Supernatural Entertainments

Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part 1: Configurations of Séances

1 The Medium on the Stage: Theatricality and Performance in the Spirit Séance

2 Parlor Games: Play and Social Life in the Haunted House

Part 2: How to Sell a Spirit

3 Breaking the News: Controversy, Sensation, and the Popular Press

4 Mediums and Stars: Religion, Consumerism, and Celebrity Culture

Part 3: Spirit and Matter

5 Stranger than Fiction: Print Media, Automatic Writing, and Popular Culture

6 The Marvels of Superimposition: Spirit Photography and Spiritualism’s Visual Culture

Afterward

Notes

Bibliography

Index

“An important addition to the growing body of rigorous scholarship on international spiritualism. Natale’s argument, however, is fairly unexpected, even unique, inasmuch as it convincingly focuses on spiritualism as a form of show business.”

—Matthew Solomon, Film Quarterly