The Pen Moves: Re: Fox Sisters and Automatic Writing??

» RoxianneM - Re: Fox Sisters and Automatic Writing??

In response to message posted by cmac29ca:

One site that alludes to the Fox sisters and automatic writing is Arthur Conan Doyle, Spiritualism and Fairies, though neither the Fox sisters nor Conan Doyle are presented very favorably.

Another site also suggests that Kate Fox did more extensive sittings, though it is not clear if these involved automatic writing or rapping:

"In 1861, Kate Fox was engaged exclusively for Charles F. Livermore, a rich banker of New York whose wife, Estelle, died a year before. For a period of five years Kate gave him nearly 400 sittings of which detailed records were kept."

I believe that what the Fox sisters did was more of a precursor to automatic writing, using taps and raps to indicate letters. Interest in ther work caused others to seek out quicker and simpler methods for communicating with Spirit.

Though the Fox sisters later admitted to faking many of their phenomena, I think their earlier successes were quite real, and they turned to fakery only when the demand for their "performances" overran their capacity for communing with Spirit.

I'm also very interested in both Spiritualism and automatic writing, so if I find any writings from the Fox sisters, I'll be sure to post that information here.

-- posted by RoxianneM