Explore Cosmic Consciousness with a Visionary Scribe
“Art is kind of an innate drive that seizes a human being and makes him its instrument. The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realize its purposes through him. ” CARL JUNG
the Visionary Mode of Artistic Creation
The eminent Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist, Carl Jung, applied the term visionary in his 1929 lecture, “Psychology and Literature,” to a super-genre forming one of the two major divisions of artistic production: “I will call the one mode of artistic creation psychological,” he says, “and the other visionary. The psychological work of art always takes it materials from the vast realm of conscious human experience—from the vivid foreground of life, we might say.” What is generally called realism.
In Visionary Fiction, he explains, “The experience that furnishes the material for artistic expression is no longer familiar. It is a strange something that derives its existence from the hinterlands of man’s mind—that suggests the abyss of time separating us from pre-human ages, or evokes a superhuman world of contrasting light and darkness. It is a primordial experience which surpasses man’s understanding, and to which he is in danger therefore of succumbing. The value and the force of the experience are given by its enormity…. [They] rend from top to bottom the curtain upon which is painted the picture of an ordered world. And allow a glimpse into the unfathomed abyss of what has not yet become. Is it a vision of other worlds, of the obscuration of the spirit, or of the beginning of things before the age of man, or of the unborn generations of the future? We cannot say that it is any or none of these.”
Carl Jung, 1929 lecture, “Psychology and Literature”
The Historical Visionary Novels by Victor E. Smith
The Anathemas
A Novel of Reincarnation and Restitution
In 553 AD, the eastern Roman Emperor, Justinian, imprisoned Pope Vigilius until the pontiff consented to sign the controversial decrees of the Council of Constantinople. Thus was any Christian who held that a soul could exist before the present body’s birth or reincarnated after its death declared anathema: condemned to Hell.
In 1879 Richard Strawn of Philadelphia, disowned by his Quaker brethren because he chose to serve albeit as a medic in the Civil War, the ghastly memories of which he drinks to forget, has his equilibrium further tested when his teenage daughter, Jennifer, who has dreamed since childhood that she was once a fabulous queen with her current father as her royal partner, insists on the reality of the tale. Richard must either find some truth in Jennifer’s position or agree with Lucinda, his wife, that their daughter is insane.
He procrastinates until a fire destroys the printing business he manages. He is blamed for the loss, and, drunk and despondent, retreats to his former farm north of the city, only to be assailed by his own dream that indeed portrays him as a monarch but a craven one who is about to surrender to a howling mob. Coincidences then, too uncanny to evade, force father and daughter to pursue a track of paranormal events. Sometimes in tandem, more often at odds, they trace their earlier identities to the historical 6th-century emperor, Justinian, and his empress, Theodora, whose nemesis, Lucinda in the 19th century, has vowed to ensure that the royal couple’s tragic fate can only repeat itself, and there is nothing they can do to stop it.
Channel of the Grail
A Novel of Cathars, Templars, and a Nazi Grail Hunter
n May 1939, German newspapers announced the untimely death of 35-year-old author Otto Rahn, applauding him as “comrade, decent SS-man and creator of outstanding historical-scholarly works.” But his Swiss lover Raymond knew that Otto had neither died accidentally nor as a member of the infamous SS.
Before the Nazis, Rahn had researched the medieval French Cathars, a heretical sect exterminated by war and the Inquisition, and he published his account of this tragedy as Crusade against the Grail.
His book intrigued Nazi SS leader Heinrich Himmler, himself an occult maven, who then enticed Otto to join the SS as a historical researcher. Gambling that Otto’s psychic talents might lead to the recovery of the coveted Holy Grail, Himmler coddled the writer, even condoning his illegal homosexuality. Then Rahn discovered that the SS’s intent and its operations were far from benign. He voiced his objections and quickly learned that one did not cross Heinrich Himmler.
