125
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The difficult encounter in Rome.
Mircea Eliade’s post-war relation with Julius Evola
– new letters and data –
Liviu BORDAȘ
New Europe College, Bucharest
Abstract: Our knowledge of the post-war relationship between Eliade
(1907-1986) and Evola (1898-1974) was based mainly on fifteen letters of
Evola, and on two recollections from Eliade’s journal and memoirs. The article
presents and discusses new data supplied by eight inedited letters of Evola and
four entries from Eliade’s unpublished journal. This data is corroborated with
Evola’s reviews of Eliade’s books, with the reciprocal quotations in their
works, as well as with various mentions from their correspondence with other
persons. The new information helps to draw a clearer picture of their epistolary
relation, re-established in September 1949, of their two encounters in Rome
(May 1952 and April 1955), as well as of the successive moments of fracture
between them (1955 and 1964). It also brings into discussion topics such as
yoga, esotericism, racism or fascism, which provide seed for further inquiry.
Keywords: Mircea Eliade, Julius Evola, inedited letters, unpublished journal,
visits to Rome, book reviews and translations, yoga, esotericism, fascism, racism.
1. From the five journal entries in which he mentions Julius Evola, Eliade
selected in his Fragments d’un journal (Paris, 1973, 1981, 1991) only the last one.1
It dates from July 1974, after he learned about the Italian writer’s death, but even
1 I would like to express my thanks to the curators of Special Collections Research Centre of the
University of Chicago Library for their kind help during my research of Mircea Eliade Papers
(M.E.P.) and for the permission to publish the letters appended to this article. I also thank
professor Mac Linscott Ricketts for providing copies of Eliade’s inedited journal and for
allowing me to quote from his English translation of it.
126
this one was not entirely published.2 The longest and probably the most interesting
of all, it evokes the story of his relationship with Evola. Eliade recalls the first letter
received from him after the war and the visit to his house in Rome, which he
thought to have happened in August 1949.3 The date of this first visit was already
questioned on various grounds. But, the most categorical and final rejection is
brought by the first mention of Evola in Eliade’s post-war journal. On 3 October
1949, he wrote: “J. Evola has written to me. He obtained my address from René
Guénon... How on earth can that be?!”4 It is evident from here that he couldn’t have
met the Italian writer on the summer of 1949.
Eliade’s first visit to Rome after the war took place in the month of July 1949,
with a return in September. From that moment till Evola’s death, he came again a
dozen of times, as attested by his journal: March 1950, March-April 1951, May
1952, April 1955, July 1957, September 1959, September 1961, August-September
1965, August 1966, September-October 1967, July-August 1968, August 1969.
There were other visits to Italy, but not to Rome.
In July 1949, wishing to renew his contacts with Eliade, Evola requested his
address from René Guénon. The French esoteric writer managed to obtain from
Mihai Vâlsan not only Eliade’s address in Paris, but also the address where he was
staying in Capri.5 However it seems that the information reached Evola only after
Eliade’s return to France (10 September).6
If their encounter happened during the first visit of Eliade to Italy after
renewing their contacts, it could have been only in 1950.7 He arrived in Rome on
21 March, invited by Giuseppe Tucci to give two lectures at Istituto Italiano per il
2 In the French version, the first to be published (Fragments d’un journal, II. 1970-1978, tr. by
C. Grigorescu, Paris: Gallimard, 1981, pp. 192-193), Eliade cancelled the last paragraph, as
visible in the typescript of the translator reported by Natale Spineto, Mircea Eliade, storico delle
religioni. Con la corrispondenza inedita Mircea Eliade - Károly Kerény, Brescia: Morcelliana,
2006, p. 34. It is also absent from the English version, translated from French (Journal, III. 1970-
1978, tr. by Teresa Lavender Fagan, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989, pp. 161-163). 3 M. Eliade, Jurnal, vol. II. 1970-1985, ed. by M. Handoca, Bucharest: Humanitas, 1993, pp.
164-166 (165). 4 M. Eliade, Jurnal, 3 October 1949, M.E.P., box 15/4 (tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts).
5 Between 16 July and 1 September 1949 Eliade changed three addresses in Capri. M. Eliade,
Jurnal, 12 September 1949, M.E.P., ibidem. 6 René Guénon, Lettere a Julius Evola (1930-1950), ed. by Renato del Ponte, Carmagnola:
Arktos, 2005, pp. 100-101, 105 (2 August and 29 October 1949). 7 The same possibility was considered by Florin łurcanu, Mircea Eliade, le prisonnier de
l’histoire, Paris: La Découverte, 2003, p. 132, but at pp. 366, 488 he reasserted August 1949.
127
Medio ed Estremo Oriente, and stayed till the end of the month. Evola – who was,
since 1948, in a hospital in Bologna – came to Rome about the same time in order
to “renew various contacts and to see various persons”,8 but also to give a lecture at
Teatro Quattro Fontane on 19 March.9 Their encounter remains a possibility which
needs confirmation. To make things more complicated, in his memoirs Eliade
located the first encounter in April 1951.10
The earliest letter of Evola known to us,
dating from 15 December 1951, makes the possibility of a recent personal
encounter less probable. Indeed, the summary of their contacts, in the opening of
the letter, leaves little room for speculation.11
In the same journal entry of 1974 Eliade thought that the second and last visit
occurred in 1952 or 1953. But he contradicts himself again when he writes, at a few
paragraphs’ distance, that he had not seen Evola for ten or twelve years, i.e. since
1962-1964.12
The only visit to Evola whose date is attested by clear evidence – his own
letters13
– is from May 1952.14
Yet till now we had no conclusive proof in order to
decide whether it was the first or the second. If this was the first visit, the second
one could have happened only in 1955, 1957, 1959 or 1961. In fact, Evola started
to keep track of Eliade’s visits to the peninsula. In his letter of 8 March 1954, he
8 As he wrote in a letter of 30 March 1951 to the Italian poet Girolamo Comi: "Circa dieci giorni
fa ho fatto un «salto» a Roma dopo tanti anni, a riprendere vari contati e a vedere varie persone."
Lettere di Julius Evola a Girolamo Comi (1934-1962), ed. by Gianfranco de Turris, Rome: Ed.
Fondazione Julius Evola, 1987, p. 25. 9 Renato del Ponte, “L’attività pubblicistica politica di Evola negli anni del secondo dopoguerra
sino a «Ordine Nuovo»”, Convivium, Turin, V, no. 17, April-June 1994, p. 44n, quoted by
Gianfranco de Turris, “L’«Iniziato» e il Professore. I rapporti «sommersi» fra Julius Evola e
Mircea Eliade”, in Mario Bernardi Guardi and Marco Rossi (eds.), Delle rovine ed oltre. Saggi
su Julius Evola, Rome: Antonio Pellicani, 1995, pp. 219-249 (235). 10
M. Eliade, Memorii (1907-1960), ed. by M. Handoca, Bucharest: Humanitas, 1997, pp. 440-
441; English translation: Autobiography, vol. II, 1937-1960. Exile’s Odyssey, tr. by Mac Linscott
Ricketts, Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1988, pp. 152-153. He adds that he is not sure
about it, as he has lost the notebooks of the years 1949-1954. 11
Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. I, ed. by M. Handoca, Bucharest: Minerva, 1993, pp.
276-278 (15 December 1951). 12
M. Eliade, Jurnal, vol. II, op. cit., pp. 164-166 (164, 166); English translation: Journal, III.
1970-1978, op. cit., p. 161. 13
Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. V, ed. by M. Handoca, Bucharest: Criterion, 2007,
pp. 350-352 (6 and 19 April, 25 May 1952). 14
Described in M. Eliade, Memorii (1907-1960), op. cit.
128
asks him whether he will come to Italy that spring.15
It would have been hard to
hide his visits to Rome from an active and well informed correspondent. The last of
these probable years, 1961, is close to the second – contradictory – statement of
Eliade, which situates his visit between 1962 and 1964.
Corroborating the three dates – 1949, 1952-1953, 1962-1964 – with the
impossibility of 1949 and the certainty of 1952, it remained a strong possibility that
the second encounter happened in 1961. However, if there was a first visit in 1950,
the one of 1952 would become the last visit, excluding therefore another one in the
coming years. Why Eliade didn’t mention the visits to Evola in his journal, while
he recorded the encounters with other Italian scholars, is another question which
needs a different kind of approach.
2. As we have seen, Evola’s first post-war letter to Eliade, containing an
invitation to visit him in Rome, dates from September 1949. But already before
receiving it, after his return from Capri, Eliade talked about the Italian writer with
one of his compatriots in Paris. In his journal of 20 September, Virgil Ierunca
(1920-2006) records how much they were amused by the fact that, in Evola’s new
book – which could be only Lo yoga della potenza (1949) –, Eliade is cited more
often than Heracles.16
He even mentioned the Italian in some recent articles.17
However, the first letter of Evola has not been found so far. The earliest known to
us is dated 15 December 1951. It is very probable that, in this period of over two
years, there were other exchanges too.18
15
Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. V, op. cit., p. 357. 16
Virgil Ierunca, Trecut-au anii… Fragmente de jurnal. Întâmpinări �i accente. Scrisori
nepierdute, Bucharest: Humanitas, 2000, p. 86. “Eliade” and “Eracle” were consecutive entries in
the book’s index. Ierunca writes Heraclites (rom. Heraclit), but he visibly misunderstood the Italian
spelling of Heracles (rom. Heracle or Hercule). See J. Evola, Lo yoga della potenza. Saggio sui
Tantra, 2nd
ed. completely reworked, Milan: Fratelli Bocca, 1949, pp. 134n, 148n, 204n, 220n,
289n, 290n, 366n, 367n (citations of Yoga. Essai sur les origines de la mystique indienne). 17
In relation with Ernesto de Martino’s recent work on magic. M. Eliade, “Science, idéalisme et
phénomènes paranormaux”, Critique, Paris, III, no. 23, Avril 1948, pp. 315-323; idem, “Ernesto
de Martino, Il mondo magico. Prolegomeni a una storia del magismo, Torino, Giulio Einaudi
editore, 1948”, Revue de l’histoire des religions, Paris, 135, no. 1, 1949, pp. 105-108 (107). 18
In 15 December 1951, Evola refers to Eliade’s last letter from 1950. Mircea Eliade �i
corespondenŃii săi, vol. I, op. cit., pp. 276-278 (277). The fact that they re-established contact by
the end of 1949 reduces to nothing some speculations from Cristiano Grottanelli’s article “War-
time connections: Dumézil and Eliade, Eliade and Schmitt, Schmitt and Evola, Drieu la Rochelle
and Dumézil”, in: Horst Junginger (ed.), The study of religion under the impact of Fascism,
Leiden - Boston: Brill, 2008, pp. 303-314 (308-309). More unfounded speculations on Eliade
129
Evola’s post-war letters are preserved in Mircea Eliade Papers, at the
University of Chicago Library. Only fifteen of them, spanning from December
1951 to March 1954, have been published so far19
, but internal evidence indicates
missing letters in between. New research is likely to bring to light other pieces of
this correspondence.
