New Lands and other worlds

One hundred years on from its original publication, should we view Fort’s sophomore effort as a “crank book”? IAN J KIDD reckons there’s far more to it than that.

“My subject is New Lands – things, objects, beings that are, or may be, the data of coming expansions.”1 Charles Fort’s second book appeared in 1923 and was a product of his time in his own new land – Great Britain. He and Anna sailed on the RMS Olympic, sister of the Titanic, to spend eight years at 39A Marchmont Street near Russell Square. Ten minutes away was the British Museum Reading Room. Fort exulted in its periodicals and newspapers from across Britain and its colonies: the “accessibility and abundance of data”.2 Many of the phenomena carried on themes from Book of the Damned. Falls of fish, frogs and other creatures and materials; odd lights seen in the sky or on the Moon. But the years in London offered new…

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Fortean Times (Digital) - 1 Issue, 444

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