PROCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH - 1891-92, Volume 7
Book Details + Condition: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner and Co. (London). First Edition, 1892. Hardcover. 442 pages, with Index to rear. Illustrated. Scarce first edition, original copy of PROCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY OF PSYCHICAL RESEARCH from 1891-92. Publisher's original green cloth boards with gilt title, etc. to spine. Firm binding; lightly rubbed corners and edges; some foxing to front & rear endpapers; text is clean and free of markings.
In 1891, Alfred Russel Wallace requested for the Society to properly investigate spirit photography. Eleanor Sidgwick responded with a critical paper in the SPR which cast doubt on the subject, and discussed the fraudulent methods that spirit photographers such as Edouard Isidore Buguet, Frederic Hudson and William H. Mumler had utilized. More contents of this volume include: Experiments in Automatic Writing; Evidence for Clairvoyance; Hypnotism; Telekinesis; and much more. Notable authors include Oliver Lodge, F.W.H. Myers, and others. Please see our other listings for more first editions of THE SOCIETY OF PSYCHICAL RESEARCH, as well as information about the organization below.
The Society for Psychical Research was created in 1882, with Henry Sidgwick serving as its first president. Its stated purpose was to apply scientific methods to the investigation of psychic phenomena and the paranormal. Areas of study included hypnotism, dissociation, thought-transference, mediumship, spirit possession, apparitions and haunted houses and the physical phenomena associated with séances. The SPR were the first to introduce a number of neologisms which have entered the English language, such as 'telepathy', which was coined by Frederic Myers. Much of the early work involved investigating, exposing and in some cases duplicating fake phenomena. Among its most renowned members were Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Harry Price, and William T. Stead.
