Mental Radio

Collector's Library of the Unknown

by Upton Sinclair

Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

Genres: Fiction, Paranormal, Occult, Psychology

239 pages, Hardcover

First published November 30, 1929

About the author

Upton Beall Sinclair, Jr. was an American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres. He achieved popularity in the first half of the twentieth century, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle (1906). To gather information for the novel, Sinclair spent seven weeks undercover working in the meat packing plants of Chicago. These direct experiences exposed the horrific conditions in the U.S. meat packing industry, causing a public uproar that contributed in part to the passage a few months later of the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act. The Jungle has remained continuously in print since its initial publication. In 1919, he published The Brass Check, a muckraking exposé of American journalism that publicized the issue of yellow journalism and the limitations of the “free press” in the United States. Four years after the initial publication of The Brass Check, the first code of ethics for journalists was created. Time magazine called him "a man with every gift except humor and silence." In 1943, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Sinclair also ran unsuccessfully for Congress as a Socialist, and was the Democratic Party nominee for Governor of California in 1934, though his highly progressive campaign was defeated.

Reviews

[Warren Fournier · Rating 3 out of 5]

Upton Sinclair clearly wanted to be a hero, the kind of guy always on the lookout for the next big social justice war, the latest scandal, or the hottest new piece of information with which to shock and educate the poorly informed masses. So perhaps it should not come as a surprise that the man who brought us one of the most influential examples of investigative reporting, "The Jungle," also delved into one of the hottest topics of the early Twentieth Century--the paranormal.

Peaking in the late Victorian period, salons of the middle and upper classes were often where you could witness candle-lit circles of gentlemen and debutants calmly raising hell. Whether it be seances, dissecting mummies, demonstrations of some traveling beatnik professor's outstanding mesmerism skills, or experiments in mind-reading, telepathy, or levitation, America and Britain were obsessed with the paranormal.

Naturally, Sinclair was curious as to whether there was any truth behind this, but the cynic and skeptic who tried to bring down Hormel was perhaps a bit softer on his latest subject--his own wife.

Craig, as his wife was called, had been told all her life by the old Southern prissies with whom she grew up that she had the gift of clairvoyance. She and Sinclair ended up introduced to a young charismatic (referred to as "Jan" in this book) who claimed to have learned secret arts in his travels to India, and he earned his pay by traveling the country and giving living room demonstrations over cups of tea and snifters of cognac. He would drive nails into his tongue. He would hypnotize pretty young ladies into doing his bidding. He would put himself into a deep trance and allow himself to be buried beneath a baseball stadium until the 8th inning of the game. He would levitate furniture over the heads of awestruck audiences until their monocles popped from their faces.

But if you expected Upton Sinclair to be like Harry Houdini and try to expose some fraud at play in these demonstrations of supernatural power, think again. He actually set out to prove that these abilities are real phenomena that, with a little practice and skill, can be done by you too at home! That is what you'll find in his 1930 book "Mental Radio."

Craig evidently became obsessed with the young Jan, and solicited him as her personal tutor to develop her own abilities. Sinclair talks about hearing them frequently arguing because Jan wouldn't share some of his secrets. At other times, he would send her flowers and their relationship seemed quite cozy.

But Craig showed potential. Once, she had a sudden premonition that their friend Jack London was in terrible emotional pain. Just when Sinclair was about to send his wife over to the London ranch to check on him, they read in the papers that London took his own life.

Sinclair then engages in a variety of experiments with his wife to test her ESP. I'm reminded of Bill Murray coddling the cute blonde undergrad in "Ghostbusters." He sketches in one room and has his wife try to copy what he's drawing in another room. Sinclair is genuinely impressed with what Craig can do, and believes that statistically his wife should not be able to pick up on his mental images as accurately as she does. He records some of the more sensational results for the reader.

So as you can see, this book is interesting on many levels. On the surface, it is intriguing to think that these phenomena Sinclair witnessed were real examples of some latent human power. Historically, it's fun to read about actual events like Jack London's death from this odd perspective. Psychologically, this is where I find the most of interest. I think it says a lot about the author's personality that he dives into this with both feet, but not so much as a skeptic. Also, he doesn't mention any suspicions regarding his wife's relationship with Jan, though it appears to me that she was quite charmed, and I don't think the frequent visits were purely in the interest of science.