During a recent period of field work in Chicago, without being particularly
concerned with Evola, we came across eight new letters of him. Four of them date
from October 1952 - January 1953 and are part of the intense exchange around the
Italian translation of Shamanism.20
The other four, dating from 1954, 1955 and
1962 respectively, are a continuation of those already published.21
They bring
considerable new data and help solve some of the unknowns of Eliade’s
relationship with Evola.
In the first letter (26 October 1952), Evola informs his Romanian
correspondent that the translation of Shamanism is almost half done. One of the
things we can infer from this epistle is that Eliade expressed his interest to shift the
Italian translation of Le mythe de l’éternel retour (1949) to “Fratelli Bocca”
publishing house of Milan, after learning that the Turin-based “Einaudi” abandoned
and Evola in his article “Mircea Eliade, Carl Schmitt, René Guénon, 1942”, Revue de l’histoire
des religions, Paris, 219, no. 3, 2002, pp. 325-356 (345-354). Very unreliable the references to
them in Steven W. Wassestrom, Religion after religion. Gershom Sholem, Mircea Eliade and Henry Corbin at Eranos, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999, pp. 44-47, 272, and Mark
J. Sedgwick, Against the modern world. Traditionalism and the secret intellectual history of the Twentieth Century, Oxford - New York: Oxford University Press, 2004, pp. 109-116, 189-192,
209-303, 321-322, which have influenced other recent writers on the subject. All these scholars,
ideological critics of the “Traditionalists”, are methodologically close to them in the way they
create relationships of unity, similarity or analogy between unrelated things. 19
Four letters were published in Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. I, op. cit., pp. 275-281
along with a pre-war letter (they appeared earlier, in Italian translation, in Mircea Eliade e l'Italia, ed. by Marin Mincu and Roberto Scagno, Milan: Jaca Book, 1987, pp. 252-257). Other
eleven letters, supplied by Mac Linscott Ricketts, were published in Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. V, op. cit., pp. 349-357 (nine of them appeared, with some omissions
and errors, in Archaeus, Bucharest, VI, no. 3-4, 2002 [2003], pp. 371-377), but they circulated
among scholars already in the ‘90s. Both editions are not free from errors. 20
Their existence was signalled to us in 2002 by Mac Linscott Ricketts, but their new location in
the archive was not known. See our article “Istoria doctorului Honigberger �i secretul unei
nuvele eliade�ti” (part II), Origins. Journal of cultural studies, Zalău, nr. 3-4, 2003, pp. 129-158
(154-155 n. 172). The last of them was mentioned by Florin łurcanu, Mircea Eliade, le
prisonnier de l’histoire, op. cit., p. 387 n. 20. 21
The last one was mentioned by Florin łurcanu, ibidem, p. 478, n. 7.
130
its intention to publish it. Instead of Le mythe, Evola renews his proposition
(expressed in the letter of 8 June22
) to publish an Italian translation of the revised
edition of Yoga, which Eliade engaged at “Payot” (and which will come out only
two years later, in December 1954). He also informs Eliade about the possibility of
publishing his books at a new Italian house, “Edizioni dell’Ascia” of Rome. But Le
mythe will appear much later, in 1968, at “Borla” of Turin.
In his turn, Eliade was trying to help Evola publish his books in Paris. After
unsuccessful attempts with “Payot” and “Laffont”, he introduced him to the owner
of “Librairie Véga”, a house specialised in books on occultism, esoterism and
“spirituality”, which also published some of René Guénon’s works.
From the second letter (17 November 1952) we can infer that Eliade agreed to
give the revised edition of Yoga to “Fratelli Bocca”. But, again, the Italian
translation of this book will be published much later, in 1973, by “Rizzoli” of
Milan. Evola asks here for bibliographical orientation on the subject of sexual
magic and orgiastic rites. This can be considered one of the initial moments in the
making of his Metafisica del sesso, published after six years.
In the third letter (16 December 1952), Evola confirms the reception of Eliade’s
recent book, Images et symboles (1952). The missive also gives an interesting glimpse
of the triangular relations between Eliade, Evola and Philippe Lavastine, an esotericist
and eccentric scholar of India, which Eliade met shortly after his arrival in Paris.
The most interesting letter as far as the translation of Shamanism is concerned
is the fourth one (13 January 1953). Evola acknowledges here that he “revised” the
Italian translation. In fact, he was the translator, under the pseudonym of Carlo
d’Altavilla. Consequently, he submits to Eliade five questions regarding the use of
some words and expressions, important in his scholarly vocabulary. Namely, he
proposes to translate “archaïque” as “primordiale”, to take “vocation” in the sense
of “choix, élection”, to translate “intégrer” as “integrato in un insieme” or as
“ripreso in un insieme”, to render “dialectique du sacré” in a more explicit way, and
to take “dieux passifs” in the sense of “dieux impassibles” or “dieux détachés”. In
respect to the last expression he adds that even Deus otiosus creates an equivoque
idea to those who ignore the positive meaning which otium had for the ancients.
It would be very interesting to know what Eliade replied to these suggestions.
Probably he was not happy with the first one and therefore preferred to abandon the
word “archaic” from the subtitle of the Italian translation.
22
Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. V, op. cit., pp. 352-353.
131
3. The second group of four letters is less cohesive and represents only
scattered pieces of what must have been a larger correspondence.
With the fifth inedited letter (29 November 1954) Evola sends his review of
Traité d’histoire des religions, recently published in Italian by “Einaudi”. His
assessment of the book is very positive and the editors of the journal have extracted
in large typographic characters the following statement: “The work of Eliade has a
revolutionary character. It gathers the most meticulous documentation and adopts
new hermeneutical perspectives more adequate to this subject.” Concluding his
review, Evola adds that, although in its own field, Eliade’s work has an “explosive
character”, in fact it only restores a way of looking upon things which was normal
before the “devastations” typical of a certain dogmatism or of a certain specialized
research, modern and profane.23
In his letter Evola inquires about the stage of
publication of the new edition of Yoga and informs Eliade of the difficulties in
collecting material for Metafisica del sesso.
The most interesting of all these epistles are the sixth and the seventh. In the
letter of 6 October 1955, Evola thanks Eliade for his recent article Aspects
initiatiques de l’alchimie occidentale, published in the official organ of the Italian
Philosophical Society, Archivio di filosofia. Here Eliade quotes a couple of times
the first edition of La tradizione ermetica (1931). The article will be incorporated in
Forgerons et alchimistes (1956).24
Evola considered it “very interesting”, but was
quick in bringing some amendments concerning the “doctrine”. Since we are not
concerned here with the doctrinal aspects of alchemy as understood by Evola, we
leave for another occasion the interpretation of this interesting letter. It suffices to
remark the application of Eliade’s distinction between enstasy and ecstasy to
alchemy and mystery religions.
It is not unlikely that Evola didn’t enjoyed being cited in the company of C.G.
Jung, whose ideas he already opposed,25
just as he could have resented Eliade’s
inclination towards the Swiss scholar, who is referred to more often and more
23
J. Evola, “Storia delle religioni”, Roma, Naples, n.s., V, 19 November 1954, p. 3. In the
following months, he mentions Eliade in other articles. In “I miti del «Anno Nuovo»” (ibidem,
VI, 6 January 1955, p. 3) Evola refers to his researches related to the cyclical conception of time.
In a review of Aurobindo Ghose’s book Le secret du Veda (Paris: Cahiers du Sud, 1954), he
cites in his help Eliade’s “happy formula” that, for the mankind of the origins, “nature was never
natural”; East and West, Rome, VI, no. 2, July 1955, p. 167. 24
M. Eliade, Forgerons et alchimistes, Paris: Flammarion, 1956. Evola is mentioned at pp. 119,
133, 139, 176, and there are several more citations of his book in the footnotes. 25
And he communicated it to Eliade in his letters of 21 November 1953, 20 January and 8
March 1954; Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. V, op. cit., pp. 356-357.
132
sympathetically.26
As if the criticism of this article would have not been enough, he
informs his corresponded about a critical review of Yoga. Immortalité et liberté to
be published in East and West, the journal of Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed
Estremo Oriente, directed by Giuseppe Tucci.
The letter also brings an interesting detail which is likely to solve the question
of Eliade’s second visit to Evola. The Italian scholar mentions “our last Roman
discussion” in relation to some of his objection to Yoga. The book came out in
December 1954. This is strong evidence that they met in April 1955, on the
occasion of Eliade’s new visit to Rome. It is less probable that he referred to the
visit of May 1952, although they could have talked on that occasion about
Techniques du Yoga (1948). His phrasing leaves no doubt that he refers to a
discussion about the same book he reviewed. In the following letter Evola evokes
again this Roman encounter.
If this is true, than Eliade’s visits occurred on two consecutive occasions: May
1952 and April 1955, at a distance of three years, exactly how he remembered, but
with a chronological shift backward (1949 and 1952-1953). This backdating is very
common in Eliade’s memoirs and is also reflected by the recollections recorded in
his journal. It would be very interesting to know why he didn’t use the occasion of
his 1950 and 1951 visits to Rome in order to meet Evola. Why did he hesitate for
two years before making this step?
From the consecutive letter of 27 December 1955, we understand that Evola’s
review of Yoga was already published. He is anxious to know whether Eliade read
it. Et pour cause! His “critical remarks”, of which he informs his correspondent
twice, were considerably more than that. The presence of two copies of this review
in Eliade’s archive at Chicago27
is a proof that he read it.
In its opening, after a double critique of Western and Westernised Indian works
of divulgation, as well as of the “objective method” of scientific studies, Evola calls
the attention to a new approach of yoga by Western scholars, who are not merely
interested in “vague «spiritualism»”. As a first example he cites the collective work
edited by Jacques Masui, Yoga, science de l’homme integral (Paris, 1953). In
reality the volume brought together very heterogeneous authors, but Evola himself
was present in it with an extract from his Lo Yoga della Potenza (1949). A second
26
They were referred together also in M. Eliade, “Note sur Jung et l’alchimie”, Le Disque vert,
special number C. G. Jung, Paris - Brussels, 1955, pp. 97-109 (104-105). The reference to Evola
was not brought in the abbreviated note “C. G. Jung et l’alchimie”, appended to Forgerons et
alchimistes, op. cit., pp. 177-181. 27
M.E.P., boxes 45/1 and 120/9.
