Alchemy: An Illustrated A to Z

By Diana Fernando

From Alchimistiches Medaillon to Zuccari, delve into the mysteries of alchemy -- the ancient mystical art considered to be one of the four esoteric paths to enlightenment. Closely related to... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0713726687
• ISBN13: 9780713726688
• Release Date: January 1998
• Publisher: Sterling Pub Co Inc
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 1.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 7.8" x 0.5" x 9.8"

Customer Reviews

A short illustrated dictionary of alchemy

I think the other reviewer ("a reader from NYC") of this book has written rather harshly, apparently following a browser's view in a bookshop but not a more prolonged reading. Diana Fernando admits in her introduction to possessing "a satirical edge to [her] nature", and this, together with with a British classical education and sense of humour, may have led to the other reviewer's annoyance. This is a useful supplement and introduction to other alchemical works, written in contemporary language and delightfully illustrated, with over 500 entries about alchemical processes, people, writings, concepts and history. The book has 192 pages, including 2 pages of a select bibliography, and includes over 160 illustrations.In her introduction to the book, Fernando states "my subject demands a sense of humour... Such pedantry as weighs down the saturnine allegories of alchemy, such yearnings for elixirs,such potterings with semen and dung, such anxiety for secrecy and such gibberish resultant therefrom - all these call for a touch of love, of airy levity." Diana Fernando has certainly achieved that with her book, and enlivened what might otherwise be an over-serious subject long consigned to the dustbin of scientific prehistory.