While many of the details of Crowley's flamboyant life have been well documented, Portable Darkness is the first book to tackle the formidable task of collecting the best of his voluminous lifework.  In bringing together Crowley's best writings, editor Scott Michaelsen makes Crowleyan philosophy both accessible and intelligible. As an intellectual and mystic, Crowley devoted his life to the study of Magick, Qabalah, gematria, numerology, astrology, myth, glyphs, yoga, and linguistics.  His intense, methodical exploration of so immense and arcane a range of knowledge has yielded, not surprisingly, a hugely challenging body of literature.  In Portable Darkness, Michaelsen has sifted through this vast, often abstruse oeuvre in search of those works which best display and illuminate the razor-sharp insight for which Crowley has become known. The selections are organized thematically according to Crowley's favorite subjects: Qabalah and Magick, Yoga and Magick, Sex and Magick, Magick and Law, and Magick and Lies.