133
example of such an attitude, more comprehensive of the “depth dimension” of
yoga, is Eliade’s book.28
Evola makes the surprising assertion that the author’s special qualifications for
understanding yoga are not due to him having studied with Dasgupta and to having
spent time in a Rishikesh ashram (as Eliade always presented himself), but to
having acquired – before his departure for India – knowledge of certain
“metaphysical and esoteric doctrines”. For the Italian writer, Dasgupta and the
ashrams of Rishikesh were not authentic, but some kind of Westernised
counterfeits. He believes Eliade is not acknowledging his real debt because he is
“very anxious to keep in line with the academic world of the West”: he cites
hundreds of authors but only from those who enjoy “definite academic
recognition”. Evola wonders rhetorically whether “this does not conceal an attempt
to introduce a Trojan horse into the citadel of official culture”. Indeed, he thinks,
judging after the favourable and “unusually prompt” (sic!) reception of Eliade’s
books in the Western academic milieus, his effort has been met with success. A
success – he adds – not exempt from the “danger of «counter shocks»”.
It would be highly interesting to know what exactly he meant by this last
expression. Was he administering such a counter shock or was he preparing the
way for it? The esoteric doctrines to which he alludes are, no doubt, those
propounded by his own books and by those of René Guénon. An inaccurate fact, at
least from a chronological perspective, as prior to India Eliade knew only a few
marginal writings of the two authors. He read their major works at Calcutta.
After praising the book, in two sentences and 10 half-lines – those quoted in his
letter –, which come down to it’s being “the most complete” of all works on yoga
written so far, Evola hurries to make “some reservations” which extend over the
remaining five pages. It must be said however that not all these pages are filled
with reservations: they alternate with expositions of Eliade’s ideas and with Evola’s
acceptance of some of them (followed by a “but”).
We are dealing at large with this review in a special study dedicated to Eliade’s
reception as scholar of yoga. It suffices here to point to some of Evola’s criticism,
underlined by the assumption of having access to “the real essence of the traditional
wisdom of India” and of being able to explain it without recourse to Western
categories. He considers the earlier version of the book (Yoga. Essai sur les
origines de la mystique indienne, 1936) superior in some respects. How exactly?
28
J. Evola, “Yoga, immortality and freedom”, East and West, Rome, VI, no. 3, October 1955,
pp. 224-230.
134
Being less erudite, the book outlined more clearly “the essential points of
reference”, while the last version, in its aspiration to include everything, has
become “contaminated”, has lost its “purity”. This might well be a new allusion to
the supposed earlier “doctrinal” debt of Eliade to the metaphysicians of Tradition.
While making various reservations, Evola sends to his own books: La dottrina del
risveglio (1943), Lo yoga della potenza (1949), and Rivolta contro il mondo
moderno (19512). He does not miss the opportunity to shoot an arrow at C.G. Jung
too, surely on account of Eliade’s inclinations towards his ideas.
Still there is a point in which the earlier book is more objectionable: the
hypothesis of pre-Aryan origins of yoga, which is put by Evola – incredibly – in
connection with some earlier “enquirers with racial views”, suggesting therefore a
racist, “Aryanist”, background of the idea. What to say about his statement that
yoga should be considered “only as an integral part of Indo-European spirituality of
the purest kind”? The Italian concludes his review by questioning another
“prejudicial” idea of Eliade: that of addressing his book, not only to the specialist,
but also to the wide public, which may find in yoga solutions to the existential
problems of the modern West. In his view, a book on yoga which could exercise a
more direct influence on the contemporary man should be written in a completely
different way. How? From the position of an initiate addressing seekers for a path
to liberty/liberation.
This is hardly a favourable evaluation of the book. After two friendly reviews
(of Le chamanisme and Traité) in a daily newspaper,29
and a benevolent note (on Le
mythe) in Introduzione alla magia,30
Evola could finally pour out his grievances of
Eliade’s scholarly behaviour. And in a scholarly journal of Oriental studies directed
by Eliade’s friend, Giuseppe Tucci, who invited him regularly to lecture at the
Institute which published it.
Four years earlier he threatened Eliade, half-jokingly, for not giving credit to
those authors to whom Evola thought he was fundamentally indebted.31
The
moment of payback (Vergeltungen) has finally arrived. This is confirmed also by
the fact that, in the first part of his review, Evola makes public a private confession
29
J. Evola, “Il superuomo primitivo e l’«esperienza estatica»”, Roma, Naples, n.s., III, 10
February 1952, p. 3 (it is perhaps significant that Evola sent the newspaper cutting without its
title, M.E.P., box 118/12); “Storia delle religioni”, loc. cit. (M.E.P., box 121/1). 30
“Glosse varie”, in: Introduzione alla magia quale scienza dell’Io, a cura del Gruppo di UR,
vol. III, Rome: Fratelli Bocca, 1955; Le chamanisme is cited in all three volumes. Their
publication was, however, delayed to 1956. 31
Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. I, op. cit., pp. 276-278 (15 December 1951).
135
of Eliade: the now famous “Trojan horse” (in his answer to the Vergeltungen
letter32
and, probably, in their two conversations in Rome).
The repeated reference in these new letters to their last encounter – April 1955
–, make us believe that the review is a more elaborate rehearsal of the discussion
around the book on that occasion. Eliade surely didn’t like it. And it wouldn’t have
been difficult for Evola to foresee his reaction. If he didn’t stop earlier to answer
the letters of his Italian colleague, this would have been certainly the occasion to do
it. If it is to believe Eliade, he took this decision only after the second Vergeltung of
Evola, when he recalled Eliade’s political sympathies of youth in his Il Cammino
del cinabro (1963).33
However, not only the letters from the end of 1955 but also
the last one of 1962 show an Evola writing missives with no answers.
The letter of 27 December 1955 offers more clues on this topic. Mircea and
Christinel lived, from October 1954 to June 1955, in the house of Dr. Roger Godel,
at Saint-Cloud. Evola knew it. It is probably there that he sent his letter of 29
November 1954 with the review of Traité. When Eliade left Rome, in April 1955,
he returned to the same address. Since Evola was not sure about the change of
address, it means that he stopped receiving his news sometime before June, when
the couple moved back to Paris.
From the same letter we learn that, on a previous occasion, Evola informed
Eliade about the difficulties of placing Yoga with an Italian publisher. These
obstacles seem to have been unsurpassable. Its translation will appear only in 1973,
under the editorship of Furio Jesi.34
What could have been the difficulties about
publishing it in 1955? Leaving aside the relative editorial crisis, the only serious
impediment would have been a bad sale of the existing translations of his works,
especially of Tecniche dello yoga (1952). Indeed, except for a reprint of Trattato di
storia delle religioni, in 1957, new translations will start to be published only from
1966 on. Le mythe de l’éternel retour, which Eliade was so anxious to see printed
in Italian, will appear in 1968.35
From this letter to the last one lay more than six years, during which we know
nothing of their relations. Eliade’s archive at Chicago preserves, along with the
reviews of Le chamanisme and Traité, sent by Evola, his review of Mythes, rêves et
mystères (1957), which we have reasons to suppose was also sent by the author
32
See Evola’s letter of 31 December 1951; ibidem, pp. 278-279. 33
M. Eliade, Jurnal, vol. II, op. cit., pp. 164-166 (166). 34
M. Eliade, Lo yoga. Immortalità e libertà, ed. by Furio Jesi, tr. by Giorgio Pagliaro, Milan:
Rizzoli, 1973. 35
M. Eliade, Il mito dell’eterno ritorno, tr. by Giovanni Cantoni, Turin: Borla, 1968.
136
himself. Like the previous two, published in the same daily newspaper, it is a
benevolent assessment of the book, interested mainly by Eliade’s ideas about the
survival of myth in the modern world.36
One year later, in an exchange of letters with a former Legionary
“commandant”, Eliade expressed – in an uncharacteristic explicit way – his opinion
about the political position of Evola. The poet Vasile Posteucă (1912-1972), who
was working on a book about his “Căpitan”, asked for information about Evola’s
encounter with Corneliu Codreanu – in Bucharest, twenty years earlier – and his
opinion about him.37
Eliade quickly advised Posteucă not to use Evola’s testimony
in the book, as he was and remained a “racist” and a “Nazi”, his opinion being
therefore likely to create more confusion.38
At the end of that year Evola published
a new article in East and West, in whose footnotes he quoted favourably, several
times, Yoga. Immortalité et liberté.39
The last letter (26 April 1962) is related to another work of Eliade. Evola
thanks him for his recent books published at “Gallimard”, which were sent to him
by the press service of the publishing house. They could be only Naissances
mystiques (1959) and Méphistophélès et l’androgyne (1962).40
It is very probable
that his letter was prompted by the receipt of the last work, which came out at the
beginning of April. Moreover, in its footnotes Eliade cites Metafisica del sesso
(1958). As we shall see, Evola gave this book a special, though delayed,
welcome. Interestingly, we also learn from here that Eliade didn’t confirm, at its
time, the receipt of Metafisica del sesso, which, by the way, quoted frequently
several of his own works: Traité, Le chamanisme, Le Yoga. Sending his own
book, in which he cites in his turn Evola’s work, could have been a form of
belated confirmation.
36
J. Evola, “Nostri miti”, Roma, Naples, n.s., VIII, 25 September 1957, p. 3 (M.E.P., box 119/8). 37
Mircea Eliade �i corespondenŃii săi, vol. III, ed. by M. Handoca, Bucharest: F.N.P.S.A., 2003,
p. 349 (17 October 1958). 38
Vasile Posteucă, “Jurnal”, in: Gabriel Stănescu (ed.), Mircea Eliade în con�tiinŃa
contemporanilor săi din exil, Norcross: Criterion, [2001], pp. 272-277 (275 – entry of 28
October 1958). Still Eliade gave Posteucă Evola’s address, but the book in which he made use of
his impressions on Codreanu (via Eliade) appeared posthumously. Idem, Dezgroparea
Căpitanului, ed. by Al. Ronnett, Madrid: Ed. Mi�cării Legionare, 1977, pp. 35-36. 39
J. Evola, “The «Mysteries of Woman» in East and West”, East and West, Rome, IX, no. 4,
December 1958, pp. 349-355. 40
The previous book from this publisher, Mythes, rêves et mystères (1957), had been already
reviewed by Evola and, as seen, the review was sent to its author (probably to his address in Paris).
