Practical Techniques Of Modern Magic
Marian Green

New Leaf Distributors 1993, ISBN 1-87045-014-0

At first sight, "Practical Techniques Of Modern Magic" appears to be a typical introduction into the more popular fields of magic as they are to be found on the market by the dozen. This (hardly dignifying) evaluation turns out not to be completely wrong, but incomplete, since "Practical Techniques Of Modern Magic" differs much and in a lot of ways from the superficial, pseudo-magical books aimed at the mass market.
What Marian Green teaches is not casual entertainment, but a way of life. No, the author is definitely not going to accept the accusation of treating magic lightly. She describes magic as a quasi-religion; for her, magical practice is, for the most part, an end in itself and an affirmation of her personal spirituality. She describes this spirituality on many pages and hardly distinguishes it (as well as her naive(???) views of psychology, philosophy and cultural history) from what she promises to tell the reader about: ritual magic. Now there are as many interpretations of magic as there are practitioners, and this one may be as valid as any other. The author disqualifies herself, however, when she tries to give the impression her entirely personal opinion was all there is to magic. Miss Green actually claims there were exactly two magical traditions in existence, namely western ceremonial magic and witchcraft, and anyone interested had to decide between these two and their ideologies. She really means that.
Anyway, to a reader willing to read past this narrow-mindedness worthy of Bardon himself, what does "Practical Techniques Of Modern Magic" have to offer? Quite a few bits worth appraisal are there. What connects detailings of actual ritual practice and the description of the surrounding spirituality is a long, imprecise but good explanation of what ritual magic - not the rituals, but ritual magic as a whole - actually is and how this thing can be done in practice. Marian Green obviously has a lot of experience (as a teacher, too). She does not lecture, but responds to the right questions with answers that are correct from her (as has been said, quite limited) view. Motivation of the reader is not forgotten, either. The fact severe errors turn up in her extremely short desciptions of topics like the qabalah is not venial, but understandable. Her intimate and mystifiying style of writing resembles the one of popular authors on Wicaa, as well as Butler and his successors - a good choice for beginners' literature. The choice of rituals she describes is not only hardly challenging, but also quite small, which prompts the idea "Practical Techniques Of Modern Magic" might be a fitting supplement for the mainstream booklets previously mentioned, which often contain a lot of ritual instructions, but little help on the actual practice. "The Ritual Magic Workbook" in particular might be a much more valuable read if accompanied by "Practical Techniques Of Modern Magic".
It is unfortunate this use stays limited to the frame cast by the worldview of the author. Those interested in chaos or grimoire magic, eastern systems of initiation and magic, shamanism and many other systems will often be disappointed by this book. On the other hand, its value, if limited, is indisputable. These three stars are a valuation specific to the target group, therefore - for other readers, it is too high. Those beginners that combine "Practical Techniques Of Modern Magic" with fitting further reading may, however, want to add a fourth star.