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78 Articles

DREAMING THE FUTURE We’ve reported previously on a couple of attempts to record and map people’s dreams during the Covid-19 pandemic (FT397:8-9, 402:6), including Susan Wardell’s CoviDreams project in New Zealand and the Guardians of Sleep project at Western University in Canada. These projects, though, merely “collected” dreams on the basis that the anxieties generated by the pandemic and the supposed changes to sleep patterns caused by lockdowns might throw up some vivid and interesting examples worth saving for posterity. In the light of this month’s pair of features about the possibility of catching glimpses of the future, we can’t help but wonder whether any of the world’s 7.9 billion dreamers received early warnings of the Covid crisis while sound asleep, and whether any such dreams were recorded in advance of the…

EDITORIAL CAPUCINE DESLOUIS DREAMING THE FUTURE We’ve reported previously on a couple of attempts to record and map people’s dreams during the Covid-19 pandemic (FT397:8-9, 402:6), including Susan Wardell’s CoviDreams project in New Zealand and the Guardians of Sleep project at Western University in Canada. These projects, though, merely “collected” dreams on the basis that the anxieties generated by the pandemic and the supposed changes to sleep patterns caused by lockdowns might throw up some vivid and interesting examples worth saving for posterity. In the light of this month’s pair of features about the possibility of catching glimpses of the future, we can’t help but wonder whether any of the world’s 7.9 billion dreamers received early warnings of the Covid crisis while sound asleep, and whether any such dreams were…

A FISH FALL IN EAST TEXAS

As 2021 drew to a close, nature had one final surprise for residents of Texarkana, a city straddling the Texas/Arkansas border – a rain of fish, falling in a wide area across the town. Tim Brigham, who manages a tyre warehouse on Summerhill Road in Texarkana, said that on the afternoon of 29 December, “It was hailing and looked like there was about to be a tornado, and there were fish falling.” He estimated that 25 to 30 fish, each several inches long, had fallen around the warehouse, and that at least that number had fallen on a vacant lot adjacent to the premises. He had to get an employee to clear them up and pile them behind the building so customers wouldn’t slip on them. A reporter from the…

A FISH FALL IN EAST TEXAS

A FISH FALL IN EAST TEXAS

A DIGEST OF THE WORLDWIDE WEIRD STRANGE DAYS A FISH FALL IN EAST TEXAS The city of Texarkana receives a fishy New Year surprise As 2021 drew to a close, nature had one final surprise for residents of Texarkana, a city straddling the Texas/Arkansas border – a rain of fish, falling in a wide area across the town. Tim Brigham, who manages a tyre warehouse on Summerhill Road in Texarkana, said that on the afternoon of 29 December, “It was hailing and looked like there was about to be a tornado, and there were fish falling.” He estimated that 25 to 30 fish, each several inches long, had fallen around the warehouse, and that at least that number had fallen on a vacant lot adjacent to the premises. He had to…

A FISH FALL IN EAST TEXAS

SCOTTISH WITCHES TO GET APOLOGY

After a two-year campaign, the pressure group Witches of Scotland is on course to win pardons and official apologies for the estimated 3,387 people who were tried as witches in Scotland between the 16th and 18th centuries. The Scottish witch panic started in 1563 with the Witchcraft Act, and lasted until 1736, when the Act was finally repealed. During that period there were five “great Scottish witch-hunts” that saw two-thirds of those accused, mostly women, executed by strangling, after which their bodies were burned at the stake. This rate of conviction made the Scottish witch hunts among the worst in Europe. “Per capita, during the period between the 16th and 18th century, we executed five times as many people as elsewhere in Europe, the vast majority of them women,” said Claire…

SCOTTISH WITCHES TO GET APOLOGY

SCOTTISH WITCHES TO GET APOLOGY

SCOTTISH WITCHES TO GET APOLOGY Campaign may see pardons for those tried as witches in Scotland’s past FOTOTECA GILARDI / GETTY IMAGES After a two-year campaign, the pressure group Witches of Scotland is on course to win pardons and official apologies for the estimated 3,387 people who were tried as witches in Scotland between the 16th and 18th centuries. The Scottish witch panic started in 1563 with the Witchcraft Act, and lasted until 1736, when the Act was finally repealed. During that period there were five “great Scottish witch-hunts” that saw two-thirds of those accused, mostly women, executed by strangling, after which their bodies were burned at the stake. This rate of conviction made the Scottish witch hunts among the worst in Europe. “Per capita, during the period between the…

SCOTTISH WITCHES TO GET APOLOGY

CANNIBALS IN COURT

IN BITS IN BERLIN A Berlin court has sentenced an ex-teacher to life in prison for murdering a man he met on an online dating site. Stefan R, a 41-year-old maths teacher, was accused of killing Stefan Trogisch, a 43-year-old power line technician he met on a dating site. Shortly after meeting the man, he killed him, chopped up his body, then ate parts of it “for sexual gratification” before distributing the rest of his remains around different parts of Berlin. After weeks of searching for the missing man, a dog walker found a femur in a forest to the north of the city, with more bones being found by police two weeks later in a Pankow park, near Stefan R’s flat. Police said that one bone was “totally devoid of flesh”…

CANNIBALS IN COURT

STRANGE DAYS SIDELINES… PERSONAL SERVICES Teenage dog walking entrepreneur Lucy Hignett, 19, got a rather different response than she expected when she placed an ad for her services in the local parish magazine. A typo substituted an “N” for the “L” in “dog walking” and as a result she was inundated with “disgusting messages.” A print worker at the magazine said, “No one did it maliciously.” Sun, 3 Mar 2020. HEARTLESS HERO When Argentine football deity Diego Maradona died in 2020, he was apparently buried without his heart according to a book written by a doctor, Nelson Castro. The heart was removed to foil a plot by fans of his final team, Gimnasiay Esgrima La Plata, to dig up his grave and steal it. vice.com, 24 Nov 2021. FACEBOOK OF…

CANNIBALS IN COURT

STRANGE DAYS CANNIBALS IN COURT People-eaters on trial in Germany, Russia & Poland ODD ANDERSEN / AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES IN BITS IN BERLIN A Berlin court has sentenced an ex-teacher to life in prison for murdering a man he met on an online dating site. Stefan R, a 41-year-old maths teacher, was accused of killing Stefan Trogisch, a 43-year-old power line technician he met on a dating site. Shortly after meeting the man, he killed him, chopped up his body, then ate parts of it “for sexual gratification” before distributing the rest of his remains around different parts of Berlin. After weeks of searching for the missing man, a dog walker found a femur in a forest to the north of the city, with more bones being found by…

CANNIBALS IN COURT

PERSONAL SERVICES Teenage dog walking entrepreneur Lucy Hignett, 19, got a rather different response than she expected when she placed an ad for her services in the local parish magazine. A typo substituted an “N” for the “L” in “dog walking” and as a result she was inundated with “disgusting messages.” A print worker at the magazine said, “No one did it maliciously.” Sun, 3 Mar 2020. HEARTLESS HERO When Argentine football deity Diego Maradona died in 2020, he was apparently buried without his heart according to a book written by a doctor, Nelson Castro. The heart was removed to foil a plot by fans of his final team, Gimnasiay Esgrima La Plata, to dig up his grave and steal it. vice.com, 24 Nov 2021. FACEBOOK OF THE DEAD In October Facebook revealed that it…