137
The absence of a real confirmation places the terminus ante quem of the
interruption of their correspondence to 1958 or 1959. It also excludes the
possibility of a visit to Evola in 1961. We have no clue whether there existed any
correspondence between 1956 and 1958, but the circumstantial evidence is rather
negative. The fact that Evola had to ask Eliade’s American address from the editor
of Antaios is a clear indication of losing contact with him after September 1956.
Moreover, Evola makes an explicit connection between Eliade’s departure to
United States and their lack of communication. He refers again to their last
encounter, when the Romanian scholar confessed that he accepts only invitations to
America, keeping his freedom of going and coming back to Europe. The invitation
to America is, no doubt, a reference to the proposal to deliver the Haskel lectures at
the University of Chicago, of which Eliade could have told him only in April 1955,
when he met Evola the last time. Indeed, he had just received the invitation from
Joachim Wach, during the Rome Congress of the History of Religions.41
The
reason for recalling this “confession” to Eliade’s attention was to point out his self-
contradiction when choosing to remain in the United States.
Corroborating all the circumstantial evidence of their communication, it
becomes very probable that Eliade stopped writing to Evola in 1955, if not
immediately after his return from Rome (and his last visit to him), then sometimes
before June. There might have been other letters from his Italian colleague, but
most probably without an answer.42
Still, sending his books to Evola, through the
press service of the publishing houses, and recommending or accepting his
collaboration to Antaios (1959-1971), through the managing editor of the journal,
was a form of indirect communication.43
We know nothing about telephone
contacts, like the one of May 1952; although possible they are less probable.
41
M. Eliade, Jurnal, 25 April 1955, M.E.P., box 15/5. 42
The letter of 27 December 1955 mentions a postcard (fr. carte), to be positioned after the letter
of 6 October 1955. 43
See Hans Thomas Hakl, “«Den Antaios kenne und missbillige ich. Was er pflegt, ist nicht
Religio, sondern Magie!» Kurze Geschichte der Zeitschrift Antaios”, Aries. Journal for the study of
Western esotericism, Leiden, IX, no. 2, 2009 pp. 195-232 (216, 217); idem, “Julius Evola e
Antaios”, paper to Giornate di studio evoliane «Evola e la filosofia», Alatri, 7-8 May 2010, 6 pp.
(4, 5-6), http://www.fondazionejuliusevola.it/DocumentiConvegni/Alatri_2010/Relazione_Hakl.pdf.
Hakl thinks that Evola’s collaboration to Antaios was recommended by a collaborator of “Ernst
Klett” publishing house, but his letters to Philipp Wolff-Windegg for the years 1959-1965 are not
yet known. It could have been Eliade, who in April 1959, gave a good recommendation for the
German translation of Metafisica del sesso (published by “Ernst Klett” in 1961), despite the fact
that later on, in August, he advised the delay of Evola’s articles.
138
These eight new letters contain also interesting data about the elaboration of
some of Evola’s books, as well as about his efforts to get them translated and
published in France. We leave this matter to the specialist of his biography and
work. Instead, we have added two letters of Paolo Boringhieri (1921-2006), the
redactor of “Einaudi” in charge of Colana viola after the death of Cesare Pavese
and director of the sub-division “Edizioni Scientifiche Einaudi”.44
They concern the
Italian translations of Techniques du Yoga and Traité d’histoire des religions, to
which Evola refers frequently in his letters of 1951-1954.45
4. After 1962 new information on Eliade’s attitude towards Evola is provided
by his unpublished journal. The second inedited note regarding the Italian esoterist
dates from 5 September 1964:
I try once again, but I don’t succeed: Yeats’ ‘occultism,’ over which so much fuss is
made, doesn’t interest me. It’s cheap, ‘literary,’ suspect – and, ultimately, uninteresting.
Out of all the modern occultist authors whom I have read, only R. Guénon and J. Evola
are worthy of being taken into consideration. I’m not discussing here to what extent their
assertions are ‘true.’ But what they write makes sense.46
Much has already been written, during the last two decades, about Evola’s
supposed “influence” on Eliade or about a presumable debt of the latter towards the
exponents of “Tradition”. This note is a clear testimony of Eliade’s old interest for
the writings of Guénon and Evola as “occultist authors”, but also an explicit reserve
regarding their “truth”. He believes their work expresses a meaningful occultist
Weltanschauung, but does not necessarily accept it as true or adhere to it.47
44
See Pietro Angelini, “Notizia supplementare”, in Cesare Pavese & Ernesto de Martino, La collana viola. Lettere, 1945-1950, ed. by P. Angelini, Turin: Bollati Boringhieri, 1991, pp. 181-187. 45
For the reception and translation of Techniques du Yoga in Italy, see our article “Mircea Eliade
as scholar of yoga. A historical study of his reception, I. 1936-1954”, in: New Europe College
"�tefan Odobleja" Program Yearbook 2010-2011, Bucharest: N.E.C., 2012 (forthcoming). For
the translation and reception of Traité d’histoire des religions, see Pietro Angelini, “Fortunes
and misfortunes of Mircea Eliade in Italy”, Origins. Journal of cultural studies, Zalău, no. 3-4,
2003, pp. 52-55. A general survey in Roberto Scagno, “La ricezione dell’opera di Mircea Eliade
in Italia. Un bilancio critico”, Studi e materiali di storia delle religioni, Rome, n.s., XXXII, no.
1, 2008, pp. 77-87. 46
M. Eliade, Jurnal, 5 September 1964, M.E.P., box. 16/6 (tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts). 47
See also the note of 11 November 1966; M. Eliade, Jurnal, vol. I. 1941-1969, ed. cit., p. 567.
139
Three months later, on 20 December 1964, while reading Evola’s
autobiography Il Cammino del cinabro, Eliade penned a larger note on him.
Although the book came out in November or December 1963, he read it only after a
year. We don’t know the reason of this delay. Maybe Evola didn’t send his book, as he
did usually, and Eliade learned about it only recently. Or maybe he had other priorities.
At that point, reading Evola was neither an urgent thing, nor the most thrilling. On the
contrary, this book proves to be disappointing in more than one respect:
I’m reading the intellectual autobiography of J. Evola, Il Cammino del mercurio,
with much melancholy. The chapter in which he presents and discusses the idealistic
‘university philosophy,’ represented by Croce and Gentile: he speaks about his two
theoretical volumes in which he supposedly destroyed those ‘professors,’ etc. etc. The
naïveté (full of resentment) with which he situates himself in the history of contemporary
thought – even though he states repeatedly that his volumes have not been reviewed and
have not evoked any response...
There must be, indeed, several tons of printed paper in Italy alone on which the
philosophy of Croce and Gentile has been discussed. Of what use, then, has Evola’s
‘radical criticism’ and ‘destruction’ been? And abroad, poor J. Evola is viewed as an
ultra-fascist. The copy of the English translation of his book on Buddhism in Swift
Library is disfigured with polemical annotations (written in indelible lead!): they say
(even on the cover) that Evola is a fascist and a ‘racist,’ that his theories about ‘Aryans’
were borrowed from A. Rosenberg, etc. I remember the brief, harsh review in Journal
asiatique written by J. Filliozat in the same vein: J. E. is a racist, ultra-fascist, etc.
Evola tries to appear indifferent to such criticisms, although he prefers them to the
‘conspiracy of silence’ of which he claims he has suffered all his life. And yet, what a
melancholic spectacle to see him talking about what he has done, how he has ‘destroyed’
and ‘surpassed’ everyone, even Nietzsche and Heidegger (whom he claims, moreover, to
have anticipated…).48
The title of Evola’s autobiography is changed from “cinnabar” to “mercury”,
which is not exactly the same thing. Could this inaccuracy suggest a certain
carelessness about it? The chapter to which Eliade refers here is the third (Il
periodo speculativo. L’idealismo magico e la teoria dell’individuo assoluto). The
book has fourteen chapters. In the tenth (L’azione in Germania e la “Dottrina del
risveglio”) Evola recollects that, in 1938, Eliade “belonged to the circle of
Codreanu”, while after the war he became a famous historian of religions49
– a
48
M. Eliade, Jurnal, 20 December 1964, M.E.P., box. 16/6, pp. 2640-2641 (tr. by Mac Linscott
Ricketts). 49
J. Evola, Il cammino del cinabro, Milan: All’insegna del pesce d’oro, 1963, pp. 151-152.
140
statement which, as we know, has saddened and irritated him.50
If we keep in mind
that Il Cammino del cinabro was completed in August 1962, shortly after the last
bitter letter of Evola known to us, his intention becomes more evident. He knew –
as proved by his correspondence with others51
– that Eliade didn’t liked to have this
brief political episode of youth remembered.
It is not without importance to know whether, by the time Eliade noted down
these impressions, he had read the entire book or only the first three chapters. The
last paragraph might be an indication that he had read it all, but the evidence is not
fully conclusive.52
The second book referred to, which Eliade read at Chicago, in
the English translation available at the library of Divinity School, is The doctrine of
awakening. A study on the Buddhist ascesis (tr. by H.E. Musson, London: Luzac,
1951). It is the same book to which is dedicated a part of the chapter in which
Evola mentions Eliade’s political sympathies of youth. Remembering that its author
is viewed abroad as an ultra-fascist looks like a replica of this. Pointing to
accusations of racism and Nazi-type Aryanism seems a rejoinder to Evola’s similar
insinuations in his review of Yoga.
The Italian’s resentment against university professors, and the "official" science
was not new to Eliade. He had the occasion to feel it, not only in his letters, but also
in some of Evola’s reviews. Saying that his criticism of Croce and Gentile was
redundant and useless, could imply his critiques of Eliade’s books too. Furthermore,
not only his philosophical works passed unnoticed by philosophers, but his books on
Asian philosophies and religions, when noticed by an important Orientalist like Jean
Filliozat (1906-1982) or by a professor or student of Chicago’s prestigious Divinity
school, were rejected on the ground of an objectionable ideological contamination.
All these details make us believe that Eliade has read the entire book and his
reaction was triggered not only by the facts mentioned in this note, but also by the
displeasure at finding a “denunciation” of his past sympathy for the Legionary
movement of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu.
