A review by Matt McCabe of The Druid’s Primer by Luke Eastwood
Moon books ISBN 978-1-84694-764-3.
Starting out along the Druid path can offer retail opportunities galore: ‘should I get a Jedi robe?’ ‘do I need a golden sickle?’ In the business of the ‘new age’ everyone’s trying to sell you something, now that you’re a Druid. So just what do you need? Well, if you’d like a bit of ancient authenticity to your druidry, then this book is for you. It does exactly what it says on the tin! It’s a ‘primer’, arm yourself with the knowledge here and save a lot of time and money, and inspire yourself to journey off onto various tangents, thanks to the excellent source references.
A Druid himself, being co-founder of the Irish Druid Network, Luke has attempted to condense the vast wealth of genuinely ancient Druidic source material into one useful handbook. Inspired by the medieval Irish Scholar’s Primer, the book is the product of 15 years’ research into Druidic texts, and an examination of the mostrecent translations to emerge into the public domain. The book, therefore, is heavily favoured by the Irish perspective which adds to its uniqueness.
As a measure of its credibility, Luke’s work is endorsed by Caitlin Matthews and John Michael Greer, and has a foreword by Philip Carr-Gomm. There are some frustrations, such as no Scottish Islands’ Cailleach riding on the back of the cold north winds, stripping the last of the leaves from the trees; and Luke has a tendency to keep modestly interjecting himself into the material,which I felt he didn’t have to do. But these are minor gripes as I found this book got better and
better, and I got more out of it the further I read which after 20+ years in druidry was a real joy. I recommend this book to anyone starting out, and to anyone who feels part of Druidry’s long and ancient journey.