WEIRD STAR Something towards the centre of the Milky Way is intermittently blasting out radio waves, seemingly at random, but what it might be is far from clear. Nicknamed “Andy’s Object” – after Ziteng “Andy” Wang, the astronomer at the University of Sydney, Australia, who discovered the phenomenon – it seems to emit radio waves for a few weeks, then stops for a time before waking up for another burst. Wang and his colleagues recorded six periods of emissions during 2020, ranging from several weeks to less than a day, so they arranged to have some of the most powerful non-radio telescopes point at it to get a better idea of what was generating them. Absolutely nothing could be detected except for the radio waves. “We’ve looked at every other wavelength…

STRANGE DAYS WAVES AND HUMS Mysterious radio waves from space and a Yorkshire drone SEBASTIAN ZENTILOMO / UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY WEIRD STAR Something towards the centre of the Milky Way is intermittently blasting out radio waves, seemingly at random, but what it might be is far from clear. Nicknamed “Andy’s Object” – after Ziteng “Andy” Wang, the astronomer at the University of Sydney, Australia, who discovered the phenomenon – it seems to emit radio waves for a few weeks, then stops for a time before waking up for another burst. Wang and his colleagues recorded six periods of emissions during 2020, ranging from several weeks to less than a day, so they arranged to have some of the most powerful non-radio telescopes point at it to get a better idea…

ANCIENT GIANT TREES

While some of the more outré recent conspiratorial ideas are clearly taken as tongue-in-cheek by the majority of those who claim to espouse them (e.g. “Birds Aren’t Real”, FT409:12), the new wave of Flat Earthers (FT281:16, 338:20-21, 368:12, 372:25, 393:42-45) continue to be bafflingly earnest, despite the complete lack of evidence for their pet theory. Now, it seems, they are enthusiastically adding a new layer of complexity to their claims – the idea that there are “no forests on Flat Earth” and that what we believe are trees are, in fact, 100ft (30m) high bushes. While the idea has been simmering for a few years, it has received a new impetus recently as a result of the 2016 video that originally expounded the idea going viral (bit.ly/3GHsF5L). Created by a Crimean…

ANCIENT GIANT TREES

ANCIENT GIANT TREES

STRANGE DAYS ANCIENT GIANT TREES Weird arboreal theory takes Flat Eathers’ fancy While some of the more outré recent conspiratorial ideas are clearly taken as tongue-in-cheek by the majority of those who claim to espouse them (e.g. “Birds Aren’t Real”, FT409:12), the new wave of Flat Earthers (FT281:16, 338:20-21, 368:12, 372:25, 393:42-45) continue to be bafflingly earnest, despite the complete lack of evidence for their pet theory. Now, it seems, they are enthusiastically adding a new layer of complexity to their claims – the idea that there are “no forests on Flat Earth” and that what we believe are trees are, in fact, 100ft (30m) high bushes. While the idea has been simmering for a few years, it has received a new impetus recently as a result of the 2016…

ANCIENT GIANT TREES

FECKLESS FELONS

MATT HANCOCK: BOMB CLOWN Air traffic out of Las Vegas airport was disrupted on 8 December last year after a man drove a limousine through the gate of a private air carrier, crashed through the airport’s security barriers, and did wheel spins on an aircraft ramp. He then drove across the tarmac and stopped near some parked planes where he got out of the limo, donned a clown mask and shouted at security that he had a bomb and was going to detonate it, before driving away again. Intercepted by police, the driver was arrested and identified as Matt Hancock, 36, a professional limo driver (pictured at right, and not the UK’s former Health Secretary). He was found to have a shotgun and a “gasoline device” in his car as well…

FECKLESS FELONS

FECKLESS FELONS

STRANGE DAYS FECKLESS FELONS More cautionary tales from the annals of inept crime MATT HANCOCK: BOMB CLOWN Air traffic out of Las Vegas airport was disrupted on 8 December last year after a man drove a limousine through the gate of a private air carrier, crashed through the airport’s security barriers, and did wheel spins on an aircraft ramp. He then drove across the tarmac and stopped near some parked planes where he got out of the limo, donned a clown mask and shouted at security that he had a bomb and was going to detonate it, before driving away again. Intercepted by police, the driver was arrested and identified as Matt Hancock, 36, a professional limo driver (pictured at right, and not the UK’s former Health Secretary). He was…

FECKLESS FELONS

A MONTHLY EXCAVATION OF ODDITIES AND ANTIQUITIES A FABLED KINGDOM The Srivijaya empire was a fabled kingdom known in ancient times as the Island of Gold, a civilisation with untold wealth that explorers tried in vain to find long after its unexplained disappearance from history around the 14th century. The site of Srivijaya may finally have been found by local fishing crews carrying out night-time dives on the Musi River near Palembang on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. Their extraordinary catches are treasures ranging from a lifesize eighth-century Buddhist statue to jewels worthy of kings. “In the last five years, extraordinary stuff has been coming up,” said maritime archæologist Dr Sean Kingsley. “Coins of all periods, gold and Buddhist statues, gems, all the kinds of things that you might read about in Sinbad…

CLASSICAL CORNER

268: HOT TODDY (You’ll soon get this titular point) From time to time, I write memoirs about my old (Lincoln, 1948-56) School for the Old Boys’ (now girls too) annual Newsletter. Most recently was a survey of the nicknames bestowed on our masters. Some were, and remain, clear. For easy instance, the chemistry master was dubbed ‘The Baron’ for his imperious manner. The headmaster was the ‘GAFF’ simply via his initials GAF. Others, though, have dimmed with the passage of time. I now have absolutely no idea why two successive history masters were ‘Buster’ and ‘Ganymede’. Not to mention the appellation ‘Tinket Man’ given to the physics beak – makes him sound like a proto-Claudio Ranieri. One comment I received was from a current master at the school, observing that nowadays the habits of…

CLASSICAL CORNER

ARCHÆOLOGY PAUL SIEVEKING reports on a lost kingdom possibly found and Viking voyages to the New World A MONTHLY EXCAVATION OF ODDITIES AND ANTIQUITIES A FABLED KINGDOM The Srivijaya empire was a fabled kingdom known in ancient times as the Island of Gold, a civilisation with untold wealth that explorers tried in vain to find long after its unexplained disappearance from history around the 14th century. The site of Srivijaya may finally have been found by local fishing crews carrying out night-time dives on the Musi River near Palembang on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. Their extraordinary catches are treasures ranging from a lifesize eighth-century Buddhist statue to jewels worthy of kings. “In the last five years, extraordinary stuff has been coming up,” said maritime archæologist Dr Sean Kingsley. “Coins…

Saved by Holy Writ?

Stories of a soldier whose life is saved when a bullet aimed at his heart is stopped by a Bible in his pocket sound like pure folklore; but there are seemingly reliable accounts, some backed up by physical evidence of damaged Bibles and the projectiles they stopped. However, there is plenty of scope for doubt, and the truth turns out to be more complex than you might expect. Does a pistol beat apostles, or does the Bible beat ballistics? In short, can the Lord stop lead? The tale has been repeated so many times that it has become a meme, and if it crops up on the screen it is likely to be used for comedic effect. And some such stories really are folklore, journalistic invention or simple lies. For example, in 2014,…

Saved by Holy Writ?

