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Manly Hall Society https://invidious.slipfox.xyz/watch?v=AIPkqh992R4
For the first time, Manly Hall's 1959 lecture on the book, Etidorpha, can now be heard. This newly re-mastered audio recording was digitized directly from the original 1/4" magnetic analog audio tape.
"'Etidorhpa: The End of Earth' - The Strangest of all Esoteric Novels" was spoken on Wednesday night, December 9th, 1955 at the Philosophical Research Society. The lecture was accompanied with slides of images from the book, drawn by illustrator J. Agustus Knapp, the artist of the color panels in Manly Hall's magnum opus, 'The Secret Teachings of All Ages'.
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Etidorhpa is a strange tale of a journey to the middle and even the end of the earth, which symbolically represents a personal journey into the underworld of our own inner lives.
MPH 591219 Etidorhpa | The End of Earth
©2023 Manly Hall Society
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Etidorhpa, or, the end of the earth: the strange history of a mysterious being and the account of a remarkable journey is the title of a scientific allegory or science fiction novel by John Uri Lloyd, a pharmacognocist and pharmaceutical manufacturer of Cincinnati, Ohio.[1] Etidorhpa was published in 1895.
The word "Etidorhpa" is the backward spelling of the name "Aphrodite." The first editions of Etidorhpa were distributed privately; later editions of the book feature numerous fanciful illustrations by John Augustus Knapp. Eventually a popular success, the book had eighteen editions and was translated into seven languages.[2] Etidorhpa literary clubs were founded in the United States, and some parents named their infant daughters Etidorhpa.[3]
Concept
The book purports to be a manuscript dictated by a strange being named I-Am-The-Man to a man named Llewyllyn Drury. Drury's adventure culminates in a trek through a cave in Kentucky into the core of the earth. Ideas presented in Etidorhpa include practical alchemy, secret Masonic orders, the Hollow Earth theory, and the concept of transcending the physical realm.
Following a framing device, the book's first chapter begins the story of how Drury met the mysterious I-Am-The-Man, who reads his own manuscript account of his adventures to Drury over many sessions. The mysterious stranger, also known as The-Man-Who-Did-It, relates events that supposedly occurred thirty years earlier, during the early part of the 19th century.
By his account, the speaker is kidnapped by fellow members of a secret society, because he is suspected to be a threat to their secrecy. (This was likely based on the 1826 kidnapping of William Morgan and the start of the Anti-Masonry movement.) I-Am-The-Man is taken to a cave in Kentucky; there he is led by a cavern dweller on a long subterranean journey. It becomes an inner journey of the spirit as much as a geographical trip through underground realms. The book blends passages on the nature of physical phenomena, such as gravity and volcanoes, with spiritualist speculation and adventure-story elements (like traversing a landscape of giant mushrooms). The whole ends with a summary from I-Am-The-Man and a conclusion from Drury. Subsequent editions of the book added various prefatory and supplementary materials.
https://archive.org/details/etidorhpaorend00lloy