After Otto’s demise, Raymond knew that his partner’s works deserved recognition not as the SS accomplice that Himmler would have had history portray him but as a legitimate channel of the mystical Grail tradition. To accomplish this end, Raymond had to recover his own gift: a form of memory that allowed him to revivify into the 14th-century Cathar era where the pair’s mutual mission, undertaken with them riding symbolically “two to a horse” in the way of the Knights Templar, was first entrusted to them.
Visionary Novel in Progress: THE AMBIGUOUS ORACLE
(Previously referred to as The Elect or The Skeleton Key)
Egyptian Alexandria in the first century CE was the consummate “melting pot” in which brewed much of the world’s intellectual and religious foundation for the next two millennia. Founded by Alexander the Great and built out to be the queen of the Mediterranean by his successors, the Ptolemies, it then saw the tragic demise of its last dynastic ruler, Cleopatra, and the loss of its independence to Caesar Augustus and Rome. Nevertheless, its wealth of intellectual and religious institutions allowed it to remain the empire’s cultural center during and well beyond the advent of Christianity.
About a third of Alexandria’s population then were Jews, whose monotheism sometimes mixed but more often clashed with other elements of the city’s religious makeup. Among them was a wealthy family, aptly surnamed Alexander, that provided the secular state with civic, political, military and religious leaders well into the Romans era. One of its members was the eminent philosopher and theologian, Philo, called Judaeus (the Jew), whose voluminous writings have survived largely intact. Philo’s life span (c. 20 BCE-50 CE) includes the years during which Jesus of Nazareth supposedly lived in Palestine.
In a short treatise called On the Contemplative Life, Philo describes and applauds a spiritual community of men and women, called Therapeutae (healers or suppliants), that built a community on a narrow strip of land between Lake Mareotis and the Mediterranean Sea, just west of the Alexandrian city walls in a location that can still be pinpointed from Philo’s indications.
Enter an uncanny coincidence: so close is the Therapeutæ’s doctrine and practice as described by Philo to later Christian monastic organizations that Eusebius, the preeminent fourth-century ecclesiastical historian, claimed that Therapeutæ formed one of the earliest known Christian communities, that they had and studied primitive versions of the Gospels, and that Philo was himself a founding “Father” of the Church. This theory persisted into modern times when it came to light that Philo’s treatise on the Therapeutæ was composed “as early as the time of Augustus,” decades before the Gospels could have been written.
These are just some of the historical facts, conflicting though they might be with the accepted chronology of Christianity’s founding, that led the author to project back–via the thoroughly contemporary paranormal technique of remote viewing–to the 1st Century and write his third historical visionary novel, The Ambiguous Oracle.
Join the Journey…
In writing this novel, I intend to do something differently. Rather than keeping the story under wraps and launching the novel only as fait accompli, I am looking to share the important points of the process with all who care to witness how “the sausage is made.” It has been said that the joy is in the journey; I’ve found that to be the case in the past about writing novels. Here’s an opportunity for us to test this theory together.
Of course, I’ve done a lot of preparations for this book–years’ worth–and have a decent sense as to where it might end up. It has already had a couple of different titles and drafts. But it can still change–a book and its characters often prove to have a mind of their own–so there is plenty of improvisation and suspense still to come.
I intend to document and share thoughts and events about The Ambiguous Oracle through my blog in the category, “Novel in Progress.” I might add an occasional permanent page to the site to cover more complicated or thematic materials as this novel encompasses much history, the work of many scholars, and some personal travel (Alexandria is still on my calendar, and I intend to blog that journey live).
To make sure that those interested in joining the journey don’t miss any blog entry or page additions about The Ambiguous Oracle, I have created and am maintaining an email list to notify subscribers when new TAO material is posted to this site. To be included, click THIS CONTACT LINK, fill in the blanks, and put “Novel in Progress” or TAO in the Message area.