CLASSICAL CORNER

CLASSICAL CORNER FORTEANA FROM THE ANCIENT WORLD COMPILED BY BARRY BALDWIN 268: HOT TODDY (You’ll soon get this titular point) From time to time, I write memoirs about my old (Lincoln, 1948-56) School for the Old Boys’ (now girls too) annual Newsletter. Most recently was a survey of the nicknames bestowed on our masters. Some were, and remain, clear. For easy instance, the chemistry master was dubbed ‘The Baron’ for his imperious manner. The headmaster was the ‘GAFF’ simply via his initials GAF. Others, though, have dimmed with the passage of time. I now have absolutely no idea why two successive history masters were ‘Buster’ and ‘Ganymede’. Not to mention the appellation ‘Tinket Man’ given to the physics beak – makes him sound like a proto-Claudio Ranieri. One comment I…

CLASSICAL CORNER

Saved by Holy Writ?

SCIENCE DAMNED DATA, NEW DISCOVERIES AND RADICAL RESEARCH Saved by Holy Writ? DAVID HAMBLING asks whether tales of bullet-stopping Bibles prove the saving power of the Gospel Stories of a soldier whose life is saved when a bullet aimed at his heart is stopped by a Bible in his pocket sound like pure folklore; but there are seemingly reliable accounts, some backed up by physical evidence of damaged Bibles and the projectiles they stopped. However, there is plenty of scope for doubt, and the truth turns out to be more complex than you might expect. Does a pistol beat apostles, or does the Bible beat ballistics? In short, can the Lord stop lead? The tale has been repeated so many times that it has become a meme, and if it crops…

Saved by Holy Writ?

EXORCIST BOY IDENTIFIED

THE ‘HAUNTED BOY’ UNMASKED It has long been known that William Friedkin’s 1973 film The Exorcist was based on an actual case, and that the child at the centre of it was not a girl, as portrayed by Linda Blair in the film, but a boy, although his identity had always been disguised under the pseudonym “Roland Doe”. Now, following his death of a stroke at 85, Skeptical Inquirer magazine has named the boy as Ronald Edwin Hunkeler. In 1949 at the age of 14, Hunkeler was exorcised in Cottage City, Maryland, and St Louis, Missouri, after experiencing paranormal phenomena that included hearing knocking and scratching sounds from behind his bedroom walls. The Hunkeler family contacted their family priest, the Rev Luther Schulze who, in a letter to the Parapsychology Laboratory at…

EXORCIST BOY IDENTIFIED

Haunted King’s Lynn

The west Norfolk coastal town of King’s Lynn is a place to go looking for ghosts in the bleakness of early new year. Centred around a hub of antique buildings, the older houses on its windswept streets are characterised by stylish crow-stepped roofs more reminiscent of Bruges than any other East Anglian scene. Established at a river mouth, it carries a sense of marginality during the winter months, bordering upon the great estuary basin known as the Wash, which empties out into the North Sea. To the south, east and west, King’s Lynn was once surrounded by treacherous marshlands and quaking fens now temporarily tamed by modern drainage, with the river links down to what were once the flourishing ports and islands of Littleport and Ely. These connections enabled trade with…

Haunted King’s Lynn

EXORCIST BOY IDENTIFIED

STRANGE DAYS EXORCIST BOY IDENTIFIED ‘Roland Doe’ revealed as Ronald Hunkeler, plus obeah man drives out duppies THE ‘HAUNTED BOY’ UNMASKED It has long been known that William Friedkin’s 1973 film The Exorcist was based on an actual case, and that the child at the centre of it was not a girl, as portrayed by Linda Blair in the film, but a boy, although his identity had always been disguised under the pseudonym “Roland Doe”. Now, following his death of a stroke at 85, Skeptical Inquirer magazine has named the boy as Ronald Edwin Hunkeler. In 1949 at the age of 14, Hunkeler was exorcised in Cottage City, Maryland, and St Louis, Missouri, after experiencing paranormal phenomena that included hearing knocking and scratching sounds from behind his bedroom walls. The…

EXORCIST BOY IDENTIFIED

Haunted King’s Lynn

GHOSTWATCH KEEPING AN EYE ON THE HAUNTED WORLD Haunted King’s Lynn ALAN MURDIE takes a tour of a Norfolk coastal town with much to offer the modern ghost hunter JIM LINWOOD / FLICKR The west Norfolk coastal town of King’s Lynn is a place to go looking for ghosts in the bleakness of early new year. Centred around a hub of antique buildings, the older houses on its windswept streets are characterised by stylish crow-stepped roofs more reminiscent of Bruges than any other East Anglian scene. Established at a river mouth, it carries a sense of marginality during the winter months, bordering upon the great estuary basin known as the Wash, which empties out into the North Sea. To the south, east and west, King’s Lynn was once surrounded by treacherous…

Haunted King’s Lynn

HIDDEN CHARMS 3

It was perhaps coincidental that, thanks to Covid-19, the Hidden Charms 3 took place at the third time of asking. Chester’s gothic St Mary’s Creative Space, a church converted for arts and other activities near the city’s castle, was the venue. The theme was the magical protection of buildings and related apotropaic topics, and followed conferences in Norwich (2016) and Salisbury (2018). Host Brian Hoggard had pulled together an impressive list of speakers to give a wide range of presentations on this particular component of the fortean spectrum, as well as tables for the Folklore Society (https://folklore-society.com) and Raking Light (https://rakinglight.co.uk/) Brian welcomed everyone and apologised for the lack of heating (!), a problem that was beyond his control. He then gave the initial talk about horse skulls and their use…

HIDDEN CHARMS 3

THE CONSPIRASPHERE

MONSTERED Regular readers of this column will have noticed that, generally, I have kept away from the Covid furore. Now, as governments, health bodies and culture warriors get ready to celebrate the second birthday of a bug, I’m going to dip a toe into the murky, conspiratorial waters that, while they sadly have not drowned the crisis, have certainly given a surprising number of folks wet feet. Doctor Anthony Fauci, the global superstar of all things Covid, has been in an ongoing spat with Senator Rand Paul pretty much from the beginning of the coronavirus crisis/conspiracy/circus. They have each accused the other of all manner of nastiness. Sen Paul recently suggested that the venerable Dr Fauci was responsible for the deaths of 800,000 Americans which, given that Paul has on numerous occasions…

THE CONSPIRASPHERE

HIDDEN CHARMS 3

STRANGE DAYS HIDDEN CHARMS 3 ROB GANDY reports from Chester on the return of the annual conference devoted to the magical protection of buildings It was perhaps coincidental that, thanks to Covid-19, the Hidden Charms 3 took place at the third time of asking. Chester’s gothic St Mary’s Creative Space, a church converted for arts and other activities near the city’s castle, was the venue. The theme was the magical protection of buildings and related apotropaic topics, and followed conferences in Norwich (2016) and Salisbury (2018). Host Brian Hoggard had pulled together an impressive list of speakers to give a wide range of presentations on this particular component of the fortean spectrum, as well as tables for the Folklore Society (https://folklore-society.com) and Raking Light (https://rakinglight.co.uk/) Brian welcomed everyone and apologised…

