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{{Short description|Italian radical-right philosopher and esotericist (1898–1974)}}
'''Julius Evola''', aka ''Giulio Evola'' or ''Baron Giulio'' (], ]-], ]), was a controversial ] ], who wrote prolifically on matters political, philosophical, historical, and religious from a ] point of view.
{{Infobox philosopher
| honorific_prefix =
| name = Julius Evola
| image = Evola.jpg
| image_size =
| caption = Evola in the early 1940s
| birth_name = Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola
| birth_date = {{birth date|df=y|1898|5|19}}
| birth_place = ], ]
| death_date = {{death date and age|df=y|1974|6|11|1898|5|19}}
| death_place = Rome, ]
|era = ]
|region = {{plainlist}}
* ]
* ]
{{endplainlist}}
| school_tradition = ]<br />] <br /> ]
| main_interests = {{plainlist}}
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]ogy
* ]
{{endplainlist}}
| notable_ideas = {{cslist |] |]}}
|module =
{{Infobox military person
|embed = yes
|embed_title = Military service
|allegiance = {{flag|Kingdom of Italy}}
|branch = {{flagicon image|Coat of arms of the Esercito Italiano.svg}} ]
|serviceyears = 1917–1918
|rank = Artillery officer
|battles = ]
}}
}}
'''Giulio Cesare Andrea''' "'''Julius'''" '''Evola''' ({{IPA|it|ˈɛːvola|lang}};<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |article=Evola cogn. |publisher=]|language=it |encyclopedia=Dizionario d'Ortografia e di Pronunzia (DOP) |url=http://www.dizionario.rai.it/poplemma.aspx?lid=61429&r=90351 |access-date=23 October 2018|title=Dizionario d'ortografia e di pronunzia|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714131056/http://www.dizionario.rai.it/poplemma.aspx?lid=61429&r=90351|archivedate=14 July 2014}}</ref> 19 May 1898 – 11 June 1974) was an ] ] philosopher. Evola regarded his values as ], ], ], and ]. An eccentric thinker in ],{{Sfnm|Ferraresi|1987|1p=84|Payne|1996|2p=113|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|3p=53}} he also had ties to ];{{Sfn|Drake|2004|p=223–224}} in the ], he was an ideological mentor of the Italian ] and militant Right.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}}


Evola was born in ]. He served as an artillery officer in the ].{{sfn|Sedgwick|2023|p=15}} He became a ] artist but gave up painting in his twenties. He said he considered suicide until he had a revelation while reading a ].{{sfn|Waterfield|1990|p=13}} In the 1920s he delved into the ]; he wrote on ] and of ], developing his doctrine of "]". His writings blend various ideas of ], ], ] and the interwar ].{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|pp=44–45}} Evola believed that mankind is living in the '']'', a ] of unleashed materialistic appetites. To counter this and call in a ], Evola presented a "world of Tradition". Tradition for Evola was not Christian—he did not believe in God—but rather an eternal supernatural knowledge with values of authority, hierarchy, order, discipline and obedience.{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=44-51}}{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=8–9}}
Born Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola in ] to a noble ] family. He fought in ] as an ] officer. Attracted to the ], Evola became a ] painter and poet & was briefly a member of ]'s ] movement but he renounced art and delved deep into ] and ] studies.


Evola advocated for ],{{Sfn|Staudenmaier|2022}} and eventually became Italy's leading "racial philosopher".{{sfn|Payne|1996|p=113}} Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the '']'', or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the ].{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=315f}}<ref>], 'Preface to the American Edition', in Julius Evola, ], {{isbn|978-1-620-55858-4}} 2018 pp-1-104, p.5. This is deduced by remarks by Evola suggesting he was an active agent for the Sicherheitsdienst, remarks that ], his French translator, believes refer to the fact that the Sicherheitsdienst had been set up within the SS and had a remit to cover cultural matters, before it actually assumed a later role in Nazi counterespionage.</ref> He fled to Nazi Germany in 1943 when the Italian Fascist regime fell, but returned to Rome under the puppet ] to organize a radical-right group.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}{{Sfn|Wolff|2016|pp=478–494}}{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=67}}{{Sfn|Gillette|2002|pp=177–178}} In 1945 in ], a Soviet shell fragment paralysed him from the waist down.<ref name="Guido" /> On trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "{{lang|it|superfascista}}" ({{literal translation|superfascist}}). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=491}}
It is hard to speak definitively about his politics. Some claim that his exaltation of a ] may have influenced ] and/or ] in a roundabout way. Others point out that he rejected ] philosophically and in general terms. Evola sought to influence Fascism in the direction of archaic ethnic ]; away from the ] ], the ], and the masses.


Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's ] after ],{{sfn|Payne|1996}} and his philosophy has been characterized as one of the most consistently "], ], ], and ] systems in the twentieth century".{{sfn|Atkins|2004|page=89}} Writings by Evola contain ],{{Sfn|Coogan|1999|p=359}} ],{{Sfn|Gillette|2002}} ],{{Sfn|Staudenmaier|2022}} and attacks on ] and the ].{{sfnm|Furlong|2011|1pp=5, 42|Drake|1988|2p=406}} He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and ].{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=330}}<ref name="auto1">{{cite book |last=Goodrick-Clarke |first=Nicholas |title=Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism, and the Politics of Identity |publisher=] |year=2003 |isbn=978-0-8147-3155-0 |pages=52–71 |author-link=Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last1=Romm|first1=Jake|title=Meet the Philosopher Who's a Favorite of Steve Bannon and Mussolini|url=http://forward.com/culture/362872/meet-the-philosopher-whos-a-favorite-of-steve-bannon-and-mussolini/|access-date=23 August 2017|work=The Forward}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Horowitz |first=Jason |title=Thinker loved by fascists like Mussolini is on Stephen Bannon's reading list |url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2017/02/11/thinker-loved-fascists-like-mussolini-stephen-bannon-reading-list/N9apaC5W69YdyjwnhRHGWL/story.html |access-date=23 August 2017 |work=BostonGlobe.com |agency=New York Times |date=11 February 2017}}</ref>
Evola believed in a race of ] "]" people from the ] who had a crucial hand in the founding of ].


== Early life ==
Evola was influenced by ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and ].
], 1917]]
Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola was born in ] on 19 May 1898. His family were devout Roman Catholic aristocrats; he is sometimes described as a ].{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=41}}{{sfn|Skorupski|2005|p=11}}{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=2}} Evola considered details about his early life irrelevant, and is noted for hiding some details of his personal life.<ref name=":4">{{Cite book |last=Rose |first=Matthew |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1255236096 |title=A World after Liberalism: Philosophers of the Radical Right |date=2021 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-26308-4 |location=New Haven |pages=41–42 |oclc=1255236096}}</ref>{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=2}} He adopted the name Julius as a connection to ancient Rome.<ref name=":4" />{{When|date=October 2022}}
]Evola rebelled against his Catholic upbringing.<ref name="auto1" /> He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he did not want to be associated with "] academic recognition" and titles such as "doctor and engineer".{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=3}}{{sfn|Evola|1974|p=13}} In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including ] and ]. He was introduced to philosophers such as ] and ].{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=4}} Other early philosophical influences included Italian ] ] and German ] thinker ].{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=32}}


]
Toward the end of ], Evola was working for the ] researching the ] archive in ]. He became ] from the waist down (and remained so throughout his life) after trying to defend ] at the barricades from the encroaching ] in ] (March/April). According to ] he was shot in the "third ]".


He was attracted to the ], and briefly associated with ]'s ] movement during his time at university. He broke with Marinetti in 1916 as Evola disagreed with his extreme nationalism and advocacy of industry.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=2}}{{sfn|Gregor|2006}} In the ], Evola served as an ] officer on the ] plateau.{{sfn|Sedgwick|2023|p=15}} Despite reservations that Italy was fighting on the wrong side (against ], which Evola admired for its discipline and hierarchy),{{Sfn|Wolff|2014|pp=258–273}} Evola volunteered in 1917 and briefly saw frontline service the following year.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=3-4}}{{sfn|Evola|1974|p=10}} Evola returned to civilian life after the war and became a painter in Italy's ]ist movement; he described his paintings as "inner landscapes".{{sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=3-4}}<ref name=":4" /> He wrote his poetry in French and recited it in ] accompanied by classical music.<ref name=":4" /> Through his painting and poetry, and work on the short-lived journal ''Revue Bleue'', he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. (In his autobiography, Evola described his Dadaism as an attack on ] cultural values.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=63}}) In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialised and stiffened by academic conventions, he gave up painting and renounced poetry.{{sfnm|Furlong|2011|1p=3|Evola|1974|2p=11|Drake|1986|3p=63}} Evola was a keen ], describing it as a source of revelatory spiritual experience.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=3}}
In ] Evola was arrested briefly on charges of attempting to ].


Evola purportedly went through a "spiritual crisis" through the intolerance of civilian life and his need to "transcend the emptiness" of normal human activity. He experimented with ]s and magic, which, he wrote, almost brought him to madness.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=3}} In 1922, at 23 years old, he considered suicide, he wrote in ''The Cinnabar Path''. He said he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early ] text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=3–4}}{{sfn|Waterfield|1990|p=13}}<ref name=":4" />
Evola died on ], ] in Rome; his ashes were deposited in hole cut in a glacier on ].
Evola has come to have a growing influence in both the occult and political realms. In the later, he has specifically influenced ], ], the ], ], and the ]. ] referred to him as "our ] - only better"


Evola would later publish the text ''The Doctrine of Awakening'', which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism.{{sfn|Skorupski|2005|p=13}} By this time his interests led him into ], ], and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, ], ], and ], particularly ] ].{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=15}} Historian Richard H. Drake wrote that Evola's alienation from contemporary values resembled that of other ] intellectuals who came of age in World War I, but took an uncompromising, eccentric and reactionary form.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=64}}
==Books==

===Early===
== Philosophy ==
*''Arte Astratta'' (an work on abstract art)
{{Fascism sidebar|intellectuals}}
*''Teoria Dell'Individuo Assoluto'' (a ] work borne out of a mental and spiritual breakdown)

*''Imperialismo pagano'' (a polemical work urging the ] regime to conduct an ], ] revolution, 1928)
Evola's writings blended ideas from ], ], ], and especially the interwar ], "with which Evola had a deep personal involvement".{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|pp=44–45}} He viewed himself as part of an aristocratic ] that had been dominant in an ancient Golden Age, as opposed to the contemporary Dark Age (the '']''). In his writing, Evola addressed others in that caste whom he called ''l'uomo differenziato''—"the man who has become different"—who through heredity and initiation were able to transcend the ages.{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=9–11}} Evola considered human history to be, in general, ];{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|pp=44–45}} he viewed modernity as the temporary success of the forces of disorder over tradition.{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=8–9}} Tradition, in Evola's definition, was an eternal supernatural knowledge, with absolute values of authority, hierarchy, order, discipline and obedience.{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=8–9}} Matthew Rose wrote that "Evola claimed to show how basic human activities—from eating and sex, commerce and games, to war and social intercourse—were elevated by Tradition into something ritualistic, becoming activities whose very repetitiveness offered a glimpse of an unchanging eternal realm".{{Sfn|Rose|2021|pp=47–48}} Ensuring Tradition's triumph of order over chaos, in Evola's view, required an obedience to aristocracy.{{Sfn|Rose|2021|pp=47–48}} Rose wrote that Evola "aspired to be the most right-wing thinker possible in the modern world".{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=41}}
===Significant===

*''La Tradidizione Ermetica'', (]) ('']'' trans. ] ISBN 0892814519)
Evola philosophical work started in the 1920s with ''The Theory of the Absolute Individual'' and ''Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual. Teoria dell'individuo assoluto'' (''Theory of The Absolute Individual'') and ''Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto'' (''Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual)'' originally constituted a single work which only for editorial reasons ended up being divided into two separate volumes, published a few years apart from each other, one in 1927 and the other in 1930, published in Turin at the publisher called ''Bocca.''{{sfn|Ferraresi|1987}} This work was different and even attack on the dominant Hegelian thought in Italy, prevailed by the works of ]. Interesting, however, ] helped Evola find a publisher for his ''Theory and Phenomenology of Absolute Individual,'' this work which started in 1924 but were only published in final form in 1927 and 1930, though it is not certain to which extent Croce helped Evola.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2023-11-23 |title=Beyond the Cosmic Ladder |url=https://www.paulbrunton.org/about-paul-brunton/beyond-the-cosmic-ladder/ |access-date=2024-10-09 |website=Paul Brunton Philosophic Foundation |language=en-US}}</ref>
*''Rivolta Contro il Mondo Moderno'', (]) ('']'' trans. ], ISBN 089281506X)

*''The Mystery of the Grail, Initiation and Magic in the Quest for the Spirit'' ISBN 0892815736
Evola wrote prodigiously on ], ], ], the myth of the ] and ].{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=13}} German Egyptologist and scholar of esotericism Florian Ebeling noted that Evola's ''The Hermetic Tradition'' is viewed as an "extremely important work" on Hermeticism for esotericists.{{sfn|Ebeling|2007|p=138}} Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text ''Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi'', which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"{{snd}}the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church.{{sfn|Forshaw|2016|p=351}} Though Evola rejected ]'s interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's ''The Hermetic Tradition'' as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy".{{sfn|Forshaw|2016|p=354}} In ''Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition'', the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favoured Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's.{{sfn|Magee|2008|p=200}} In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."{{sfn|Coogan|1999|pages=296–297}}
*''Sintesi di Dottrina Della Razza'', (])

