Summoned to the Seance
Spirit Tales From Beyond The Veil -Edited by Emily Vincent
It not really clear if there is such a genre as 'Seance Fiction', distinct from Ghost Stories or Weird / Horror Tales. A common theme would be a seance with a medium, or perhaps someone using a planchette to make a deliberate attempt to contact the Dead. But even then not all the writings on offer here meet the definition.
This collection includes work by the famous;Charles Dickens, Arthur Conan Doyle, H.G.Wells and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Also by the forgotten, Lettice Galbraith, Florence Marryat, Emma Frances Dawson. There is a gender balance amongst those selected. Emily Vincent's Introduction is extremely informative and probably could have been longer. I would like to have read more concerning how the above selections were made. Were they chosen for literary merit or historical interest?
Ms Vincent offers some insight via her Introduction and pieces explaining the background to each individual tale. Considering how Spiritualism emerged from the spirit rapping of the Fox Sisters in 1848 through to the post World War 1 mass grieving, with the bereaved trying to find solace by being in touch with the other world. Ms Vincent mentions how scientists such as Sir Oliver Lodge and William Crookes were Spiritualists.Also there is a mention of how women could be mediums. It would be great to read her views concerning how Spiritualism connected to radicalism, and to the emergence of interest in Eastern mysticism. Also looking at the class background of Spiritualism- was the movement some sort of 'alternative religion' to the existing churches?
It's not a surprise to have Dickens included with Well Adjusted Rappings (1858). After all Dickens's A Christmas Carol is perhaps the most famous ghost story in the English language. And his short story The Signalman has become a major text for modern day Hauntology . Well Adjusted Rappings explores the banality of so much alleged contact with spirits, and is jolly funny. An extract from Robert Browning's Mr Sludge,(1864) a savage attack on the most controversial medium of the era, Daniel Dunglass Home, is slightly off-kilter. Home is the one medium nobody so far has managed to bust.The 'paranormal' events he generated via his trance workings have not been sufficiently explained. H.G.Wells contribution even references Mr Sludge in the chapter from Love and Mr. Lewisham (1899). As H G Wells had the dubious honour of being allegedly contacted by a medium during a seance who assumed he was already dead, his piece is more on the sceptical side.
Lettice Galbraith's In the Séance Room (1893) and Seance (1940) by Olga. L. Rosmanith are quite pro-feminist tales of women out for revenge against abusive men via a Spiritualist channel. At first this reader was unsure about the inclusion of F.Scott Fitzgerald but his short story The I.O.U ( written in 1922 but only published in 2017) is humorous but also a ruthless exposure of a Spiritualist who attempts to exploit post -World War 1 grief. By contrast Katherine Drake's The Séance at Radley Manor : A Warning (1926), is a Christian depiction of Spiritualism as dangerous, leading to deception, misery and even insanity.
Probably the most unusual offering is Arthur Conan Doyle's Playing With Fire (1900). Conan Doyle was a late convert to Spiritualism. Playing with Fire seems to get very near to magical working, emphasising how thought can materialise into an actual form via a seance type setting. With quite alarming results. Strangely incomplete and inconclusive. The Light of Pentraginy (1897) by Elizabeth D'Espérance, is about a girl with second sight, set in a fishing village in Cornwall and is quite a charming though tragic story. Not a medium or seance in sight. But included as the author was a leading Spiritualist herself.
Overall, an important collection with a range of writings from the 1850's through to 1940. Not necessarily the greatest literature, but demonstrates how Spiritualism motivated or even inspired the writers of this era. Quite a demanding read at times but extremely worthwhile.
Links
British Library Publishing Tales of the Weird series
Other posts from this blog
The Mina Scarletti Mysteries A series of novels set in 1870's Brighton with plenty of seance and medium busting.
Other blogs from this writer
Instagram Mr bleak
I am trying to update news about this blog and other 19th century history on Bluesky : Do join me.
Michael Bully @bleakchesneywold.bsky.social
.jpg)
From Marck Satyr -much appreciated:
ReplyDelete"If the anthology, Summoned to the Séance, Spirit Tales from Beyond the Veil . Ed. Emily Vincent. British Library Publishing, 2024. wets the appetite for more séance themed weird tales, I can recommend Message for Margie (1964) by Flavia Richardson. This is one of several pen names used by author Christine Campbell Thomson (1897-1985) who published well received anthologies of short stories as well as factual works. Thomson was also an active occultist who knew & studied under the influential Dion Fortune (1890-1946). Thomsons actual understanding & experience of the Hermetic magickal world is well represented in her fictional output. She also published The Western Mystery Tradition (1968) & A Case for Reincarnation (1972) both as Christine Hartley, the later work is considered a key text in the Mystery Tradition of the West.
The introduction to this volume, indicates that it reiterates the received wisdom of secular sanitised academia regarding Spiritualism . Unquestionably , the British history of spiritualism spanning the previous century is polluted by fraud , self-deception , delusion and the naked exploitation and abuse of numberless grieving people. Their exposure and condemnation are unquestionably commendable.
This troubled history however muddies the water for those aspiring for a more neutral overview and seeking the signal in the noise of the debate. Any suggestion or other approach or perspective due to prevailing hegemony remains unconscionable.
The fashion of western academia identifies the foundations of the spiritualist movement signally from the Fox Sisters onward. The origins of Spiritualism extended border and further back, as something essentially analogous to the practice of spiritualism is represented in practically every culture from the Fang people of Africa to Japan’s Shintoism. Prevailing attitudes demand that we are uncritically “positive about other cultures” which effectively means in this case, that this aspect of the worlds cultural and historical narratives is simply ignored.
Those perhaps interested in a wider more inclusive perspective on spiritualism's cultural roots , may wish to explore John Wesley (1703-1791) recorded experience of unaccountable rapping and knocking noises , and his attempts to establish communication with their invisible progenitor , through the coded raps of two for “yes” and one for “no”. The account of the Witch of Endor in The Tanakh or Hebrew scripture or Homers (born. C 8th Cent B.C.) The Odyssey (c.7th Cent B.C.) may proffer fertile soil.
Harry Houdini (1874-1926) an infrangible exposer of humbugs, remains on written account that “he did not doubt the possibility of communication between the living and the departed dead” but was “sceptical of the claims of physical mediumship”. This will come as a significant surprise to many, and why Houdini’s words on this aspect of the topic remain so under reported I leave the present reader to decide.I feel it is important to add, even if any of the above points have merit , it does not necessarily prove the ultimate credibility or not of spiritualism. This is principally an appeal for a broader and culturally imaginative perspective”.