HIDDEN CHARMS 3

STRANGE TALES FROM JAMAICA

TROUBLE IN PARADISE A cult-like Christian ministry based in Jamaica was the focus of several deaths in October last year, two of which appear to have been human sacrifices. Following a tip-off from a member of the group, police stormed the headquarters of Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries on the night of Sunday 17 October. They believe that in doing so they prevented further bloodshed. They found 144 congregants, including several children, dressed in white. They had been fasting for two days in preparation for what they believed to be a great deluge, from which they hoped to be delivered by an ark, set to arrive at 9.30 on Monday morning. The group’s pastor, Dr Kevin O Smith, had warned his followers that those considered unclean should expect to have their blood…

STRANGE TALES FROM JAMAICA

THE CONSPIRASPHERE

THE CONSPIRASPHERE Covid dissent is more likely to get you cancelled than conspiracy theory these days, says NOEL ROONEY, who also finds the Devil in the detail of an energy drink can’s iconography… MONSTERED Regular readers of this column will have noticed that, generally, I have kept away from the Covid furore. Now, as governments, health bodies and culture warriors get ready to celebrate the second birthday of a bug, I’m going to dip a toe into the murky, conspiratorial waters that, while they sadly have not drowned the crisis, have certainly given a surprising number of folks wet feet. Doctor Anthony Fauci, the global superstar of all things Covid, has been in an ongoing spat with Senator Rand Paul pretty much from the beginning of the coronavirus crisis/conspiracy/circus. They…

THE CONSPIRASPHERE

STRANGE NEW BELIEFS

FERAL HUMANS As well as the notion that we are surrounded by the remains of ancient giant trees (see p9), other odd ideas have been gaining ground in some quarters. One such is the belief that there are significant numbers of feral people living secretly in America’s National Parks. Primarily spread via TikTok videos and Reddit posts, the assertion is that the country’s National Parks were not created to preserve areas of natural beauty, but to corral packs of subhuman cannibals that prey on visitors. These are either a race of human-like beings unknown to science, or humans who have gone off-grid, lost the trappings of civilisation and now live a primitive feral existence as cannibals. The tales exploded in early 2021 and have continued to spread through the year, with…

STRANGE NEW BELIEFS

STRANGE TALES FROM JAMAICA

STRANGE DAYS STRANGE TALES FROM JAMAICA CHRIS JOSIFFE brings the latest Caribbean craziness TROUBLE IN PARADISE A cult-like Christian ministry based in Jamaica was the focus of several deaths in October last year, two of which appear to have been human sacrifices. Following a tip-off from a member of the group, police stormed the headquarters of Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries on the night of Sunday 17 October. They believe that in doing so they prevented further bloodshed. They found 144 congregants, including several children, dressed in white. They had been fasting for two days in preparation for what they believed to be a great deluge, from which they hoped to be delivered by an ark, set to arrive at 9.30 on Monday morning. The group’s pastor, Dr Kevin O…

STRANGE TALES FROM JAMAICA

ANNE RICE It would be no exaggeration to say that the modern vampire would not exist without Anne Rice. When her first book, Interview with the Vampire, came out in 1976, the overwhelming cultural image of vampires was that of Bram Stoker’s Dracula: cloak, fangs, eastern European, an embodiment of evil, a dark intrusion into our modern world from an archaic, superstitious past. Rice’s vampire, Lestat, was, urbane, conflicted, adaptable, at home in the modern world, giving a radio interview in which he unfolds his life as an immortal – a tragic hero, someone you might want to meet, the kind of vampire you might want to be. Once it came out in paperback, the book was a massive worldwide hit, with its impact further boosted by Neil Jordan’s 1994 film…

STRANGE NEW BELIEFS

STRANGE DAYS STRANGE NEW BELIEFS National Parks haunted by subhuman cannibals, alternative history and “architectural Qanon” FERAL HUMANS As well as the notion that we are surrounded by the remains of ancient giant trees (see p9), other odd ideas have been gaining ground in some quarters. One such is the belief that there are significant numbers of feral people living secretly in America’s National Parks. Primarily spread via TikTok videos and Reddit posts, the assertion is that the country’s National Parks were not created to preserve areas of natural beauty, but to corral packs of subhuman cannibals that prey on visitors. These are either a race of human-like beings unknown to science, or humans who have gone off-grid, lost the trappings of civilisation and now live a primitive feral existence…

STRANGE NEW BELIEFS

FAIRIES, FOLKLORE AND FORTEANA

ANN AND THE FAIRIES A surprising number of individuals see fairies. A number of these see fairies frequently. But only a tiny number claim to be able to draw on fairy magic. The best documented case of this from Britain is the 17th-century fairy witch, Ann Jefferies (sometimes given as ‘Anne Jeffries’, see FT198:38-41). Ann began to see fairies in the spring of 1645 in the house of her mistress, a Mrs Pitt at St Teath in Cornwall. Our 19-year-old nanny – Ann was looking after Master Pitt – found herself approached, one day, by six fairies in the garden and was thrown, as a result, into convulsions. The next year was a blur as Ann convalesced in bed tended by the kindly Pitts. But by the autumn of 1646 Ann was back.…

FAIRIES, FOLKLORE AND FORTEANA

UAPs and luminous ghosts

YEAR OF THE UAP ‘UAP’ now seems to have taken over from the UFO acronym and flying saucers have now been replaced by tic-tac or pyramidshaped craft. Media interest in UFOs – sorry, UAPs – has escalated in recent years with the release of US Navy videos and the testimony of Navy pilots, and it reached a peak with the release by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) of their preliminary UAP assessment report on 25 June 2021 (see FT408:30, 409:51). Another milestone in 2021 was the establishment of the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group (AOIMSG) announced by the Pentagon in a memorandum dated 23 November. It will be directed and overseen by the Airborne Object Identification and Management Executive Council (AOIMEXEC). The AOIMSG’s mission is to synchronise…

UAPs and luminous ghosts

STRANGE DAYS NECROLOG This month, we bid adieu to the vampire queen of New Orleans, Anne Rice, whose series of bestselling books effectively created the modern boodsucker ANNE RICE It would be no exaggeration to say that the modern vampire would not exist without Anne Rice. When her first book, Interview with the Vampire, came out in 1976, the overwhelming cultural image of vampires was that of Bram Stoker’s Dracula: cloak, fangs, eastern European, an embodiment of evil, a dark intrusion into our modern world from an archaic, superstitious past. Rice’s vampire, Lestat, was, urbane, conflicted, adaptable, at home in the modern world, giving a radio interview in which he unfolds his life as an immortal – a tragic hero, someone you might want to meet, the kind of vampire…

FAIRIES, FOLKLORE AND FORTEANA

STRANGE DAYS FAIRIES, FOLKLORE AND FORTEANA SIMON YOUNG FILES A NEW REPORT FROM THE INTERFACE OF STRANGE PHENOMENA AND FOLK BELIEF ANN AND THE FAIRIES A surprising number of individuals see fairies. A number of these see fairies frequently. But only a tiny number claim to be able to draw on fairy magic. The best documented case of this from Britain is the 17th-century fairy witch, Ann Jefferies (sometimes given as ‘Anne Jeffries’, see FT198:38-41). Ann began to see fairies in the spring of 1645 in the house of her mistress, a Mrs Pitt at St Teath in Cornwall. Our 19-year-old nanny – Ann was looking after Master Pitt – found herself approached, one day, by six fairies in the garden and was thrown, as a result, into convulsions. The…

