Abstract

Indridi Indridason: The Icelandic Physical Medium is the second important book to be issued recently about spectacular, relatively unknown physical mediums, the evidence for whom would be inaccessible to English-speaking people if it were not for the translations of the original material by their authors. The first, Zofia Weaver’s excellent Other Realities? The Enigma of Franek Kluski’s Mediumship (Weaver 2015) was reviewed in the Fall 2015 issue of this journal, and now we have Erlendur Haraldsson and Loftur Gissurarson’s definitive book on the short-lived but extraordinary Icelandic medium, Indridi Indridason. Haraldsson has reported details of his investigation into Indridason’s mediumship for years. Those articles have been compiled together with translations of “new” material that the authors have unearthed in this volume. Indridi Indridason, born in the same year as D. D. Home, 1883, was a farmer’s son from a rural area of Iceland. When he was about 21 he went to live in the capital, Reykjavik, to become a printer’s apprentice. He lived in the home of a relative whose wife was interested in experimenting with table turning and séances. In early 1905 she asked the young man to participate and as soon as he sat at the table it trembled, shook, and started to move violently about the room even overturning once. Indridi himself was rather shaken but evidently intrigued enough to continue with the experiments.