50
M. Eliade, Jurnal, vol. II, op. cit., p. 166 (July 1974). 51
A post-factum testimony in J. Evola, Lettere. 1955-1974, ed. by Renato del Ponte, Finale
Emilia: La Terra degli Avi, [1996], p. 104 (letter of 29 June 1971 to Gaspare Cannizzo). But we
can be sure he didn’t learn it after the publication of his autobiography. 52
If Nietzsche is referred to many times throughout the book, Heidegger is mentioned only
twice, in the first and last chapters. Yet the claim to have anticipated him is found in the first
chapter. Evola talks about a “conspiracy of silence” a couple of times in the final part of the
book, but the expression is already used by the editor in his introductory note.
141
According to Eliade’s journal note of July 1974, he ceased writing to Evola only
after the reading of his autobiography. Could there have been other exchanges of
letters between May 1962 and December 1964? We think not. Eliade states, in the
same place, that he continued his correspondence with Evola only for “a few years”
after the 1949 renewal of their contacts.53
This expression refers, as we have seen, to
a period of about five years, stretching from the end of 1949 to the spring of 1955.
Could he have visited him again in August-September 1965, when he came to Rome?
Unlikely. Despite declaring that he has not seen Evola for ten or twelve years (i.e.
since 1962-1964), he also stated clearly that he visited him only twice. And two visits
– in May 1952 and April 1955 – are attested by Evola’s letters.
The fourth mention of Evola’s name in the journal is only tangential to him.
Eliade recalls, on 28 April 1965, after learning about George Călinescu’s death, his
habit of writing long, “learned” articles on the basis of a single book. As an
example, he gives his essay on alchemy after reading La tradizione ermetica
(1931).54
After this brief mention, Eliade will return to Evola only in 1974, upon his
death. And for the last time. In 1964, he not only broke ties with him, but
apparently also stopped citing him in his books and articles.55
The same can’t be said about the Italian writer. After a few years of possible
intentional silence, Eliade’s name can be found again in his writings. In L’arco e la
clava (1968), a collection of miscellaneous writings, some dating back to the ‘50s, he
mentions him twice in connection with the idea of cyclical time.56
In the second
revised edition (1968) of Lo yoga della potenza – translated in French in 1971 and
reprinted three times till 1984 –, Evola quotes Eliade’s “excellent work” (ottima
opera) Yoga. Immortalité et liberté (1954), which contains a “rich material” on
53
M. Eliade, Jurnal, vol. II, loc. cit. 54
M. Eliade, Jurnal, 28 April 1965, M.E.P., box 16/7. The article is probably “Magie �i
alchimie” (Vremea, XV, no. 729, 25 December 1943, p. 8), which refers explicitly to Evola’s
book. Călinescu also translated a fragment from an earlier work of Evola, L’Individuo e il divenire del mondo (Jurnalul literar, I, no. 23, 4 June 1939, pp. 1, 4). 55
He still mentioned Evola in private conversations. An interesting story, told to his student John
Patrick Deveney, in Joscelyn Godwin, Arktos. The Polar myth in science, symbolism, and Nazi survival, Grand Rapids: Phanes Press, 1993, p. 61, 231 (cited in our article “Istoria doctorului
Honigberger…”, op. cit., pp. 144, 155). J.P. Deveney was in Chicago in 1965-1969 and 1972-
1973. He couldn’t remember when exactly Eliade told him the story, but was inclined to think
that it happened during the last years (email letter of 30 April 2004 to Mac Linscott Ricketts,
whom I thank for it). 56
J. Evola, L’arco e la clava, 3rd
ed., Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 1995, pp. 25, 185.
142
Tantrism.57
Was this an intention of reconciliation after the harsh review from East
and West? Still, in the 1969 edition of Rivolta contro il mondo moderno, he didn’t
update the footnote which cited the old version of the book, Yoga. Essai sur les
origines de la mystique indienne (1936).58
In 1971, Evola introduced Méphistophélès et l’androgyne in the series Orizzonti
dello spirito, directed by him at “Edizioni Mediterranee”.59
Further on he reviewed it,
and also quoted it in the third edition of Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo
contemporaneo, published the same year.60
The review is very different from the
previous ones written for the same newspaper. It is rather a personal gloss on the
second chapter of the book, which is mentioned briefly and neutrally, sparing it of any
epithet.61
Also, unlike the other reviews, we couldn’t find it in Eliade’s archive. If
further research will confirm its absence, it can be considered a proof that the
communication was completely severed also from Evola’s side.
The same year, in his edition of the Taoist book of meditation The secret of the
Golden Flower, based on the German and French translations, Evola chose not to
include the introductory study of C.G. Jung, but that of Pierre Grison. He
considered the first a mere pretext for exposing Jung’s own psychoanalytical ideas,
while the second was, in his opinion, based on “esoteric teaching”. It happens
though that Grison’s introduction quoted several books by Eliade.62
In the third
edition (1973) of La dottrina del risveglio Evola quotes the Italian translation
(1967) of Le sacré et le profane.63
His last anthumous book, Meditazioni delle vette
57
J. Evola, Lo yoga della potenza. Saggio sui Tantra, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 2006, pp.
27, 80, 81, 99, 106, 113, 150, 155, 156, 161, 163, 196 (with some more citations than the 1968
edition). Rendered as “superb work” in the English translation; The yoga of power. Tantra,
shakti, and the secret way, tr. by Guido Stucco, Rochester: Inner Traditions, 1992, p. 9 (also pp.
91, 221, 223, 228, 231). 58
Cited along with Traité d’histoire des religions (1949) and Le mythe de l’éternel retour (1949). J.
Evola, Rivolta contro il mondo moderno, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 2007, pp. 198, 288. 59
M. Eliade, Mefistofele e l’androgino, tr. by Enrico Pinto, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 1971;
reprinted, 1983, 1989, 1995. 60
J. Evola, Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 1971, p. 172. 61
J. Evola, “Mefistofele e l’androgino”, Roma, Naples, n.s., XXII, no. 325, 27 November 1971, p. 3. 62
Le yoga. Immortalité et liberté (1954), Forgerons et alchimistes (1956), Patañjali et le Yoga
(1961). Liu Hua-yang, Il mistero del fiore d’Oro, seguito dal Libro della coscienza e della vita,
ed. by Julius Evola, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 2007, pp. 19-65 (25, 30, 46, 48, 55). 63
J. Evola, La dottrina del risveglio, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 1995, p. 266n.
143
(1974), contains an older essay which cites Eliade.64
The same year a revised
translation of Le chamanisme will appear in the series Orizzonti dello spirito.65
As we have seen, in three of the five journal entries which make reference to
Evola, he is coupled with René Guénon. The name of the latter occurs much more
frequently: once in the journal of the novel ViaŃă nouă, three times in the Portugal
Journal66 and 19 times in the post-war journal.
67 Only six of these entries have been
selected for publication: the first two in a Romanian exile review, the others in
Fragments d’un journal.68 Most of them record what other people
69 had to say
about Guénon. Only two of these notations (11 November 1966 and September
1977) convey what Eliade himself thought about the French esoterist. But they are
the only ones in which he does this at large in his journal. The majority of the
unpublished entries refer to Guénon tangentially, in connection with other
persons.70
On one other occasion (29 February 1948) he meets an old doctor, a
good friend of Guénon, who tells him “a number of picturesque details from the life
of the great initiate” (the epithet is used ironically).71
Perhaps the most interesting of these notations is the one of 26 August 1947:
“Only after you’ve studied Coomaraswamy’s writings in detail do you discover,
suddenly, the poverty, the ‘elementarism,’ [rom. primarism] of René Guénon’s
64
“Il pittore delle nevi tibetane” (1959), in: J. Evola, Meditazioni delle vette. Scritti sulla
montagna. 1927-1959, La Spezia: Edizioni del Tridente, 1974; 5th revised and expanded edition,
Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 2003, pp. 193-198 (197). 65
M. Eliade, Lo sciamanismo e le tecniche dell’estasi, tr. by Julius Evola, revised and updated
by Franco Pintore, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 1974. 66
27 July 1941, respectively August and October 1942, 17 February 1943; M. Eliade, Jurnalul
portughez �i alte scrieri, vol. I, ed. by Sorin Alexandrescu, Bucharest: Humanitas, 2006, pp. 134,
140, 183, 391; English translation: The Portugal Journal, tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts, Albany:
SUNY Press, 2010, pp. 32, 37, 72, 232. 67
27 July, 2 August 1946; 22 March, 26 August 1947; 29 February, 4 December 1948; 2 April, 3
October, 6 November 1949; 5 September, 28 October 1953; 5 September 1964; 20 June 1965; 21
May, 11 November 1966; 4 March 1969, 20 August 1970, July 1974, September 1977; M.
Eliade, Jurnal, M.E.P., boxes 15/1-17/6, 25/10, 26/1, 6-7, 9, 27/1, 3, 9, 28/5. 68
Published later in the Romanian edition of the Jurnal, vol. I, op. cit., pp. 19, 21, 259, 567; vol.
II, op. cit., pp. 164-166, 283. 69
Carl Schmitt, dr. Mario (the correspondent in Paris of Kölnische Zeitung), Jean Chauvel (the
French Ambasador at Bern), and Julius Evola. 70
Anton Dumitriu, Vasile Lovinescu and Mihai Vâlsan, a French doctor converted to the “Indian
tradition”, Paul le Cour, a young man met on the street, Raymond Abellio, the Swiss film maker
Gabriel Uribe (?), a certain George, Canadian Ambassador to Paris, and Ninian Smart. 71
M. Eliade, Jurnal, M.E.P., box 15/3 (tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts).
144
œuvre. And the insufferable self-importance with which he hides, so often, his
ignorance!”72
Still he kept him on the scale of esoteric writers right after the Anglo-
Indian scholar, as proved by a later note. On 4 March 1969, after a student read a
seminar paper on the symbolism of the Tarot, which professor Eliade considered to
contain pseudo-esoteric banalities, learned from a few occult books, he says, and for
the benefit of whole class: “if one is truly attracted to hermetism, he ought to read the
‘authorized’, if not Cardanus, at least Coomaraswamy and René Guénon.”73
Obviously, Evola came only after them. Was this a recent hierarchy,
especially after his break with the Italian esoterist? No, it existed at least from
1947, if not already from the ‘30s.74
Eliade’s perception of the metaphysicians of
“Tradition” has changed after the war. This journal note from 11 November 1966
regards Julius Evola too:
What Guénon and the other ‘hermeticists’ say about ‘Tradition’ must not be
understood on the plane of historical reality (as they claim). These speculations
constitute a universe of systematically articulated meanings; they are to be compared
with a great poem or novel. The same with Marxist and Freudian ‘explanations’: they
are true if we consider them imaginary universes. The ‘proofs’ are few and uncertain –
they correspond to the historical, social, and psychological ‘realities’ in a novel or a
poem. All these global and systematic interpretations constitute, in fact, mythological
creations, very useful for understanding the World; but they are not, as their authors
believe, ‘scientific explanations’.75
As clearly stated, professor Eliade considered the works of Guénon and Evola
useful tools for understanding the World, with capital letter. What he means here is,
we think, the human representation of the world, more precisely the mythical
representation. That’s why he continues to read them with the same old interest.
