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Collector's Library of the Unknown
Many Voices: The Autobiography of a Medium
Autobiography of medium, Eileen J. Garrett.
254 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1939
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 5, 2014
Eileen Garrett spent a life trying to understand her life.
This book is her third attempt at autobiography, coming out three decades after her first. She was born in Ireland and grew up to be one of the most famous mediums of the 20th century--though she's mostly forgotten these days.
This book is not as weird as her second one, which makes it less interesting, too. Her childhood becomes more conventional--the classic red-headed step-child, abused for her lack of faith. At the same time, Ireland itself takes on a more important role--as a place where belief in the supernatural was common and death an accepted part of life. These don't seem particularly unique, but Garrett casts them as so.
She was always sensitive to the emotions of other people--though in this iteration of her autobiography she's less empathetic to her family and peers as a youth--as well as to the magnetic fields she saw surrounding every living thing.
Garrett married and suffered unimaginable loss--three of her children died very young--as well as a loveless relationship. She divorced, married again--a boy who died in the Great War. She worked operated a hostel. And became involved with socialist policies in London--where a series of men interpreted hr sensitivities as parapsychological. Through the 1920s and into the 1930s, she transformed herself into a medium, working with the likes of Nandor Fodor, Harry Price, Hereward Carrington, and J.B. Rhine. Early in the 1930s she came to the United States, where she traveled and became involved with the American parapsychological community.
Garrett was sickly all her life--she wore a belt of rats that she fed everything she ate, to monitor her allergies. (She says this in a toss-away line: in her earlier book, the belt would have received significant discussion: weird.) And in the late 1930s went to southern France, in part for health reasons. She became ill, though. She fell in love with southern France--eventually purchasing land there--and stayed even as war came to Europe, helping the resistance and orphaned children. Finally, though, she realized as an Irish woman she was at extreme risk, and so returned to the U.S. Eventually she became an American citizen.
Returned to the U.S., she was done with the parapsychological for a time. She had been unimpressed by all those who had studied her before. She was not sure that she was in contact with the dead, or acting as a medium to a discarnate personality--as the lingo went. Instead, she thought she was just tapping into her subconscious. She thought those who had studied her were not sufficiently scientific, but moved by their own biases.
So she became involved with the literary world. Garrett had known a number of people involved with the Irish literary Renaissance--Joyce, Yeats, others--and remained intrigued by modernist literature. She started a literary journal, Tomorrow, and also a publishing house, Creative Age Press. She continued with these until 1951, when she sold her Press, re-launched her magazine as a parapsychological periodical, and re-started scientific investigation of her gifts. She spent the rest of her life on these pursuits, traveling a lot. Somehow, she had become wealthy, although exactly how is unclear.
This book is her third attempt at autobiography, coming out three decades after her first. She was born in Ireland and grew up to be one of the most famous mediums of the 20th century--though she's mostly forgotten these days.
This book is not as weird as her second one, which makes it less interesting, too. Her childhood becomes more conventional--the classic red-headed step-child, abused for her lack of faith. At the same time, Ireland itself takes on a more important role--as a place where belief in the supernatural was common and death an accepted part of life. These don't seem particularly unique, but Garrett casts them as so.
She was always sensitive to the emotions of other people--though in this iteration of her autobiography she's less empathetic to her family and peers as a youth--as well as to the magnetic fields she saw surrounding every living thing.
Garrett married and suffered unimaginable loss--three of her children died very young--as well as a loveless relationship. She divorced, married again--a boy who died in the Great War. She worked operated a hostel. And became involved with socialist policies in London--where a series of men interpreted hr sensitivities as parapsychological. Through the 1920s and into the 1930s, she transformed herself into a medium, working with the likes of Nandor Fodor, Harry Price, Hereward Carrington, and J.B. Rhine. Early in the 1930s she came to the United States, where she traveled and became involved with the American parapsychological community.
Garrett was sickly all her life--she wore a belt of rats that she fed everything she ate, to monitor her allergies. (She says this in a toss-away line: in her earlier book, the belt would have received significant discussion: weird.) And in the late 1930s went to southern France, in part for health reasons. She became ill, though. She fell in love with southern France--eventually purchasing land there--and stayed even as war came to Europe, helping the resistance and orphaned children. Finally, though, she realized as an Irish woman she was at extreme risk, and so returned to the U.S. Eventually she became an American citizen.