As a former member of le Société du Magnétisme in New Orleans, I certainly ran across clinicians who were so charismatic that they could walk into a room, look at a student in the eyes, utter the word "SLEEP" in a sexy commanding voice, and the student would collapse on the floor like spilled Jello. And one thing I learned about hypnotism is that there is a high degree of surrender of control required on the part of the person experiencing the hypnosis. The person expects and wants the powerful hypnotist to command, to manipulate, to effect change. That is why the stage hypnotist asks for volunteers, you see. They select immediately for the most suggestible. Then they further select out those volunteers who will put on the best "performance." The hypnotist struts around the stage, putting each volunteer into a state of relaxation, and early on they will pick on a few and say, "Sorry, you're just not deep enough. That's not what we're looking for. You can return to your seat, please." That puts a suggestion in the heads of the remaining volunteers that they better show that they're able to go deeper than anyone else. And then the show begins.

I'm not trying to give away trade secrets, nor am I impugning any potential benefits people may get from clinically applied hypnosis. There is certainly such a thing as trance, and we go into it naturally every day. And people are wired to be suggestible. But there is a fine line between the clinical application vs flat-out exploitation of others. And I think that Sinclair and his wife were manipulated.

Sinclair anticipated such a reaction in his readers. He essentially says, "You guys probably think my wife was hypnotized by Jan and made to believe all this stuff. And because I have rapport with my wife, and because I'm in a trance half the time due to having to concentrate while writing, I'm easily misled by her in turn." Well, that's putting it rather simply, Upton, but yes, something like that.

Craig was evidently going through a period of depression during this period in her life, and seems to have enjoyed the attention that her famous and well-connected husband was giving to her extraordinary "mental radio." Unfortunately, she could not reproduce the satisfactory results when studied by outside observers.

Does this mean I'm a hardened skeptic? No. I've known a Serbian priest who had the uncanny ability to know exactly what was in my mind when he would take my hand and look in my eyes. I myself have suddenly had a vivid dream or thought about a friend I've not spoken to in years who would give me a call out of the blue within the hour. And I know hypnosis works. I don't believe any of these phenomena are faked or just coincidence. But I appreciate the power of empathy and hysteria, and I also believe that these "powers" can be exploited nefariously.

But don't let me persuade you with my own stunning powers of suggestion. This book has convinced many readers over the years as being genuine and in good faith. Even Albert Einstein was impressed and convinced by this book.

So decide for yourself. Was Upton Sinclair duped, or was he trying to dupe the reader? Or did his wife truly perform feats of mental control that should be more rigorously studied by science? Check this amazing book out and see what you think!

[bladenomics · Rating 1 out of 5]

What did I miss?

How can a book endorsed by Einstein and a Prof. William McDougall, be devoid of any content?
Einstein and McDougall both write, “ it is out of the question in the case of so conscientious an observer and writer as Upton Sinclair that he is carrying on a conscious deception of the reading world; his good faith and dependability are not to be doubted.”
Basically, he isn’t kidding guys. Believe him and his book.

I do.

It might appear otherwise, but I always get into things with an open mind and trust in other people. I may even be in denial when proved wrong to do so, because that gets in the way of newer experiences in life.

Two months ago, I had a hypnosis session. My faith levels in this department can be termed, “disbeliever” as in the Holy Qu’ran. For weeks preceding this session, there were preparatory classes to approach the conscious mind and subconscious mind , success stories about telepathy and hypnotic cure. There were printed and written notes, games, you name it.

My attitude towards it was literally, “Evalavo Pathutom”.

I didn’t have any objective behind this so nothing to gain or lose. I wrote it off at the expense of my weekly pizza night, let me treat myself to this experience to whet my curiosity. Nevertheless, I approached it with sincerity, I did view the hypnotist as a man of integrity and devoid of pretentious mumbo-jumbo. He had been a senior IT consultant abroad and is pursuing this as a post retirement career to help youngsters heal.

In the middle of an Alphabet game that I couldn’t concentrate on, I told him my mind was on to other things. He said, “you haven’t practiced mind techniques yet, so I don’t know if this may work, but let’s go for a hypnotic session and see what it has to say.”