FAIRIES, FOLKLORE AND FORTEANA

I DREAM THE FUTURE AND SO DO YOU

Some years ago, I discovered a remarkable fact: I dream the future, or at least some of my future experience turns up ahead of time in my dreams. I do not make predictions, or pick winners at the races, although some “future dreamers” have. But bits and pieces of what I will come across in the next day or so – or week, or month, sometimes years – will often show up in advance in my dreams. Let me tell you how this came about. In 1980 I read a book entitled An Experiment With Time by JW Dunne. I was reading a great deal of literature about the paranormal and the occult at the time, and I came across a reference to the book and decided to check it out.…

I DREAM THE FUTURE AND SO DO YOU

TAKING THE FUTURE AS READ

Is it conceivable that writers can accurately predict the future? Academics at the literature department of the German University of Tübingen certainly thought so when they set up Project Cassandra in 2017. Taking its name from the Trojan priestess who could foresee the future, the project’s initial aim was to investigate novels from different countries to find pointers to future conflicts. Daunted by the challenge of reading so many works in such a multitude of languages, the academics switched to focusing on what they called the “literary infrastructure” – that is, how the book was received. Did it accumulate awards and state prizes? Or was it banned, and the author made to go into exile? The data was fed into a computer and a conflict risk score developed. Results were impressive. In…

TAKING THE FUTURE AS READ

UAPs and luminous ghosts

UFO FILES / SAUCERS OF THE DAMNED UAPs and luminous ghosts NIGEL WATSON looks back at the year of the UAP and shares one man’s unique close encounters YEAR OF THE UAP ‘UAP’ now seems to have taken over from the UFO acronym and flying saucers have now been replaced by tic-tac or pyramidshaped craft. Media interest in UFOs – sorry, UAPs – has escalated in recent years with the release of US Navy videos and the testimony of Navy pilots, and it reached a peak with the release by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) of their preliminary UAP assessment report on 25 June 2021 (see FT408:30, 409:51). Another milestone in 2021 was the establishment of the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group (AOIMSG) announced…

UAPs and luminous ghosts

PALISSY THE POTTER

In the beginning, the Earth spontaneously generated forms in rock, some of which resembled living organisms. Stone forms grew within stones. Just as living organisms above ground gave birth to living young, so the Earth itself produced subterranean stone simulacra of living organisms. As above, so below. That was how they came about – mostly. Some fossil seashells on the tops of mountains were said to be formed by the stars. Swiss physician, zoologist and botanist Conrad Gesner (1516-1565) wrote that gems were Earthly reminders of the jewelled heavenly City of God. Influential Persian philosopher Avicenna (Ibn Sina, 980-1037) stated that fossils were produced by vapours and exhalations in the depths of the earth, like gallstones and pearls. Some fossils were assumed to be generated through astrological influences, or were “sports of…

PALISSY THE POTTER

I DREAM THE FUTURE AND SO DO YOU

I DREAM THE FUTURE AND SO DO YOU Can we really dream of events yet to take place? Conventional logic suggests that precognitive dreams are imposssible – yet recorded examples, ranging from the trivial to the terrfying, argue otherwise. GARY LACHMAN delves into his dream diaries to offer a personal take on a wild, yet widespread, talent. Some years ago, I discovered a remarkable fact: I dream the future, or at least some of my future experience turns up ahead of time in my dreams. I do not make predictions, or pick winners at the races, although some “future dreamers” have. But bits and pieces of what I will come across in the next day or so – or week, or month, sometimes years – will often show up in…

I DREAM THE FUTURE AND SO DO YOU

BLACK AFTERLIVES MATTER

Here in Britain, we’ve witnessed mobs wanting to tear down statues of long-forgotten colonial figures in repeated fits of iconoclasm (see FT398:32-39). In our former African colony of Zimbabwe, the opposite problem has emerged, with outrage being caused by plans to erect a memorial to one of the nation’s black anti-colonial heroes. Following a successful armed independence struggle from the white-majority rule of PM Ian Smith’s quasi-apartheid government back in 1980, the name of Cecil Rhodes, the imperialist adventurer who’d grabbed the native soil in the first place, was literally wiped from the map as the former nation of ‘Rhodesia’ was renamed with the indigenous term ‘Zimbabwe’. So when in the summer of 2020 the governing ZANU-PF Party, the political heirs to the military rebels who’d fought off Smith’s soldiers in…

BLACK AFTERLIVES MATTER

TAKING THE FUTURE AS READ

TAKING THE FUTURE AS READ Do writers have some form of visionary access to the future, an ability to project from the present into days and years to come? Are they tapping into quantum interconnectedness, or just coming up with lucky guesses? RICHARD C McNEFF peers into his literary crystal ball in search of answers. Is it conceivable that writers can accurately predict the future? Academics at the literature department of the German University of Tübingen certainly thought so when they set up Project Cassandra in 2017. Taking its name from the Trojan priestess who could foresee the future, the project’s initial aim was to investigate novels from different countries to find pointers to future conflicts. Daunted by the challenge of reading so many works in such a multitude of…

TAKING THE FUTURE AS READ

Headless phantom coach horses

SEND FORUM SUBMISSIONS TO THE EDITOR: DRSUTTON@FORTEANTIMES.COM There are a remarkable number of traditions from around the British Isles featuring phantom coaches. These are often driven by headless coachmen, sometimes with even the horses pulling the coach being headless too. The village of Olney, Buckinghamshire, is allegedly the home of a phantom coach pulled by headless horses and with a decapitated driver. Kingston Russell House in Long Bredy, Dorset, is said to be haunted by a coach with a headless coachman, a headless footman and four headless passengers, pulled by a team of four headless horses. Headless horses driven by a headless coachman were said to emerge at midnight from a hole at Rowlands Hill in Wimborne, Dorset. Another phantom coach, with a headless lady passenger, as well as a headless coachman…

Headless phantom coach horses

Middle-Aged Mulder Syndrome

In episode three of the 2016 series of The X-Files, Agent Scully walks in to find Mulder throwing pencils at her “I Want to Believe” poster. Mulder informs Scully that since their absence “much of the unexplained has been explained.” This has led to a deep disillusion on his part, hence the vandalism of Scully’s poster. “I’m a middle-aged man,” Mulder moans, wondering whether it’s time to put away childish things and stop hunting monsters in the dark. He has been struck with a case of “Middle-Aged Mulder Syndrome”. A similar disillusion seems today to pervade fortean circles. It seems easy to conclude that in the third decade of the 21st century “visions and miracles have ceased”. In successive issues of Fortean Times, case after phenomenal case is revealed as having…

Middle-Aged Mulder Syndrome

A dizzying labyrinth of credulity

TO SEND REVIEW COPIES, CONTACT THE BOOK REVIEWS EDITOR AT DVBARRETT@FORTEANTIMES.COM Mysteries and Secrets Revealed From Oracles at Delphi to Spiritualism in America Loren Pankratz Prometheus Books 2021 Hb, £25, 472pp, ISBN 9781633886681 If you have ever asked yourself “How can anybody believe that?” then Loren Pankratz’s history of deception is highly recommended. As a former professor of psychiatry now involved in forensic consultancy, there is little about human gullibility that he has not considered. From the ancient world to the rise of Spiritualism, he guides the reader through a dizzying labyrinth of human fallibility in its search for existential reassurance. Beginning in Delphi, Pankratz explores how the trust of the Athenian elite in the oracles remained steadfast even in the face of defeat at the hands of the Persians and the apocalyptic plague of 429 BC.…

