TIME TRAVELLING
The Manual of Hypnosis – Desmond Dunne
This is a curious book.
I found it somewhat pedestrian and boring to begin with, TBH. Which is what I was expecting of someone who’d also authored a book about yoga (see cover image – SORRY, yogis). But it blends old-school mesmerism and unusual, occasionally mad, gems of hypnosis of the past, with contemporary – for its 1959 publishing date – influences.
The author, Desmond Dunne, wants to instruct readers as to how to study and practice hypnosis via a ‘manual’, a word that reveals so much about Dunne – twice over in that his key book is called The Manual of Yoga. His is a practical, sensible, no-nonsense approach.
The foreword and first chapter, ‘The Evolution of Hypnotism’, are not surprising by our standards by now. But there is an interesting, lengthy passage about ‘the evil eye’, which I’ve yet to come across in popular hypnosis folklore.
The first chapter also describes hypnosis as a “gift of God”, and includes thoughts on good versus evil. We don’t get much of a sense of Dunne’s deeper beliefs, but there are further God-allusions: hypnosis being misconstrued as an instrument of the devil and another ‘gift from God’ assertion; and, in the closing chapter, claiming that few scientists dispute the “guiding hand which rules the universe” deployed generically about progress.
I was confused, in the opening chapter, as to why Dunne spent so long describing mesmerism and the stages and passes and all that yawn. This is a 1959 book about hypnotism? Turns out Dunne has experienced some trippy, spangly-fingered moments. Well, haven’t we all?! But he takes this as “circumstantial evidence for the actuality of a magnetic fluid or some similar property”, hence this book being a fascinating hangover of mesmerism years beyond its demise.
He includes a quote from James Coates (1843-1933; a Braid contemporary who doesn’t have a Wikipedia entry) on the distinctions between mesmerism and hypnosis:
“In the mesmeric state the senses, as a rule, are temporarily suspended – the subject feels, tastes or smells in sympathy with or through his mesmerist; in the hypnotic state the senses are exalted, their power intensified… In the former the mental faculties are refined, definite and coherent action; in the latter, as in dreaming, any illusion created by the operator appears to be a reality. In the mesmeric, the sleep is calm, refreshing and curative, the pulse slow and rhythmic; in the hypnotic state, the respiration is frequently irregular, and may be accompanied by slight convulsive movements, nausea and vomiting, and general prostration of the nervous system.”
Dunne’s attachment to mesmerism shows up in a few interesting ways:
1. I should stress this is based upon idiosyncratic observations made so far in this blog project, BUT – this is the first post-mesmerism book I’ve read decreeing, with notable specificity, on healthy body and diet to cultivate hypnotic powers. Contemporary books on mesmerism went into a detail comparable to the modern wellness guru’s Instagram. But 40s and 50s books I’ve read have been relatively quiet on precisely how much bran you should be ingesting. In terms of hypnosis as a meme, it’s interesting to ponder – particularly commercially – when the narrative changed that you had to be physically (and mentally) exemplary to practice hypnosis.
2. Dunne also includes lengthy guidance on cultivating your hypnotic gaze. This ranges from building up your resistance to staring at increasingly bright lights, to staring at the backs of people’s heads til they turn around (in reaction to your will). Dunne includes an example of causing commuters on the London Underground to keep distance and part ways because of your mesmeric hypnotic will. As any woman will attest, staring intently at strangers on the tube will indeed cause people to shun you (in fear of their lives). But you get my point: several pages dedicated to staring is, in my journey so far, unusual for a book of this era.
3. In his chapter on developing your hypnotic powers, Dunne advises that the aspiring hypnotist should never “allow himself to be the subject of another hypnotist”. The reasons for this are evasive. “The negative side of the personality is played upon when control is exerted by another person,” he states. “The hypnotist should concentrate only on keeping and applying a positive disposition.” If 95% of people can be hypnotised, hypnotists should keep themselves in the 5%. This is interesting in terms of the gravity of Dunne’s warning versus his unwillingness to elaborate; again, as a meme, this changed because of commercialism – student hypnotists must practice upon one another, as well as subjugate to teachers for demos and to aid teachers’ prestige.
On the subject of subjects, I enjoyed Dunne’s aside about subjects: “It is usually found that men make the best hypnotic subjects, being as a rule more logical than women and less likely to be the slaves of their emotion.”
Other points of interest include a description of a typical hypnosis stage show (of which Dunne disapproves). “Girls would be made to slither and slide on imaginary ice; to act as if intoxicated; to lament at the imagined funeral of a loved one or to dance with reckless, childish abandon. Men would be made to “make love” to umbrellas under the impression that these were their favourite film stars; to howl like infants; to crawl round on all fours and make appropriate animal noises or divest themselves of part of their clothing.”
The penultimate chapter of the book, entitled ‘The Loose Ends of Hypnosis’, is a hoot, spanning animal hypnosis and the mass hypnosis explanation for the Indian rope trick. The highlight is surely Dunne’s detailed instructions as to how to hypnotise a canary.
The closing chapter is ‘The Future of Hypnosis’. It’s striking that Dunne is contemplating hypnosis at a great inflection point in science and progress. In 1959, the year this book was published, the Soviet Union launched Luna 2 – the first human-made object to make contact with the moon – and Dunne mentions “envisaged journeys to the moon” amongst atomic bombs and satellites as reasons it’s difficult to predict the future of anything at the time of writing.
It is quite sad, reading Dunne’s hopes for hypnosis, that even simple applications such as doctors and nurses better understanding the power of suggestion in patient care and pain management have still not yet landed.