Their works show how mythological creation takes place even today, and permit a
good glimpse into its structure and functioning. They have no explanatory function
for the historical dimension of reality, and therefore are not to be considered on the
same plane with scientific explanations.
72
Ibidem, box 15/2 (tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts). 73
Ibidem, box 15/4 (tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts). 74
See for this M. Eliade, “Ananda Coomaraswamy”, Revista FundaŃiilor Regale, Bucharest, IV,
no. 7, July 1937, pp. 183-189; reprinted in Insula lui Euthanasius, Bucharest: F.R.P.L.A, 1943. 75
M. Eliade, Jurnal, vol. I, op. cit., p. 567 (tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts).
145
When exactly did this new perception appear? The first expression of it in his
journal dates from 5 September 1964. Did Eliade think the same when he quoted
Evola in his books between 1954 and 1962?
In a footnote of Yoga. Immortalité et liberté (1954), he referred to La dottrina
del risveglio for its “excellent analysis” of the four psychic states – pali jhānas,
skr. dhyānas – experienced in the Buddhist meditation. In the final bibliography,
Lo yoga della potenza is present three times – among general works on tantrism,
as an overview on mantra, and for its interpretation of cakras –, while La
Tradizione ermetica is cited as a reference for the metaphysics of alchemy.76
In 1955, in the special issue of Le Disque vert, dedicated to Carl Gustav Jung,
Eliade mentioned La Tradizione ermetica as a book presenting the principles and
technique of ars regia according to the best sources and in a rigorous spirit – that of
the “Tradition”.77
The same book is cited several times in the article Aspects
initiatiques de l’alchimie occidentale (1955) and in Forgerons et alchimistes
(1956), in relation to the philosophical incestus, the symbolism of initiatic death,
the parallelism of Christ with the philosopher’s stone, the operations albedo and
rubedo, and the materia prima as a symbol. It is also listed in the final bibliography
among books on alchemy from a “Traditionalist” perspective, a fact which is
recalled in the text.78
Metafisica del sesso is cited again in four footnotes of the Eranos paper La
coincidentia oppositorum et le mystère de la totalité (1959)79
– reprinted in
Méphistophélès et l’androgyne (1962) –, in relation to the mythical division of
the sexes, the celestial Virgin, the alchemical idea of androgyny, and the idea of
unification of sexes in the nature of the resurrected Christ.80
When Evola’s books are referred as a “Traditionalist” approach to the
problems Eliade discusses from the viewpoint of history of religions, he clearly
takes them as samples of the mythical thinking. This is the case in 1955 and 1956.
The same can be said about 1959 and 1962, in view of the topics to which
76
M. Eliade, Yoga. Immortality and freedom, tr. by W.R. Trask, with a new introduction by
David Gordon White, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009, pp. 171n, 403, 407, 410, 416. 77
M. Eliade, “Note sur Jung et l’alchimie”, op. cit., pp. 104-105. 78
M. Eliade, Forgerons et alchimistes, op. cit., pp. 119, 132, 133, 134, 135, 138, 139, 176. 79
Eranos-Jahrbuch, Zürich, XXVII, 1959, pp. 195-236. 80
M. Eliade, Méphistophélès et l’androgyne, Paris: Gallimard, 1962, pp. 126, 127, 128.
146
Evola’s work is related, but there Metafisica del sesso is used mostly for its
bibliographical sources, very helpful to Eliade’s argument.81
The 1954 reference to La Tradizione ermetica falls into the same category, as it
is explicitly done with regard to the “metaphysics of alchemy”. But La dottrina del
risveglio and Lo yoga della potenza are cited there in a conspicuously different
way, along with other scholarly works. Did Eliade think differently at that moment
or was he just answering the reproach of not mentioning Evola’s name in his
writings? This is a good opening question for a fresh inquiry into the substance of
his relation with the Italian author.82
81
This was noticed also by Marcello de Martino, Mircea Eliade esoterico. Ioan Petru Culianu e i “non detti”, Rome: Settimo Sigillo, 2008, pp. 327-328 n, but we can’t agree with his inferences. 82
While editing the letters attached to this article, we tried to be faithful to the original and chose
not to make corrections to their grammar or style. Since the writing of the article there were
published an Italian translation of the sixteen known letters of Evola to Eliade (Julius Evola,
Lettere a Mircea Eliade. 1930-1954, edited and translated by Claudio Mutti, notes by
Gianfranco de Turris and Claudio Mutti, preface by Giovanni Casadio, Naples: Controcorente,
2011, 80 pp.) and a pamphlet partly triggered by it (Marcello De Martino, Le ultime lettere di
Julius Evola à M. Mircea Eliade (29/XI/1954 e 26/IV/1962), Rome: Settimo Sigillo, 2011, 48
pp.), which contains the Italian translation of two – 5 and 8 – of the new letters edited here.
147
Julius Evola to Mircea Eliade
1
Bologna, 26.X.1952
Cher Monsieur
J’avais bien reçu les placards avec les nouvelles coupures à ajouter aux autres.
La traduction va assez vite – on en est presque à la moitié.1 Ensuite je vous
demanderai quelques éclaircissement.
Pour ce qui est de votre Mythe,2 je ne crois pas qu’il soit bien en intéresser Bocca
3
maintenant. Je crois qu’il soit plus utile qu’il songe à publier aussi votre Yoga,4 car c’est
là un ouvrage qui s’encadre mieux dans sa collection scientifique, tandis que Mythe
rentrerait dans une collection d’essais très variée et parfois même d’un genre douteux.
Je voulais déjà vous demander si on pourrait avoir, en emprunt, la nouvelle rédaction
de Yoga à ce fin, dans le cas que Payot retarde à la faire paraître.
Pour Mythe on pourrait voir ailleurs. Mais je pense qu’il serait, à la fin,
“controproducente” (comme on dit ici) que faire paraître trop de livres de vous
presque dans le même temps. Car à la fin de cette année devrait paraître votre
Traité5 chez Einaudi, dans le cours du 1953 j’espère que Chamanisme paraîtra à
son tour. Par conséquent on n’est pas pressé. Cela n’empêche pas que je ferai des
démarches préparatoires. Entre autre, une nouvelle maison éditrice6 – mais avec des
possibilités financières assez limitées – vient de s’organiser à Rome, et sa première
publication ce sera mon Gli uomini e le rovine;7 en suite on pense d’éditer des
livres de Guénon, de Reininger, de O. Spann,8 etc. Il s’agit de voir comme cela
marchera financiellement.
1 The translation of Le chamanisme et les techniques archaïques de l’extase, Paris: Payot, 1951.
2 Le mythe de l’éternel retour. Archétypes et répétition, Paris: Gallimard, 1949.
3 The publishing house “Fratelli Bocca” of Milan.
4 The revised edition of Yoga. Essai sur les origines de la mystique indienne, Bucharest - Paris:
F.P.L.A.R.C. - Paul Geuthner, 1936, of which Eliade must have informed him in a letter. It will
be published only two years later: Yoga. Immortalité et liberté, Paris: Payot, 1954. 5 Traité d’histoire des religions. Morphologie du sacré, Paris: Payot, 1949. The Italian
translation appeared after two years: Trattato di storia delle religioni, tr. by Virginia Vacca,
preface by Ernesto de Martino, Turin: Einaudi, 1954. 6 “Edizioni dell’Ascia”.
7 The book will appear in April 1953.
8 René Guénon (1886-1951), Robert Reininger (1869-1955), Othmar Spann (1878-1950). Evola
reprinted his old translation (Milan: Hoepli, 1937) of Guénon’s La crise du monde moderne,
148
Merci beaucoup pour votre démarche chez Véga. Je garde personnellement les
droits de traduction de tous mes livres. Pour cela, je crois qu’il est bien que j’écris
directement à la Librairie Véga.
En principe je tiendrais naturellement que ce soit Rivolta9 qui parait le premier
en France, car ce livre est un peu le clef de tous les autres, si bien que même le livre
sur le Graal10
peut être considéré comme le développement d’un de ses chapitres.
Avec les éditions Laffont je pense qu’il y a peu de chances s’il est vrai ce que me
dit Lavastine11
(dont j’ai reçu la lettre), voir que mes livres sont en examen dans les
mains d’un lecteur démocrate-chrétien, juif par-dessus. J’ai prié Lavastine de voir
s’il peut intéresser quelque autre éditeur.
Veuillez agréer, cher M. Eliade, l’expression de mes sentiments très sympathiques,
J. Evola
Pensione Nuova
Via del Porto Bologna
L’adresse en est valable encore deux semaines.
M.E.P., box 91/2. Typed letter, single sheet, autograph signature in blue ink, last line in handwriting.
2
Bologna, le 17.XI.52
Cher Monsieur,
J’ai reçu votre lettre. Bocca vient de me dire qu’il a l’intention de publier votre livre12
en printemps, pourvu que celui de Einaudi13
paraisse déjà dans le cours de cette année.
Paris: Bossard, 1927 (La crisi del mondo moderno, Rome: Edizioni dell’Ascia, 1953; Edizioni
Mediterranee, 1972, 1985). He translated and prefaced Reininger’s book Friedrich Nietzsches
Kampf und Sinn des Lebens. Der Ertrag seiner Philosophie für die Ethik, Vienna - Leipzig:
Wilhelm Braumüller, 1922, under the title Nietzsche e il senso della vita, Rome: Giovanni
Volpe, 1971. New translations from the works of Spann appeared in Italian only from 1982 on
(before the war Evola translated from them in his bimonthly page Diorama filosofico from the
daily newspaper Il regime fascista). 9 Rivolta contro il mondo moderno, Milan: Hoepli, 1934; 2
nd revised and expanded edition,
Milan: Fratelli Bocca, 1951. It will be published in French much later and not in France: Révolte
contre le monde moderne, tr. by Pierre Pascal, Montreal - Brussels: Ed. de l’Homme, 1972. 10
Il mistero del Graal e la tradizione ghibellina dell’Impero, Bari: Laterza, 1937. 11
Philippe Lavastine (1908-1999). 12
Lo sciamanismo e le tecniche dell’estasi, tr. by Carlo d’Altavilla [=Julius Evola], Rome -
Milan: Fratelli Bocca, 1953.
