Hidden Histories of the Unconscious Mind: Rediscovering Freud’s “Brilliant Mystic”, Carl du Prel (1839-1899)

The philosopher and occult writer Carl du Prel was the most prominent German-language theorist of the unconscious self immediately before Sigmund Freud, who once called du Prel “that brilliant mystic.” Revered by artists like R. M. Rilke, Wassily Kandinsky and Hilma af Klint, du Prel’s writings informed the work of renowned psychologists other than Freud, … Read more

William James and the Occult: Download a Free PDF of my Oxford Handbook Chapter, “James and Psychical Research in Context”

I’m glad to share the news that my contribution to the Oxford Handbook of William James has just appeared in an electronic version ahead of print. William James at a slate-writing seance with the medium Mrs. Walden (probably late 1890s. Image Credit: James papers, Houghton Library, Harvard University, MS.Am.1092.[1]). Chapter summary: James’s open advocacy, practice, … Read more

Women at the Margins: Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick (1845-1936)

“You don’t want to mess with Mrs. Sidgwick!”. No Victorian has ever written a statement like this, though it is certainly along the lines of what many contemporaries of Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick were thinking. Born on 11 March 1845 into one of the most politically and intellectually influential families in Britain, Nora (as she was … Read more

Patreon Prize Draw: Win a Copy of Adam Crabtree’s From Mesmer to Freud

From its inception in 2013, Forbidden Histories has been a labour of love – I currently receive no funding for my research and pay all expenses to run this website, produce Youtube videos, and promote FH out of my own pocket. (Sadly, ad revenue and Amazon and AbeBooks affiliate commissions do not even begin to … Read more

Positivists in Wonderland: Extended Abstract of my Talk at the Conference, Science and Spiritualism, 1750-1930

As I’m preparing my presentation for the upcoming conference on the history of science and spiritualism in Leeds, I thought I’d share an extended version of my abstract with those of you who won’t be able to attend:  Scientific Naturalism and the Study of Spiritualist Phenomena by Positivist and Materialist Representatives of Science and Medicine … Read more

Born on this Day: William James (11 January 1842 – 26 August 1910)

An effective way to flag up fundamental difficulties with the often taken-for-granted notion that science has disenchanted the world is to demonstrate that several ‘founding fathers’ of science entertained rather strong interests in the occult. Standard histories of psychology feature William James at Harvard and Wilhelm Wundt in Leipzig as founders of the modern psychological … Read more

Why Was the First Compilation of James’ Essays on Unorthodox Science Published in French?

Given my own specialization in the occult underbelly of the history of modern human sciences, the heretical preoccupations of William James as the ‘founding father’ of modern American psychology are a naturally recurring theme of Forbidden Histories. Some of you might be aware of a recent book by Krister D. Knapp, William James: Psychical Research … Read more

William James and the American Society for Psychical Research, 1884-9

Thanks to a travel grant from the British Society for the History of Science (BSHS) I was able to present a paper at this year’s British-North American Joint Meeting of the BSHS, CSHPS, and HSS in Canada. The presentation distilled a small part of a chapter in my forthcoming study on the formation of modern … Read more

Can Psychotherapists Benefit from History of Science Scholarship?

Historians rarely have the opportunity to say something that might be of practical relevance to clinicians or workers in other fields of applied scientific knowledge. As mentioned previously, I was therefore particularly chuffed when psychotherapist Nick Totton invited me last year to contribute an article to an envisaged special issue of the European Journal of … Read more

Fresh off the Press: Léon Marillier and the Veridical or Telepathic Hallucination in France

I’m pleased to see my joint article on telepathic hallucinations in French psychology and psychiatry with Pascal Le Maléfan came out today in the journal History of Psychiatry. Le Maléfan, P., & Sommer, A. (2015). Léon Marillier and the veridical hallucination in late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century French psychology and psychopathology. History of Psychiatry, 26, 418-432. … Read more