28 / CHRONICLESnRogers, George Leonard, WilliamnIrwin Thompson, and TheodorenRoszak—not to mention Shirley Mac-nLaine. Respectable causes like holisticnhealth and the human potential movementnin psychology became havens fornNew Age thinking. The affinity betweennthe new psychics and pantheismnbrought in scientific recruits like physicistnFritjof Capra of Berkeley. Consultingngroups, such as the PacificnInstitute, provided sanitized versionsnof mystical philosophy for corporationsnand government agencies includingnthose of the intelligence and defensenestablishments. Perhaps sensing yetnanother arena in which they werenbeing left in the dust, Soviet researchnteams have been focusing enormousnresources on the paranormal, unconsciouslyninviting a redefinition of thenterm “scientific socialism.”nNaive souls might have expected tonA Neglected MasternVirtually unknown in the UnitednStates, the Australian RandolphnStow is one of the most powerfulnand original novelists at work today.nWe ran across a mention of hisnwork in the catalog of his publishern(Taplinger) two years ago and havenbeen meaning to devote a majornessay to him ever since. This issue,nhowever, provides a good occasionnfor drawing the attention of ournreaders to the work of an importantnwriter who is virtually ignored bynNew York critics.nStow has led a strange life, andnmany of his books chronicle, tonsome extent, his experiences growingnup in Western Australia—anregion so distinctive that it oncenattempted to secede {The Merry-nGo-Round in the Sea)—working atna mission station for aborigines {Tonthe Islands) and as assistant to thenGovernment Anthropologist innNew Guinea {The Visitants) untilnhis health failed him. Since 1960nhe has lived in England, where henwent to recover {The Girl Green asnElder Flower). Despite the autobiographicalnelement. Stow is far fromnbeing a “realist,” much less a local-nfind the churches in the forefront innexposing this assault on the primarynprinciples of Christian faith, but thatnhas hardly been the case. The mainlinenProtestant denominations are lostnin their accustomed sleep from whichnthey awaken only to posture aboutnsanctuary or apartheid. On the othernhand, the Evangelicals have producednpopular works alerting those willing tonbe alerted of the coming tide. Britishnsociologist Os Guinness’ interpretationnof the counterculture of the 60’s, ThenDust of Death {1971), and James Sire’sntaxonomic study. The Universe NextnDoor (1976), had considerable materialnon the philosophic roots and thenpractical outworkings of the movementnin their overtiy mystical forms.nHowever, it was not until 1983 thatnthere appeared the serious exposes ofnthe New Age movement in its nowncharacteristic forms—that is, the “sec­nREVISIONSncolorist, and his best work is tingednwith mystery and the supernatural.nAll of his published work is worthnreading, but three stand out: Tourmaline.nThe Girl Green as EldernFlower, and The Suburbs of Hell. Innall three. Stow beat his head againstnthe other world (in The Girl henseems even to break through), andnwe hear the horns of Elfland blowing;nbut there is littie whimsy orncharm in these supernaturalnrealms. It is more “perilous seas innfaery lands forlorn.” In Tourmalinena sun-baked mining town, almostndeserted, witnesses the eruption of anrevival cult, which by the end willnbe corrupted into an institution.nThere was nothing false in thentown’s brush with the supernatural.nThe narrator remarks, “Wild beastsnwere loose on the world. Terrorsnwould come. But wonders, too, asnin the past. Terrors and wonders, asnalways.”nThe strangest of Stow’s books isnThe Girl Green as Elder Flower, anwork impossible to describe withoutndistortion. A colonial (South Africa,nNew Zealand, Australia) recoveringnfrom illness in Suffolk beginsnwriting down local legends (containednin a 12th-century historynnnular” forms attractive to the educatednmiddle class: Constance Cumbey’s ThenHidden Dangers of the Rainbow andnDave Hunt’s Peace, Prosperity and thenComing Holocaust. Hunt followednthat two years later with The Seductionnof Christianity, which was an exposition,nnaming names, of the ways innwhich New Age thinking had beenninfiltrating into Christian groups.nCumbey and Hunt would havenreached wider audiences if their booksnwere not tied to the apocalyptic premillennialismnthat appeals to so manynfundamentalist groups.nBy contrast, both Groothius andnNorth write in the tradition of reformednChristianity. Unmasking thenNew Age is a straightforward, generalnsurvey of the movement’s manifestationsnin American society. Groothius’nsix identifying marks of the movementnmay be redundant but serve to illus-nwritten in Latin). As a sort of therapynhe writes his own acquaintancesnand experiences into the tales. Thenresults are haunting, if bizarre.nStow’s most recent book, ThenSuburbs of Hell, disappointed someneven friendly reviewers. In mynview, it is the best thing he’s everndone. He succeeds in combining,nfor the first time, his exploration ofnthe not-quite-normal with a powerfulnnarrative line which makes thenwork accessible to even the casualnreader of thrillers. Indeed, Suburbsnis a mystery novel about a series ofnkillings in a seaside town. Like thengreat exemplar of all detective fiction,nSophocles’ Oedipus, Stow’snnovel tells us a great deal more thannwho done it.nThese few words hardly do justicento Stow’s talent (or the faith ofnhis publisher), but they shouldnserve as a warning to anyone whonthinks the novel is dead on thenstrength of what is written in thenNew York Review of Books. I havennever seen a Randolph Stow novelnin a bookstore, but Taplinger’s addressnis 132 West 22nd Street, NewnYork, NY 10011.n