149
D’après votre communication j’ai écrit à la Librairie Véga (pour le livre sur le
Graal) il y a plus de deux semaines, sans avoir aucune réponse. Si une occasion se
présentera, vous pourrez peut-être voir qu’il en est.
Si, comme je le suppose, vous aller faire copier votre Yoga à la machine pour
Payot, il serait bien en faire deux exemplaires, pour en pouvoir utiliser un ici.
Veuillez agréer, cher Monsieur, l’expression de mes sentiments très amicales.
J. Evola
Pourrez-vous me signaler quelque ouvrage spécial ayant trait à la magie du
sexe et aux rites orgiastiques?
M.E.P., box 91/2. Postcard, handwritten on both sides, mailed to Paris (rue Duhesme 11) on 18
November 1952.
3
Bologna, le 16.XII. 1952
Cher Monsieur Eliade,
Merci pour votre lettre. Je pense que la traduction de votre livre sera au point
au commencement de janvier et puisque Traité a un tel retard, nous allons ménager
les choses afin que Chamanisme paraisse avant.
De la part de la Librairie Véga, aucune nouvelle jusqu'à présent. Au contraire,
je viens de recevoir une lettre très aimable de M. Lavastine, qui se propose de
s’intéresser sérieusement pour le placement de mes livres. Je crois qu’il va parler de
nouveau avec vous sur ce sujet.
Il se peut que vous voudrez me rendre un petit service, c’est-à-dire envoyer de
Paris (ou d’où vous vous trouvez maintenant) la lettre ci-jointe. Merci beaucoup.
A l’occasion veuillez agréer, cher Monsieur Eliade, mes souhaits les meilleurs
pour les jours de fête qui viennent.
J. Evola
Merci beaucoup pour Images et symboles,14
que je vais lire dans ces jours avec
l’intérêt que méritent tous vous ouvrages.
A propos de mon livre sur le Graal il serait bien, le cas échéant, de signaler que
surtout la fin – qui pourrait agacer quelques lecteurs – a été élabore de nouveau.
13
Trattato di storia delle religioni, op. cit. 14
Images et symboles. Essais sur le symbolisme magico-religieux, preface by George Dumézil,
Paris: Gallimard, 1952.
150
Mon adresse actuel est bien
Pensione Nuova
Via del Porto
Bologna Est-ce que le votre n’est plus à rue Duhesme?
M.E.P., box 91/2. Typed letter, single sheet, autograph signature in blue ink, last line in handwriting.
4
Bologna, le 13.I.1953
Cher Monsieur,
Je viens de réviser la traduction de votre Chamanisme et pour la mettre au point je
vous soumet quelques questions.
1. Avant tout: je me doute que le mot "archaïque" a en français la même nuance
négative qu’en italien. En italien ce mot est employé presque exclusivement dans le
domaine de la littérature et des arts et, surtout pour les non-spécialisés, a une résonance
négative, défavorable: comme “vieux”, “sans vie”, stéréotype, momifie, etc. Même M.
de Martino15
lorsqu’il parle de “arcaismi” entends par là une non-valeur. Je proposerais
de substituer à “arcaico” “primordiale”, qui étymologiquement revient plus ou moins
au même et qui éloignerait ce malentendu. Cela, déjà dans le titre, tandis que dans le
texte je mettrais de temps en temps les deux mots “primordiale e arcaico” pour que le
premier rectifie le second.
2. Je pense que surtout dans les premiers chapitres lorsque vous parlez de
“vocation” vous entendez plutôt “choix, élection”. Vocation est quelque chose de
positif, un penchant libre, pendant que vous entendez, dans ces cas, quelque chose qui
intervient et même s’impose à la suite d’une volonté étrangère (esprits, ancêtres, etc.).
3. Vous employez le mot “intégrer” dans un sens que, je crois, est un peu spécial
même en français. En tout cas en italien un équivalent parfait s’impose (“integrato in
un insieme” = “ripreso in un insieme”, etc.)
4. “Dialectique du sacré”: pour les lecteurs qui ne connaissent pas les autres
livres de vous, cela reste obscur. Il faudrait expliciter en quelque sorte.
5. La remarque qui suit ne s’applique qu’en passant à Chamanisme. Je crois que
par “dieux passifs” vous entendez plutôt “dieux impassibles”; ce sont les “dieux
détachés”, tandis que si vous dites “passifs” cela suppose une action qu’ils subissent.
“Deus otiosus” lui aussi crée un équivoque pour celui qui ignore la signification
positive de otium chez les anciens.
Pour ce qui est des particuliers:
15
Ernesto de Martino (1908-1965), who took care of the translations of Eliade’s books at
“Einaudi” and prefaced them.
151
P. 107, ligne 10: Qu’est-ce que vous entendez ici par “fauves”? Il semble qu’il ne
s’agit pas des animaux sauvages.
P. 149, l. 4, 8: “bois” dans le sens de substance des cornes?
P. 162, l. 25: Je crois qu’on devrait dire “macrocosme”.
P. 218, l. 36: Qu’est-ce que vous entendez par “chamanisme vers la terre”?
P. 220, l. 32: C’est vraiment “régions supérieures” et non “inférieures”, à cause du
“mais” oppositif?
P. 242, l. 8: C’est vraiment “empoigné” dans le sens de pris avec la main?
P. 107, l. 26: Que doit-on entendre par “peines”? Souffrances?!
P. 275, l. 38: “dans un petit trou” – où? Il n’est pas clair.
P. 306, l. 21: “L’Arme Chaman” – que signifie?
P. 351, l. 9-10: “Une continuation d’Alburz” – il semble être incohérent, si le “il”
se rapporte à l’Enfer.
Il se peut que vous voudrez m’écrire deux mots pour éclaircir tout cela.
Veuillez prendre note que mon adresse actuel est valable jusqu’au 24 de ce mois;
ensuite je suis à Rome, Corso Vittorio Emanuele 197.
Est-ce que vous avez entendu quelque chose du côté de chez M. Lavastine et de
la Librairie Véga? Moi, rien du tout.
Veuillez agréer, cher Monsieur Eliade, mes salutations très cordiales,
J. Evola
J. Evola
Pensione Nuova
Via del Porto
Bologna
M.E.P., box 91/2. Typed letter, single sheet written on both sides, autograph signature in blue ink.
5
Rome, le 29.XI.54
Cher Monsieur,
J’ai vu que enfin votre Traité est paru chez Einaudi. Je joins ici un compte-
rendu que j’ai écrit à l’occasion, pour contribuer au “battage”. Il est paru en deux
quotidiens, Roma16 e Patria.
17 Le manager de Bocca m’a dit que, il ne sait pas
16
“Storia delle religioni”, Roma, Naples, n.s., V, 19 November 1954, p. 3. Roma was a
conservative daily newspaper published after the war by Achile Lauro (1887-1982), and directed
from 1950 to 1958, by Alfredo Signoretti (1901-1971). 17
Most probably, La Patria. Quotidiano indipendente del mattino, published at Milan from 1952
to 1956 by Achile Lauro and directed by A. Signoretti.
152
pourquoi, votre Chamanisme jusqu’à présent à été peu vendu. J’espère que l’un
ouvrage aidera à intéresser à l’autre.
Pour ce qui est de la traduction française de ma Dottrina del risveglio,18
il y a là
une impasse, parce que l’éditeur vient de me faire savoir que les personnes
auxquelles elle a été assignée ne peuvent la terminer avant la fin d’avril – ce qui
signifie presque un an après que le contrat a été signe. C’est assez fâcheux, parce
que, comme vous le savez, je compte sur ce que cet ouvrage agisse en France un
peu comme un “faiseur de brèche” pour des autres publications.
Si non, rien de remarquable à signaler. Je continue à recueillir assez
péniblement des matériaux à servir pour ma Métaphysique du sexe19 et je viens de
conseiller à Bocca – faute de mieux – la traduction d’un ouvrage de Suzuki.20
A
quel point votre nouvelle édition de Yoga est-elle?
Veuillez agréer, cher Monsieur, l’assurance de mes sentiments très cordiaux.
J. Evola
J. Evola
Corso Vittorio Emanuele 197
Roma
Vient de paraître en allemand, chez Barth, München, mon livre sur le Graal.21
M.E.P., box 82/9. Typed letter, single sheet, autograph signature in blue ink.
6
Rome, 6.X.1955
Cher Monsieur,
J’ai reçu l’extrait très intéressant sur les aspects initiatiques de l’alchimie
occidentale.22
Je vous remercie d’avoir fait mention de mon ouvrage sur ce sujet,
dont est parue, d’ailleur, une édition plus récente.23
18
La dottrina del risveglio. Saggio sull’ascesi buddhista, Bari: Laterza, 1943. 19
Metafisica del sesso, Rome: Atanor, 1958. 20
Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki, Essays in Zen Buddhism, I-III, London: Luzac, 1927, 1933, 1934,
published later as Saggi sul buddhismo zen, vol. I-III, Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee, 1975, 1977,
1978. The first volume was translated by Julius Evola, the other two by Roberta Rambelli. 21
Das Geheimnis des Graals, München: O.W. Barth, 1954. 22
“Aspects initiatiques de l’alchimie occidentale”, Archivio di filosofia, Rome, XXV, no. 2,
1955, pp. 215-225. The journal, official organ of the Italian Philosophical Society, was directed
by Enrico Castelli (1900-1977), professor of philosophy of religion at the University “La
153
Pour ce qui est de la doctrine, puisque vous étudiez cette matière, je pense qu’il
y aurait lieu de souligner davantage la différentiation des deux phases de la
réalisation hermétique. La base peut être déjà donnée par l’introduction très
heureuse que vous avez fait, en traitant du Yoga, du terme enstase opposé à extase.
Cette opposition marque assez bien non seulement la distinction entre expérience
initiatique et expérience mystique, mais aussi celle entre la phase hermétique de
l’albedo, comme issue de la dissolution, et la phase finale de la rubedo.