*''Yoga della potenza'' ('']: ], Shakti, and the Secret Way'' trans. ] ISBN 0892813687)
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance out his earlier work on the Hindu ''tantras''.<ref name="forum"/> Evola's interest in ] was spurred on by correspondence with ].{{sfn|Lachman|2012|p=215}} Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality.{{sfn|Taylor|2012|p=135}} In ''Tantric Buddhism in East Asia'', Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in ''The Yoga of Power'' gave insight into his mentality.<ref>Richard K. Payne. ''Tantric Buddhism in East Asia''. Simon and Schuster, 2006. p. 229</ref> Evola often relied on European sources about Asian creeds while evoking them for racist ends, Peter Staudenmaier wrote.{{Sfn|Staudenmaier|2022}} Rose described Evola as an "unreliable scholar of Eastern religions."{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=41}}
*''La dottrina del risveglio'' (]) ('']'' trans. ] ISBN 0892815531)

*''Meditations on the Peaks: The Metaphysics of Mountain Climbing'' ISBN 0892816570
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the ] use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the left-hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.<ref name=occult/>{{rp|217}}
*''Gli Uomini e le Rovine'' ('']'' trans. ], ISBN 0892819057)

*''Orientamenti''
According to ], Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in ''Meditations on the Peaks'': "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body."{{sfn|Gregor|2006|pp=101–102}} Evola attempted to construct, Ferraresi wrote, "a model of man striving to reach the 'absolute' within his inner self".{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|pp=44–45}} For Evola, Furlong wrote, transcendence "rested on the freeing of one's spiritual self through the purity of physical and mental discipline."{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|p=6}} Evola wrote that the tension between a detached "impulse toward transcendence" and an engaged "warrior spirit" defined his life and work.{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|p=7}}
*''Metafisica del Sesso'' ('']'' trans. ] ISBN 0892813156)

*''Cavalcare la Tigre'' ('']'' trans. ] ISBN 0892811250)
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous ] spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal."{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|p=71}} Stephen Atkins summarized Evola's philosophy as "a complete rejection of modern society and its mores".{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}} Evola loathed ], because, as Rose wrote, "Everything he revered—social castes, natural inequalities, and sacred privileges—was targeted by liberalism for reform or abolition."{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=51}} Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola invoked ] tradition to advance "a radical doctrine of anti-egalitarianism, anti-democracy, anti-liberalism and anti-Semitism".{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|p=53}} Rose described Evola as "one of the strangest intellectual figures of his century".{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=41}}
*''Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries'' ISBN 1558182284
=== Magical idealism ===
*''RENE GUENON: A Teacher for Modern Times'' ISBN 1558182292
{{Esotericism}}
*''Zen: The Religion of the Samurai'' ISBN 1558183299
] wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action."{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}} Accordingly, Evola developed his doctrine of "]", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency."{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}}{{Sfn|Gillette|2002|p=155}} For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=31}} In his 1925 work ''Essays on Magical Idealism'', Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}}
*''TAOISM: The Magic, the Mysticism'' ISBN 1558182276

According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being.{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}} Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as ], ], and ] that was exaggerated by Evola.{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}} Evola would later write: "The truths that allow us to understand the world of Tradition are not those that can be "learned" or "discussed." They either are or are not. We can only ''remember'' them, and that happens when we are freed from the obstacles represented by various human constructions (chief among these are the results and methods of the authorized "researchers") and have awakened the capacity to ''see'' from the nonhuman viewpoint, which is the same as the Traditional viewpoint ... Traditional truths have always been held to be essentially ''non-human''."{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}}

Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being."{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}} He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle.{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}} He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."{{sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=45–73}}

===Ur Group===
Among Evola's chief contacts was ], a critic of Christianity and democracy and advocate for the ]. Reghini welcomed the rise of ] and sought to return to pre-Christian spirituality through the promotion of a "cultured magic".{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=5}}{{Sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|pp=55–56}} Through Reghini, Evola was introduced to the French ] ], a leading figure of traditionalism at the time who shared an interest in the occult.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=5}}{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=64}}<ref name=":4" /> Guénon's 1927 text ''Crisis of the Modern World'' inspired Evola to organise his thoughts around the critique of modernity,{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=64}} and Guénon, whom Evola called his "master",{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=45}} would be one of the few writers Evola found worthy to debate with.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=5-6}} In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the '']'' ("Ur Group").{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=87}} The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts.{{sfn|Drury|2004|p=96}} They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ], and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.{{sfn|LewisMelton|1992|p=276}}{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=77}}

Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in ''Introduction to Magic''.{{sfn|Gregor|2006|p=89}}{{sfn|Lachman|2012|p=215}} Reghini's support of ] would however prove contentious for Evola; accordingly, Reghini broke himself from Evola and left the Ur Group in 1928.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=5}} Reghini accused him of plagiarising his thoughts in the book ''Pagan Imperialism'';{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} Evola, in turn, blamed him for its premature publication.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=88}} Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to Guénon's ''Crisis of the Modern World'',{{sfn|Versluis|2007|pp=144–145}} though he diverged from Guénon by valuing action over contemplation,{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=49}}{{Sfn|Sedgwick|2009|pp=100–101}} and the empire over the church.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=43}}

===Sex and gender roles===
Evola held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=121}} He quoted ]'s statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey."{{Sfn|Drake|2021}} Coogan wrote, "It goes almost without saying that Evola's views on women were saturated with misogyny."{{Sfn|Coogan|1999|p=359}} Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=121}}{{Clarify|date=October 2022}} Evola believed that ] was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman".<ref>Franco Ferraresi. ''Threats to Democracy: The Radical Right in Italy after the War''. Princeton University Press, 2012. p. 220.</ref> A woman, Evola wrote, "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man."{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=359}} He held, as a feature of his idealised gender relations, the archaic Hindu ] (suicide), which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions.<ref>R. Ben-Ghiat, M. Fuller. ''Italian Colonialism''. Springer, 2016. p. 149</ref><ref name="Merelli" /> For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord."<ref name="Merelli">{{Cite web |last=Merelli |first=Annalisa |date=2017-02-22 |title=Steve Bannon's interest in a thinker who inspired fascism exposes the misogyny of the alt-right |url=https://qz.com/909323/bannons-interest-for-julius-evola-unveils-the-sexism-at-the-core-of-trump/ |access-date=2022-10-17 |website=Quartz |language=en}}</ref> Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}{{page needed|date=August 2019}}

Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.{{sfn|MeltonBaumann|2010|p=1085}} He was influenced by ], a proponent of the '']'' ('alliance of men') concept as a model for his "warrior-band" or "warrior-society".{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}{{page needed|date=August 2019}} Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of ]'s book '']'' on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrick-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War."{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|p=60}} Evola denounced ] as "useless" for his purposes.{{Citation needed|reason=This claim needs a reliable source.|date=November 2022}} He did not neglect ], so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of ]."{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=358}} Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ] way, the possibilities of sex."{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=358}}

Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality.<ref name=":0">{{cite book|author=Franco Ferraresi|title=Threats to Democracy: The Radical Right in Italy after the War|publisher=]|year=2012|isbn=978-1-4008-2211-9|page=44}}</ref> He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility",<ref name=Merelli/> and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards".<ref name=occult/>{{page needed|date=August 2019}} He believed that in ] and ], in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West.<ref name=occult>{{cite book|editor1-last=Lycourinos|editor1-first=Damon Zacharias|title=Occult traditions|date=2012|publisher=Numen Books|isbn=9780987158130}}</ref>{{page needed|date=August 2019}} Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins",{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=358}} and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising",{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=359}} so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate".{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=359}}

Evola translated Weininger's ''Sex and Character'' into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text ''Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex'' (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length.{{sfnm|Coogan|1999|1p=343|Furlong|2011|2p=123}} ] described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from '']'' (1934).{{sfn|Versluis|2007|pp=144–145}} This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Conner |first1=Randy P. |last2=Sparks |first2=David Hatfield |last3=Sparks |first3=Mariya |date=1997 |title=Cassell's Encyclopedia of Queer Myth, Symbol, and Spirit: Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Lore |publisher=Cassell |page=136}}</ref>

===Race===
Evola's views on ] had roots in his aristocratic elitism. According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed what he called "the law of the regression of castes" in '']'' and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves".{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=40}} Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=40}} Evola used "a man of race" to mean "a man of breeding".<ref name="auto1" />{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=46}} "Only of an elite may one say that 'it is of a race': the people are only people, mass," Evola wrote in 1969.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=46}}

In ''Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race'' (1941) (Italian: ''Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza''), Evola provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and ], introducing the concept of "spiritual racism",<ref name="Rota2008">{{cite book|author=Rota|title=Intellettuali, dittatura, razzismo di stato|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IGwiln0yQC4C&pg=PA57|year=2008|publisher=FrancoAngeli|isbn=978-88-568-2094-2|pages=57–}}</ref> and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".<ref name=cassata>{{cite book|last=Cassata|first=Francisco|title=Building the New Man: Eugenics, Racial Science and Genetics in Twentieth-century Italy|translator=Erin O’Loughlin|publisher=Central European University Press|year=2011|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2rZKPeD6CyAC&q=%22Sintesi+di+Dottrina+della+Razza%22&pg=PA264|isbn=9789639776838}}</ref>{{page needed|date=June 2023}} The book was endorsed by ].{{Sfn|Sheehan|1981|p=50}}{{sfn|De Turris|2020|p=41}}

Prior to the end of the Second World War, Evola frequently used the term "Aryan" to refer to the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=21}} Feinstein writes that this interpretation made the term "Aryan" more plausible in an Italian context and thereby furthered antisemitism in Fascist Italy.{{Sfn|Feinstein|2003|p=286}} Evola's interpretation was adopted by Mussolini, who declared in 1938 that "Italy's civilization is Aryan".{{Sfn|Feinstein|2003|p=301–302}} Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights or the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=480}}{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}

Evola wrote of "inferior, non-European races".{{Sfn|Coogan|1999|p=314}} He believed that military aggressions such as ] were justified by Italy's dominance, outweighing concerns he had about the possibility of ].{{Sfn|Drake|1986|pp=70-71}} Richard H. Drake wrote, "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote:{{When|date=September 2022}} "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West."<ref name=":1">Peter H. Merkl. ''Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations''. University of California Press, 1986. p. 67, 85</ref> Furlong wrote that a 1957 article by Evola about America "leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people".{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=}}

=== "Spiritual racism" ===
{{main|Aryanism}}
Evola's ] included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."<ref name="auto1" /> For his spiritual interpretation of different racial psychologies, Evola was influenced by the German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Gillette |first=Aaron |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/52996792 |title=Racial Theories in Fascist Italy |date=2002 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=0-203-16489-X |location=London |oclc=52996792}}</ref>{{page needed|date=June 2023}} Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of ].<ref name=":0"/>{{Verification needed|date=October 2022}} Peter Staudenmaier notes that many other racists of the time found Evola's "spiritual racism" perplexing.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Staudenmaier |first=Peter |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1266843104 |title=Religion, ethnonationalism, and antisemitism in the era of the two world wars |date=2022 |publisher=McGill-Queen's University Press |others=Kevin P. Spicer, Rebecca Carter-Chand |isbn=978-0-2280-1020-3 |location=Montreal |chapter=Julius Evola and the "Jewish Problem" in Axis Europe: Race, Religion, and Antisemitism |oclc=1266843104}}</ref>

Like ], Evola believed that mankind is living in the ] of ]—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and ] represented hope that the "celestial" ] would be reconstituted.{{sfn|Gregor|2005}}{{page needed|date=August 2019}} He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the ]ns, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Aryan men. He felt that Aryan men had devolved from these higher mythological races.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=150}} Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"{{sfn|Gregor|2006|p=106}}

Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific: "The factor of 'blood' or 'race' has its importance, because it is not psychologically—in the brain or the opinions of the individual—but in the very deepest forces of life that traditions live and act as typical formative energies. Blood registers the effects of this action, and indeed offers through heredity, a matter that is already refined and pre-formed ..."{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=119}}

=== Antisemitism ===
Writings by Evola in the late 1930s contributed arguments for Fascist Italy's repression of its Jews.{{sfn|Feinstein|2003|pp=286–287}} Evola encouraged and applauded Mussolini's antisemitic ] in 1938, and called for a "supreme Aryan elite" to oppose the Jews.{{Sfn|Staudenmaier|2022}} In some writings, Evola called Jews a virus. He said Fascism and Nazism's final victory over Jews would end "the spiritual decadence of the West" and thereby "re-establish genuine contact between man and a transcendent, supersensible reality".{{Sfn|Staudenmaier|2022}}

Evola wrote the foreword and an essay in the second Italian edition of the infamous ] '']'' published in 1938 by the Catholic fascist ].{{sfn|Junginger|2008|p=136}} In it, Evola argued that the ''Protocols''—whether or not a forgery—"contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values."{{sfn|Junginger|2008|p=136}} He was an admirer of ], the antisemitic leader of the fascist Romanian ].{{Sfn|Weitzman|2021}} After Codreanu was assassinated in 1938 on orders from ],{{Sfn|Weitzman|2021}} Evola railed against "the Judaic horde" that he accused of planning "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny."<ref>Julius Evola, "''La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro"'' in La vita italiana 309 (December 1938), quoted in {{harvp|Ferraresi|1987|pp=129–30)}}</ref><ref name="auto1" />

