Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke

Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke (15 January 1953 – 29 August 2012) was a British historian and professor of Western esotericism at the University of Exeter, best known for his authorship of several scholarly books on the history of Germany between the World Wars and Western esotericism.

Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke
Goodrick-Clarke in his office
Born	(1953-01-15)15 January 1953 Lincoln, Lincolnshire, UK
Died	29 August 2012(2012-08-29) (aged 59) Torquay, UK
Occupation	Historian, professor, writer
Nationality	British
Alma mater	University of Bristol (B.A.) St Edmund Hall, Oxford (D.Phil.)
Subject	History of Western esotericism
Notable works	The Occult Roots of Nazism (1985) Black Sun (2002)
Spouse	Clare Badham ​ (m. 1985)​

Early life and education

Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke was born in Lincoln, England, on 15 January 1953,^[1][2] to David and Phyllis Goodrick-Clarke (née Gilbert).^[2] His father was a lawyer.^[2]

He was an Open Exhibitioner at Lancing College.^[1] He studied German, politics, and philosophy at the University of Bristol, and gained a Bachelor of Arts with distinction in 1974.^[1][2] Moving to St. Edmund Hall, Oxford, Goodrick-Clarke obtained a D.Phil. in 1983.^[2][3] During his education he worked as a schoolmaster, first in Scotland from 1978 to 1980, before moving to Schelkingen in West Germany until 1981, and finally Cambridge until 1982. From 1982 to 1985, he was the manager of the Chase Manhattan Bank in London.^[2]

Career

Goodrick-Clarke's Ph.D. dissertation was the basis for his most celebrated work, The Occult Roots of Nazism.^[4][5][3] This book has been continually in print since its first publication in 1985, and has been translated into twelve languages. Later notable works include his well-regarded Paracelsus: Essential Readings, published in 1990, and Black Sun, published in 2002.^[4]

In his varied career, Goodrick-Clarke worked as a schoolmaster, banker, and a successful fundraiser for The Campaign for Oxford. In 2002, he was appointed a Research Fellow in Western Esotericism at the University of Lampeter,^[1] and then in 2005 he was appointed to a personal chair in the Department of History at Exeter University. While at Exeter he wrote The Western Esoteric Traditions: A Historical Introduction, published in 2008.^[3] He edited Aquarian Press's Essential Readings anthology series on religion and esotericism from 1986 on.^[2] He was also the director of IKON Productions starting in 1988.^[2]

Goodrick-Clarke was the founder and director of the Centre for the Study of Esotericism (EXESESO) within the College of Humanities at Exeter.^[3] He helped co-found the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism.^[3] In 1983, Goodrick-Clarke was one of the founder members of "The Society", an informal London-based association of professional and amateur scholars of esotericism, including Ellic Howe, the publisher Michael Cox, John Hamill, and the scholar of Rosicrucianism, Christopher McIntosh. He was a founding member of the Association for the Study of Esotericism (ASE), in America. He was a faculty member of the New York Open Center from 1995.

Personal life and death

He married his wife Clare Badham, a scholar of English literature, on 11 May 1985.^[2][3] With her he ran a publishing house. She has also written several books on esoteric topics.^[3]

Goodrick-Clarke died on 29 August 2012, in Torquay, of pancreatic cancer.^[1][3]

Bibliography

• —— (1985). The Occult Roots of Nazism: The Ariosophists of Austria and Germany, 1890–1935. Wellingborough: Aquarian Press. ISBN 0-85030-402-4.
• —— (1987). The Enchanted City: Arthur Machen and Locality: Scenes from His Early London Years, 1880–85. ISBN 0-948482-03-6.
• —— (1998). Hitler's Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth, and Neo-Nazism. ISBN 0-8147-3110-4.
• —— (2002). Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity. ISBN 0-8147-3124-4.
• ——, ed. (2004). Helena Blavatsky. North Atlantic Books. ISBN 1-55643-457-X.
• Goodrick-Clarke, Clare; ——, eds. (2005). G.R.S. Mead and the Gnostic Quest. North Atlantic Books. ISBN 1-55643-572-X.
• —— (2008). The Western Esoteric Traditions: A Historical Introduction. ISBN 0-19-532099-9.

Contributed

• Hakl, Hans Thomas (2005). Unknown Sources: National Socialism and the Occult. Translated by Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. Holmes Publishing. ISBN 1-55818-470-8.
• Handbook of the Theosophical Current, 2013 ISBN 978-90-04-23596-0
• Constructing Tradition: Means and Myths of Transmission in Western Esotericism, 2010 ISBN 978-90-04-19114-3
• Emanuel Swedenborg: Visionary Savant in the Age of Reason by Ernst Benz, translated and introduced by Goodrick-Clarke – ISBN 0-87785-195-6 .
• Paracelsus: Essential Readings, edited by Goodrick-Clarke – ISBN 1-55643-316-6 .
• Swedenborg and New Paradigm Science by Ursula Groll, translated by Goodrick-Clarke – ISBN 0-87785-303-7 .
• The Rosicrucian Enlightenment Revisited, 1999 – ISBN 0-940262-84-3
• Decadence and Innovation: Austro-Hungarian Life and Art at the Turn of the Century, 1989 ISBN 0-297-79559-7
• Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International by Kevin Coogan, foreword by Goodrick-Clarke, Autonomedia, Brooklyn, NY 1998 – ISBN 1-57027-039-2 .
• Rudolf Steiner by Rudolf Steiner (Author), Richard Seddon (Editor), Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke (Preface) Publisher: North Atlantic Books ISBN 1556434901 ISBN 9781556434907

See also

• Academic study of Western esotericism