My thoughts about these contradictions found expression in my character Pearl, a shy young girl held at the mercy of her “gift”. She spoke with a voice of authority, but that voice was not her own. Nineteenth-century medium Elizabeth d’Esperance wrote in her memoir Shadow Land, “I feel very much like reminding that she ought to be obliged to me, and take some notice of me sitting there, instead of sweeping past in so unceremonious a fashion.”ĭ’Esperance’s quote illustrates the paradox at the heart of the spirit medium’s life: while she apparently possessed a power, she needed to become passive to exercise it. Rather than being wanted, she was a mere gateway that even the spirits suffered as an inconvenience. Although the medium could be a “star” such as Florence Cook in the 1870s, her real purpose was to disappear from the room altogether. For me, the fascination lay in exploring a character poised between two worlds, belonging to neither.
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