The experience was nothing but a series of suggestions and talking while in meditation, of which I was perfectly aware of. The only difference I felt was lesser resistance to accept his suggestions. I thought the hypnosis would reveal some broken heart or spiritual connection. Instead , it was traveling in the mind, choosing one scene / place after the next (consciously) and eventually, it turned out to be re-performing my father’s funeral in which I got to tell him whatever I wanted to tell him one last time and say bye (which obviously had my eyes shed streams of tears). I didn’t go back for another session. I don’t think one needs a hypnotist to perform this act- for it was no magic. It was entirely self-controlled and merely guided thinking. Thereby, bringing me back to finding no meaning in clairvoyance, dreams, hypnosis and intuition.

I do catalogue some dreams just for the record hoping to find meaning someday. I am in the middle of reading the voluminous works of Carl Jung and Freud on and off over years, but since this was a smaller book, I picked it up hoping for something to chew on meanwhile.

Mental Radio is a notebook of Sinclair’s wife’s personal experiments and experience with telepathy, dreams and clairvoyance. Even if one has complete faith in the topic, I’d say this book has nothing useful for anyone and is ridiculously boring. Mrs. Sinclair performs several experiments in “remote viewing” which are partially successful. This book chronicles the experiments as they are and offers little information on the methods used.

It is no surprise that this book was self-published in those times. I do think Mrs. Sinclair may have those talents in reading minds of others or “remote viewing”, but it offers the reader nothing to learn from.

[Penny · Rating 2 out of 5]

"Let me begin by repeating that reading a book about telepathy experiments can actually be quite boring."

[Mudge · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was the same drawing experiment repeated multiple times. It was alright but not the best book about the paranormal by far

[M David Mo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reseñable por el tema y por las explicaciones de Craig, pero repetitivo. Es todo el rato el mismo experimento una y otra vez.
Se nota que Sinclair redactaba el libro con miedo a las críticas y a los escépticos, si no hubiese sido así, podría haber incluido en este libro explicaciones esotéricas (o científicas) que ahora debo buscar en otros lados xd.
Las 3 estrellas se las doy por introducirme a este tema (la telepatía) y romperme un poco los esquemas. Si lo vas a leer, puedes hacerlo de forma salteada.

[Briz · Rating 3 out of 5]

A quick read with a lot of examples to show the fundamental aspects of Remote Viewing. Besides the illustrations I enjoyed the theories Sinclair presents as well as the overall folksiness of the book. Plus I got it on Kindle for 2.99!

[Payaso Uno · Rating 5 out of 5]

A small gem in the paranormal field.

Whenever I read an intelligently written book about telepathy - a less 'fight worthy' topic within the field of the 'paranormal' - it's with the hope that its contents are enough to contribute to an already impressive body of literature affirming its reality. Amid the hoaxers, frauds or, as Sinclair himself describes in these pages, well-intentioned folks using gifts unwisely, skeptics jostled for position to decry such beliefs. This book has its own Wikipedia entry making sure that the reader is aware these 'experiments' weren't conducted in lab settings. We don't feel dismayed at all about this information, which makes us right brained and/or credulous. (Since telepathy is often attributed to claims of 'evidence' from mediums professing to bring messages from the afterlife, the subjects are often mentioned interchangeably, even if we find them to be different ends of the same playing field, so to speak.)

It bears mentioning that Sinclair was past the age of fifty when he and his wife Mary Craig Sinclair - the 'sensitive' who made the experiments possible - began the series of experiments. This was also decades before the acronym ESP was used to describe extrasensory perception: In this sense, the title 'Mental Radio' was apt. Due to a siege of bad health that required her to rest frequently, Upton's wife had been increasingly able to gather her focus via a meditative state during which she was often able to describe, over time and distance, the actions of both friends and strangers over the course of years. Too, the author provides enough separate testimony to convince at least open-minded skeptics of events that challenge the notion of 'sheer coincidence'. For those of us already certain that such stellar synchronicities exist, the accounts are more entertaining.

To their credit, both Mary and Upton were diligent about the methodology utilized to preclude charges that they somehow manipulated results. Since comparative drawings are the chief examples used, it's easy enough for the reader to make his own judgement as to 'hits' and 'misses'.

ESP, although still thought of as new age in 1930, was considered more tame than claims of soul survival, so it was surprising to read the degree of defensiveness Sinclair employed to explain his involvement in said work. Perhaps seeing his explanations as simple dialectics is a better description.

In all, the Kindle version of 'Mental Radio' is only $2.50, less than a hundred pages long and an enjoyable look into events that were rightly fascinating enough for a novelist to tell about though it risked, he frets throughout the book, threats to his professional reputation. Lastly, for those of us who have read and greatly enjoyed several of his excellent books already, it's also an interesting look at a brilliant artist's personal life.

