Few lives have taken such radical turns as Annie Besant's. Wife of an Anglican clergyman, then a militant atheist and freethought activist, a Fabian socialist and trade-union organiser, she finally became the world leader of the Theosophical Society and a protagonist in the struggle for Indian self-government. Every phase of her life was lived with the same intensity, and it is hard to understand early twentieth-century esotericism without knowing her.
Youth and religious crisis
Annie Wood was born in London in 1847 into a middle-class family of Irish descent. She received a deeply religious upbringing and in 1867 married the Anglican clergyman Frank Besant. The marriage was unhappy, and in the same years Annie went through a severe crisis of faith: she could no longer accept certain dogmas of Christianity. In 1873 she separated from her husband, who later obtained custody of their daughter.
Freethought and social reform
In London Besant joined the National Secular Society and became a collaborator of Charles Bradlaugh, the best-known figure of British freethought. She was an extraordinary speaker and a forceful writer.
In 1877 Besant and Bradlaugh republished an American pamphlet giving information on birth control. They were tried for obscenity and convicted, but the verdict was quashed on appeal on a technicality. The trial made her famous and cost her custody of her daughter.
In the 1880s she moved towards socialism and joined the Fabian Society, alongside George Bernard Shaw. In 1888 she supported the strike of the women workers at the Bryant & May match factory in London, who denounced harsh working conditions and exposure to white phosphorus: the strike won improvements and became a symbol of the labour movement.
The meeting with Blavatsky
In 1889 the journalist William Thomas Stead asked her to review The Secret Doctrine, Helena Blavatsky's great work. Reading it struck her deeply: she found in it a vision of the universe that answered the questions materialism had left open. Soon afterwards she met Blavatsky and joined the Theosophical Society, breaking with many of her old freethought comrades.
After Blavatsky's death in 1891, Besant became one of the most authoritative figures in the movement. In 1893 she went to India for the first time, and she settled and lived there for the rest of her life.
India and the presidency
In India Besant devoted herself to education and to promoting Hindu culture. In 1898 she founded the Central Hindu College in Benares, which would become the nucleus of Banaras Hindu University. In 1907, on the death of co-founder Henry Steel Olcott, she was elected president of the Theosophical Society, headquartered at Adyar, near Madras, a post she held until her death.
She wrote many books, some in collaboration with Charles Webster Leadbeater:
| Work | Year | Content |
|---|---|---|
| Esoteric Christianity | 1901 | A Theosophical reading of the Christian mysteries |
| Thought-Forms | 1901 | With Leadbeater: description and illustration of the "forms" produced by thoughts |
| Occult Chemistry | 1908 | With Leadbeater: alleged clairvoyant observations of atoms |
Krishnamurti and the Star
In 1909, on the beach at Adyar, Leadbeater noticed an Indian boy, Jiddu Krishnamurti, and identified him as the future vehicle of the "World Teacher". Besant became his legal guardian, and in 1911 the Order of the Star in the East was founded to prepare for his coming. This choice led to the secession of the German section led by Rudolf Steiner.
In 1929 Krishnamurti publicly dissolved the Order, declaring that "truth is a pathless land" and that no organisation could lead people to it. For Besant it was a very hard blow, although she maintained an affectionate relationship with him.
The struggle for India
Besant was also active in politics. In 1916 she founded the Home Rule League, which demanded self-government for India within the British Empire. In 1917 the colonial authorities interned her for some months; the same year she was elected president of the Indian National Congress. Later the independence movement took different paths, led by Gandhi, and her political role diminished. She died at Adyar in 1933.
An assessment
Annie Besant was a courageous reformer and an important figure in the history of women's rights, labour and India. As a Theosophist, however, she must be read critically: the "clairvoyant observations" of the books written with Leadbeater have no verifiable scientific value, and her trust in Leadbeater, about whom serious allegations concerning his conduct circulated, was strongly contested even by contemporaries. What remains is the portrait of a woman who always sought, along different paths, an idea of universal brotherhood.
In short
- Annie Besant (1847-1933) was a freethought activist, Fabian socialist and trade unionist before becoming a Theosophist.
- In 1889 she met Blavatsky, and in 1907 she became president of the Theosophical Society at Adyar.
- With Leadbeater she promoted the young Krishnamurti, who dissolved the Order of the Star in 1929.
- She founded the Home Rule League and in 1917 presided over the Indian National Congress.