A dizzying labyrinth of credulity

PALISSY THE POTTER

PALISSY THE POTTER MATT SALUSBURY recounts the story of Bernard Palissy, the French potter whose quest for the perfect glaze led him to overturn centuries’ worth of thinking about the nature of fossils. In the beginning, the Earth spontaneously generated forms in rock, some of which resembled living organisms. Stone forms grew within stones. Just as living organisms above ground gave birth to living young, so the Earth itself produced subterranean stone simulacra of living organisms. As above, so below. That was how they came about – mostly. Some fossil seashells on the tops of mountains were said to be formed by the stars. Swiss physician, zoologist and botanist Conrad Gesner (1516-1565) wrote that gems were Earthly reminders of the jewelled heavenly City of God. Influential Persian philosopher Avicenna (Ibn…

PALISSY THE POTTER

BLACK AFTERLIVES MATTER

STRANGE STATESMEN #51 BLACK AFTERLIVES MATTER BLACK AFTERLIVES MATTER SD TUCKER finds a plague of supernatural statuary in ZANU-PF Zimbabwe, where Cecil Rhodes is not the only ghost from the region’s colonial past causing monumental controversy these days… Here in Britain, we’ve witnessed mobs wanting to tear down statues of long-forgotten colonial figures in repeated fits of iconoclasm (see FT398:32-39). In our former African colony of Zimbabwe, the opposite problem has emerged, with outrage being caused by plans to erect a memorial to one of the nation’s black anti-colonial heroes. Following a successful armed independence struggle from the white-majority rule of PM Ian Smith’s quasi-apartheid government back in 1980, the name of Cecil Rhodes, the imperialist adventurer who’d grabbed the native soil in the first place, was literally wiped from…

BLACK AFTERLIVES MATTER

A gentle scholar

Towards the Unknown Memoir of a Psychical Researcher Erlendur Haraldsson White Crow Books 2021 Pb, 200pp, £11.99, ISBN 9781786770899 Professor Erlendur Haraldsson, who died in November 2020, is a greatly missed parapsychologist from Iceland, a man rightly called “one of the giants of psychical research” by his peers. This book is his last published work, a modest and gentle memoir recalling a dynamic life labouring in this world in order to discover the truth about survival in the next. Born in 1932 into a working-class family, Haraldsson propelled himself by sheer intellectual ability into academia. Initially majoring in philosophy, after studying at Freiburg and in Edinburgh, he switched to psychology and then parapsychology, the subject which consumed his principal research efforts for the rest of his life. Never a cloistered scholar, he took a cross-cultural approach…

A gentle scholar

Not so elementary

How Sherlock Pulled the Trick Spiritualism and the Pseudoscientific Method Brian McCuskey Penn State University Press 2021 Hb, 195pp, £27.95, ISBN 9780271089874 The “trick” Brian McCuskey investigates involves the frequently drawn contrast between the cool, analytical approach of Sherlock Holmes (regarded as good) and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s credulous Spiritualism (definitely bad). He argues that the distinction is bogus, because Holmes is not the paragon of rationality he is so often held up to be, and Holmes and Spiritualism are not as far apart as the casual reader might assume. McCuskey starts by looking at the development of Conan Doyle’s thinking in the context of the intellectual climate of the late 19th century, outlining the friction between science and religion. Conan Doyle, having discarded his Catholicism but possessing a spiritual impulse, found a way to side-step the…

Not so elementary

Headless phantom coach horses

FORUM Headless phantom coach horses MATT SALUSBURY finds what might be a perfectly reasonable Iron Age explanation for for some very odd ghost stories… SEND FORUM SUBMISSIONS TO THE EDITOR: DRSUTTON@FORTEANTIMES.COM There are a remarkable number of traditions from around the British Isles featuring phantom coaches. These are often driven by headless coachmen, sometimes with even the horses pulling the coach being headless too. The village of Olney, Buckinghamshire, is allegedly the home of a phantom coach pulled by headless horses and with a decapitated driver. Kingston Russell House in Long Bredy, Dorset, is said to be haunted by a coach with a headless coachman, a headless footman and four headless passengers, pulled by a team of four headless horses. Headless horses driven by a headless coachman were said to…

Headless phantom coach horses

UFOs, Earthquakes and the Straight Line Mystery The Answer to the UFO Enigma Ahmad Jamaludin Flying Disk Press, 2021 Pb, 234pp, £10.75, ISBN 9798721390159 Ufologists may remember Ahmad Jamaludin’s articles in the long-defunct Flying Saucer Review; fascinating for the rare glimpses they presented of the phenomenon in the Far East, in particular the panic among Malaysian schoolkids who witnessed tiny ‘alien’ invaders in tiny UFOs. Few of us knew that for 40 years Jamaludin also researched the early ideas linking ‘waves’ of sightings with ‘orthoteny’ (straight lines in the landscape) and radical theories about the origins of earthquakes and anomalous aerial noises. Flying Disk Press have done a public service by collecting a number of Jamaludin’s academic papers on these matters, herein synthesised into a unified reference book. A minority interest perhaps, but an almost…

Middle-Aged Mulder Syndrome

FORUM Middle-Aged Mulder Syndrome MATT COLBORN argues that contemporary forteana needs to reconnect with a sense of wonder that it’s currently in danger of losing In episode three of the 2016 series of The X-Files, Agent Scully walks in to find Mulder throwing pencils at her “I Want to Believe” poster. Mulder informs Scully that since their absence “much of the unexplained has been explained.” This has led to a deep disillusion on his part, hence the vandalism of Scully’s poster. “I’m a middle-aged man,” Mulder moans, wondering whether it’s time to put away childish things and stop hunting monsters in the dark. He has been struck with a case of “Middle-Aged Mulder Syndrome”. A similar disillusion seems today to pervade fortean circles. It seems easy to conclude that in…

Middle-Aged Mulder Syndrome

Theatre of the absurd

TO SEND REVIEW COPIES, CONTACT THE EDITOR AT DRSUTTON@FORTEANTIMES.COM Stage Fright Dir Michele Soavi, Italy 1987 Shameless Films, Blu-ray, £17.99 The debut feature from Dario Argento’s one-time protégé Michele Soavi, Stage Fright could have been the beginning of a new era for Italian horror cinema. Argento’s powers were starting to show signs of waning – 1985’s Phenomena was especially poorly received – and the genre needed someone to step into the great man’s shoes. Soavi was an assistant director on that film and its predecessor Tenebrae; in an interview on this Blu-ray release he states that being an AD for the great man was what he’d always wanted to do. However, for Stage Fright Soavi was contacted by Aristide Massacessi (aka, among many other names, Joe D’Amato), the prolific director of Italian horror…

Theatre of the absurd

The Mezzotint Isn’t Mark Gatiss a busy chap? Everywhere you look, there’s something on that he’s in, or has written, or directed, or all three, while all the while being in/writing/directing something else for later in the year (and no doubt finishing a still life in acrylics and a symphony for concertinas). Idle he isn’t. What’s daunting is how good he is at all of these things. His pedigree with the rum and macabre is equally well-established, and as I’m fond of MR James, I was looking forward to A Ghost Story for Christmas: The Mezzotint (BBC) Teeing off in resplendent moustache and tweed plus-fours, Williams (Rory Kinnear) natters with a golfing companion about his new-fangled iron and how moving with the times jars with tradition (“Oh bad luck, Binks!”); then, cut…

