{"product_id":"2940012865465","title":"The Best Psychic Stories","description":"PREFACE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe case for the \"psychic\" element in literature rests on a very old\u003cbr\u003efoundation; it reaches back to the ancient masters,--the men who wrote\u003cbr\u003ethe Greek tragedies. Remorse will ever seem commonplace alongside the\u003cbr\u003efuries. Ever and always the shadow of the supernatural invites, pursues\u003cbr\u003eus. As the art of literature has progressed it has grown along with it.\u003cbr\u003eTo-day there is a whole new school of writers of Ghost-Stories, and the\u003cbr\u003edomain of the invisible is being invaded by explorers in many paths. We\u003cbr\u003edo not believe so much more, perhaps, that is, we do not so openly\u003cbr\u003eexpress a belief, but art has finally and frankly claimed the\u003cbr\u003esupernatural for its own. One discerning authority even goes so far as\u003cbr\u003eto assert that the borders of its domain will be greatly enlarged in the\u003cbr\u003ewonderful new field of the screen.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThere is no motive in a story, no image in poetry, that can give us\u003cbr\u003equite the thrill of a supernatural idea. If we were formally charged\u003cbr\u003ewith this we might resent the imputation, but the evidence has persisted\u003cbr\u003efrom the beginning, lives on every hand, and multiplies daily. What we\u003cbr\u003ehave been in the habit of calling the \"machinery\" of the old Greek\u003cbr\u003edrama--its supernatural effects--has come finally to be an art\u003cbr\u003ecultivated with care at the present hour, and has given us some\u003cbr\u003ewonderful new writers. In fact, few of the best masters for a generation\u003cbr\u003enow have been able to resist its persistent and abiding charm. Every\u003cbr\u003ewriter of true imagination, almost without exception, including even\u003cbr\u003ecertain realists, has given us at least one story, long or short, in\u003cbr\u003ewhich the central motive is purely psychical in the Greek sense of the\u003cbr\u003eword.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe whole subject opens up a virgin field which has after all only begun\u003cbr\u003eto be tilled. Within the coming generation we may look for great artists\u003cbr\u003eto devote their whole powers to it, as Algernon Blackwood is doing\u003cbr\u003eto-day. A simple underlying reason is enough to account for it all--_the\u003cbr\u003enew field imposes simply no limit on the imagination_. In addition to\u003cbr\u003eall that science has taught us, there is illimitable store of myth and\u003cbr\u003elegend to aid, to draw from, to work in, to work over, as Lord Dunsany\u003cbr\u003ehas shown us. It is the most significant movement in literature at the\u003cbr\u003epresent hour, and whether it is supported by a special background of\u003cbr\u003einterest--as at present in spiritism--or not, the assertion is logical\u003cbr\u003ethat it is creating a new body of fictional literature of permanent\u003cbr\u003eimportance for the first time in the history of literature. The human\u003cbr\u003ecomedy seems to have been exploited to its final limits; as the art of\u003cbr\u003ethe novel, the art of the stage, but too sadly prove to-day. We have\u003cbr\u003eturned outward for new thrills to the supernatural and we are getting\u003cbr\u003ethem.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt only remains to be added that the present great interest in\u003cbr\u003espiritualism and allied phenomena has made necessary the addition of\u003cbr\u003ecertain material of a \"literal\" character which we believe will be found\u003cbr\u003equite as interesting by the general reader as the purely literary\u003cbr\u003eportion of the book.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJOSEPH LEWIS FRENCH\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCONTENTS\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePREFACE _Joseph Lewis French_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eINTRODUCTION _Dorothy Scarborough_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWHEN THE WORLD WAS YOUNG _Jack London_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE RETURN _Algernon Blackwood_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE SECOND GENERATION _Algernon Blackwood_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJOSEPH--A STORY _Katherine Rickford_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE CLAVECIN--BRUGES _George Wharton Edwards_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLIGEIA _Edgar Allan Poe_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE SYLPH AND THE FATHER _Elsa Barker_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA GHOST _Lafcadio Hearn_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE EYES OF THE PANTHER _Ambrose Bierce_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePHOTOGRAPHING INVISIBLE BEINGS _William T. Stead_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE SIN-EATER _Fiona Macleod_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGHOSTS IN SOLID FORM _Gambier Bolton_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE PHANTOM ARMIES SEEN IN FRANCE _Hereward Carrington_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE PORTAL OF THE UNKNOWN _Andrew Jackson Davis_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE SUPERNORMAL: EXPERIENCES _St. John D. Seymour_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNATURE-SPIRITS, OR ELEMENTALS _Nizida_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA WITCH'S DEN _Helena Blavatsky_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSOME REMARKABLE EXPERIENCES OF FAMOUS PERSONS _Dr. Walter F. Prince_\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eINTRODUCTION\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE PSYCHIC IN LITERATURE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWar, that relentless disturber of boundaries and of traditions in a\u003cbr\u003espiritual as well as a material sense, has brought a tremendous revival\u003cbr\u003eof interest in the life after death and the possibility of communication\u003cbr\u003ebetween the living and the dead. As France became nearer to millions\u003cbr\u003eover here because our soldiers lived there for a few months, as French\u003cbr\u003esoil will forever be holy ground because our dead rest there, so the far\u003cbr\u003ecountry of the soul likewise seems nearer because of those young\u003cbr\u003eadventurers.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47078994149616,"sku":"2940012865465","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012865465_p0.jpg?v=1763573584","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012865465","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}