Returned to the U.S., she was done with the parapsychological for a time. She had been unimpressed by all those who had studied her before. She was not sure that she was in contact with the dead, or acting as a medium to a discarnate personality--as the lingo went. Instead, she thought she was just tapping into her subconscious. She thought those who had studied her were not sufficiently scientific, but moved by their own biases.
So she became involved with the literary world. Garrett had known a number of people involved with the Irish literary Renaissance--Joyce, Yeats, others--and remained intrigued by modernist literature. She started a literary journal, Tomorrow, and also a publishing house, Creative Age Press. She continued with these until 1951, when she sold her Press, re-launched her magazine as a parapsychological periodical, and re-started scientific investigation of her gifts. She spent the rest of her life on these pursuits, traveling a lot. Somehow, she had become wealthy, although exactly how is unclear.
May 23, 2024
THE STORY OF A WELL-KNOWN 20TH CENTURY MEDIUM
Eileen Jeanette Vancho Lyttle Garrett (1893-1970) was a well-known Irish medium and parapsychologist, who was tested in the 1930s by Joseph Rhine and others.
She wrote in the first chapter of this 1968 book, “it seems to me that two aspects of my external environment, interweaving with the individual lines of my personal life, played a major role in my becoming a medium. One was the fact that I was born in Ireland and spent my childhood in a countryside where the ‘little people’ were universally accepted as an everyday part of normal existence. The other was the almost equally universal acceptance of death as an intimate element of the daily round, so that I early grew to have not fear of what for many people may be an insupportable terror.” (Pg. 15)
She recalls, “Many primitive peoples have held the belief that ghosts may steal the soul and, in the vacated body, cause illnesses that radically alter the personality, thoughts, and actions. Often ill as a child, I was solemnly assured that this had happened to me. It was alleged to have been brought about by fairies.” (Pg. 21)
After she married and had a child, “my energies were of a kind that needed more than a home and child to keep me busy. The subtle dimensions contained in the unconscious were blending themselves with my conscious everyday existence to give me another dimensional aspect. This was always there during my childhood, but my husband did not wish these aspects to be encouraged. In spite of his advice, I was living two lives, as the theater of the unconscious took over much of my waking life. Then opportunity presented itself, I returned to Ireland to see my aunt, who had become gravely ill. At the same time I wondered if acting might not offer a career. I had continued to regard the world of the theater with excitement and awe.” (Pg. 32)
She opened a tearoom in Hampstead, “and to this my husband reluctantly agreed.” One of her customers was D.H. Lawrence: “I believe he was rather short of money, for sometimes he would suddenly explain before he left: ‘I don’t have any money; I probably will pay you tomorrow.’ I believe he was writing copiously at this time. He complained of the weather, the bad life, and difficult friends, but his health seemed to be his chief concern. Occasionally, he was affable and chatted with the young painters and writers. The effect of the war troubled him greatly… Lawrence told me then that he loved no one… His moods were many and unpredictable. There were moments when he liked the young people who came and went; and then again, he would ignore them… Lawrence gave the impression that he bore with people because they were around him. He spoke so much of evil---‘Men’s ways are evil.’ He would reiterate---that it finally repelled me… One day Lawrence announced that he was leaving Hampstead find a better climate… Later, when he returned to London, he sought me out on many occasions.” (Pg. 38-39)
She recounts, “Mercy Phillimore told me about the London Spiritualist Alliance of its members’ belief in the survival of personality after death, and of their search for proof of survival… She advised me to seek the counsel of Hewat McKenzie, director of the College of Psychic Science… [I] immediately felt the strength and vitality of his personality.. I never asked McKenzie or his wife how they acquired their knowledge of psychic science… McKenzie had gone to America to meet Professor William James and others interested in the subject of psychical research… Mrs. McKenzie was in attendance every day at the college to interview the people who came seeking help and advice about death and their lost relatives---‘lost’ in the sense of being dead…. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle came to work with me during these early days. he was interested in healing, and I worked in this field for a long time… For years he took much interest in my work, especially diagnostic work… I do not think at this period of my life I had any curiosity about the spiritual or mystical life. Intellectual wondering took me in other directions.” (Pg. 51-53)
She explains, “such internal and external discipline over the years removed any desire for self-gratification. I had to learn to experience, measure, and test my own feelings in relation to others… It took me years of observation to understand something of the mechanics of mediumship. I am positive that a deep emotional tie between two people, a sympathetic kinship, is necessary to obtain results in ‘communication.’” (Pg. 55)
