Dion Fortune

Early life and Career

1890

Born Llandudno, North Wales, as Violet Mary Firth on December 6th 1890.

1910-20:

Interest and involvement in psychoanalysis and attracted towards the occult by their apparent overlap. Studied occultism under Dr. Theodore Moriarty and joined the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in 1919, in the Alpha et Omega Lodge run by the novelist Brodie Innes.

1920-30:

Transferred to Stella Matutina Lodge of the Golden Dawn run by Moina MacGregor Mathers and developed mediumship capabilities in herself whilst continuing the occult/psychological interest. Her writings in this period reflect this: Machinery Of The Mind, The Soya Bean, The Psychology Of The Servant Problem, The Problem Of Purity; The Esoteric Philosophy Of Love And Marriage, Sane Occultism, The Esoteric Orders And Their Work, The Training And Work Of An Initiate, The Cosmic Doctrine, Psychic Self Defence and the fictional works The Secrets of Dr Taverner and The Demon Lover.

Her strong magical-psychological bias was modified by a powerful vision about the need to take on board the Christian dynamic, and she joined, somewhat reluctantly, the Christian Mystic Lodge of the Theosophical Society of which she soon become President. As a result however of strong disapproval of senior figures in the Theosophical Society, and the Golden Dawn, in her view, becoming moribund, she founded the Community of the Inner Light, first at Glastonbury and soon also with a headquarters in London. In 1927 she married Dr. Thomas Penry Evans.

Late Career and Death

1930-40:

Most of her subsequent non-fiction work first saw the light of day in The Inner Light Magazine and her inner development can be followed fairly straightforwardly from their titles. Avalon Of The Heart, Spiritualism In The Light Of Occult Science, Through The Gates Of Death, Practical Occultism In Daily Life, Mystical Meditations On The Collects, The Mystical Qabalah, and the novels The Winged Bull, The Goat-Foot God, The Sea Priestess. The novels were an attempt to give practical exemplification to the theoretical principles given in her important textbook "The Mystical Qabalah".

1940-46:

At the outbreak of war she continued in difficult circumstances, (including being bombed out of her headquarters temporarily), to keep the Fraternity going with a series of Weekly Letters and after the restructuring of the group in 1942 in readiness for the post-war epoch by a series of Monthly Letters, paper rationing having put a stop to magazine and book publication. She also continued work on the novel Moon Magic. Her writings of this time have been collected and edited by Gareth Knight under the titles of The Magical Battle Of Britain, An Introduction To Ritual Magic, The Circuit Of Force, and Principles of Hermetic Philosophy (which includes "Esoteric Principles of Astrology"). Teaching upon the Arthurian Tradition that she initiated at this time has been incorporated into The Secret Tradition In Arthurian Legend by Gareth Knight.

She died of leukemia at the Middlesex Hospital, London on January 8th 1946.

A list of published works by Don Fortune

Non Fiction

The Machinery of the Mind

The Esoteric Philosophy of Love and Marriage

The Psychology of the Servant Problem

The Problem of Purity

The Esoteric Orders and Their Work

Sane Occultism

Mystical Meditations on the Collects

Psychic Self-Defense

The Training and Work of an Initiate