Evola's antisemitism did not emphasise the Nazi conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race", but rather as "the carriers of a world view, a way of being and thinking—simply put, a spirit—that corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism", Wolff writes.{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=483}}<ref name="auto1" />{{Sfn|Drake|1986|pp=69–71}} According to Wolff, "Evola's 'totalitarian' or 'spiritual' racism was no milder than Nazi biological racism", and Evola was trying to promote an "Italian version of racism and antisemitism, one that could be integrated into the Fascist project to create a New Man".{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=483–484}} Evola dismissed the biological racism of chief Nazi theorist ] and others as reductionist and materialistic.<ref name="auto1" /> He also argued that one could be "Aryan" but have a "Jewish" soul, and could be "Jewish" but have an "Aryan" soul.{{sfn|Lachman|2012|p=217}} In Evola's view, ] and ] were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.{{sfn|Gregor|2006|p=105}} In 1970, Evola described ]'s antisemitism as a paranoid ] that damaged the reputation of the ].<ref name="auto1" /> But Evola never clearly acknowledged the ] committed by the regimes he associated with, perpetrated in the name of racism—Furlong called this a "fatal lapse that by itself ought to be enough to destroy his authority".{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|p=115}}

== Written works ==
Evola wrote more than 36 books and 1,100 articles.{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|p=20}} In some of his 1930s writings, and in works about magic, Evola used pseudonyms, including Ea (]), Carlo d'Altavilla, and Arthos (from ] legend).{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=1–2}}

=== Christianity ===
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled ''Pagan Imperialism'', which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and ]. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticised by both ]'s fascist regime and the Vatican itself.{{source needed|date=May 2023}} ] argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism".{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=42}}{{sfn|Gregor|2006|pp=89–91}} Richard Drake wrote that Evola "rarely missed an opportunity to attack the Catholic Church".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Drake |first=Richard |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1221015144 |title=The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy |date=2021 |isbn=978-0-253-05714-3 |edition=Second |publisher=Indiana University Press |location=Bloomington, Indiana |oclc=1221015144}}</ref> On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal ''Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes'' published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of ].{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=293}}{{sfn|Waterfield|1990|p=14}}{{sfn|Tarannes|1928|pp=124–129}}

In his ''The Mystery of the Grail'' (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the ] and wrote that it "symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation."{{sfn|Sedgwick|2009|pp=}} He held that the ], who had fought the ] for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the ] represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste.{{sfn|Sedgwick|2009|p=105}} In the epilogue to the book, Evola argued that the fictitious '']'', regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity.{{sfn|Barber|2004|pp=305-306}}<ref>{{cite book|author-last=Evola |author-first=Julius |title=Mystery of the Grail |date=November 1996 |publisher=Inner Traditions |translator-first=H. T. |translator-last=Hansen |pages=172–173 |isbn=0892815736}}</ref> The historian ] said, "Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature."{{sfn|Barber|2004|p=306}}

Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola "regarded the advent of Christianity as an era of unprecedented decline", because Christianity's egalitarianism and accessibility undermined the Roman ideals of "duty, honor and command" that Evola believed in.{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|p=61}}

=== Buddhism ===
In his '']'' (1943), Evola argued that the ] could be held to represent true ].{{sfn|Skorupski|2005|p=9}} His interpretation of Buddhism is intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste.<ref name="forum">T. Skorupski. ''''. Routledge, 2005, pp. 11–20</ref> ] described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence,<ref>Harry Oldmeadow. ''Journeys East: 20th Century Western Encounters with Eastern Religious Traditions''. World Wisdom, Inc, 2004. p. 369.</ref> but Evola criticised Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher.<ref name="forum"/> Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-World War II scholarship of the Orientalist ], who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate.{{sfn|Lopez|1995|p=177}} ] stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writings on Hermeticism.{{sfn|Versluis|2007|pp=144–145}} ] was inspired to become a ] from reading Evola's text ''The Doctrine of Awakening'' in 1945 while hospitalised in ].<ref name="forum"/>

=== Modernity ===
Evola's '']'' (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient ] which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealised traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East.{{source needed|date=May 2022}} Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=42}} He asserted that history's intellectuals starting as early as ancient Greece had undermined traditional values through their questioning.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|pp=64–65}} He insisted that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it."{{sfn|Versluis|2007|pp=144–145}} The text was "immediately recognized by ] and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition."{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=480}} Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathiser associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement ].{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}<ref>{{cite journal|last=Weitzman |first=Mark |date=2020 |title="One Knows the Tree by the Fruit That It Bears:" Mircea Eliade's Influence on Current Far-Right Ideology |journal=Religions |language=en |volume=11 |issue=5 |pages=250 |doi=10.3390/rel11050250 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of ], one of the key intellectual influences on fascism.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}{{page needed|date=August 2019}} ] described ''Revolt Against the Modern World'' as "really dangerous."{{sfn|Sedgwick|2009|p=105}} Richard Drake wrote that the book was not widely influential in the 1930s but eventually received a cult following on the extreme right and is now considered Evola's most important work.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=64}}

''Ride the Tiger'' (1961), Evola's last major work, saw him examining dissolution and subversion in a world in which God was dead, and rejected the possibility of any political or collective revival of Tradition due to his belief that the modern world had fallen too far into the ] for any such thing to be possible. Instead of this and rather than advocating a return to religion as Rene Guénon had, he conceptualised what he considered an apolitical manual for surviving and ultimately transcending the Kali Yuga. This idea was summarised in the title of the book, the Tantric metaphor of "Riding the Tiger" which in general practice, consisted of turning things that were considered inhibitory to spiritual progress by mainstream ] society (for example, meat, alcohol and in very rare circumstances, sex, were all employed by Tantric practitioners) into a means of spiritual transcendence. The process that Evola described involved potentially making use of everything from modern music, hallucinogenic drugs, relationships with the opposite sex and even substituting the atmosphere of an urban existence for the Theophany that Traditionalists had identified in virgin nature.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=96, 103}}

During the 1960s Evola thought ] entities could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilisation.{{sfn|Ferraresi|1987|p=131}} E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote ''Ride the Tiger,'' choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running."{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=490}} Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|p=47}}

=== Other writings ===
Evola contributed to ]'s magazine '']'' for a time''.''{{Sfn|Wolff|2014|pp=259-260}} From 1934 to 1943 Evola was responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of ''Il Regime Fascista'', an influential radical fascist daily newspaper owned by ], the pro-Nazi mayor of ].<ref name=":3">{{cite journal |last=Wolff |first=Elisabetta Cassina |date=2014 |title=Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/271934502 |journal=European Review |language=en |volume=22 |issue=2 |pages=258–273 |doi=10.1017/S106279871400009X |issn=1062-7987 |s2cid=144821530}}</ref>{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=66–67}}{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}} Evola used the page to publish international right-wing thinkers.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=66–67}} Evola's writings on the page argued for ]; leading up to Mussolini's ], Evola praised "the sacred valor of war".{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=66}} During the same period he contributed to the antisemite ]'s magazine ''La vita italiana.''<ref>{{cite book |last=Evola |first=Julius |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VGgQAQAAIAAJ |title=I testi de La vita italiana: 1939-1943 |date=2006 |publisher=Edizioni di Ar |isbn=9788889515136 |language=it |trans-title=The texts of La vita italiana: 1939-1943}}</ref>{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=66}}

] has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal ] of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."<ref name="auto1" />{{page needed|date=October 2022}}

In the posthumously published collection of writings, ''Metaphysics of War'', Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary ], explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.<ref>Lennart Svensson. ''Ernst Jünger{{snd}}A Portrait''. Manticore Books, 2016. p. 202.</ref>

Evola translated some works of ] and ] to Italian.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Path of Cinnabar: An Intellectual Autobiography |last=Evola |first= Julius |publisher=Arktos |year=2009 |isbn=978-1907166020 |page=177 |oclc=985108552}}</ref>

== Politics ==
]
In Evola's view, a state ruled by a spiritual elite must reign with unquestionable supremacy over its populace.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|1988|p=85}} He cited two models of such an elite as the ] and ], known for their violence.{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}} Evola's philosophy, over his long career, adapted the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as ] and the political concerns of the European ] right, Furlong wrote.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=14}} Sheehan described Evola as "perhaps the most original and creative — and, intellectually, the most nonconformist, of the Italian Fascist philosophers".{{Sfn|Sheehan|1981|p=50}}

Evola had access to ] in the last years of the Fascist regime, and advised him on racial policies,{{sfn|Sedgwick|2023|p=7}} but "without much effect", Ferraresi wrote;{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}} Evola "was kept (or stayed) on the sidelines of officialty, as some sort of eccentric".{{Sfn|Ferraresi|1987|p=84}} Evola was in charge of the cultural page of the influential fascist newspaper ''Il Regime Fascista'' for the regime's last decade.''<ref name=":3" />{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}}{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=66}}'' Evola declined to join Italy's ] or any other party of the time;{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}}{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}} Ferraresi wrote that Evola's "lofty nonconformism" and "imperial paganism" did not fit well in a party that would make the Catholic Church a regime pillar.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}} Evola's lack of party membership was later emphasized by admirers to distance him from the regime.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}}

Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the '']'', the intelligence agency of the SS and the ].{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=315f}}<ref>H. T. Hansen, 'Preface to the American Edition', in Julius Evola, ], {{isbn|978-1-620-55858-4}} 2018 pp-1-104, p.5. This is deduced by remarks by Evola suggesting he was an active agent for the Sicherheitsdienst, remarks that ], his French translator, believes refer to the fact that the Sicherheitsdienst had been set up within the SS and had a remit to cover cultural matters, before it actually assumed a later role in Nazi counterespionage.</ref> With its help, he fled to ] in Nazi Germany when the Italian Fascist regime fell in 1943.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}{{Sfn|Wolff|2016|pp=478–494}} In May 1951, Evola was arrested in Italy and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Evola declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "{{lang|it|superfascista}}" ({{literal translation|superfascist}}). He was acquitted of all charges.{{sfn|Wolff|2016}}{{sfn|Sedgwick|2009|p=5}}

===Fascist Italy===
Evola experienced Mussolini's ] in 1922 and was intrigued by fascism.{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}} He would praise fascism for "its attempt to refashion the Italian people into a severe, military mold", in Ferraresi's words, but would criticize any concessions to "democratic" pressures.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=46}} Atkins wrote that "Evola was critical of the Fascist regime because it was not fascist enough."{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}}

Evola applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticised Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime.<ref name="occult" />{{page needed|date=August 2019}} Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of ''Übermensch'' culture which, in Evola's view, characterised the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe.<ref name="occult" />{{page needed|date=August 2019}}

Evola applauded the fascist motto "Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State".{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=68}} Sheehan described Evola as "an ardent supporter of Mussolini".{{Sfn|Sheehan|1981|p=50}} But his Traditionalist ethos rejected ], which he viewed as a conception of the modern West and not of a Traditional hierarchical social arrangement.<ref>], "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola" in Evola, ''Revolt Against the Modern World'', p xviii.</ref> He stated that to become "truly human", one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny".{{sfn|Gregor|2006}}{{Context inline|date=September 2022}}

Evola argued that the regime should dictate to the Catholic Church, not negotiate with it, and warned in ''Critica fascista'' in 1927 that allowing the church independent power would make fascism a "laughable revolution".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Drake |first=Richard |date=1988 |title=Julius Evola, Radical Fascism, and the Lateran Accords |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25022841 |journal=The Catholic Historical Review |volume=74 |issue=3 |pages=403–419 |issn=0008-8080 |jstor=25022841}}</ref> In 1928, he wrote that fascists had made "the most absurd of all errors" through entente with Christianity and the church.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=69}} He also opposed the ] that Italian society was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement.{{sfn|Gregor|2006|p=86}} He opined that Mussolini should have disbanded his party after 1922 and become a loyal advisor to ] instead.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=68}} Accordingly, Evola launched the journal ''La Torre'' (The Tower) in 1930, to advocate for a more elitist social order. He wrote in ''La Torre'', "We would like a fascism more radical, more intrepid, a truly absolute fascism, made of pure force, inaccessible to any compromise."<ref name=":1" /> Evola's ideas were poorly received by the contemporary fascist mainstream.{{sfn|Sedgwick|2009|p=105}} Evola wrote that Mussolini's censors had repressed ''La Torre'', which lasted five months and ten issues; in Drake's words, Italian fascism "had as little tolerance for opposition on the right as on the left".{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=66}} Regardless, a few years later in 1934, Evola was put in charge of the cultural page of the influential radical fascist newspaper ''Il Regime Fascista'', a position he held until 1943.''<ref name=":3" />''{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}}{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=66}}

Scholars disagree about why ] embraced racist ideology in 1938—some have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy.<ref>''See'' Renzo de Felice, ''Storia degli ebrei''; ]; Meir Michaelis, ''Mussolini and the Jews''; ''contra'' Aaron Gillette, ''Racial Theories in Fascist Italy'', Ch. 4.</ref>{{pages needed|date=January 2023}} Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence.<ref>''See'' Luigi Preti (1968) for discussion of ]; Gene Bernardini (1977) for discussion of German influence</ref> A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the ''uomo fascista''."{{sfn|Gillette|2014|pp=51–53}} With the passage of the ] in 1938 and Italy's campaign against Jews, Evola demanded measures to counter "the Jewish menace", through "discrimination and selection".<ref name="spicer"/> Echoing Evola's writings, Mussolini declared in 1938 that "The population of Italy today is of Aryan origin and Italy's civilization is Aryan."{{Sfn|Feinstein|2003|p=301–302}}

Mussolini read Evola's ''Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race'' in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist ] distinct from that found in ]. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal ''Sangue e Spirito'' (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola travelled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on ''Sangue e Spirito'' from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy."<ref name=":0"/> Fascists appreciated the ] value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race."<ref name=":0"/> Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.{{sfn|Payne|1996}} ] directed the ] to be guided by "Evola's racist thought".{{Sfn|Staudenmaier|2022}}

Evola blended ] with Mussolini's ] agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."{{sfn|Gillette|2014|p=54}}