[Don Kubicki · Rating 2 out of 5]

Only about one-tenth of the book is about how to do telepathy. Mostly it is bragging about his wife's capability and justifying his belief in telepathy.

[Steven H · Rating 3 out of 5]

THE EXTRASENSORY EXPERIMENTS OF UPTON SINCLAIR'S WIFE

Upton Sinclair was best-known for his classic muckraking novel, 'The Jungle'; he wrote in the Foreword to this 1929 book, "I wrote the text of 'Mental Radio,' 1929, under [my wife's] direction; she revised every word and had it exactly the way she wanted it... She knew just how we did our experiments; she had told me exactly what to do, and I had done it... So trust this book. Understand that what is told here happened exactly as it has been told."

Of a series of drawings "transmitted" mentally, he notes, "In the 290 drawings, the total of successes is 65, which is roughly 23 per cent. The total of partial successes is 155, which is 53 per cent. The total of failures is 70, which is 24 per cent... It seems to me that any one must agree that the chances of the twelve drawings so far shown have been reproduced by accident is too great to be worth considering." (Pg. 14)

Later, he admits, "The border-line between successes and failures is not easy to determine. Bear in mind that we are not conducting a drawing class, nor making tests of my wife's eyesight: we are trying to ascertain whether there does pass from my mind to hers, or from my drawing to her mind, a recognizable impulse of some sort." (Pg. 112)

About a critic who argued that a husband and wife were too close to make such experiments, he responds, "but how does it account for the half-dozen successes with a brother-in-law, twenty or thirty with a secretary, and many with Jan? How does it account for the covers and jackets of books in which I had no interest, but which had come to me by chance, and which Craig had never even glanced at, so far as she remembers?" (Pg. 153)

He concludes, "that there should be so many reproductions which strikingly resemble the originals in shape, yet which do not represent the objects which the agent drew, and have no more ideational connection with them than can be traced between a cockroach and an archangel, or between a violin and an eel, and yet that the explanation for the correspondences should lurk in the involuntary whispering of the agent, I maintain is practically inconceivable." (Pg. 247)

This book will interest persons studying psychical research.

[Donald · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this one for what it's worth. But there are only a couple of pages describing what Upton's wife does to prepare herself for her telepathic abilities. The first hundred pages or so depict the drawings she was to "see" and either her descriptions or her own drawings as interpretations. It ends with a bunch of "I swear this was all done most scientifically and is not a hoax."
I don't disbelieve.
And I suppose I could try her method, but it may take some doing... That's the claim, anyway: that it takes some practice.

[Fred Fanning · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an interesting book of experiences within a small group of people who experimented with telepathy. Their methods lacked scientific rigor, statistical analysis, and replication to ensure they were correct. In spite of this, the results of their experimentation leave the reader wondering whether telepathy could exist.

[Frank Aquino Ruiz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting book about telepathy

This book,written by the famous writer, Upton Sinclair, is very interesting because he narrates in detail the experiment he did with his wife. In this experiment he wanted to explain if his wife had telepathic powers.

[Shyma · Rating 4 out of 5]

what a book ...i believe in psy

[Clark Hugo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Prefaced by Einstein who was a personal friend of the Sinclair's...

[Beth]

DNF due to reviews saying there isn't any substance. But interesting that it was ever written nonetheless.

[Mitchell Botting · Rating 5 out of 5]

Funniest book I’ve read in awhile

[Lee Satkowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

Needs editing

[Levent Mollamustafaoglu · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a very surprising book, but the surprise is not in the content but in the identity of the author. Upton Sinclair is an American author who was an outspoken socialist and wrote many novels which covered conditions for the working class. In this book, he's describing the psychic experiments they conducted with his wife to research telepathy and similar skills.

The book is unnecessarily long and repetitive, it includes analysis by third parties, but can not raise the interest of the reader who looks for psychic content.

