Stella Benson wasn’t human: she had the soul of a snake

The feeling of being very different on the inside from those around them is very common among certain types of people. Some of them even believe that they are not really human: they are aliens who don’t belong in this world.

These ideas come from many independent sources. As I have just learned from reading her novel Living Alone (1919) and her biography by Joy Grant, the writer Stella Benson is one example. 

From an early age she felt very different from other girls; she also had a conviction that she wasn’t a real person; she wasn’t human. A future article about her may go into this in more detail.

In the meantime, there is something that is worth highlighting: she went one step further and confided to her diary that she had a ‘snake-soul’.

Stella Benson’s Living Alone: Part I

I recently re-read Stella Benson’s fantasy novel Living Alone to see what she has to say about witches. As with many other books featured on here, I first read it many years ago and just for entertainment. 

At the time, I overlooked things that now seem very significant indeed; I now see that there is enough material about witches, wizards and magic to generate more than one article.

There are also some autobiographical elements in the book; they will be included in an article about Stella Benson herself.

Part I starts with an overview of Living Alone and continues with some material from the book about magic and its practitioners.

About Living Alone

Living Alone consists of just ten chapters, so it is sometimes called a novella.

Living Alone has been described as a comedy, but it mentions desolation and has a horrible ending.

It is a very strange and unusual book, yet there are some familiar elements:

There are whimsical descriptions in Living Alone that make me think of J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan.

The witches and their broomsticks in the book remind me of Terry Pratchett's witches.

There are a few scenes that remind me of the use of magic in Diana Wynne Jones’s Charmed Life.

London has a magic of its own. There are many references to locations in London, places that I know well and enjoy reading about. Stella Benson was writing from experience: she too knew London well.

Anyone who wants to read Living Alone will find it on Project Gutenberg.

Lucy M. Boston, her birthday and her memoirs

The English novelist Lucy M. Boston, who is often known as L. M. Boston, was born on December 10th 1892. She was over 60 when her first book was published, and she lived to the age of 97.

She is of interest to me mainly because of her book An Enemy at Green Knowe. The enemy in the title is the scholar, black magician and demon-possessed witch Dr. Melanie Powers, who has been mentioned in passing in a few articles. This is the only book in which Lucy M. Boston writes at length about the battle between good and evil.

There is little in Lucy M. Boston’s life to explain where Melanie Powers and her very familiar characteristics and behaviour came from; unlike Nicholas Stuart Gray’s and Diana Wynne Jones’s witches, she was not based on the author’s mother: Lucy M. Boston’s mother was unhappy and neglectful, but not cruel and evil.

However, the magical house Green Knowe, whose name appears in the titles of her series of children’s fantasy books, is taken directly from Manor House, which was built by the Normans around the year 1130 and was her home for almost 50 years.

Manor House is still in the Boston family and is now open to the public. Maybe I will go to see it some time.

A multi-level approach to finding explanations

When I am trying to understand certain phenomena and occurrences, my method is to start by considering the most obvious explanations. There is no need to assume occult influences or go into full conspiracy theory mode unless and until it is absolutely necessary!

If all the top-level possibilities I can think of are not relevant, if they are inadequate and insufficient to explain everything, if they are the symptoms as opposed to the cause, then I will move down a level to more subtle possibilities.

If these too do not provide a full and satisfactory explanation, I will go lower still.

For example, if someone acts unprofessionally and out of character and causes a lot of damage to the company they work for, I would first check for such personal factors as illness, money worries, family problems or a drink problem. I would then look at the employer and the job and to see whether they were tired from working very long hours, were living in fear of redundancy or had been promoted beyond their capabilities.

Upton Sinclair and the difficulty in getting through to people

The starting point for this article is the well-known proposition from the American novelist Upton Sinclair:

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"

While true up to a point, this seems both incomplete and partly off the mark.

In some cases there is a lot more than a salary at stake, and it may be less a matter of a man’s not understanding something than of his understanding it only too well but refusing to accept it or admit that he knows it.

If someone did accept or admit that they know and understand an inconvenient truth, they might be expected or forced to do something about it. This might entail taking a stand; it might mean the loss of their existing role and plan of action; it might mean the loss of acceptance, credibility, any chance of promotion and even their professional reputation.

Ignorance really is bliss in many cases.

Joyce Collin-Smith and the Maharishi Yogi

Author, journalist and seeker after esoteric knowledge Joyce Collin-Smith spent six years as secretary and general assistant to the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the Indian guru who developed and promoted the Transcendental Meditation (TM) technique.

She served as his driver, cooked his food, washed his silk clothes, tucked him into his bedclothes, made his phone calls, booked hotel rooms, prepared leaflets and posters, took dictation for his books and performed many other exhausting tasks and duties, all in the name of assisting him to realise his inordinate and unrealistic ambitions.

She came to know him very well, and saw at close quarters how he operated and what effect this had on his followers.

Much of her book Call No Man Master is about the time she spent in the Maharishi’s company. Her account of her involvement is disillusioning and sometimes chilling. Casualties and broken people abound. Some damage was spiritual and emotional, but people’s ability to earn a living was also greatly impaired.

Anyone who is interested in cults and cult leaders will find it educational; anyone who is interested in unseen influences will find it fascinating. It contains many elements that have been featured in other articles.

Cult leaders and Call No Man Master

Author and journalist Joyce Collin-Smith’s autobiographical book Call No Man Master is a good source of information about some specific cult leaders.

It may be seen as rather superficial and subjective, but it is still useful for both educating people and confirming what they already suspect or know.

Although her main interests and involvements were in the areas of consciousness raising practices, spiritual development movements, esoteric sects and Eastern religions, much of what she has to say can be applied to cults and cult leaders of any kind.

I am particularly interested in Joyce Collin-Smith’s account of her dealings with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the Transcendental Meditation man who was spiritual guru to the Beatles. I can see some very familiar syndromes and connections in this case.

Before we get to the Maharishi, here are some commentaries and ideas inspired by other material of interest in this book:

Call No Man Master

Joyce Collin-Smith chose this title after having spent much of her very long life investigating groups and cults and in the company of various messiahs, spiritual teachers and gurus.

She became disillusioned with most of them, and with good reason. 

Many were found to be hypocritical, self-indulgent and a danger to their followers.