She recalls, “Catherine Dawson Scott … started the Tomorrow Club, which extended a helping hand to younger and as yet unknown writers… This was an exciting time in my life. While I worked with Catherine and her group, I found myself once again meeting all the writers whom I had known at the Fitzroy Club… or at the Café Royal… Many came to the Café Royal in the wake of Aleister Crowley… Although Crowley was much maligned by the more orthodox members of society, I felt he had a mystical union with nature, whether or not he had occult powers… all admitted he was guilty of devil worship and more. They talked of his obscene ceremonies, which involved young girls known as his priestesses, blood sacrifices of cats, and ritual dances to the rhythm of drums. I was invited to a ‘black mass’ he held in a room in Fitzroy Square… I have really seen more uncanny things in the voodoo rites in Haiti… If there was ‘authority’ in Crowley’s meetings with Lucifer, I never knew it… If he did have these occult powers, I think they must have been fleeting, for he often ran into monetary difficulties.” (Pg. 58-59)
She states, “Sir Oliver [Lodge] was a reflective gentlemen… he did not neglect the stars. He believed that the only limit to comprehension was imposed from within ourselves. He often declared that Christianity was not so much a doctrine as the way we live our lives…. He often declared that … death released us from the barriers of the body to open up a new vista of work and service.” (Pg. 67)
She notes, “My own lack of a true belief in the identity of the controls troubled me. I had never been certain of their reality of that the messages they conveyed from their ‘universe’ about those who had departed this life were truly evidence of life after death. The people who came to communicate with the ‘living dead’ usually lacked sufficient profundity for critical examination of the communications they received. Instead of gaining moral strength, they continued to seek out those who would continually give them easy assurance that life after death had indeed been proven… I began to have a revulsion to continuing year after year producing results about which there could be doubts.” (Pg. 91-92)
She recounts, “I turned away from other disciplines of training and meaning and turned toward the field of spiritualism, where the entities were then hailed as spirits and treated accordingly. But whether these entities do contain a consciousness of their own is a question that will, I am sure, find an answer, although not in my lifetime. I definitely believe the entitles are formed from spiritual and emotional needs of the person involved… For myself, I have never been able wholly to accept them as the spiritual dwellers on the threshold, which they seem to believe they are. I rather leaned away from accepting them as such, a fact which is known to them and troubles them not at all.” (Pg. 94)
She recalls, “I encountered [J.B. Rhine] again when I wrote to him at the psychology laboratory at Duke University, asking if I might be permitted to come and work with him. He replied cordially, and so began my first experiments… I was invited to take part in the studies in extra-sensory perception (ESP) using the Zener Cards… I thought at first it would be easy to be objectively stimulated to produce evidence with the cards, since repetition would establish its own habit-forming pattern to obtain results. It did not turn out, however, as I anticipated… the cards remained stubbornly inanimate… Dr. Rhine was kind enough to say that my early scores were higher than chance, a speculation that encouraged me to continue. I did so, hoping to arouse some unconscious activities that might increase awareness and suggestivity, but I knew that at best I was too unresponsive to expect much better results.” (Pg. 98)
She says, “In the early days of my mediumship … before I understood what mediumship was, I had a faculty for producing automatic writing. There were times when it appeared that this could be another and unknown part of the subconscious finding release in this particular way. During my early training days, I learned that many people had this faculty, which thy regarded as unusual and even as being supernatural.” (Pg. 111)
She summarizes, “I have given proof during my life, of the mind’s ability to travel and observe over long distances, and I have carried out extensive spontaneous journeys in cross correspondence tests with the living as well as the alleged departed. If I could carry on long sustained conversations with the departed, I could earnestly say that communication had been proven, but the test I set for such evidence has not yet been met. I am aware that this sounds like a contradiction of things I have written elsewhere. Nevertheless, I feel I must say it.” (Pg. 187) Later, she admits, “I have had many out-of-the-body experiences; they almost always occur when I am ill or depleted.” (Pg. 190) She asserts, “Parapsychology is not even a science, but it may be on the route to revelation. Like everything that is young, it has much explaining to do. A whole process of comprehension is necessary in order to open up the way to the inner experiences of which I have spoken.” (Pg. 227)
She concludes, “One lives a fuller life when one comprehends the world of dreams, psychic impulses, urges, and even conscience itself. The gift of faith and a state of grace become at once one’s own religious experience, where one is truly in tune with the cosmic order of goodness and harmony To mediumship and its pursuits below the level of consciousness, through these many years, I owe the gifts of the heart. Without those who have helped me pursue the light within, I would still be kneeling on the outer doors of insight that lead to the untapped sources of energy which have given me a relationship to the world of the unconscious---a world I regard with both awe and veneration.” (Pg. 241)
This book will be of keen interest to those studying Ms. Garrett, or previous generations of mediums.
