https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/05/31/why-did-so-many-victorians-try-to-speak-with-the-dead Skip to main content The New Yorker * Newsletter To revisit this article, select My Account, then Close Alert Sign In Search * News * Books & Culture * Fiction & Poetry * Humor & Cartoons * Magazine * Crossword * Video * Podcasts * Archive * Goings On * Shop Open Navigation Menu To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories Close Alert The New Yorker Books May 31, 2021 Issue Why Did So Many Victorians Try to Speak with the Dead? Many explanations have been offered for Spiritualism, but the movement was more than a fad. By Casey Cep May 24, 2021 * * * * * Save this story for later. six people looking at a candle Among its other effects, spiritual work gave women the chance to speak in public.Illustration by Amanda Berglund * * * * * Save this story for later. It's a good time to be dead--at least, if you want to keep in touch with the living. Almost a third of Americans say they have communicated with someone who has died, and they collectively spend more than two billion dollars a year for psychic services on platforms old and new. Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, television: whatever the medium, there's a medium. Like clairvoyants in centuries past, those of today also fill auditoriums, lecture halls, and retreats. Historic camps such as Lily Dale, in New York, and Cassadaga, in Florida, are booming, with tens of thousands of people visiting every year to attend seances, worship, healing services, and readings. And many people turn up not every year but every week: there are more than a hundred Spiritualist churches in the United States, more than three hundred in the United Kingdom, and hundreds of others in more than thirty countries around the world. Such institutions hardly represent the full extent of Spiritualism's popularity, since the movement does not emphasize doctrines, dogmas, or creeds, and plenty of people hold spiritualist beliefs within other faith traditions or stand entirely outside organized religion. The surging numbers are reminiscent of the late nineteenth century, when somewhere between four million and eleven million people identified as Spiritualists in the United States alone. Some of the leaders back then were hucksters, and some of the believers were easy marks, but the movement cannot be dismissed merely as a collision of the cunning and the credulous. Early Spiritualism attracted some of the great scientists of the day, including the physicists Marie and Pierre Curie, the evolutionary biologist Alfred Russel Wallace, and the psychologist William James, all of whom believed that modern scientific methods, far from standing in opposition to the spiritual realm, could finally prove its existence. Published in the print edition of the May 31, 2021, issue, with the headline "Kindred Spirits." [casey_cep] Casey Cep is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the author of " Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee." More:SpiritualismSpiritsBooksVictoriansHistoriesTechnologySisters Ghosts Books & Fiction Get book recommendations, fiction, poetry, and dispatches from the world of literature in your in-box. Sign up for the Books & Fiction newsletter. Enter your e-mail address [ ] Sign up By signing up, you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement. The New Yorker Sections * News * Books & Culture * Fiction & Poetry * Humor & Cartoons * Magazine * Crossword * Video * Podcasts * Archive * Goings On More * Customer Care * Shop The New Yorker * Buy Covers and Cartoons * Conde Nast Store * Digital Access * Newsletters * Jigsaw Puzzle * RSS * Site Map * About * Careers * Contact * F.A.Q. * Media Kit * Press * Accessibility Help * Conde Nast Spotlight (c) 2021 Conde Nast. All rights reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. The New Yorker may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Conde Nast. Ad Choices * * * * * Do Not Sell My Personal Info