Watkins Books (also Watkins Media) [1] is London's oldest esoteric bookshop. It specialises in esotericism, mysticism, occultism, oriental religion and contemporary spirituality. [2] Watkins Media, the publishing side of the business is owned by entrepreneur Etan Ilfeld. [3] It publishes books and owns a number publishing imprints.
The book store was established by John M. Watkins, a friend of Madame Blavatsky, in 1897 at 26 Charing Cross. John Watkins had already been selling books via a catalogue which he began publishing in March 1893. [4] The first biography of Aleister Crowley recounts a story of Crowley making all of the books in Watkins magically disappear and reappear. [5]
Geoffrey Watkins (1896–1981) owned and managed the store after his father. [6] He was also an author [7] and publisher
The company first publishing Carl Gustav Jung's 1925 edition of Septem Sermones ad Mortuos . [8]
In 1901, Watkins Books moved to 21 Cecil Court where it has been continuously trading ever since. It publishes a magazine called the Watkins' Mind Body Spirit magazine, which has featured leading authors from mind-body-spirit and esoteric fields. Watkins Books has been owned by Etan Ilfeld since March 2010. [9] [10] Since then, a new website has been launched, and the store regularly hosts book launches and signings.
Watkins publishes an annual list of "the 100 Most Spiritually Influential Living People," which is usually featured in the spring issue of Watkins' Mind Body Spirit magazine. [11] The main factors used to compile the list are that the person has to be alive and has to have made a unique and spiritual contribution on a global scale.
Watkins Media owns a number of publishing imprints. In 2014, it launched the Repeater Books imprints with some former founders of Zero Books. [1] Collective Ink (formerly John Hunt Publishing) was brought by Watkins Media in October 2021.
Verso Books is a left-wing publishing house based in London and New York City, founded in 1970 by the staff of New Left Review (NLR) and includes Tariq Ali and Perry Anderson on its board of directors. According to its website, it's the largest independent, radical publishing house in the English-speaking world, publishing one hundred books a year. Harper's called it "Anglo-America's preeminent radical press," and The Sunday Times called it "a rigorously intelligent publisher."
The Friday Project was a London-based independent publishing house founded by Paul Carr and Clare Christian in June 2004. It evolved out of The Friday Thing, an Internet newsletter taking an offbeat look at the week's politics, media activities and general current events, originally written together with Charlie Skelton.
Osprey Publishing is a British publishing company specializing in military history based in Oxford. Predominantly an illustrated publisher, many of their books contain full-colour artwork plates, maps and photographs, and the company produces over a dozen ongoing series, each focusing on a specific aspect of the history of warfare. Their publications include the Men-at-Arms series, running to over 500 titles, with each book dedicated to a specific historical army or military unit. Osprey is an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing.
The body of light, sometimes called the 'astral body' or the 'subtle body,' is a "quasi material" aspect of the human body, being neither solely physical nor solely spiritual, posited by a number of philosophers, and elaborated on according to various esoteric, occult, and mystical teachings. Other terms used for this body include body of glory, spirit-body, luciform body, augoeides, astroeides, and celestial body.
Parragon Books Ltd, a United Kingdom publishing company, was formed in 1988 by friends Guy Parr and Paul Anderson. In 2001, it became part of D. C. Thomson & Co.
Red Wheel/Weiser, also known in different periods in its history as RedWheel/Weiser/Conari and Samuel Weiser, Inc., is a book publisher with three imprints: Red Wheel, Weiser Books and Conari Books. It is America's second-largest publisher of occult and New Age books, behind Llewellyn Worldwide, and is also one of the oldest American publishers to concentrate exclusively on that genre. It publishes on average 60-75 new titles per year and maintains a large backlist, partly of books that it originally published, and partly of older public domain rare occult books.
Nevill Drury was an English-born Australian editor and publisher, as well as the author of over 40 books on subjects ranging from shamanism and western magical traditions to art, music, and anthropology. His books have been published in 26 countries and in 19 languages.
The Good Book Company (TGBC) is an evangelical Christian publisher, located in Epsom, Surrey, England. They are structured as a large unquoted, private company, limited by share capital. Their practices include publishing, mission outreach and training. The Publisher was declared runner up in the Christian Publisher of the Year Award by the Trade Body for Christian Publishing and Retailing in the UK.
Weiser Antiquarian Books is the oldest occult bookstore in the United States. It specialises in books on Aleister Crowley and his circle, magic, mysticism, eastern religions and alternative spirituality. Its earlier New York incarnation, The Weiser Bookshop, was described by Leslie A. Shepherd as "perhaps the most famous occult bookstore in the U.S."
Angry Robot is a British-based publishing house dedicated to producing modern adult science fiction and fantasy, or as they call it “SF, F and WTF?!?”. The Nottingham-based company first released books in the UK in 2009, and since September 2010 has simultaneously been publishing its titles in the US as well, as a distributed client of Random House. All titles are released as paperbacks and eBooks.
Madeline Montalban was an English astrologer and ceremonial magician. She co-founded the esoteric organisation known as the Order of the Morning Star (OMS), through which she propagated her own form of Luciferianism.
Etan Ilfeld is a London-based entrepreneur and the founder of Tenderbooks, Tenderpixel gallery, Watkins Mind Body Spirit Magazine, Watkins Wisdom Academy, PlayStrategy.org, co-founder of Repeater Books, a venture partner at Remagine Ventures, and the owner and managing director of Watkins Books, Watkins Media, and the Mind Sports Olympiad. Ilfeld is the inventor of Diving chess and the author of Beyond Contemporary Art, co-author of Duchamp versus Einstein and the creator of the Synchronicity Oracle. He is also the host of the Etan Ilfeld Podcast.
The Quarto Group is a global illustrated book publishing group founded in 1976. It is domiciled in the United States and listed on the London Stock Exchange.
The Atlantis Bookshop is an esoteric bookshop in Museum Street, London. Established by Michael Houghton in 1922, it is currently owned and run by Bali Beskin and her mother Geraldine.
Stephen Skinner is an Australian author, editor, publisher and lecturer. He is known for authoring books on magic, feng shui, sacred geometry and alchemy. He has published more than 46 books in more than 20 languages.
James Heneage is a British writer, and literary festival entrepreneur. He was the co-founder of the Ottakar’s bookshop chain, the Chalke Valley History Festival and the Kardamyli Festival in the Greek Peloponnese.
Repeater Books is a publishing imprint based in London, founded in 2014 by Tariq Goddard and Mark Fisher, formerly the founders of radical publishers Zero Books, along with Etan Ilfeld, Tamar Shlaim, Alex Niven and Matteo Mandarini. It was launched by Watkins Media.
Collective Ink is a publishing company founded in the United Kingdom in 2001 under the name O Books. The publisher has 15 active imprints, the largest of which are Moon Books, O-Books and Zero Books. After changing ownership in 2021, in June 2023, John Hunt Publishing was renamed to Collective Ink.
The University of New South Wales Press Ltd. is an Australian academic book publishing company launched in 1962 and based in Randwick, a suburb of Sydney. The ACNC not-for-profit entity has three divisions: NewSouth Publishing, NewSouth Books, and the UNSW Bookshop, situated at the Kensington campus of the University of New South Wales, Sydney. The press is currently a member of the Association of University Presses.
Housmans is a bookshop in London, England, and is one of the longest-running radical bookshops in the United Kingdom. The shop was founded by a collective of pacifists in 1945 and has been based in Kings Cross, since 1959. Various grassroots organisations have operated from its address, including the Gay Liberation Front, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and London Greenpeace. Housmans shares its building with its sister organisation Peace News.