Eileen Jeanette Vancho Lyttle Garrett (1893-1970) was a well-known Irish medium and parapsychologist, who was tested in the 1930s by Joseph Rhine and others.
She wrote in the first chapter of this 1968 book, “it seems to me that two aspects of my external environment, interweaving with the individual lines of my personal life, played a major role in my becoming a medium. One was the fact that I was born in Ireland and spent my childhood in a countryside where the ‘little people’ were universally accepted as an everyday part of normal existence. The other was the almost equally universal acceptance of death as an intimate element of the daily round, so that I early grew to have not fear of what for many people may be an insupportable terror.” (Pg. 15)
She recalls, “Many primitive peoples have held the belief that ghosts may steal the soul and, in the vacated body, cause illnesses that radically alter the personality, thoughts, and actions. Often ill as a child, I was solemnly assured that this had happened to me. It was alleged to have been brought about by fairies.” (Pg. 21)
After she married and had a child, “my energies were of a kind that needed more than a home and child to keep me busy. The subtle dimensions contained in the unconscious were blending themselves with my conscious everyday existence to give me another dimensional aspect. This was always there during my childhood, but my husband did not wish these aspects to be encouraged. In spite of his advice, I was living two lives, as the theater of the unconscious took over much of my waking life. Then opportunity presented itself, I returned to Ireland to see my aunt, who had become gravely ill. At the same time I wondered if acting might not offer a career. I had continued to regard the world of the theater with excitement and awe.” (Pg. 32)
She opened a tearoom in Hampstead, “and to this my husband reluctantly agreed.” One of her customers was D.H. Lawrence: “I believe he was rather short of money, for sometimes he would suddenly explain before he left: ‘I don’t have any money; I probably will pay you tomorrow.’ I believe he was writing copiously at this time. He complained of the weather, the bad life, and difficult friends, but his health seemed to be his chief concern. Occasionally, he was affable and chatted with the young painters and writers. The effect of the war troubled him greatly… Lawrence told me then that he loved no one… His moods were many and unpredictable. There were moments when he liked the young people who came and went; and then again, he would ignore them… Lawrence gave the impression that he bore with people because they were around him. He spoke so much of evil---‘Men’s ways are evil.’ He would reiterate---that it finally repelled me… One day Lawrence announced that he was leaving Hampstead find a better climate… Later, when he returned to London, he sought me out on many occasions.” (Pg. 38-39)
She recounts, “Mercy Phillimore told me about the London Spiritualist Alliance of its members’ belief in the survival of personality after death, and of their search for proof of survival… She advised me to seek the counsel of Hewat McKenzie, director of the College of Psychic Science… [I] immediately felt the strength and vitality of his personality.. I never asked McKenzie or his wife how they acquired their knowledge of psychic science… McKenzie had gone to America to meet Professor William James and others interested in the subject of psychical research… Mrs. McKenzie was in attendance every day at the college to interview the people who came seeking help and advice about death and their lost relatives---‘lost’ in the sense of being dead…. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle came to work with me during these early days. he was interested in healing, and I worked in this field for a long time… For years he took much interest in my work, especially diagnostic work… I do not think at this period of my life I had any curiosity about the spiritual or mystical life. Intellectual wondering took me in other directions.” (Pg. 51-53)
She explains, “such internal and external discipline over the years removed any desire for self-gratification. I had to learn to experience, measure, and test my own feelings in relation to others… It took me years of observation to understand something of the mechanics of mediumship. I am positive that a deep emotional tie between two people, a sympathetic kinship, is necessary to obtain results in ‘communication.’” (Pg. 55)
She recalls, “Catherine Dawson Scott … started the Tomorrow Club, which extended a helping hand to younger and as yet unknown writers… This was an exciting time in my life. While I worked with Catherine and her group, I found myself once again meeting all the writers whom I had known at the Fitzroy Club… or at the Café Royal… Many came to the Café Royal in the wake of Aleister Crowley… Although Crowley was much maligned by the more orthodox members of society, I felt he had a mystical union with nature, whether or not he had occult powers… all admitted he was guilty of devil worship and more. They talked of his obscene ceremonies, which involved young girls known as his priestesses, blood sacrifices of cats, and ritual dances to the rhythm of drums. I was invited to a ‘black mass’ he held in a room in Fitzroy Square… I have really seen more uncanny things in the voodoo rites in Haiti… If there was ‘authority’ in Crowley’s meetings with Lucifer, I never knew it… If he did have these occult powers, I think they must have been fleeting, for he often ran into monetary difficulties.” (Pg. 58-59)