===Third Reich===
]
Finding Italian fascism "too compromising" (in Goodrick-Clarke's words), Evola sought more recognition in ]. He began lecturing there in 1934.<ref name="auto1" /> He described Berlin's Herrenklub, associated with the ] aristocracy, as his "natural habitat".{{sfn|Ferraresi|1987}} His considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938 included a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938.<ref name=":0"/><ref name="auto1" /> Evola appreciated what he called Nazism's "attempt to create a kind of new political-military Order with precise qualifictions of race", and believed that the Nazis' brand of fascism had taken its traditionalist thinkers seriously.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=67}} Evola thought far more highly of ] than Mussolini,{{Sfnm|Drake|1986|1p=67|Atkins|2004|2p=89}} although he had reservations about Hitler's ''völkisch'' nationalism.{{sfn|Coogan|1999|p=315}} Evola wanted a spiritual unity between Italy and Germany and an Axis victory in Europe.{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}} (] calls Evola an "Italian Nazi philosopher" in '']''.)<ref>{{Cite book |last=Lee |first=Martin A. |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/858861623 |title=The beast reawakens |date=2013 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |isbn=978-1-135-28124-3 |edition=Revised |location=New York |pages=211, 320 |oclc=858861623}}</ref>

Evola admired ], whom he knew personally.<ref name=":0" /> Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement.<ref name="auto1" /> The Nazi ] reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts".<ref name=":0" /> Himmler's ] ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".{{sfn|Coogan|1999|page=320}}<ref>], "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola" in Evola, ''Revolt Against the Modern World'', p. xviii.</ref><ref name="Umland">] and ]. ''Erwägen Wissen Ethik'', 15: 3 & 4 (2004), pp. 424–429, 591–595; vol. 16: 4 (2005), pp. 566–572 ''''.</ref>

Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the ].{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} He subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} Evola wrote the article ''Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order'' for the Nazi-backed journal ''European Review''.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} He spent World War II working for the ].{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.<ref name="forum"/>{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}

Mussolini was ] in 1943, and Italy surrendered to the Allies.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|1988|pp=74–75}}{{Sfn|Sheehan|1981|p=50}} At this point, Evola fled to ] in Nazi Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}{{Sfn|Wolff|2016|pp=478–494}} Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by ] in September 1943.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Drake |first=Richard |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/52547630 |title=Fascism: Critical Concepts in Political Science |date=2004 |publisher=Routledge |others=Roger Griffin, Matthew Feldman |isbn=0-415-29015-5 |location=London |pages=223 |chapter=The Children of the Sun |oclc=52547630}}</ref> According to Sheehan, ] also met with Evola and other fascist intellectuals.{{Sfn|Sheehan|1981|p=51}} After the meeting with Mussolini, at Hitler's ], Evola involved himself in Mussolini's ] (the Republic of Salò, a Nazi puppet regime).{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}<ref name="auto1" />{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=67}}{{Sfn|Sheehan|1981|pp=50–51}}{{Sfn|Gillette|2002|pp=177–178}} Evola returned to Rome in 1943 to organize a radical right group called the Movimento per la Rinascita dell'Italia.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=67}} He fled to ] in 1944, barely avoiding capture by the Americans when the Allies took Rome.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=67}}{{Sfn|Sheehan|1981|p=51}}

In Vienna, Evola studied Masonic and Jewish documents confiscated by the Nazis, and worked with the SS and fascist leaders on recruiting an army to resist the ]' advances.{{Sfn|Wolff|2016|pp=478–494}}<ref name="auto1" /> It was Evola's custom to walk around the city during ]s in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such aerial bombardment in 1945, a ] fragment damaged his ] and he became ] from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.<ref name="Guido">Guido Stucco, "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, ''The Yoga of Power'', pp. ix–xv.</ref>{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=67}}

About the alliance during ] between ] and the ], Evola wrote: "The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end."{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=50|ps=; Translation from the Italian by Paul Furlong.}}

=== Postwar and later years ===
Evola, partially paralysed after the Soviet bombing raid in ] in 1945, returned to postwar Italy in 1948, after being treated for his injuries in Austria.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=1}}{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=67}}{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}}{{Sfn|Ferraresi|1988|p=84}}

Ferraresi wrote that Evola was "''the'' guru" for generations of radical right Italian militants, through his writings and youth groups.{{Sfn|Ferraresi|2012|p=44}} "The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler," Wolff writes; instead, in post-World War II conversations with neo-fascists, Evola would reference the ], the ], ]'s ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ] (particularly '']''), ] (particularly '']''), ], ], ], ], ], ], and ].<ref>Julius Evola, 'La legge contro le idee', Meridiano d'Italia, 23 September 1951, in Evola, I testi del Meridiano d'Italia, 103–4; and Julius Evola, 'Il coraggio di dirsi antidemocratici non equivale necessariamente a dichiararsi fascisti', La rivolta ideale, 17 January 1952, in Evola, I testi de La rivolta ideale, 56–8.</ref>{{Sfn|Wolff|2016|pp=478–494}} He wrote for publications of the neo-fascist ] (MSI) but never joined the party.{{Sfn|Drake|1986|pp=70-72}} Adkins wrote that the MSI "claimed him as their philosopher-king, but he barely tolerated their attention".{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}} Wolff described him as a "freelance political commentator".{{Sfn|Wolff|2014|p=258}}

Evola continued his work in the domain of esotericism, writing a number of books and articles on ] and various other esoteric studies, including ''The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way'' (1949), ''Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex'' (1958), and ''Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest'' (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books ''Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist'' (1953), ''Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul'' (1961), and his autobiography,{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} ''The Path of Cinnabar'' (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilisation and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology ''Civiltà Americana''.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Civiltà americana. Scritti sugli Stati Uniti (1930–1968)|last=Evola|first=Julius|publisher=Controcorrente|year=2010|location=Napoli}}</ref>

Evola was arrested along with thirty-six others in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the ] ] organisation ] (FAR), after attempted bombings in 1949–50 were linked to Evola's circle.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=92}}{{sfn|Wolff|2016|pp=490-491}} Evola's charges were glorifying fascism and promoting the revival of the Fascist Party.{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=491}} His lawyer was ].{{Citation needed|date=September 2022}} He was carried into the courtroom on a stretcher.{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=1–3}} Defending himself at trial, Evola said that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "{{lang|it|superfascista}}" ({{literal translation|superfascist}}). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that it is unclear whether this meant he was placing himself "above or beyond Fascism".{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=491}} The judges, who themselves had served during the fascist era, ruled that Evola could not be held responsible for the crimes. Evola was acquitted of all charges on 20 November 1951. Of the 36 other defendants, 13 received prison sentences.{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=491}}<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.rigenerazionevola.it/evola-al-processo-ai-f-a-r-premessa/ |title=Evola al processo ai F.A.R.: premessa |language=it |trans-title=Evola at the F.A.R. trial: premise |date=27 September 2016 |website=RigenerAzione Evola}}</ref>

While trying to distance himself from ], Evola wrote in 1955 that the ] were a farce.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Evola {{!}}|first=Autore: Julius|date=1 January 2000|title=Il significato delle SS. Ordini ed élites politiche|url=https://www.centrostudilaruna.it/evolass.html|access-date=6 July 2020|website=Centro Studi La Runa|language=it-IT}}</ref> Evola also made an effort to differentiate his caste based aristocratic state from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text ''Men Among the Ruins,'' as well as in his ''autodifesa''.{{sfn|Furlong|2011|p=154}} Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European ''Imperium'', which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual".{{sfn|Furlong|2011|pp=63, 65}} Evola endorsed ]'s neo-fascist manifesto ''Imperium'', but said Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} He dreamt that such a "New Order" of aristocracy might seize power from above during a democratic crisis.{{Sfn|Rose|2021|pp=54–56}}

Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war ].<ref name=":0"/> After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement{{sfn|Wolff|2016}} and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right.{{sfn|Payne|1996}} Ferraresi wrote that "Evola's thought was the 'essential mortar' that held together generations of militants".{{Sfn|Ferraresi|1987|p=105}} According to Jacob Christiansen Senholt, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are ''Orientamenti'' and ''Men Among the Ruins''.{{sfn|Senholt|2013|p=245}} In the opening phrase in the first edition of ''Men Among the Ruins'', Evola said: "Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first."{{sfn|Evola|1953|p=16}}

In ''Men Among the Ruins'', Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with a spiritual elite of divine right. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterised by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Ferraresi |first=Franco |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r0DG3uk9o8oC&pg=PA45 |title=Threats to Democracy: The Radical Right in Italy after the War |publisher=Princeton University Press |year=2012 |isbn=978-1-4008-2211-9 |pages=45 |language=en}}</ref>{{sfn|Evola|2015|p=}}

''Orientamenti'' was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modelled on the principles of the Nazis' ], which had mustered international forces.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}}{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=76}} The Italian neo-fascist group ] adopted ''Orientamenti'' as a guide for action in postwar Italy.{{sfn|Laruelle|2015|p=102}} Evola praised Ordine Nouvo as the only Italian group that had "doctrinally had held firm without descending to compromise".{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=72}} The ] of ] called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of its publication ''Frontfighter''.{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} Giuliano Salierni, who was an activist in the neo-Fascist ] during the early 1950s, later recalled Evola's calls to violence, along with Evola's reminiscences about Nazis such as ].<ref name="auto1" />{{Sfn|Drake|1986|pp=77–78}}

==Personal life==
Evola was childless and never married,{{Sfn|Drake|1986}} but as a young man he had a relationship with ].<ref>{{cite book |last= Sedgwick |first= Mark |date= 2004 |title= Against the Modern World |publisher= Oxford University Press |page= 99 |isbn=978-0195396010}}</ref> He spent his postwar years in his Rome apartment.<ref name="auto1" /> He died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.<ref name="treccani">{{cite encyclopedia |year=1993 |title=EVOLA, Giulio Cesare Andrea |encyclopedia=Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani |publisher=Treccani |url=http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giulio-cesare-andrea-evola_(Dizionario-Biografico) |access-date=23 October 2018 |volume=43 |language=it |trans-title=Biographical Dictionary of Italians |quote=Morì a Roma l'11 giugno 1974 e le ceneri, per sua volontà, furono sepolte sul Monte Rosa. |author=Luca Lo Bianco |trans-quote=He died in Rome on 11 June 1974 and the ashes, by his will, were buried on Monte Rosa.}}</ref> His ashes, per his will, were deposited in a hole cut in a glacier on ] in the ].<ref>{{cite news |author=] |date=14 June 1974 |title=Julius Evola |language=it |newspaper=] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1974/06/14/archives/julius-evola.html |access-date=5 July 2020 |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>

== Influence on the far-right ==
At one time Italian Fascist leader ], the Nazi Grail seeker ], and the Romanian fascist sympathiser and religious historian ] admired Evola.<ref name="HorowitzMussolini">{{cite news|last=Horowitz |first=Jason |date=11 February 2017 |title=Thinker loved by fascists like Mussolini is on Stephen Bannon's reading list |work=] |agency=] |url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2017/02/11/thinker-loved-fascists-like-mussolini-stephen-bannon-reading-list/N9apaC5W69YdyjwnhRHGWL/story.html |access-date=23 August 2017}}</ref>{{sfn|Wolff|2016|p=484}}{{sfn|Coogan|1999}} After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).<ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.tradicio.org/bibliographia.pdf|title= Metaphysicum et Politicum|access-date= 2018-05-24|archive-date= 2016-03-04|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160304222457/http://www.tradicio.org/bibliographia.pdf|url-status= dead}} pp.&nbsp;130–154.</ref> Franco Ferraresi described Evola in 1987 as "possibly the most important intellectual figure for the Radical Right in contemporary Europe" but "virtually unknown outside the Right".{{sfn|Ferraresi|1987}} He is described by Stanley Payne (in 1996) and Stephen Atkins (2004) as the leading neo-fascist intellectual in Europe until his death in 1974.{{Sfn|Payne|1996|p=502}}{{Sfn|Atkins|2004|p=89}} ] referred to him as "our ]&mdash;only better."<ref name="sheehanterror">Thomas Sheehan. . ''The New York Review of Books'', Volume 27, Number 21 & 22, 22 January 1981</ref> But outside Italy, France and Germany, Evola was not well known until around 1990 when he received wider English language publication, according to Furlong.{{Sfn|Furlong|2011|p=1}}

Richard Drake wrote that Evola advocated for ].{{Sfn|Drake|1986|p=79}} Peter Merkl noted that Evola's advocacy of force was part of his appeal to the radical right.<ref>{{cite book |last=Merkel |first=Peter |chapter=Prologue |title=Political Violence and Terror |date=2021 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3q_oDwAAQBAJ |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0-520-32803-7 |page=3}}</ref> Wolff wrote: "The debate around his 'moral and political' responsibility for terrorist actions perpetrated by right-wing extremist groups in Italy between 1969 and 1980 began as soon as Evola died in 1974 and have not yet come to an end."{{Sfn|Wolff|2016|pp=478–494}}

According to one leader of the neofascist organization ], "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."<ref>Quoted in {{cite journal|last=Ferraresi |first=Franco |title=The Radical Right in Postwar Italy |journal=Politics & Society |date=1988 |volume=16 |issue=1 |pages=71–119 |doi=10.1177/003232928801600103|s2cid=153805679 }}(p.84)</ref> Neofascist terrorists ] and Mario Tuti reprinted Evola's most militant texts.{{Sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|p=68}} Radicals of the ] (NAR) helped spread Evola's philosophy in far-right circles abroad after fleeing Italy in the wake of the ] in 1980; some influenced Britain's ].{{Sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2001|p=52}} ] and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Front{{'}}s "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", ''The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory''. ''The Aryan Doctrine'' called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies.<ref name="auto1" />

