This edition provides an insight into the dark areas between Victorian science, medicine and religion. The rare reset source material in this collection is organized thematically and spans the period from initial mesmeric experiments at the beginning of the nineteenth century to the decline of the Society for Psychical Research in the 1920s.

This edition provides an insight into the dark areas between Victorian science, medicine and religion. The rare reset source material in this collection is organized thematically and spans the period from initial mesmeric experiments at the beginning of the nineteenth century to the decline of the Society for Psychical Research in the 1920s.

This edition provides an insight into the dark areas between Victorian science, medicine and religion. The rare reset source material in this collection is organized thematically and spans the period from initial mesmeric experiments at the beginning of the nineteenth century to the decline of the Society for Psychical Research in the 1920s.

This edition provides an insight into the dark areas between Victorian science, medicine and religion. The rare reset source material in this collection is organized thematically and spans the period from initial mesmeric experiments at the beginning of the nineteenth century to the decline of the Society for Psychical Research in the 1920s.

This edition provides an insight into the dark areas between Victorian science, medicine and religion. The rare reset source material in this collection is organized thematically and spans the period from initial mesmeric experiments at the beginning of the nineteenth century to the decline of the Society for Psychical Research in the 1920s.

This book explores how nineteenth-century science stimulated the emergence of weird tales at the fin de siècle, and examines weird fiction by British writers who preceded and influenced H. P. Lovecraft, the most famous author of weird fiction. From laboratory experiments, thermodynamics, and Darwinian evolutionary theory to psychology, Theosophy, and the ‘new’ physics of atoms and forces, science illuminated supernatural realms with rational theories and practices. Changing scientific philosophies and questioning of traditional positivism produced new ways of knowing the world—fertile borderlands for fictional as well as real-world scientists to explore. Reading Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) as an inaugural weird tale, the author goes on to analyse stories by Arthur Machen, Edith Nesbit, H. G. Wells, William Hope Hodgson, E. and H. Heron, and Algernon Blackwood to show how this radical fantasy mode can be scientific, and how sciences themselves were often already weird.

"Provides an important insight into the dark areas between science, medicine and religion in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Scientific principles were commonly used during this period in an attempt to prove the existence of the supernatural. It was this emphasis on proof rather than faith that led to the emergence of psychical research as a discipline. Investigation reflected the popular desire to account for events such as ghost-sightings, telepathy and second-sight, as well as seeking to provide a better understanding of human psychology and proof of the soul. Observation, credibility and accumulation of evidence were seen as key to legitimizing the supernatural as an area for scientific debate and for challenging its many sceptics. This created a lively public sphere for debates, reports, narratives and a rich documentary culture. This five-volume collection is organized thematically and spans the period from initial mesmeric experiments to the decline of the Society for Psychical Research in the 1920s. It includes a wide range of rare source material which illustrates the variety of different debates and opposing viewpoints, while a full editorial apparatus allows a nuanced reading of the texts. The set is a significant addition to the growing research on spiritualism and will be of interest to scholars of the history of science and medicine, parapsychology and Victorian studies." -- Blackwells.

This edition provides an important insight into the dark areas between science, medicine and religion in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Scientific principles were commonly used during this period in an attempt to prove the existence of the supernatural. It was this emphasis on proof rather than faith that led to the emergence of psychical research as a discipline.Investigation reflected the popular desire to account for events such as ghost-sightings, telepathy and second-sight, as well as seeking to provide a better understanding of human psychology and proof of the soul. Observation, credibility and accumulation of evidence were seen as key to legitimizing the supernatural as an area for scientific debate and for challenging its many sceptics. This created a lively public sphere for debates, reports, narratives and a rich documentary culture.This five-volume collection is organized thematically and spans the period from initial mesmeric experiments to the decline of the Society for Psychical Research in the 1920s. It includes a wide range of rare source material which illustrates the variety of different debates and opposing viewpoints, while a full editorial apparatus allows a nuanced reading of the texts. The set is a significant addition to the growing research on spiritualism and will be of interest to scholars of the history of science and medicine, parapsychology and Victorian studies.