A DOUBLE LIFE OR STARR CROSS AN HYPNOTIC ROMANCE
Published by S. W. Green's Son, New York, 1884
- First Edition
- Hardcover
- Used
Seller: Currey, L.W. Inc. ABAA/ILAB, Elizabethtown, NY, U.S.A.Currey, L.W. Inc. ABAA/ILAB
AbeBooks seller since October 13, 2022
Association member: ILAB
Condition: Used
£ 194.65
Quantity: 1 available
Add to basketItem description from seller
Octavo, pp. [1-2] [1-3] 4 [5] 6-301 [302: blank], flyleaves at front and rear, original decorated brown cloth, front and spine panels stamped in black and gold, floral patterned endpapers. First edition. "Occult romance and science fiction. Orphaned at birth, Starr Cross is raised in New York City by the kindly Dr. Hendon. Seemingly incapable of human emotion, as a child Starr demonstrates incredible mesmeric powers and a keen intellect, performing macabre surgical experiments on his pets, such as grafting rabbit ears and a horse's tail onto one of his dogs. After learning of Starr's existence when the boy is a teenager, John Barlow, Starr's biological father, takes him under his care. A powerful mesmerist and gifted scientist, Barlow has fashioned a number of remarkable creations, including an electric 'life-belt' that has prevented him from aging, antigravity straps that make heavy objects light as a feather, and statues constructed from human corpses in which he has arrested all decay. Barlow also keeps his servants in mesmeric trances in order to exert complete control over them; one, Zeno, functions not only as an assassin but also as a human closed-circuit camera via induced clairvoyance that allows Barlow to spy on his enemies. Obsessed with discovering immortality and with Starr at his side, Barlow plans to reanimate a criminal's corpse using electricity and blood transfusions, but he is killed when an experiment involving unstable gases mortally wounds him. Hoping to restore Barlow to life, Starr preserves his father's body and continues their experiments, occasionally using human subjects, until he successfully revives the dead criminal who unfortunately is nothing more than a mindless automaton. Starr also succeeds in constructing an electronic device using wires, lenses, and mirrors so he can watch his own mind-controlled servants' clairvoyant impressions of people and places on a large screen, similar to a television. Tragedy strikes when Starr unexpectedly learns he has been subject to intense periods of somnambulism during which he lives for weeks at a time as a humble country laborer who is happily married and has a young daughter. Prefiguring not only weird menace pulps but also the superman theme found in much early twentieth-century science fiction, A DOUBLE LIFE OR STARR CROSS AN HYPNOTIC ROMANCE is both remarkable and ridiculous, marred by unnecessary sermonizing about spiritualism, social reform, the nature of electricity, and the redeeming power of a good woman's love. There are aspects of this book that are as imaginative as Bodkin's A MODERN MIRACLE (1902), but the book itself is very mediocre despite having some great ideas. Even so, it has some fine chapters. If Chase had edited this work into a novella, he might have had a minor genre classic on his hands instead of a curiosity." - Boyd White. Bleiler (1978), p. 42. Not in Reginald (1978; 1992). Wright (III) 994. Cloth worn at spine ends and corner tips, lacks the front free endpaper, a sound, good copy. (#165795).…
Seller Inventory # 165795
Bibliographic details
- Title
- A DOUBLE LIFE OR STARR CROSS AN HYPNOTIC ROMANCE
- Author
- Chase, Herbert E.
- Publisher
- S. W. Green's Son, New York
- Publication year
- 1884
- Binding
- Hardcover
- Edition
- 1st Edition
- Seller catalogs
- Early American Fiction, Occult, Victorian Fiction
Currey, L.W. Inc. ABAA/ILAB
Elizabethtown, NY, U.S.A.
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19th & 20th century literary first editions, fantasy & horror lit., science fictionAssociation member
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203 Water St
Elizabethtown, NY U.S.A. 12932
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