E. Christian Kopff

Julius Evola (1898-1974) was an important Italian intellectual, though he despised this term intensely. As poet and painter, he was the major Italian representative of Dadaism (1916-1922). Later he became the leading Italian exponent of Integral Traditionalism or Perennialism, the intellectually challenging esotericism of René Guénon (1886-1951). Evola enjoyed an international reputation for books on eastern religious traditions that won the respect of scholars such as Mircea Eliade and Giuseppe Tucci. His 1943 book on early Buddhism, The Doctrine of Awakening, was translated in 1951. It was more than a generation before a second translation appeared, in 1983, when Ienner Traditions published 1958’s The Metaphysics of Sex, reprinted as Eros and the Mysteries of Love in 1992, the same year it published his 1949 book on Tantra, The Yoga of Power. The marketing appeal of books about sex is obvious, but these works are serious studies, not sex manuals. In 1995 Inner Traditions reprinted The Doctrine of Awakening and began publishing translations of his other books, including Revolt against the Modern World, his fullest account of the World of Tradition, which he opposed to the degenerate modern world.

In Europe, Evola is also known as a brilliant and incisive right-wing thinker. His books, New Age and political, were translated into French under the aegis of Alain de Benoist, leader of the French Nouvelle Droite. His books and articles have appeared in German since the 1930s. Translations into English continue to appear. Italian New Age publisher Edizioni Mediterranee keeps his books in print and has republished some with good texts and new introductions. Evola never belonged to a political party or held a political or academic post, but 25 years after his death his books are available in Italian, French, German, and English.