Principiellement (et non avec un référence stricte aux données historiques) c’est là
aussi la différence entre Petits Mystères et Grand Mystères. Je pense qu’on doit
délimiter votre idée-clef de la restauration des origines, à cause de la possibilité
d’une direction “feminine” ou panthéiste de cette expérience. En alchimie l’œuvre
au blanc est justement l’extase et elle est identifiée au régime de la Femme ou de la
Lune; mais la perfection de l’ouvrage est le dépassement de cette sortie et
conjonction avec la “materia prima” ou la Mère; c’est là l’œuvre au rouge,
identifiée au régime de l’Homme (qui “monte sur la femme” ou “possède sa Mère”)
et du Soleil.
Il y a aussi lieu de remarquer un point signalétique important: la marque du
caractère initiatique “solaire” et “royal” de l’hermétisme (ars regia) est que le rouge
est placé au dessus du blanc. A l’encontre, le blanc prend toujours la première place
dans les traditions que nous sommes censé de considérer comme ayant un caractère
plus contemplatif ou extatico-sacerdotal.
Je viens de réviser la traduction anglaise d’un compte-rendu assez long sur
votre Yoga que j’ai écrit pour le prochain numéro de la revue de M. Tucci, East and West (je suppose que vous recevez cette revue).
24 J’espère que vous ne m’en
voudrez pas si, après une reconnaissance ouverte de la valeur du livre, j’ai fait
quelques remarques critiques qui, au demeurant, sont les mêmes que j’ai esquissé à
l’occasion de notre dernier entretien romain.
Croyez, cher Monsieur, à l’expression de mes meilleurs sentiments.
J. Evola
Corso Vittorio 197
M.E.P., box 91/2. Typed letter, single sheet, autograph signature in blue ink, address in handwriting.
Sapienza”, and published many thematic issues. This one was entitled Studi di filosofia della religione. 23
La tradizione ermetica, nei suoi simboli, nella sua dottrina e nella sua arte regia, Bari:
Laterza, 1931; 2nd
revised edition, 1948. 24
“Yoga, immortality and freedom”, East and West, Rome, VI, no. 3, October 1955, pp. 224-
230. The journal, official organ of Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, was directed
by Giuseppe Tucci (1894-1984) with the assistance of Mario Bussagli (1917-1988).
154
7
Rome, le 27.XII.1955
Cher Monsieur,
C’est depuis assez de temps que je n’ai pas eu de nouvelles de vous. Je ne sais
pas même si vous vous trouvez à Paris ou toujours à St. Cloud.25
C’est pourquoi
j’adresse cette lettre chez Payot.
Je pense que vous avez reçu une carte de moi, et que entre-temps vous avez lu
l’article que je vous avais annoncé, sur votre Yoga, paru en East and West en même
temps qu’un essai de vous.26
Après avoir reconnu que votre ouvrage “is the most
complete of all these that have been written in the domain of the history of religions
and of Orientalism – one cannot mention another… that stands on the same level”,
je me suis permis de faire certaines remarques critiques sur des points, sur lesquels
nous avons déjà eu l’occasion de parler quand vous étiez à Rome.
Je n’ai pas oublié votre désir de voire paraître en italien votre Eternel retour,27
depuis que je vous ai indiqué pour quelles raisons Yoga est difficile à placer.28
Mais
entre-temps s’est produit un fait fâcheux. L’éditeur, chez lequel je contrôle la
branche orientalisme, mythes, etc., vient de subir une crise très grave (du reste,
comme des autres éditeurs italiens), qui aurait pu donner lieu à un effondrement.
Maintenant il est en train de se relever, mais il faudra du temps avant qu’il puisse
songer à des nouveaux engagements: même la nouvelle édition de mon livre sur le
Graal29
et de Ur,30
bien que déjà composés, sont là à attendre depuis quelques mois.
Dans le mois qui vient paraîtra l’édition de ma Doctrine de l’éveil en français.31
Peux-je vous rappeler votre aimable intention de me transmettre une liste
d’adresses des personnes qui vous plus ou moins connaissez et à lesquelles le livre
pourrait être utilement envoyée?
25
Saint-Cloud is a suburb of Paris, at about 10 km west from the city centre. There, in the new
house of Dr. Roger Godel (45 rue Val d’Or), Eliade and Christinel lived from October 1954 to
June 1955. 26
“Smiths, shamans and mystagogues”, ibidem, pp. 206-215. 27
Le mythe de l’éternel retour, op. cit. 28
Reference to a letter not yet known, most probably sent between December 1954 and
September 1955. 29
Published much later by another house: Il mistero del Graal e la idea imperiale ghibellina, 2nd
revised and expanded edition, Milan: Ceschina, 1962. 30
Introduzione alla magia quale scienza dell’Io, a cura del Gruppo di UR, vol. I-III, Rome:
Fratelli Bocca, 1955. 31 La doctrine de l’éveil. Essai sur l’ascèse bouddhiste, tr. by Pierre Pascal, Paris: Adyar, 1956.
155
A l’occasion, veuillez accepter, cher Monsieur, l’expression de mes souhaits les
meilleurs pour le nouvel an.
J. Evola
J. Evola
Corso Vittorio Emanuele 197
Roma
M.E.P., box 91/2. Typed letter, single sheet, autograph signature in blue ink.
8
Rome, le 26.IV.1962
Cher Monsieur,
Il s’est écoulé pas mal de temps depuis que nous avions été en rapport la
dernière fois.
Je n’ai plus entendu de vous que indirectement. J’ai reçu toutefois vos
nouveaux ouvrages par Gallimard,32
et puisque c’est vous sans doute que lui avez
dit, je vous en remercie.
De ma part, je ne suis pas sur si, à son temps, un exemplaire de ma Metafisica
del sesso33 vous est parvenu; plus récemment vous auriez dû recevoir un nouveau
livre à moi, Cavalcare la tigre,34
qui vient d’attirer l’attention aussi au dehors des
milieux plutôt spécialisés des lectures de la plus grand partie de mes livres. Il vous
a été envoyé par l’éditeur à la même adresse à laquelle maintenant je vous écris et
que le Klett-Verlag35
m’a communiquée.
A certains égards je garde une mentalité quite out of date, au point que je
considère l’Amérique comme un pays dont la distance (pas seulement spirituelle)
est telle de décourager une correspondance. C’est là une raison de mon silence.
Ma considération pour vous s’était considérablement accrue quand, à l’occasion
de votre dernière visite chez moi, vous, en bon européen, m’avez dit d’accepter
32
He refers probably to Naissances mystiques. Essai sur quelques types d’initiation, Paris:
Gallimard, 1959; and Méphistophélès et l’androgyne, ibidem, 1962. 33
Metafisica del sesso, Rome: Atanor, 1958. 34
Cavalcare la tigre, Milan: All’insegna del pesce d’oro, 1961. 35
“Ernst Klett Verlag” from Stuttgart was the publisher of Antaios. Zeitschrift für eine freie
Welt, directed by Eliade and Ernst Jünger (1895-1998) from May 1959 to March 1971 (from
March 1960 without the subtitle). Evola contributed to the journal from 1960 to 1969, but the
editorial work and correspondence was done single-handedly by Philipp Wolff-Windegg. The
same editor published, in 1961, the German translation of Evola’s book Metafisica del sesso.
156
seulement des invitations en Amérique, en gardant votre liberté d’aller et revenir en
Europe. Je me demande si vous avez résisté au tentations de la sirène (à vrais dire, je
voudrais employer une expression un peu plus forte) de l’Amérique US.
Bon, il me fera plaisir si, à l’occasion, vous me ferez savoir quelque chose de
vous. Entre-temps je vous confirme, cher Monsieur Eliade, les sentiments de notre
ancienne et cordiale amitié.
Bien à vous,
J. Evola
J. Evola
Corso Vittorio Emanuele 197 Roma
M.E.P., box 82/9. Typed letter, single sheet, autograph signature in black ink.
ADDENDA
Paolo Boringhieri to Mircea Eliade
1
Giulio Einaudi Editore
Segreteria editoriale Torino
Corso Umberto 5 bis
telefoni 55.37.61/62/63
LF/
Monsieur Mircea Eliade
Hôtel de Suède 31 Rue Vaneau
Paris VII
le 19 Mai 1951
Cher Monsieur,
Nous avons bien reçu votre lettre du 23 Avril et nous avons le plaisir de vous
annoncer que la publication de votre ouvrage Techniques du Yoga a été établie pour
le mois d’octobre prochain.36
Pour ce qui concerne le Traité d’Histoire des
36
The book came out by mid-January 1952. Eliade received it on 28 January. Cf. M. Eliade,
Jurnal, 31 January 1952, M.E.P., box 15/5.
157
Religions, nous espérons de pouvoir inclure ce titre dans notre programme de
publication pour 1952.
Nous sommes contents de pouvoir ainsi vous rassurer à propos des soupçons
dont vous nous avez très franchement fait part dans votre lettre.37
Le retard dans la
publication n’est pas dû seulement à la malheureuse disparition de Pavese mais
aussi à la nécessité de ralentir le rythme de publication comme suite à la diminution
des possibilités d’absorption du marché libraire italien.
Est-ce que vous voulez avoir l’obligeance de nous envoyer une courte notice bio-
bibliographique qui doit nous servir pour le lancement de Techniques du Yoga? Merci.
Entre temps, nous vous prions de croire, cher Monsieur, à tous nos meilleurs
sentiments.
Giulio Einaudi Editore
Boringhieri
M.E.P., box 73/26. Typed letter, single sheet, printed letterhead, autograph signature in black ink.
2
Edizioni Scientifiche Einaudi
s.a.s. Torino
corso Umberto 5 bis
telefoni 55.37.61/62/63
[A] Prof. Mircea Eliade
62 bis rue de la Tour
Paris 16e
Turin, le 16 septembre 1954
Cher Monsieur,
comme suite à votre lettre du 10 Septembre, nous avons le plaisir de vous
communiquer que nous vous avons envoyé sous pli séparé un exemplaire de
l’édition italienne du Traité.38
Nous en enverrons aussi trois exemplaires aux Editions Payot, selon le contrat.
37
On 28 March 1951, in Rome, Eliade wrote in his journal: “I found out from R[affaele]
P[ettazzoni] that since the death of Pavese, who was in charge of the series of ethnological
studies in which my books were going to appear, Einaudi is slighting this series increasingly.”
(tr. by Mac Linscott Ricketts) M.E.P., box 15/4. 38
The book appeared in summer, but with no publicity.
158
Dans l’attente de vous lire, nous vous prions d’agréer nos salutations les plus
empressées.
Edizioni Scientifiche Einaudi
Boringhieri
M.E.P., box 73/26. Typed letter, single sheet, printed letterhead, autograph signature in blue ink.