” even though we never met.  As of today I own three copies of Mastering Witchcraft, my first is falling apart after 30 years of use. My second is a signed copy I was given for my Birthday some years back. My third is inherited from a friends Aunt whose only instruction was to make sure that book went into the hands of someone who would appreciate it.

Thank you Paul, you helped shape a generation of Witches, Magicians, and Sorcerers, and kept witchcraft sexy, dangerous, and effective, as it should be.

Happy Birthday