[Kelly Head · Rating 2 out of 5]

How can a book that has a preface by Albert Einstein, a body by Upton Sinclair, and an appendix by William McDougall (who went on to found the parapsychology department at Duke University on the basis of Mental Radio) be so damn boring? I’ll tell you: by forcing readers to look at page after page of reproduced images of Sinclair’s wife’s drawings of her attempts at telepathically “seeing” what Sinclair and others have drawn on tiny sheets of paper. Don’t get me wrong, a description of the procedure and a few of the closer matches had me interested. But, one can kind of see why this book was originally self-published by Sinclair in 1930. The procedure for Kimbrough’s telepathic experiment consists of taking a stack of index cards folded in half that include drawings by her husband and other close friends and relatives. She lies in a dark room flat on her back on a sofa next to a table with the drawings stacked. She takes one of the drawings after quieting her mind and holds it above her solar plexus without looking at the drawing with her eyes. She then “commands” her subconscious (or whatever one chooses to call it) to bring to view the image on the card. When she sees something take form, she immediately turns on a light and begins to draw the image brought before her mind. She describes various methods for avoiding false positives, and techniques to prepare one’s mind beforehand. I have not tried to reproduce this experiment, but I believe the reader is given enough information to “try this at home.” Some of the drawings seemed remarkably close, and I trust the credentials of Upton Sinclair preclude an outright hoax. It’s funny to read him write about how his “Socialist” friends were often the one’s to discourage him from writing this book, confirmed as they were in their naturalism and materialism. The preface from Einstein is worth quoting in full, as it is so short:

I have read the book of Upton Sinclair with great interest and am convinced that the same deserves the most earnest consideration, not only of the laity, but also of the psychologists by profession. The results of the telepathic experiments carefully and plainly set forth in this book stand surely far beyond those which a nature investigator holds to be thinkable. On the other hand, it is out of the question in the case of so conscientious an observer and writer as Upton Sinclair that he is carrying on a conscious deception of the reading world; his good faith and dependability are not to be doubted. So if somehow the facts here set forth rest not upon telepathy, but upon some unconscious hypnotic influence from person to person, this also would be of high psychological interest. In no case should the psychologically interested circles pass over this book heedlessly.

[signed] A. Einstein
May 23, 1930

For the full-text of Mental Radio, visit the Internet Archive: http://archive.org/details/mentalradi...

[Julie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Upton Sinclair's wife Mary Craig experimented with telepathy and clairvoyance with mixed results. I have an open mind about this subject, but I think Upton and Craig's methodology could have been more strict. If you are interested in the subject, it's worth reading. I would also recommend "Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal Extrasensory Perception", which uses a similar method, but includes third parties to eliminate the natural bias that is bound to exist between a married couple. Another difference: In "Dream Telepathy", the percipient is actually sleeping, whereas Craig put herself into a meditative state.

[Angeluismanzueta · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book is about a man named upton sinclair. and his wife he believes that his wife may have physic powers he decides to taketests in which she succeeds about 65. partially about 120 and about 80 fails.
i can relate this book to mind to mind by rene warcollier. it talks about where tests are taken. by people who have special abilities. and proven that their is such thing as telepathy. i would rate this book five stars because it is very interesting and have the exact words of what upton sinclair has wrote also with the images from his journal that him and his wife drew. i would recommend this book to people who are interested in facts and non-fiction.

[Tori · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the drawings, which were often funny, and the candor with which Upton Sinclair wrote about his self-consciousness writing about telepathy. Particularly at the very end, where he brings up various critics' objections to the experiments he's narrated as "evidence."

I'm incapable of really being convinced, though. Mostly I just like thinking of Upton Sinclair writing this...it's an interesting piece of metafiction, if you think of it as such. I think I enjoyed it most when I thought of it in the context of Borges's "Pierre Menard, Author of Don Quixote," as evidence of an author earnestly creating something that reveals nothing so much as his own absurdity. Or something.

[Mike S · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book includes Sinclair's personal experiences of ESP experiments with his wife and several other people. If you are looking for proof of psychic abilities I think there are much more interesting books in the field. The best part of the book is where his wife describes how she tunes in to information, starting on page 105 in chapter 21. Unfortunately the chapters aren't labeled by content, and the book becomes redundant after a short while. The book became tedious for me and I can't really recommend it, unless you are desperate for books about the beginnings of psi experimentation.

[Debbie Otenburg · Rating 1 out of 5]

I suppose if you have an interest in psychic studies or, as one review stated, if you look at this as a historical document, it might be interesting. -I was expecting something more Upton Sinclair-ish. I'm just going to pretend this book never happened.

[Jack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting book on experiments with his wife's abilities. Earlier part of book more interesting and progressive than back end.

[heidi mo · Rating 4 out of 5]

an important historical document about psychic phenomena.