She states, “Sir Oliver [Lodge] was a reflective gentlemen… he did not neglect the stars. He believed that the only limit to comprehension was imposed from within ourselves. He often declared that Christianity was not so much a doctrine as the way we live our lives…. He often declared that … death released us from the barriers of the body to open up a new vista of work and service.” (Pg. 67)
She notes, “My own lack of a true belief in the identity of the controls troubled me. I had never been certain of their reality of that the messages they conveyed from their ‘universe’ about those who had departed this life were truly evidence of life after death. The people who came to communicate with the ‘living dead’ usually lacked sufficient profundity for critical examination of the communications they received. Instead of gaining moral strength, they continued to seek out those who would continually give them easy assurance that life after death had indeed been proven… I began to have a revulsion to continuing year after year producing results about which there could be doubts.” (Pg. 91-92)
She recounts, “I turned away from other disciplines of training and meaning and turned toward the field of spiritualism, where the entities were then hailed as spirits and treated accordingly. But whether these entities do contain a consciousness of their own is a question that will, I am sure, find an answer, although not in my lifetime. I definitely believe the entitles are formed from spiritual and emotional needs of the person involved… For myself, I have never been able wholly to accept them as the spiritual dwellers on the threshold, which they seem to believe they are. I rather leaned away from accepting them as such, a fact which is known to them and troubles them not at all.” (Pg. 94)
She recalls, “I encountered [J.B. Rhine] again when I wrote to him at the psychology laboratory at Duke University, asking if I might be permitted to come and work with him. He replied cordially, and so began my first experiments… I was invited to take part in the studies in extra-sensory perception (ESP) using the Zener Cards… I thought at first it would be easy to be objectively stimulated to produce evidence with the cards, since repetition would establish its own habit-forming pattern to obtain results. It did not turn out, however, as I anticipated… the cards remained stubbornly inanimate… Dr. Rhine was kind enough to say that my early scores were higher than chance, a speculation that encouraged me to continue. I did so, hoping to arouse some unconscious activities that might increase awareness and suggestivity, but I knew that at best I was too unresponsive to expect much better results.” (Pg. 98)
She says, “In the early days of my mediumship … before I understood what mediumship was, I had a faculty for producing automatic writing. There were times when it appeared that this could be another and unknown part of the subconscious finding release in this particular way. During my early training days, I learned that many people had this faculty, which thy regarded as unusual and even as being supernatural.” (Pg. 111)
She summarizes, “I have given proof during my life, of the mind’s ability to travel and observe over long distances, and I have carried out extensive spontaneous journeys in cross correspondence tests with the living as well as the alleged departed. If I could carry on long sustained conversations with the departed, I could earnestly say that communication had been proven, but the test I set for such evidence has not yet been met. I am aware that this sounds like a contradiction of things I have written elsewhere. Nevertheless, I feel I must say it.” (Pg. 187) Later, she admits, “I have had many out-of-the-body experiences; they almost always occur when I am ill or depleted.” (Pg. 190) She asserts, “Parapsychology is not even a science, but it may be on the route to revelation. Like everything that is young, it has much explaining to do. A whole process of comprehension is necessary in order to open up the way to the inner experiences of which I have spoken.” (Pg. 227)
She concludes, “One lives a fuller life when one comprehends the world of dreams, psychic impulses, urges, and even conscience itself. The gift of faith and a state of grace become at once one’s own religious experience, where one is truly in tune with the cosmic order of goodness and harmony To mediumship and its pursuits below the level of consciousness, through these many years, I owe the gifts of the heart. Without those who have helped me pursue the light within, I would still be kneeling on the outer doors of insight that lead to the untapped sources of energy which have given me a relationship to the world of the unconscious---a world I regard with both awe and veneration.” (Pg. 241)
This book will be of keen interest to those studying Ms. Garrett, or previous generations of mediums.
June 21, 2021
The writing is antiquated and the name-dropping completely irrelevant. Didn't finish; not worth the time.
October 29, 2023
Intelligent, empathetic and thoughtful review of her life with insight on her personal experiences. I enjoyed reading this book.
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