A dizzying labyrinth of credulity

REVIEWS / BOOKS A dizzying labyrinth of credulity Chris Hill delves into a sympathetic but comprehensive study of the human desire to believe in the paranormal and metaphysical in our quest for existential reassurance TO SEND REVIEW COPIES, CONTACT THE BOOK REVIEWS EDITOR AT DVBARRETT@FORTEANTIMES.COM Mysteries and Secrets Revealed From Oracles at Delphi to Spiritualism in America Loren Pankratz Prometheus Books 2021 Hb, £25, 472pp, ISBN 9781633886681 If you have ever asked yourself “How can anybody believe that?” then Loren Pankratz’s history of deception is highly recommended. As a former professor of psychiatry now involved in forensic consultancy, there is little about human gullibility that he has not considered. From the ancient world to the rise of Spiritualism, he guides the reader through a dizzying labyrinth of human fallibility in…

A dizzying labyrinth of credulity

THE REVEREND’S REVIEW

The perennial accusation that “Horror Films Exploit Women” sounds a bit old-hat these days. After all, the genre has a long tradition of female empowerment. There are three examples in this month’s new releases. My favourite is Jakob’s Wife, (Shudder Originals, Blu-ray, DVD and Digital), the story of Anne, a pastor’s spouse who has abandoned her ambitions of travel and adventure and now sits quietly in church listening to her husband preach; she cooks him breakfast and when he talks over her at parties, she doesn’t complain. Yet frustration is bubbling under the surface, and half an hour of home-based aerobics isn’t enough to ease it. Liberation comes not with an affair (though she’s tempted), but when she’s attacked by a rat-toothed vampire. At first, she’s horrified, wondering why normal…

CONTACT US BY POST: PO BOX 1200, WHITSTABLE CT1 9RH, OR E-MAIL SIEVEKING@FORTEANTIMES.COM PLEASE PROVIDE US WITH YOUR POSTAL ADDRESS They are indexed Although I was very happy to see my two ShukerNature books receive a positive joint review [FT411:65], I have to correct the anonymous reviewer’s closing words: “A pity, then, that they are not indexed”. On the contrary, both books are indexed, very extensively, with even an index entry prominently contained in their respective lists of contents. In ShukerNature 1, the index spans pages 397-405; and in ShukerNature 2, pages 433-445. I have no idea how the reviewer failed to notice this. I abhor nonfiction books that lack an index. Dr Karl Shuker DB Cooper In his feature on DB Cooper [FT412:30-37], Brian Robb mentions some songs about the case. There is also…

A gentle scholar

REVIEWS / BOOKS A gentle scholar Alan Murdie reflects on the life and work of parapsychologist Erlendur Haraldsson Towards the Unknown Memoir of a Psychical Researcher Erlendur Haraldsson White Crow Books 2021 Pb, 200pp, £11.99, ISBN 9781786770899 Professor Erlendur Haraldsson, who died in November 2020, is a greatly missed parapsychologist from Iceland, a man rightly called “one of the giants of psychical research” by his peers. This book is his last published work, a modest and gentle memoir recalling a dynamic life labouring in this world in order to discover the truth about survival in the next. Born in 1932 into a working-class family, Haraldsson propelled himself by sheer intellectual ability into academia. Initially majoring in philosophy, after studying at Freiburg and in Edinburgh, he switched to psychology and then…

A gentle scholar

Not so elementary

REVIEWS / BOOKS Not so elementary Tom Ruffles finds that Sherlock Holmes was no great paragon of logic, and that he and his Spiritualist creator were not so very different How Sherlock Pulled the Trick Spiritualism and the Pseudoscientific Method Brian McCuskey Penn State University Press 2021 Hb, 195pp, £27.95, ISBN 9780271089874 The “trick” Brian McCuskey investigates involves the frequently drawn contrast between the cool, analytical approach of Sherlock Holmes (regarded as good) and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s credulous Spiritualism (definitely bad). He argues that the distinction is bogus, because Holmes is not the paragon of rationality he is so often held up to be, and Holmes and Spiritualism are not as far apart as the casual reader might assume. McCuskey starts by looking at the development of Conan Doyle’s…

Not so elementary

SIMULACRA CORNER

SIMULACRA CORNER

It Happened to Me…

The Thing of Rags As I’ve grown older (I’m now 55) I have trouble sleeping and staying asleep. I can only sleep through sensory deprivation: I have to block out the street lights as much as possible with blinds and curtains, I wear an eye mask/blindfold and use ear plugs. We always keep the bedroom door closed at night. Even so, I am acutely aware of any small sound or movement around me (think Edgar Allen Poe’s Roderick Usher). I will wake up if my son walks across the landing, or if someone opens or closes a door in the house. So at the end of June 2021 I was asleep, with my blindfold on and earplugs in, when I woke up and sensed that someone was walking lightly around the bed.…

It Happened to Me…

REVIEWS / BOOKS ALSO RECEIVED WE LEAF THROUGH A SMALL SELECTION OF THE DOZENS OF BOOKS THAT HAVE ARRIVED AT FORTEAN TOWERS IN RECENT MONTHS… UFOs, Earthquakes and the Straight Line Mystery The Answer to the UFO Enigma Ahmad Jamaludin Flying Disk Press, 2021 Pb, 234pp, £10.75, ISBN 9798721390159 Ufologists may remember Ahmad Jamaludin’s articles in the long-defunct Flying Saucer Review; fascinating for the rare glimpses they presented of the phenomenon in the Far East, in particular the panic among Malaysian schoolkids who witnessed tiny ‘alien’ invaders in tiny UFOs. Few of us knew that for 40 years Jamaludin also researched the early ideas linking ‘waves’ of sightings with ‘orthoteny’ (straight lines in the landscape) and radical theories about the origins of earthquakes and anomalous aerial noises. Flying Disk Press…

PECULIAR POSTCARDS

24. TO-YA AND HIS ICE FAMILY Karl Breu was a young Austrian born at Dubnany, Moravia, in 1884. Although his parents were said to be normal, Karl was born an albino, notable in later life for his frizzy white hair, pink and red eyes, and very pale skin. After both his parents had died while he was a boy, he was separated from his (non-albino) sister Lori and brought up by his mother’s family in the town of Lenora, South Bohemia. In spite of these calamities in his early life, he grew up to become a cheerful, active boy. In the medical textbooks, albinos are described as feeble and sickly, but Karl was the absolute opposite: a tall, sturdy lad with impressive musculature. He decided to become a circus clown, moving on…

PECULIAR POSTCARDS

Theatre of the absurd

REVIEWS / FILMS Theatre of the absurd Argento protégé Michele Soavi’s directorial debut remains a visually inventive and gory misfire, but the fascinating extras on this new restoration almost make up for the film’s shortcomings TO SEND REVIEW COPIES, CONTACT THE EDITOR AT DRSUTTON@FORTEANTIMES.COM Stage Fright Dir Michele Soavi, Italy 1987 Shameless Films, Blu-ray, £17.99 The debut feature from Dario Argento’s one-time protégé Michele Soavi, Stage Fright could have been the beginning of a new era for Italian horror cinema. Argento’s powers were starting to show signs of waning – 1985’s Phenomena was especially poorly received – and the genre needed someone to step into the great man’s shoes. Soavi was an assistant director on that film and its predecessor Tenebrae; in an interview on this Blu-ray release he states…

