Katabatic Wind ― Good Craic Fueled by Fumes from the Abyss

Literary Nonfiction. Essays. Classics. Mythology. Traditionally, the mountains are from whence wisdom is found and dispensed, the homes of the gods, places we look up to for aspiration and inspiration. Yet there is another source of insight, which involves a katabasis, from the Ancient Greek, meaning 'to go down', to travel from this world to the underworld. There, the chthonic gods and goddesses are just as real, and maybe just a little bit edgy from being neglected for so long. It is the journey of the initiate, to die before you die, thence to live twice-born: once of the flesh, and again of wisdom. KATABATIC WIND is an inspired collection of essays drawn from the lost unknown sacred tradition of the West. Using the lens of mythology, pre-Socratic Greek thought, and a long essay comparing the West with the Indian tradition through the characters of Hamlet and Arjuna of the Bhagavad Gita, this book illumines how these traditions shadow life lived today. The kernel of these essays is loss, longing for return, and the grief of living in a society without an inkling of its sacred origin story.

"This is the best sort of esoteric work—scholarly yet personal, wide-ranging yet detailed. Fascinating book."—Rachel Pollack

"If the end of the world is at hand, there's no point in reading this book—or any other book. If however there still exists one iota of hope…you have about ten minutes…to start reading this book."—Peter Lamborn Wilson

"Stephen Crimi embraces his life's dedication to primordial traditions with genuine humility, his colloquial essays are unapologetic as he alerts us Americans to our current condition. Taking us on a journey through the cross-fertilization of mystery wisdom cultures, Crimi announces through his informal examples that 'crisis is the spark of friction at the intersection of the sacred and the profane…finding what is best to do in the face of the impossible.' For Crimi, visioning reality through the Western crises is about pulling our sensory awareness together and starting at the place that sparks our own life."—Sabrina Dalla Valle