] mocked Evola;{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=41}} his 1995 essay "'']''" referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".<ref name="Eco">Eco, Umberto. "". ''The New York Review of Books'', Vol. 42, No. 11 (1995), accessed 12 February 2017.</ref>

The far-right English politician and orator ] gave lectures on Evola's philosophy.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://jonathanbowden.org/speeches/julius-evola/|title= Julius Evola: The Worlds most Right Wing thinker|access-date= 2023-11-07}} pp.&nbsp;130–154.</ref> The French far-right figure ] has cited Evola as an influence.{{Sfn|Weitzman|2021}}

Goodrick-Clarke noted Evola's pessimistic invocation of the Kali Yuga as an influence on ] and Aryan cults.{{Sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|2003|p=304}}

Evola's ''Heidnischer Imperialismus'' (1933) was translated by the Russian radical-right Eurasianist ] in 1981.<ref name="laurelle">Laruelle, Marlene The Keenan Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Occasional Paper #294.</ref> Dugin has said that in his youth he was "deeply inspired" by Guénon's and Evola's Traditionalism.{{Sfn|Weitzman|2021|p=104}}

The Greek neo-Nazi party ] includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of ], the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.<ref name="HorowitzMussolini" />

References to Evola are widespread in the ] movement.{{Sfn|Weitzman|2021}}<ref>{{Cite web |last=Momigliano |first=Anna |date=2017-02-21 |title=The Alt-Right's Intellectual Darling Hated Christianity |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/02/julius-evola-alt-right/517326/ |access-date=2022-09-03 |website=The Atlantic |language=en}}</ref> ] has called him an influence.{{Sfn|Rose|2021|p=41}}

== Works ==
;Books
*''L'individuo e il divenire del mondo'' (1926; ''The Individual and the Becoming of the World'').
*''L'uomo come potenza'' (1925; ''Man as Potency'').
*''Teoria dell'individuo assoluto'' (1927; ''The Theory of the Absolute Individual'').
*''Imperialismo pagano'' (1928; second edition 1978){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2024 |title=Pagan Imperialism |publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781915755773}}
*''Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto'' (1930; ''The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual'').
*''La tradizione ermetica'' (1931; third edition 1971){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=1995 |title=The Hermetic Tradition: Symbols and Teachings of the Royal Art |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8l2KNAAACAAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions |isbn=9780892814510}}
*''Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile'' (1932){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2018 |title=The Mask and Face of Contemporary Spiritualism |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EIRNvwEACAAJ |publisher=] |isbn=9781912079346}} And: {{cite book |date=2021 |title=The Fall of Spirituality: The Corruption of Tradition in the Modern World |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NCgBEAAAQBAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9781620559789}}
*''Heidnischer Imperialismus'' (1933){{snd}}English translations: {{cite book |date=2007 |title=Heathen Imperialism |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bOVcEAAAQBAJ |publisher=Cariou Publishing |isbn=9782493842008}} And: {{cite book |date=2017 |title=Pagan Imperialism |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=S_3jtAEACAAJ |publisher=Gornahoor Press |isbn=9780999086001}}
*'']'' (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=1995 |title=Revolt Against the Modern World: Politics, Religion, and Social Order in the Kali Yuga |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Aq1lQgAACAAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9780892815067}}
*''Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero'' (1937){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=1996 |title= The Mystery of the Grail: Initiation and Magic in the Quest for the Spirit |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QAqRHAAACAAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9780892815739}}
*''Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo'' (1937; second edition 1942){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2018 |title=The Myth of the Blood: The Genesis of Racialism |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YiB5twEACAAJ|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781912079421}}
*''Sintesi di dottrina della razza'' (1941){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2020 |title=Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rcSbEAAAQBAJ |publisher=Cariou Publishing |isbn=9782954741642}}
*''Indirizzi per una educazione razziale'' (1941){{snd}}English translations: {{cite book |date=2022 |title=The Elements of Racial Education |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9N9eEAAAQBAJ |publisher=Cariou Publishing |isbn=9782954741635}}
*''La dottrina del risveglio'' (1943){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=1996 |title=The Doctrine of Awakening: The Attainment of Self-Mastery According to the Earliest Buddhist Texts|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Kza7tTkiytUC |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9780892815531}}
*''Lo Yoga della potenza'' (1949; second edition 1968){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=1993 |title=The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=21mMGwAACAAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9780892813681}}
*''Gli uomini e le rovine'' (1953; second edition 1972){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2002 |title=Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=y9jEPAAACAAJ |publisher= Inner Traditions/Bear|isbn=9780892819058}}
*'']'' (1958; second edition 1969){{snd}}English translations: 1983–1991: {{cite book |date=1991 |title=Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zlAX8pSUHSkC |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9780892813155}}
*''L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger'' (1960; ''The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger'').
*''Cavalcare la tigre'' (1961){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2003 |title=Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7uTyNAAACAAJ |publisher= Inner Traditions/Bear|isbn=9780892811250}}
*''Il cammino del cinabro'' (1963; second edition 1972){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2009 |title=The Path of Cinnabar |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D7W0ufxS5pEC|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781907166020}}
*''Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra'' (1964; second edition 1970){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2013 |title=Fascism Viewed from the Right |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6KUAMK9JdgYC |publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781907166853}} And: {{cite book |date=2013 |title=Notes on the Third Reich |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0B4osNsj9Fo |publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781907166860 }}{{Dead link|date=August 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
;Collections
*''Saggi sull'idealismo magico'' (1925; ''Essays on Magical Idealism'').
*''Introduzione alla magia'' (1927–1929; 1971){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2001 |title=Introduction to Magic: Rituals and Practical Techniques for the Magus|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F1EtGwAACAAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9780892816248}} And: {{cite book |date=2019 |title=Introduction to Magic, Volume II: The Path of Initiatic Wisdom |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=scVWDwAAQBAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9781620557181}} And: {{cite book |date=2021 |title=Introduction to Magic, Volume III: Realizations of the Absolute Individual |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CAHZzQEACAAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9781620557198}}
*''L'arco e la clava'' (1968){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2018 |title=The Bow and the Club |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Upa1tAEACAAJ|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781912079087}}
*''Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi'' (1974){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2017 |title=Recognitions: Studies on Men and Problems from the Perspective of the Right |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KANjswEACAAJ|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781912079179}}
*''Meditazioni delle vette'' (1974){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=1998 |title=Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vV4oDwAAQBAJ |publisher=Inner Traditions/Bear |isbn=9781620550380}}
*''Metafisica della Guerra'' (1996){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2011 |title=Metaphysics of War: Battle, Victory and Death in the World of Tradition |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0laH5kSoe5MC|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781907166365}}
*''Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve'' (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2017 |title=A Handbook for Right-Wing Youth |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=odSOAQAACAAJ|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781620559789}}
*{{cite book |date=2015 |title=A Traditionalist Confronts Fascism |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LRCiCgAAQBAJ|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781910524022}}
*{{cite book |date=2018 |title=East & West: Comparative Studies in Pursuit of Tradition|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=epcPnwEACAAJ|publisher=Counter-Currents |isbn=9781935965664}}
*{{cite book |date=2021 |title=Metaphysics of Power |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JM00zgEACAAJ|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781914208096}}

;Articles and pamphlets
* ''L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta.'' (1925'';'' Review of ] published in 1925 in ''L'Idealismo Realistico'').
* ''Il superamento dello spiritismo'' (1928) ,11 April.
*''Tre aspetti del problema ebraico'' (1936){{snd}}Originally published by ''Edizioni Mediterranee'' in 1936, this was also published in Italian by ''Edizioni di Ar'', in 1978. English translation: {{cite book |date=2014 |title=Three Aspects of the Jewish Problem |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WI_WEAAAQBAJ |publisher=Cariou Publishing |isbn=9782493842022}}
* '' -'' (1938) English translation'': ].'' Originally published in ''La vita italiana 309,'' Dec 1938.
* (1938){{snd}}Originally written in German<ref>{{Cite book|last=O'Meara|first=Michael|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Q6Di0jzSLpEC&q=Uber+das+geheimnis+des+verfalls+1938&pg=PA173|title=New Culture, New Right: Anti-Liberalism in Postmodern Europe|date=2013|publisher=Arktos|isbn=978-1-907166-89-1|pages=173|language=en}}</ref> and published by the ] magazine n. 14''.''
* ''Una vittima d'Israele'' (1939). Published in January 1939 in ''La vita Italiana.''<ref>{{Cite book |last=Evola |first=Julius |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wurWAAAAMAAJ |title=I testi de La vita italiana |date=2005 |publisher=Edizioni di Ar |isbn=978-88-89515-13-6 |language=it}}</ref><ref name="spicer">{{Cite book |last1=Spicer |first1=Kevin P. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QvcrEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA84 |title=Religion, Ethnonationalism, and Antisemitism in the Era of the Two World Wars |last2=Carter-Chand |first2=Rebecca |date=15 January 2022 |publisher=McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP |isbn=978-0-2280-1020-3 |pages=84 |language=en}}</ref>
*''Orientamenti, undici punti'' (1950){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2015 |title="Orientations: Eleven Points", in A Traditionalist Confronts Fascism |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LRCiCgAAQBAJ|publisher=Arktos |isbn=9781910524022}}
*''L’emancipazione dell’islam è una strada verso il comunismo'' (1957) - English translation: ''The emancipation of Islam is a path towards communism.'' Published on ''Meridiano d’Italia'' newspaper''.''<ref>{{Citation |last=Mirshahvalad |first=Minoo |title=Evola and the Dilemma of Islam |date=2024 |work=Crises and Conversions: The Unlikely Avenues of "Italian Shiism" |series=Palgrave Studies in New Religions and Alternative Spiritualities |pages=39–54 |editor-last=Mirshahvalad |editor-first=Minoo |url=https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-55877-1_3 |access-date=2024-10-21 |place=Cham |publisher=Springer Nature Switzerland |language=en |doi=10.1007/978-3-031-55877-1_3 |isbn=978-3-031-55877-1}}</ref> It appears this article was reprinted in the journal '']'' in 1958.
*''Il vampirismo ed i vampiri'' (1973){{snd}}English: ''.'' Written for journal ''] in'' September 1973.
;Works edited and/or translated by Evola
*''Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù'' (1923; ''The Book of the Way and Virtue''). Second edition: ''Il libro del principio e della sua azione'' (1959; ''The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action'').
*''La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea'' by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939){{snd}}English translation: {{cite book |date=2015 |title=The Occult War: The Judeo-Masonic Plot to Conquer the World |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aZhJjgEACAAJ|publisher=Logik Förlag |isbn=9789187339356}}

== See also ==
*]
*]
*]


== References == == References ==
'''Notes'''
* "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy" by Richard H. Drake in ''Aspects of Political Violence''
{{Reflist}}
* "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords" by Richard H. Drake in ''The Catholic Historical Review'' 74 (1988): 403-19
* ''Social Research'', 48, Spring 1981: 45-83
* ''Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity'' by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, 2001, ISBN 0814731554
* ''Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890'' edited by Philip Rees, 1991, ISBN 0130893013
* ''Arktos: The Polar Myth in Science, Symbolism, and Nazi Survival'' by Joscelyn Godwin, 1996, ISBN 0932813356
* ''Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the postwar fascist international'' by Kevin Coogan, Autonomedia, Brooklyn, NY 1998 ISBN 1570270392