Theatre of the absurd

TELEVISION FT’s very own couch potato, STU NEVILLE, casts an eye over the small screen’s current fortean offerings The Mezzotint Isn’t Mark Gatiss a busy chap? Everywhere you look, there’s something on that he’s in, or has written, or directed, or all three, while all the while being in/writing/directing something else for later in the year (and no doubt finishing a still life in acrylics and a symphony for concertinas). Idle he isn’t. What’s daunting is how good he is at all of these things. His pedigree with the rum and macabre is equally well-established, and as I’m fond of MR James, I was looking forward to A Ghost Story for Christmas: The Mezzotint (BBC) Teeing off in resplendent moustache and tweed plus-fours, Williams (Rory Kinnear) natters with a golfing…

HOW TO SUBSCRIBE ANNUAL SUB of 12 issues (inc p&p) UK £48; Europe £58; USA $89.99 ($161.98 for 24 issues); Rest of World £68. Please see house ads in the latest issue for details of special offers. UK, EUROPE, NORTH AMERICA & REST OF WORLD Major credit cards accepted. Cheques or money orders should be in sterling, preferably drawn on a London bank and made payable to Diamond Publishing Limited. Mail to: Fortean Times, Diamond Publishing Limited, 7th Floor, Vantage London, Great West Road, London TW8 9AG. NB: This address should be used for orders and subscriptions only. Telephone payments and queries: +44 (0) 208 752 8195. E-mail payments and queries: hello@metropolis.co.uk HOW TO SUBMIT Fortean Times reserves all rights to reuse material submitted by FT readers and contributors in any medium or format. ILLUSTRATIONS Contact the art…

THE REVEREND’S REVIEW

THE REVEREND’S REVIEW FT’s resident man of the cloth REVEREND PETER LAWS dons his dog collar and faces the flicks that Church forgot! The perennial accusation that “Horror Films Exploit Women” sounds a bit old-hat these days. After all, the genre has a long tradition of female empowerment. There are three examples in this month’s new releases. My favourite is Jakob’s Wife, (Shudder Originals, Blu-ray, DVD and Digital), the story of Anne, a pastor’s spouse who has abandoned her ambitions of travel and adventure and now sits quietly in church listening to her husband preach; she cooks him breakfast and when he talks over her at parties, she doesn’t complain. Yet frustration is bubbling under the surface, and half an hour of home-based aerobics isn’t enough to ease it. Liberation…

In the early hours of 2 November 2021, a man dressed as Fred Flintstone was struck by a car and killed in San Antonio, Texas. According to police, they had received several reports of a man dressed as the cartoon caveman weaving in and out of traffic and attacking vehicles with what witnesses described as “a spear”, although officers were unsure whether it actually was a spear or just a broomstick. Before they could arrive at the scene, a car hit the costumed individual and killed him, with the driver claiming he’d not seen him until it was too late as it was dark. star-telegram.com, 2 Nov 2021. When police were called to a high-end love hotel in the Fushimi District of Kyoto, Japan, they found noted Japanese potter Furukawa Go,…

LETTERS CONTACT US BY POST: PO BOX 1200, WHITSTABLE CT1 9RH, OR E-MAIL SIEVEKING@FORTEANTIMES.COM PLEASE PROVIDE US WITH YOUR POSTAL ADDRESS They are indexed Although I was very happy to see my two ShukerNature books receive a positive joint review [FT411:65], I have to correct the anonymous reviewer’s closing words: “A pity, then, that they are not indexed”. On the contrary, both books are indexed, very extensively, with even an index entry prominently contained in their respective lists of contents. In ShukerNature 1, the index spans pages 397-405; and in ShukerNature 2, pages 433-445. I have no idea how the reviewer failed to notice this. I abhor nonfiction books that lack an index. Dr Karl Shuker DB Cooper In his feature on DB Cooper [FT412:30-37], Brian Robb mentions some songs…

SIMULACRA CORNER

SIMULACRA CORNER We are always glad to receive pictures of spontaneous forms and figures, or any curious images. Send them (with your postal address) to Fortean Times, PO Box 1200, Whitstable CT1 9RH or to sieveking@forteantimes.com.…

SIMULACRA CORNER

It Happened to Me…

It Happened to Me… The Thing of Rags As I’ve grown older (I’m now 55) I have trouble sleeping and staying asleep. I can only sleep through sensory deprivation: I have to block out the street lights as much as possible with blinds and curtains, I wear an eye mask/blindfold and use ear plugs. We always keep the bedroom door closed at night. Even so, I am acutely aware of any small sound or movement around me (think Edgar Allen Poe’s Roderick Usher). I will wake up if my son walks across the landing, or if someone opens or closes a door in the house. So at the end of June 2021 I was asleep, with my blindfold on and earplugs in, when I woke up and sensed that someone…

It Happened to Me…

PECULIAR POSTCARDS

PECULIAR POSTCARDS JAN BONDESON shares another deltiological discovery from his prodigious collection of postcards. This month’s pictorial blast from the past tells the strange story of the Austrian albino who posed as a frizzy-haired Icelander 24. TO-YA AND HIS ICE FAMILY Karl Breu was a young Austrian born at Dubnany, Moravia, in 1884. Although his parents were said to be normal, Karl was born an albino, notable in later life for his frizzy white hair, pink and red eyes, and very pale skin. After both his parents had died while he was a boy, he was separated from his (non-albino) sister Lori and brought up by his mother’s family in the town of Lenora, South Bohemia. In spite of these calamities in his early life, he grew up to become…

PECULIAR POSTCARDS

READER INFO HOW TO SUBSCRIBE ANNUAL SUB of 12 issues (inc p&p) UK £48; Europe £58; USA $89.99 ($161.98 for 24 issues); Rest of World £68. Please see house ads in the latest issue for details of special offers. UK, EUROPE, NORTH AMERICA & REST OF WORLD Major credit cards accepted. Cheques or money orders should be in sterling, preferably drawn on a London bank and made payable to Diamond Publishing Limited. Mail to: Fortean Times, Diamond Publishing Limited, 7th Floor, Vantage London, Great West Road, London TW8 9AG. NB: This address should be used for orders and subscriptions only. Telephone payments and queries: +44 (0) 208 752 8195. E-mail payments and queries: hello@metropolis.co.uk HOW TO SUBMIT Fortean Times reserves all rights to reuse material submitted by FT readers and…

STRANGE DEATHS UNUSUAL WAYS OF SHUFFLING OFF THIS MORTAL COIL In the early hours of 2 November 2021, a man dressed as Fred Flintstone was struck by a car and killed in San Antonio, Texas. According to police, they had received several reports of a man dressed as the cartoon caveman weaving in and out of traffic and attacking vehicles with what witnesses described as “a spear”, although officers were unsure whether it actually was a spear or just a broomstick. Before they could arrive at the scene, a car hit the costumed individual and killed him, with the driver claiming he’d not seen him until it was too late as it was dark. star-telegram.com, 2 Nov 2021. When police were called to a high-end love hotel in the Fushimi…

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