The Whispering Swarm, by Michael Moorcock (re-broadcast)

On April 16th, 2015 the Hermetic Hour with host Poke Runyon will review the
new semi-biographical novel by fantasy grandmaster Michael Moorcock "The
Whispering Swarm." This remarkable book should be of special interest to
magicians and Hermetic students. Moorcock is the modern heir to the mantles
of J.R.R. Tolkien, and Robert E.Howard. His fiction is deeply magical and
steeped in Hermetic lore. The Whispering Swarm is somewhat experimental. His
protagonist is himself and he tells his life story up to his passage from
adolescence into adulthood through the entrance into a secret enclave in the
multiverse, inhabited by historical and fictional characters he has read
about. Raised in London during and after WWll, he discovers an ancient
hidden medieval village called the Alsacia, or The Sanctuary, inhabited by
magical monks in an old Abbey, a tavern full of swashbuckling cavaliers,
including the Musketeers from Dumas and a glamorous Hughwaywoman called
Molly Midnight. He also lives in the real world, having a wife and children
and a job as an editor, but is driven to escape into The Sanctuary by the
tumult of Whispering voices in his head (the Swarm). Most importantly it
explores Moorcock's two warring personalities in emotional spiritual and
political conflict. He is a romantic at heart and an agnostic socialist in
intellect -- so he fights to save King Charles from Cromwell's Ax because
his cavalier heroes need his abilities to walk between the worlds. One
wonders all through the book, just how much of the fantasy is real, or a
metaphor for reality. So, if you want to visit an adult's Land of Oz then
follow us through the London fog to the hidden gates of the Sanctuary and
we'll find the Swan with Two Necks tavern for a shant of ale and an hour of
High Magical Adventure.