'''Works cited'''
==Other revolutionary minded Italians of the inter-war period==
{{div col|colwidth=35em}}
*]
{{refbegin}}
*]
* Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," ''The Scorpion'' No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
*]
*{{cite book |last=Atkins |first=Stephen E. |date=2004 |title=Encyclopedia of Modern Worldwide Extremists and Extremist Groups |publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group}}
*]
*{{cite book|author-last=Barber |author-first=Richard |title=The Holy Grail: Imagination and Belief |date=2004 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0674018150}}
*]
* Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," ''Ohm Clock'' No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
*]
* {{cite book|last1=Coogan|first1=Kevin|title=Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International|date=1999|publisher=Autonomedia|location=Brooklyn, New York|isbn=9781570270390}}
*]
* De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," ''Nouvelle Ecole'', No. 53–54 (2003), pp.&nbsp;147–69.
*]
*{{cite book
*]
| last = De Turris
*]
| first = Gianfranco
*]
| translator = Eric Dennis Antonius Galati
*]
| date = 2020
| title = Julius Evola: The Philosopher and Magician in War: 1943-1945
| url =
| location =
| publisher = Inner Traditions
| page =
| isbn = 9781620558065
}}
* {{cite book |last=Drake |first=Richard H. |date=1986 |chapter=Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy |editor=Peter H. Merkl |title=Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=0-520-05605-1 |pages=61–89}}
* Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," '']'' 74: 403–419.
* Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in ''The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy'' (Bloomington: ], {{ISBN|0-253-35019-0}}), 114–134.
*{{cite book |last1=Drury |first1=Nevill |title=The Dictionary of the Esoteric: 3000 Entries on the Mystical and Occult Traditions |date=2004 |publisher=] |location=] |isbn=978-81-208-1989-4 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=k-tVr09oq3IC |access-date=11 August 2022 |language=en }}
*{{cite book |last1=Ebeling |first1=Florian |title=The Secret History of Hermes Trismegistus: Hermeticism from ancient to modern times |date=2007 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7591/j.ctt1ffjptt |access-date=7 August 2022 |publisher=] |location=] |jstor=10.7591/j.ctt1ffjptt |isbn=9780801445460 }}
*{{cite book
| last = Evola
| first = Julius
| date = 1953
| title = Gli uomini e le rovine
| location = Rome
| publisher = Edizioni dell'Ascia
}}
*{{cite book |last1=Evola |first1=Julius |title=Il cammino del cinabro |date=1974 |publisher=Vanni Scheiwiller |location=Milan |isbn=9788827223444 |url=https://archive.org/details/il-cammino-del-cinabro |access-date=17 July 2022 |language=it }}
*{{Cite book |last=Evola |first=Julius |title=A Traditionalist Confronts Fascism |date=17 September 2015 |publisher=] |isbn=9781910524022 |language=en}}
*{{Cite book |last=Feinstein |first=Wiley |title=The Civilization of the Holocaust in Italy: Poets, Artists, Saints, Anti-Semites |date=2003 |publisher=Fairleigh Dickinson University Press |isbn=0-8386-3988-7 |location=Madison |oclc=51985017}}
*{{cite book |last1=Furlong |first1=Paul |title=Social and Political Thought of Julius Evola |date=21 April 2011 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |location=] |isbn=978-1-136-72549-4 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fVGkhzpXxLkC |access-date=17 July 2022 |language=en }}
* {{Cite journal |last=Ferraresi |first=Franco |date=1987 |title=Julius Evola : tradition, reaction, and the Radical Right |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-journal-of-sociology-archives-europeennes-de-sociologie/article/abs/julius-evola-tradition-reaction-and-the-radical-right/40B8C534101D56E3F62B006D82074B5C |journal=European Journal of Sociology / Archives Européennes de Sociologie |language=en |volume=28 |issue=1 |pages=107–151 |doi=10.1017/S0003975600005415 |issn=1474-0583}}
*{{cite book |editor-last1=Forshaw |editor-first1=Peter |title=Lux in Tenebris: The Visual and the Symbolic in Western Esotericism |date=28 November 2016 |publisher=Koninklijke Brill |location=] |isbn=978-90-04-33495-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rNOYDQAAQBAJ |access-date=10 August 2022 |language=en }}
*{{cite book
|last= Gillette
|first= Aaron
|date= 2014
|title= Racial Theories in Fascist Italy
|publisher= Routledge
}}
*{{cite book
|last= Goodrick-Clarke
|first= Nicholas
|date= 2001
|title=]
|publisher= ]
}}
*{{cite book|last1=Gregor |first1=A. James |title=The Search for Neofascism: The Use and Abuse of Social Science |date=2006 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0521676397 |location=Cambridge |author-link1=A. James Gregor}}
*{{cite book|last1=Gregor |first1=A. James |title=Mussolini's Intellectuals: Fascist Social and Political Thought |date=2005 |publisher=]}}
* ] (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," ''Literature and History'' 11 (Spring): 101–123.
* Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), '']'' (], {{ISBN|0-19-289249-5}}), 317–318.
* ], "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e ]", in: ''Arthos'' 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp.&nbsp;269–289.
* ] (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," ''Theosophical History'' 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, '']'', (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
* Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, ''Men Among the Ruins'', (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
*{{cite book
|last= Junginger
|first= Horst
|date= 2008
|title= The Study of Religion Under the Impact of Fascism
|publisher= Koninklijke Brill
|pages= 105–177
|chapter= From Buddha To Adolf Hitler: Walther Wüst And The Aryan Tradition
}}
*{{cite book
|title= Politics and the Occult: The Left, the Right, and the Radically Unseen
|last= Lachman
|first= Gary
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|publisher= Quest Books
}}
*{{cite book
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}}
*{{cite book |last1=Lewis |first1=James R. |last2=Melton |first2=J. Gordon |title=Perspectives on the New Age |date=1 January 1992 |publisher=SUNY Press |location=New York City |isbn=978-0-7914-1213-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=U1werz4a1BIC |access-date=19 July 2022 |language=en }}
*{{cite book
| last = Lopez
| first = Donald S.
| date = 1995
| title = Curators of the Buddha: The Study of Buddhism Under Colonialism
| publisher = University of Chicago Press
| isbn = 978-0226493091
}}
*{{cite book |last1=Melton |first1=J. Gordon |last2=Baumann |first2=Martin |title=Religions of the World: A Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Beliefs and Practices, 2nd Edition |date=21 September 2010 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |location=] |isbn=978-1-59884-204-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=v2yiyLLOj88C |access-date=21 July 2022 |language=en }}
*{{cite book|last=Payne|first=Stanley G.|author-link=Stanley G. Payne|title=A History of Fascism, 1914–1945|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x_MeR06xqXAC|year=1996|publisher=University of Wisconsin Press|isbn=978-0-299-14873-7}}
* ] (1991), '']'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, {{ISBN|0-13-089301-3}}), 118–120.
*{{cite book |last1=Magee |first1=Glenn Alexander |title=Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition |date=2008 |publisher=] |location=] |isbn=978-0-8014-7450-7 |language=en }}
*{{cite book
|last= Sedgwick
|first= Mark
|date= 2009
|title= Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century
|publisher= Oxford University Press
|isbn= 978-0195396010
}}
*{{cite book
| last = Sedgwick
| first = Mark
| author-link = Mark Sedgwick
| date = 2023
| title = Traditionalism: The Radical Project for Restoring Sacred Order
| url =
| location =
| publisher = Pelican Books
| page = <!-- or pages: -->
| isbn = 9780241487921
}}
*{{cite book
|last=Senholt
|first=Jacob Christiansen
|date= 2013
|title= Contemporary Esotericism
|publisher= Equinox Publishing
|editor-last1= Asprem
|editor-first1= Egil
|editor-first2= Kennet
|editor-last2= Granholm
|chapter= Radical Politics and Political Esotericism: The Adaptation of Esoteric Discourse within the Radical Right
|pages= 244–264
}}
* {{cite journal |last1= Sheehan |first1= Thomas |date= 1981|title= Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist |journal= Social Research|volume= 48|issue= 1|pages= 45–73}}
*{{cite book |last1=Skorupski |first1=Tadeusz |title=The Buddhist Forum |date=9 August 2005 |publisher=] |location=] |isbn=978-1-135-75182-1 |edition=4 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6VWAAAAAQBAJ |access-date=19 July 2022 |language=en }}
* Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, ''The Yoga of Power'' (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
* Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, ''The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries'', ''Zen: The Religion of the Samurai'', ''Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times'', and ''Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism'' (]: Holmes Publishing Group).
*{{cite journal
| last1 = Tarannes
| first1 = A.
| date = 1 April 1928
| title = Un sataniste italien
| journal = Revue Internationale des Sociètès Secrètes
| volume = 17
| issue = 4
| pages = 124–129
}}
*{{cite book
|last= Taylor
|first= Kathleen
|date= 2012
|title= Sir John Woodroffe, Tantra and Bengal: 'An Indian Soul in a European Body?
|publisher= Routledge
|isbn= 9780415749367
}}
*{{cite book
|title= Magic and Mysticism: An Introduction to Western Esoteric Traditions
|last= Versluis
|first= Arthur
|date= 2007
|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
}}
* Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," ''Alphabet City'' 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
* {{cite book |last=Weitzman |first=Mark |chapter=Traditionalism or the Perennial Philosophy |date=2021 |title=Contending with Antisemitism in a Rapidly Changing Political Climate |publisher=Indiana University Press |pages=96–112}}
*{{cite journal |last1=Wolff |first1=Elisabetta Cassina |title=Evola's interpretation of fascism and moral responsibility |journal=Patterns of Prejudice |date=19 October 2016 |volume=50 |issue=4–5 |pages=478–494 |doi=10.1080/0031322X.2016.1243662 |s2cid=152240495 |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0031322X.2016.1243662 |access-date=21 July 2022 |issn=0031-322X }}
* {{cite magazine
| last = Waterfield
| first = Robin
| date = 1990
| title = Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition
| issue = 14
| magazine = ]
| pages = 12–17
}}
* {{cite web |title=Bibliografia di J. Evola |url=http://www.fondazionejuliusevola.it/Biblio.htm |website=Fondazione Julius Evola |access-date=25 April 2015 |archive-date=29 April 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150429220929/http://www.fondazionejuliusevola.it/Biblio.htm |url-status=dead }}
{{refend}}
{{div col end}}
==Further reading==
:<small>''({{Helveticat}}:)''</small>
{{refbegin}}
*{{cite book
|last = Giudice
|first = Christian
|year = 2022
|title = ]
|series = Oxford Studies in Western Esotericism
|location = Oxford
|publisher = Oxford University Press
|doi = 10.1093/oso/9780197610244.001.0001
|isbn = 978-0-19-761024-4
}}
* {{cite journal
|last1 = Staudenmaier
|first1 = Peter
|date = 2019
|title = Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43
|url = https://epublications.marquette.edu/hist_fac/290
|journal = Journal of Contemporary History
|volume = 55
|issue = 3
|pages = 473–491
|doi = 10.1177/0022009419855428
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Latest revision as of 00:18, 21 December 2024

Italian radical-right philosopher and esotericist (1898–1974)
Julius Evola
Evola in the early 1940s
BornGiulio Cesare Andrea Evola
(1898-05-19)19 May 1898
Rome, Kingdom of Italy
Died11 June 1974(1974-06-11) (aged 76)
Rome, Republic of Italy
Era20th-century philosophy
Region
SchoolPerennialism
Traditionalism
Conservative Revolution
Main interests
Notable ideas
Military service
Allegiance Kingdom of Italy
Service / branch Italian Army
Years of service1917–1918
RankArtillery officer
Battles / warsWorld War I

Giulio Cesare Andrea "Julius" Evola (Italian: [ˈɛːvola]; 19 May 1898 – 11 June 1974) was an Italian far-right philosopher. Evola regarded his values as traditionalist, aristocratic, martial, and imperialist. An eccentric thinker in Fascist Italy, he also had ties to Nazi Germany; in the post-war era, he was an ideological mentor of the Italian neo-fascist and militant Right.

Evola was born in Rome. He served as an artillery officer in the First World War. He became a Dada artist but gave up painting in his twenties. He said he considered suicide until he had a revelation while reading a Buddhist text. In the 1920s he delved into the occult; he wrote on Western esotericism and of Eastern mysticism, developing his doctrine of "magical idealism". His writings blend various ideas of German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism and the interwar Conservative Revolution. Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga, a Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. To counter this and call in a primordial rebirth, Evola presented a "world of Tradition". Tradition for Evola was not Christian—he did not believe in God—but rather an eternal supernatural knowledge with values of authority, hierarchy, order, discipline and obedience.

Evola advocated for Fascist Italy's racial laws, and eventually became Italy's leading "racial philosopher". Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. He fled to Nazi Germany in 1943 when the Italian Fascist regime fell, but returned to Rome under the puppet Salò government to organize a radical-right group. In 1945 in Vienna, a Soviet shell fragment paralysed him from the waist down. On trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "superfascista" (lit. 'superfascist'). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".

Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II, and his philosophy has been characterized as one of the most consistently "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular systems in the twentieth century". Writings by Evola contain misogyny, racism, antisemitism, and attacks on Christianity and the Catholic Church. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.

Early life

Evola serving as an artillery officer on Monte Cimone di Tonezza, 1917

Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola was born in Rome on 19 May 1898. His family were devout Roman Catholic aristocrats; he is sometimes described as a baron. Evola considered details about his early life irrelevant, and is noted for hiding some details of his personal life. He adopted the name Julius as a connection to ancient Rome.

Evola before leaving the army in 1918.

Evola rebelled against his Catholic upbringing. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he did not want to be associated with "bourgeois academic recognition" and titles such as "doctor and engineer". In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Italian man of letters Carlo Michelstaedter and German post-Hegelian thinker Max Stirner.

Five o'clock tea, by Evola, 1917

He was attracted to the avant-garde, and briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement during his time at university. He broke with Marinetti in 1916 as Evola disagreed with his extreme nationalism and advocacy of industry. In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. Despite reservations that Italy was fighting on the wrong side (against Germany, which Evola admired for its discipline and hierarchy), Evola volunteered in 1917 and briefly saw frontline service the following year. Evola returned to civilian life after the war and became a painter in Italy's Dadaist movement; he described his paintings as "inner landscapes". He wrote his poetry in French and recited it in cabarets accompanied by classical music. Through his painting and poetry, and work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. (In his autobiography, Evola described his Dadaism as an attack on rationalist cultural values.) In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialised and stiffened by academic conventions, he gave up painting and renounced poetry. Evola was a keen mountaineer, describing it as a source of revelatory spiritual experience.

Evola purportedly went through a "spiritual crisis" through the intolerance of civilian life and his need to "transcend the emptiness" of normal human activity. He experimented with hallucinogenics and magic, which, he wrote, almost brought him to madness. In 1922, at 23 years old, he considered suicide, he wrote in The Cinnabar Path. He said he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence.

Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism. By this time his interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. Historian Richard H. Drake wrote that Evola's alienation from contemporary values resembled that of other Lost Generation intellectuals who came of age in World War I, but took an uncompromising, eccentric and reactionary form.

Philosophy

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Evola's writings blended ideas from German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and especially the interwar Conservative Revolution, "with which Evola had a deep personal involvement". He viewed himself as part of an aristocratic caste that had been dominant in an ancient Golden Age, as opposed to the contemporary Dark Age (the Kali Yuga). In his writing, Evola addressed others in that caste whom he called l'uomo differenziato—"the man who has become different"—who through heredity and initiation were able to transcend the ages. Evola considered human history to be, in general, decadent; he viewed modernity as the temporary success of the forces of disorder over tradition. Tradition, in Evola's definition, was an eternal supernatural knowledge, with absolute values of authority, hierarchy, order, discipline and obedience. Matthew Rose wrote that "Evola claimed to show how basic human activities—from eating and sex, commerce and games, to war and social intercourse—were elevated by Tradition into something ritualistic, becoming activities whose very repetitiveness offered a glimpse of an unchanging eternal realm". Ensuring Tradition's triumph of order over chaos, in Evola's view, required an obedience to aristocracy. Rose wrote that Evola "aspired to be the most right-wing thinker possible in the modern world".

