Long before witchcraft became a cultural curiosity or a staple of mass-market mysticism, one man dared to step out of the shadows and declare himself a practicing witch: Gerald Brousseau Gardner. In this unexpected biographical study – published under Idries Shah’s name for the first time – Witch explores the life of the man who reintroduced witchcraft to the modern West. Born into a well-heeled but unconventional Liverpool family, Gardner’s early years were shaped by chronic illness, a globe-trotting Irish nursemaid, and a parade of exotic landscapes – from the windswept shores of Madeira to the dense jungles of Borneo and Ceylon. These formative experiences set the stage for a life driven by spellbinding curiosity, independence, and a quest for secretive knowledge. Gardner emerges as a figure that is both eccentric and visionary: a scholar of weapons and folklore, a rubber planter and amateur anthropologist and, the founder of the modern Wicca movement. Through a tapestry of travelogue, personal recollection, and investigative reportage, Shah reveals how Gardner’s encounters with Eastern religions, indigenous rituals, and esoteric societies culminated in his initiation into the Witch cult. At a time when spiritual longing and scientific scepticism were increasingly at odds, Gardner’s bold assertion that witchcraft was a surviving pre-Christian nature religion – and a force for personal transformation – provoked admiration, controversy, and derision. Drawing on candid interviews, little-known materials, and first-hand observation, Witch offers both an intimate portrait of Gardner and a compelling commentary on taboo, belief, and the construction of modern magical identity. Shah writes not as a disciple or a cynic, but as a cultural explorer, following Gardner through séances and sword collections, through rituals in candle-lit chambers, and through the streets of Colombo and Castletown alike. Biography, travel narrative, and anthropological enquiry, Witch remains the most insightful and humanising account of the extraordinary figure responsible for Wicca, a man credited with altering the landscape of Western spiritual thought. Reissued in this definitive edition, Witch invites readers to journey with Idries Shah into the life of the twentieth century’s most enigmatic occultist – and to consider anew what it means to be committed to a life of Wicca.