Victor Benjamin Neuburg

Victor Benjamin Neuburg (May 6 1883 - 1940) was an English poet and writer of Jewish descent who also wrote on the subjects of theosophy and occultism. He was an assocate of Aleister Crowley and the publisher of Pamela Hansford Johnson and the early works of Dylan Thomas.

Neuburg was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. He took up with Crowley for a number of years, eventually suffering a breakdown that led to their separation. "The Triumph of Pan" (1910) and "Opus Lutertianum -- The Paris Working" (co-written with Crowley, 1914) date from this period. The cause of Neuberg's breakdown is not known, but according to Crowley's biographer, Lawrence Sutin, Crowley, who was antisemitic, used racial epithets to bully Neuburg: "Crowley leveled numerous brutal verbal attacks on Neuburg's family and Jewish ancestry...". [(Sutin, Lawrence. "Do What Thou Wilt", p. . 197)] .

Neuburg served in World War I, and then lived in Steyning, Sussex, where he ran a small press, the Vine Press. In 1920 he published a collection of ballads and other verse under the title "Lillygay". Many of these were actually from earlier ballad collections, though it seems Neuburg was unaware of this. Some of the poems were his own. In 1923 Peter Warlock set five of these verses to music, with the same title, "Lillygay".

He edited "Poet's Corner" in "The Sunday Referee" from April 1933 for a period, assisted by A. L. Morton.

He died from tuberculosis.

References

*"Magic of my Youth" Arthur Calder-Marshall (Hart-Davis, 1951)
*"The Magical Dilemma of Victor Neuburg" Jean Overton Fuller (W.H.Allen, 1965)