Vic’s Blog and Featured topics
My Blog is where I can chat with my readers, and they can do the same with me. While the majority of posts stay focused on Visionary Writing (fiction and non-fiction) and my own writing travels and travails, sometimes I diverge to discuss books I’ve read and reviewed, random trips and photos I’ve taken, and those precious insights I’ve garnered from deep meditation and communication with a marvelous group of friends and supporters. I have tried to group related information with the use of the category and tag features supplied by WordPress. Some of these can be accessed through dropdowns under Vic’ s Blog on the main menu or through the listings of Categories and Tags on the sidebars. I will do my best to highlight new material or revisions to old pieces worth a new look. And be generous with your Comments. Writing can be a lonely business and I like to know what my readers are thinking.
MOST RECENT BLOG POSTS
Test Post Novel in Progress
(Previously referred to as The Elect or The Skeleton Key) Egyptian Alexandria in the first century CE was the consummate “melting pot” in which brewed much of the world’s intellectual and religious foundation for the…
Neil Gaiman’s The Ocean at the End of the Lane
My interest roused by Tony Ortega’s review of The Ocean at the End of the Lane entitled “In His New Book, Is Neil Gaiman Exorcising His Scientology Past?” (a question, by the way, the book…
Review Dr. Bruce Greyson AFTER
Credit the progression of the Near-Death Experience (NDE) over the past 50 years from an event that raised eyebrows about the experiencer’s sanity to a phenomenon that merited serious consideration by scientific and medical professionals…
Featured Topics
CHANNEL OF THE GRAIL–RESEARCH FRANCE 2010
While writing Channel of the Grail, I took two self-conducted research tours of Europe.
(Ah the pleasure of combining business and pleasure!) In the first leg in
August 2010, I visited the Cathar-Templar country in southern France and
northern Spain. CLICK HERE OR ON THE PHOTO ABOVE TO ENJOY
MY 2010 TRIP BLOG.
CHANNEL OF THE GRAIL–RESEARCH EUROPE 2011
From Oct. 4 to Oct. 20, 2011, I traveled to Germany with forays into Austria
and Switzerland with my Indiana Jones hat on In both trips I followed in the footsteps of the
Otto Rahn, the novel’s protagonist. CLICK HERE OR ON THE PHOTO ABOVE FOR MY 2011 TRIP
SEQUENCE.
THE PARANORMAL SERIES
I’m looking to start thoughtful cyber-conversation among people, especially other writers, on an evolutionary premise that is headed in the right direction but requires much more discussion, experimentation, and improvement to be become a practical reality. That theory in a sound bite: today’s paranormal will be tomorrow’s normal. CLICK HERE OR ON THE PHOTO ABOVE FOR MY PARANORMAL SERIES..
ABOUT THIS SITE
A few years back, when planning a redesign of this website, rather than making this my single author site, I wanted it to somehow become a larger portal for the Visionary Literature genre as defined so clearly by Carl Jung. Since the year 2000, I had been connecting with the few out-of-the-closet visionary fiction authors I could find until 2013 when I became an active member of the Visionary Fiction Alliance and a frequent contributor to its website VisionaryFictionAlliance.com, which has become the primary electronic gathering place for writers, readers, supporters and resource providers of the still emerging Visionary Fiction genre.
While remaining primarily the showplace for my work, the site is also meant to showcase the energy, thoughts, and words of this vibrant group of authors, who dedicate their time and talent to producing literature designed to elevate the level of human consciousness, no easy tasks in an era as challenging in our current tumultuous one that tetters on a razor’s edge between disastrous Dystopia and promising Utopia. CLICK HERE to read more about this site’s connection to Visionary Literature.
NEWS AND LINKS
NEW SITE DESIGN AND UPGRADE: In August 2023, on the occasion of the site moving to a new platform and adopting a new WordPress theme, Kadence, Victoresmith.com received a modernizing face-lift with a full content review and several revisions, some still in progress. There’s also a “rumor” that there are plans for several new pages and more frequent blog posts are anticipated. Don’t forget to check back often. Announcements about new materials and major revisions with links will be posted in this section.
May 3, 2016 My latest novel, Channel of the Grail, was published to stellar advance reviews by Quantum Leap Publishing, Tucson, AZ. It is available on Amazon, domestic and international, in print. The e-book can be purchased from Amazon.com and most e-books outlets worldwide.