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One evening in May 1853, about twenty people gathered at the home of M. Delamarre , a Parisian banker, to witness an exciting and mysterious new phenomenon . Forming a chain, hands resting on a table, the participants waited patiently for unprovoked movements of the table or sounds of rapping to occur.1 The Parisians had discovered a new game: turning tables. In many salons that season, evenings would be spent in a similar manner, waiting for tables to turn of their own accord. The craze, which had already entranced Great Britain and Germany, arrived in France at the end of April that year. Contemporaries talked of a frenzy, an epidemic sweeping Europe. Newspapers and magazines began to feature accounts of séances. Pamphlets were quickly put together to explain how to produce the phenomenon to those interested. In just a few weeks, turning tables had managed to capture the attention of the whole country. Some authors warned participants against the dangers to a susceptible public of such a futile activity, but for most, table turning was simply an entertaining way to pass an evening. By June, however, the tables had mostly stopped turning. The press ceased to report on their supposed marvels. The French, it seemed, had lost interest in a game that, if amusing, was limited in its scope. But not everyone abandoned this latest pastime. Over the next few months, as the turning tables continued to fascinate a more limited audience, the practice began to mutate. By the end of 1853, what had initially seemed like mere parlor tricks was evolving into a full-fledged pursuit of the supernatural: the séance. The press began to report on this less popular but more complicated trend. At a typical séance, a group of fewer than a dozen people would gather around a wooden table where, connected by their c h a p t e r o n e From Turning Tables to Spiritism ji 8 i n v e s t i g a t i n g t h e s u p e r n a t u r a l fingers, they would form a chain. Hidden behind two thick curtains, the medium would leave only her or his hands visible on the table. The participants would then patiently wait in the dark, sometimes talking or singing quietly. At a successful séance, the table would at some point begin to oscillate and raise itself to one side before returning to the floor—this signaled that the spirit had arrived and could now be questioned. Reciting the alphabet, participants would wait for the spirit to spell out its revelations through rappings emanating from the table to indicate a particular letter. This method of communication was cumbersome, however, and often the medium would enter a trance, supposedly letting the spirit take control of his or her arm, take pen and paper, and frantically write out a communication . A still more efficient method of communication was for the spirit to enter the medium’s body and directly talk to the audience. On occasion, a spirit might also materialize itself, touch some of the participants, and even leave imprints of a hand or a foot in mastic prepared beforehand. Many more phenomena could be witnessed at a séance. Some mediums claimed to predict the future or be able to reveal secrets to their audiences. Others levitated or provoked musical instruments to play, objects to move, or flowers to materialize out of thin air and rain down upon the astonished participants. Whatever their particular specialty, gifted mediums were certain to provide a good show. Journalists, scientists, and religious thinkers alike became preoccupied with the new phenomena. What lay behind them? Various theories were proposed: some said it was the work of clever con artists; that it was trickery and fraud. Others thought that mediums had mysterious abilities waiting to be uncovered and understood . For others still, divine or demonic forces were at work. From the first mentions of turning tables, a few scientists provided somewhat dismissive explanations for the phenomena they had either heard about or witnessed firsthand. Later on, as parlor games turned into séances and spirits began to manifest themselves and provide what appeared to be tangible proofs of their existence, scientific explanations had to be adapted or changed. In 1857, using the pseudonym “Allan Kardec,” a mathematics teacher from Lyon wrote a book titled Le livre des esprits, which introduced his doctrine of...

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