Author. Arthur Machen is the author of The Novel of the Black Seal, which was included in The Hastur Cycle as a precursor to The Whisperer in Darkness. He also wrote the non-mythos tales The Rose Garden and The White People.
His first major success was The Great God Pan, the first edition of which featured cover art by Aubrey Beardsley.
Machen was a keen student and proponent of mystical belief and developed a deep interest in legends, such as those of King Arthur and of the Holy Grail.
Following the death of his first wife and a subsequent spiritual crisis, he was persuaded by his close friend A.E. Waite to join, for a time, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (see also). Machen also took up acting, his first wife having had a passion for the theatre.