Evola philosophical work started in the 1920s with The Theory of the Absolute Individual and Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual. Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (Theory of The Absolute Individual) and Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual) originally constituted a single work which only for editorial reasons ended up being divided into two separate volumes, published a few years apart from each other, one in 1927 and the other in 1930, published in Turin at the publisher called Bocca. This work was different and even attack on the dominant Hegelian thought in Italy, prevailed by the works of Croce. Interesting, however, Benedetto Croce helped Evola find a publisher for his Theory and Phenomenology of Absolute Individual, this work which started in 1924 but were only published in final form in 1927 and 1930, though it is not certain to which extent Croce helped Evola.

Evola wrote prodigiously on mysticism, Tantra, Hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and scholar of esotericism Florian Ebeling noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work" on Hermeticism for esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic" – the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favoured Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."

Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance out his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality. Evola often relied on European sources about Asian creeds while evoking them for racist ends, Peter Staudenmaier wrote. Rose described Evola as an "unreliable scholar of Eastern religions."

Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the left-hand path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the left-hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.

According to A. James Gregor, Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Evola attempted to construct, Ferraresi wrote, "a model of man striving to reach the 'absolute' within his inner self". For Evola, Furlong wrote, transcendence "rested on the freeing of one's spiritual self through the purity of physical and mental discipline." Evola wrote that the tension between a detached "impulse toward transcendence" and an engaged "warrior spirit" defined his life and work.

Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Stephen Atkins summarized Evola's philosophy as "a complete rejection of modern society and its mores". Evola loathed liberalism, because, as Rose wrote, "Everything he revered—social castes, natural inequalities, and sacred privileges—was targeted by liberalism for reform or abolition." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola invoked Indo-Aryan tradition to advance "a radical doctrine of anti-egalitarianism, anti-democracy, anti-liberalism and anti-Semitism". Rose described Evola as "one of the strangest intellectual figures of his century".

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Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed his doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."

According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write: "The truths that allow us to understand the world of Tradition are not those that can be "learned" or "discussed." They either are or are not. We can only remember them, and that happens when we are freed from the obstacles represented by various human constructions (chief among these are the results and methods of the authorized "researchers") and have awakened the capacity to see from the nonhuman viewpoint, which is the same as the Traditional viewpoint ... Traditional truths have always been held to be essentially non-human."

Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."

Ur Group

Among Evola's chief contacts was Arturo Reghini, a critic of Christianity and democracy and advocate for the ancient Roman aristocracy. Reghini welcomed the rise of Fascist Italy and sought to return to pre-Christian spirituality through the promotion of a "cultured magic". Through Reghini, Evola was introduced to the French Orientalist René Guénon, a leading figure of traditionalism at the time who shared an interest in the occult. Guénon's 1927 text Crisis of the Modern World inspired Evola to organise his thoughts around the critique of modernity, and Guénon, whom Evola called his "master", would be one of the few writers Evola found worthy to debate with. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.

Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove contentious for Evola; accordingly, Reghini broke himself from Evola and left the Ur Group in 1928. Reghini accused him of plagiarising his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism; Evola, in turn, blamed him for its premature publication. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to Guénon's Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon by valuing action over contemplation, and the empire over the church.

Sex and gender roles

Evola held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. He quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Coogan wrote, "It goes almost without saying that Evola's views on women were saturated with misogyny." Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman, Evola wrote, "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealised gender relations, the archaic Hindu sati (suicide), which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.

Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos. He was influenced by Hans Blüher, a proponent of the Männerbund ('alliance of men') concept as a model for his "warrior-band" or "warrior-society". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrick-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."

Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate".

Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World (1934). This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.

Race

Evola's views on race had roots in his aristocratic elitism. According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed what he called "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Evola used "a man of race" to mean "a man of breeding". "Only of an elite may one say that 'it is of a race': the people are only people, mass," Evola wrote in 1969.

In Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (1941) (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza), Evola provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism". The book was endorsed by Benito Mussolini.

Prior to the end of the Second World War, Evola frequently used the term "Aryan" to refer to the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Feinstein writes that this interpretation made the term "Aryan" more plausible in an Italian context and thereby furthered antisemitism in Fascist Italy. Evola's interpretation was adopted by Mussolini, who declared in 1938 that "Italy's civilization is Aryan". Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights or the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."

Evola wrote of "inferior, non-European races". He believed that military aggressions such as Fascist Italy's 1935 invasion of Ethiopia were justified by Italy's dominance, outweighing concerns he had about the possibility of race-mixing. Richard H. Drake wrote, "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." Furlong wrote that a 1957 article by Evola about America "leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people".

"Spiritual racism"

Main article: Aryanism

Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed." For his spiritual interpretation of different racial psychologies, Evola was influenced by the German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Peter Staudenmaier notes that many other racists of the time found Evola's "spiritual racism" perplexing.

Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of Hinduism—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Aryan men. He felt that Aryan men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"

Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific: "The factor of 'blood' or 'race' has its importance, because it is not psychologically—in the brain or the opinions of the individual—but in the very deepest forces of life that traditions live and act as typical formative energies. Blood registers the effects of this action, and indeed offers through heredity, a matter that is already refined and pre-formed ..."

Antisemitism

Writings by Evola in the late 1930s contributed arguments for Fascist Italy's repression of its Jews. Evola encouraged and applauded Mussolini's antisemitic racial laws in 1938, and called for a "supreme Aryan elite" to oppose the Jews. In some writings, Evola called Jews a virus. He said Fascism and Nazism's final victory over Jews would end "the spiritual decadence of the West" and thereby "re-establish genuine contact between man and a transcendent, supersensible reality".

Evola wrote the foreword and an essay in the second Italian edition of the infamous antisemitic fabrication The Protocols of the Elders of Zion published in 1938 by the Catholic fascist Giovanni Preziosi. In it, Evola argued that the Protocols—whether or not a forgery—"contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He was an admirer of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the antisemitic leader of the fascist Romanian Iron Guard. After Codreanu was assassinated in 1938 on orders from King Carol II, Evola railed against "the Judaic horde" that he accused of planning "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny."

Evola's antisemitism did not emphasise the Nazi conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race", but rather as "the carriers of a world view, a way of being and thinking—simply put, a spirit—that corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism", Wolff writes. According to Wolff, "Evola's 'totalitarian' or 'spiritual' racism was no milder than Nazi biological racism", and Evola was trying to promote an "Italian version of racism and antisemitism, one that could be integrated into the Fascist project to create a New Man". Evola dismissed the biological racism of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others as reductionist and materialistic. He also argued that one could be "Aryan" but have a "Jewish" soul, and could be "Jewish" but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category. In 1970, Evola described Adolf Hitler's antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. But Evola never clearly acknowledged the Holocaust committed by the regimes he associated with, perpetrated in the name of racism—Furlong called this a "fatal lapse that by itself ought to be enough to destroy his authority".

Written works

Evola wrote more than 36 books and 1,100 articles. In some of his 1930s writings, and in works about magic, Evola used pseudonyms, including Ea (after a Babylonian god), Carlo d'Altavilla, and Arthos (from Arthurian legend).

Christianity

In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticised by both Benito Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". Richard Drake wrote that Evola "rarely missed an opportunity to attack the Catholic Church". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.

In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it "symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation." He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to the book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, "Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature."

Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola "regarded the advent of Christianity as an era of unprecedented decline", because Christianity's egalitarianism and accessibility undermined the Roman ideals of "duty, honor and command" that Evola believed in.

Buddhism

In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticised Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-World War II scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writings on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalised in Sorrento.

Modernity

Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealised traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. He asserted that history's intellectuals starting as early as ancient Greece had undermined traditional values through their questioning. He insisted that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathiser associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous." Richard Drake wrote that the book was not widely influential in the 1930s but eventually received a cult following on the extreme right and is now considered Evola's most important work.

Ride the Tiger (1961), Evola's last major work, saw him examining dissolution and subversion in a world in which God was dead, and rejected the possibility of any political or collective revival of Tradition due to his belief that the modern world had fallen too far into the Kali Yuga for any such thing to be possible. Instead of this and rather than advocating a return to religion as Rene Guénon had, he conceptualised what he considered an apolitical manual for surviving and ultimately transcending the Kali Yuga. This idea was summarised in the title of the book, the Tantric metaphor of "Riding the Tiger" which in general practice, consisted of turning things that were considered inhibitory to spiritual progress by mainstream Brahmanical society (for example, meat, alcohol and in very rare circumstances, sex, were all employed by Tantric practitioners) into a means of spiritual transcendence. The process that Evola described involved potentially making use of everything from modern music, hallucinogenic drugs, relationships with the opposite sex and even substituting the atmosphere of an urban existence for the Theophany that Traditionalists had identified in virgin nature.

During the 1960s Evola thought right-wing entities could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilisation. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."

Other writings

Evola contributed to Giuseppe Bottai's magazine Critica Fascista for a time. From 1934 to 1943 Evola was responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, an influential radical fascist daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci, the pro-Nazi mayor of Cremona. Evola used the page to publish international right-wing thinkers. Evola's writings on the page argued for imperialism; leading up to Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia, Evola praised "the sacred valor of war". During the same period he contributed to the antisemite Giovanni Preziosi's magazine La vita italiana.

Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."

In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.

Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.

Politics

A black and white photo of Julius Evola, looking left. He wears a monocle
Evola in 1940

In Evola's view, a state ruled by a spiritual elite must reign with unquestionable supremacy over its populace. He cited two models of such an elite as the Nazi SS and Romanian Iron Guard, known for their violence. Evola's philosophy, over his long career, adapted the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right, Furlong wrote. Sheehan described Evola as "perhaps the most original and creative — and, intellectually, the most nonconformist, of the Italian Fascist philosophers".

Evola had access to Benito Mussolini in the last years of the Fascist regime, and advised him on racial policies, but "without much effect", Ferraresi wrote; Evola "was kept (or stayed) on the sidelines of officialty, as some sort of eccentric". Evola was in charge of the cultural page of the influential fascist newspaper Il Regime Fascista for the regime's last decade. Evola declined to join Italy's National Fascist Party or any other party of the time; Ferraresi wrote that Evola's "lofty nonconformism" and "imperial paganism" did not fit well in a party that would make the Catholic Church a regime pillar. Evola's lack of party membership was later emphasized by admirers to distance him from the regime.

Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. With its help, he fled to Berlin in Nazi Germany when the Italian Fascist regime fell in 1943. In May 1951, Evola was arrested in Italy and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Evola declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "superfascista" (lit. 'superfascist'). He was acquitted of all charges.

Fascist Italy

Evola experienced Mussolini's March on Rome in 1922 and was intrigued by fascism. He would praise fascism for "its attempt to refashion the Italian people into a severe, military mold", in Ferraresi's words, but would criticize any concessions to "democratic" pressures. Atkins wrote that "Evola was critical of the Fascist regime because it was not fascist enough."

Evola applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticised Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterised the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe.

Evola applauded the fascist motto "Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State". Sheehan described Evola as "an ardent supporter of Mussolini". But his Traditionalist ethos rejected nationalism, which he viewed as a conception of the modern West and not of a Traditional hierarchical social arrangement. He stated that to become "truly human", one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny".

Evola argued that the regime should dictate to the Catholic Church, not negotiate with it, and warned in Critica fascista in 1927 that allowing the church independent power would make fascism a "laughable revolution". In 1928, he wrote that fascists had made "the most absurd of all errors" through entente with Christianity and the church. He also opposed the futurism that Italian society was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. He opined that Mussolini should have disbanded his party after 1922 and become a loyal advisor to King Victor Emmanuel III instead. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower) in 1930, to advocate for a more elitist social order. He wrote in La Torre, "We would like a fascism more radical, more intrepid, a truly absolute fascism, made of pure force, inaccessible to any compromise." Evola's ideas were poorly received by the contemporary fascist mainstream. Evola wrote that Mussolini's censors had repressed La Torre, which lasted five months and ten issues; in Drake's words, Italian fascism "had as little tolerance for opposition on the right as on the left". Regardless, a few years later in 1934, Evola was put in charge of the cultural page of the influential radical fascist newspaper Il Regime Fascista, a position he held until 1943.

Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista." With the passage of the Italian racial laws in 1938 and Italy's campaign against Jews, Evola demanded measures to counter "the Jewish menace", through "discrimination and selection". Echoing Evola's writings, Mussolini declared in 1938 that "The population of Italy today is of Aryan origin and Italy's civilization is Aryan."

Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola travelled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher. Mussolini directed the Ministry of Popular Culture to be guided by "Evola's racist thought".

Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."

Third Reich

Title page of Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933), the German authorized translation of Julius Evola's book Imperialismo pagano (1928)

Finding Italian fascism "too compromising" (in Goodrick-Clarke's words), Evola sought more recognition in Nazi Germany. He began lecturing there in 1934. He described Berlin's Herrenklub, associated with the Conservative Revolution aristocracy, as his "natural habitat". His considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938 included a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola appreciated what he called Nazism's "attempt to create a kind of new political-military Order with precise qualifictions of race", and believed that the Nazis' brand of fascism had taken its traditionalist thinkers seriously. Evola thought far more highly of Adolf Hitler than Mussolini, although he had reservations about Hitler's völkisch nationalism. Evola wanted a spiritual unity between Italy and Germany and an Axis victory in Europe. (Martin A. Lee calls Evola an "Italian Nazi philosopher" in The Beast Reawakens.)

Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts". Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".

Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. He subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.

Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned in 1943, and Italy surrendered to the Allies. At this point, Evola fled to Berlin in Nazi Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September 1943. According to Sheehan, Adolf Hitler also met with Evola and other fascist intellectuals. After the meeting with Mussolini, at Hitler's Wolf's Lair, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic (the Republic of Salò, a Nazi puppet regime). Evola returned to Rome in 1943 to organize a radical right group called the Movimento per la Rinascita dell'Italia. He fled to Vienna in 1944, barely avoiding capture by the Americans when the Allies took Rome.

In Vienna, Evola studied Masonic and Jewish documents confiscated by the Nazis, and worked with the SS and fascist leaders on recruiting an army to resist the Allies' advances. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such aerial bombardment in 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralysed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.

About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote: "The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end."

Postwar and later years

Evola, partially paralysed after the Soviet bombing raid in Vienna in 1945, returned to postwar Italy in 1948, after being treated for his injuries in Austria.

Ferraresi wrote that Evola was "the guru" for generations of radical right Italian militants, through his writings and youth groups. "The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler," Wolff writes; instead, in post-World War II conversations with neo-fascists, Evola would reference the Nazi SS, the Spanish Falange, Codreanu's Legionary Movement, Knut Hamsun, Vidkun Quisling, Léon Degrelle, Drieu La Rochelle, Robert Brasillach, Maurice Bardèche, Charles Maurras, Plato (particularly The Republic), Dante (particularly De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Otto von Bismarck, Klemens von Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Vilfredo Pareto, and Robert Michels. He wrote for publications of the neo-fascist Italian Social Movement (MSI) but never joined the party. Adkins wrote that the MSI "claimed him as their philosopher-king, but he barely tolerated their attention". Wolff described him as a "freelance political commentator".

Evola continued his work in the domain of esotericism, writing a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilisation and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.

Evola was arrested along with thirty-six others in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organisation Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR), after attempted bombings in 1949–50 were linked to Evola's circle. Evola's charges were glorifying fascism and promoting the revival of the Fascist Party. His lawyer was Francesco Carnelutti. He was carried into the courtroom on a stretcher. Defending himself at trial, Evola said that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "superfascista" (lit. 'superfascist'). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that it is unclear whether this meant he was placing himself "above or beyond Fascism". The judges, who themselves had served during the fascist era, ruled that Evola could not be held responsible for the crimes. Evola was acquitted of all charges on 20 November 1951. Of the 36 other defendants, 13 received prison sentences.

While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. Evola also made an effort to differentiate his caste based aristocratic state from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual". Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but said Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics. He dreamt that such a "New Order" of aristocracy might seize power from above during a democratic crisis.

Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. Ferraresi wrote that "Evola's thought was the 'essential mortar' that held together generations of militants". According to Jacob Christiansen Senholt, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: "Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first."

In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with a spiritual elite of divine right. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterised by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".

Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modelled on the principles of the Nazis' Waffen-SS, which had mustered international forces. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. Evola praised Ordine Nouvo as the only Italian group that had "doctrinally had held firm without descending to compromise". The European Liberation Front of Francis Parker Yockey called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of its publication Frontfighter. Giuliano Salierni, who was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s, later recalled Evola's calls to violence, along with Evola's reminiscences about Nazis such as Joseph Goebbels.

Personal life

Evola was childless and never married, but as a young man he had a relationship with Sibilla Aleramo. He spent his postwar years in his Rome apartment. He died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure. His ashes, per his will, were deposited in a hole cut in a glacier on Monte Rosa in the Pennine Alps.

Influence on the far-right

At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathiser and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works). Franco Ferraresi described Evola in 1987 as "possibly the most important intellectual figure for the Radical Right in contemporary Europe" but "virtually unknown outside the Right". He is described by Stanley Payne (in 1996) and Stephen Atkins (2004) as the leading neo-fascist intellectual in Europe until his death in 1974. Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." But outside Italy, France and Germany, Evola was not well known until around 1990 when he received wider English language publication, according to Furlong.

Richard Drake wrote that Evola advocated for terrorism. Peter Merkl noted that Evola's advocacy of force was part of his appeal to the radical right. Wolff wrote: "The debate around his 'moral and political' responsibility for terrorist actions perpetrated by right-wing extremist groups in Italy between 1969 and 1980 began as soon as Evola died in 1974 and have not yet come to an end."

According to one leader of the neofascist organization Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action." Neofascist terrorists Franco Freda and Mario Tuti reprinted Evola's most militant texts. Radicals of the Nuclei Armati Rivoluzionari (NAR) helped spread Evola's philosophy in far-right circles abroad after fleeing Italy in the wake of the terrorist bombing of the Bologna railway station in 1980; some influenced Britain's National Front. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Front's "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies.

Umberto Eco mocked Evola; his 1995 essay "Ur-Fascism" referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".

The far-right English politician and orator Jonathan Bowden gave lectures on Evola's philosophy. The French far-right figure Alain de Benoist has cited Evola as an influence.

Goodrick-Clarke noted Evola's pessimistic invocation of the Kali Yuga as an influence on esoteric Nazism and Aryan cults.

Evola's Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933) was translated by the Russian radical-right Eurasianist Aleksandr Dugin in 1981. Dugin has said that in his youth he was "deeply inspired" by Guénon's and Evola's Traditionalism.

The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.

References to Evola are widespread in the alt-right movement. Steve Bannon has called him an influence.

Works

Books
Collections
Articles and pamphlets
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
  • Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
  • La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939) – English translation: The Occult War: The Judeo-Masonic Plot to Conquer the World. Logik Förlag. 2015. ISBN 9789187339356.

See also

References

Notes

  1. "Evola cogn.". Dizionario d'ortografia e di pronunzia. Dizionario d'Ortografia e di Pronunzia (DOP) (in Italian). Rai Libri. Archived from the original on 14 July 2014. Retrieved 23 October 2018.
  2. Ferraresi 1987, p. 84; Payne 1996, p. 113; Goodrick-Clarke 2001, p. 53.
  3. Drake 2004, p. 223–224.
  4. ^ Ferraresi 2012, p. 44.
  5. ^ Sedgwick 2023, p. 15.
  6. ^ Waterfield 1990, p. 13.
  7. ^ Ferraresi 2012, pp. 44–45.
  8. Rose 2021, p. 44-51.
  9. ^ Furlong 2011, pp. 8–9.
  10. ^ Staudenmaier 2022.
  11. Payne 1996, p. 113.
  12. ^ Coogan 1999, p. 315f.
  13. H. T. Hansen, 'Preface to the American Edition', in Julius Evola, Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist, Simon and Schuster, ISBN 978-1-620-55858-4 2018 pp-1-104, p.5. This is deduced by remarks by Evola suggesting he was an active agent for the Sicherheitsdienst, remarks that Philippe Baillet, his French translator, believes refer to the fact that the Sicherheitsdienst had been set up within the SS and had a remit to cover cultural matters, before it actually assumed a later role in Nazi counterespionage.
  14. ^ Coogan 1999.
  15. ^ Wolff 2016, pp. 478–494.
  16. ^ Drake 1986, p. 67.
  17. ^ Gillette 2002, pp. 177–178.
  18. ^ Guido Stucco, "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power, pp. ix–xv.
  19. ^ Wolff 2016, p. 491.
  20. ^ Payne 1996.
  21. ^ Atkins 2004, p. 89.
  22. ^ Coogan 1999, p. 359.
  23. Gillette 2002.
  24. Furlong 2011, pp. 5, 42; Drake 1988, p. 406.
  25. Coogan 1999, p. 330.
  26. ^ Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2003). Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism, and the Politics of Identity. New York University Press. pp. 52–71. ISBN 978-0-8147-3155-0.
  27. Romm, Jake. "Meet the Philosopher Who's a Favorite of Steve Bannon and Mussolini". The Forward. Retrieved 23 August 2017.
  28. Horowitz, Jason (11 February 2017). "Thinker loved by fascists like Mussolini is on Stephen Bannon's reading list". BostonGlobe.com. New York Times. Retrieved 23 August 2017.
  29. ^ Rose 2021, p. 41.
  30. Skorupski 2005, p. 11.
  31. ^ Furlong 2011, p. 2.
  32. ^ Rose, Matthew (2021). A World after Liberalism: Philosophers of the Radical Right. New Haven: Yale University Press. pp. 41–42. ISBN 978-0-300-26308-4. OCLC 1255236096.
  33. Alberto. "«Frainteso da amici e nemici, lottò da solo contro il Mondo Moderno». Julius Evola: per riscoprire la Tradizione e la Spiritualità e progettare un futuro. Di Carlo Lago. – 'Storia Verità'" (in Italian). Retrieved 2024-08-02.
  34. ^ Furlong 2011, p. 3.
  35. Evola 1974, p. 13.
  36. Furlong 2011, p. 4.
  37. Furlong 2011, p. 32.
  38. ^ Gregor 2006.
  39. Wolff 2014, pp. 258–273.
  40. ^ Furlong 2011, pp. 3–4.
  41. Evola 1974, p. 10.
  42. Drake 1986, p. 63.
  43. Furlong 2011, p. 3; Evola 1974, p. 11; Drake 1986, p. 63.
  44. Skorupski 2005, p. 13.
  45. Furlong 2011, p. 15.
  46. ^ Drake 1986, p. 64.
  47. Furlong 2011, pp. 9–11.
  48. ^ Rose 2021, pp. 47–48.
  49. ^ Ferraresi 1987.
  50. "Beyond the Cosmic Ladder". Paul Brunton Philosophic Foundation. 2023-11-23. Retrieved 2024-10-09.
  51. Furlong 2011, p. 13.
  52. Ebeling 2007, p. 138.
  53. Forshaw 2016, p. 351.
  54. Forshaw 2016, p. 354.
  55. Magee 2008, p. 200.
  56. Coogan 1999, pp. 296–297.
  57. ^ T. Skorupski. The Buddhist Forum, Volume 4. Routledge, 2005, pp. 11–20
  58. ^ Lachman 2012, p. 215.
  59. Taylor 2012, p. 135.
  60. Richard K. Payne. Tantric Buddhism in East Asia. Simon and Schuster, 2006. p. 229
  61. ^ Lycourinos, Damon Zacharias, ed. (2012). Occult traditions. Numen Books. ISBN 9780987158130.
  62. Gregor 2006, pp. 101–102.
  63. Furlong 2011, p. 6.
  64. Furlong 2011, p. 7.
  65. Goodrick-Clarke 2001, p. 71.
  66. Rose 2021, p. 51.
  67. Goodrick-Clarke 2001, p. 53.
  68. ^ Sheehan 1981, pp. 45–73.
  69. Gillette 2002, p. 155.
  70. Furlong 2011, p. 31.
  71. ^ Furlong 2011, p. 5.
  72. Goodrick-Clarke 2001, pp. 55–56.
  73. Rose 2021, p. 45.
  74. Furlong 2011, pp. 5–6.
  75. Furlong 2011, p. 87.
  76. Drury 2004, p. 96.
  77. LewisMelton 1992, p. 276.
  78. Furlong 2011, p. 77.
  79. Gregor 2006, p. 89.
  80. Furlong 2011, p. 88.
  81. ^ Versluis 2007, pp. 144–145.
  82. Rose 2021, p. 49.
  83. Sedgwick 2009, pp. 100–101.
  84. Furlong 2011, p. 43.
  85. ^ Furlong 2011, p. 121.
  86. Drake 2021.
  87. Franco Ferraresi. Threats to Democracy: The Radical Right in Italy after the War. Princeton University Press, 2012. p. 220.
  88. R. Ben-Ghiat, M. Fuller. Italian Colonialism. Springer, 2016. p. 149
  89. ^ Merelli, Annalisa (2017-02-22). "Steve Bannon's interest in a thinker who inspired fascism exposes the misogyny of the alt-right". Quartz. Retrieved 2022-10-17.
  90. MeltonBaumann 2010, p. 1085.
  91. Goodrick-Clarke 2001, p. 60.
  92. ^ Coogan 1999, p. 358.
  93. ^ Franco Ferraresi (2012). Threats to Democracy: The Radical Right in Italy after the War. Princeton University Press. p. 44. ISBN 978-1-4008-2211-9.
  94. Coogan 1999, p. 343; Furlong 2011, p. 123.
  95. Conner, Randy P.; Sparks, David Hatfield; Sparks, Mariya (1997). Cassell's Encyclopedia of Queer Myth, Symbol, and Spirit: Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Lore. Cassell. p. 136.
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  97. ^ Ferraresi 2012, p. 46.
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  116. Feinstein 2003, pp. 286–287.
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  135. ^ Sedgwick 2009, p. 105.
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  137. Evola, Julius (November 1996). Mystery of the Grail. Translated by Hansen, H. T. Inner Traditions. pp. 172–173. ISBN 0892815736.
  138. Barber 2004, p. 306.
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  141. Harry Oldmeadow. Journeys East: 20th Century Western Encounters with Eastern Religious Traditions. World Wisdom, Inc, 2004. p. 369.
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  159. Ferraresi 1987, p. 84.
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  161. ^ Wolff 2016.
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  168. See Renzo de Felice, Storia degli ebrei; A. James Gregor; Meir Michaelis, Mussolini and the Jews; contra Aaron Gillette, Racial Theories in Fascist Italy, Ch. 4.
  169. See Luigi Preti (1968) for discussion of miscegenation; Gene Bernardini (1977) for discussion of German influence
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  171. ^ Spicer, Kevin P.; Carter-Chand, Rebecca (15 January 2022). Religion, Ethnonationalism, and Antisemitism in the Era of the Two World Wars. McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. p. 84. ISBN 978-0-2280-1020-3.
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