Sexual Outlaw, Erotic Mystic: The Essential Ida Craddock

tina — Sun, 06 Mar 2011 20:00:00 +0000

One of the best things about reviewing books is the exposure I get to the fabulous females in feminist history who would otherwise be consigned to the cobwebby corners of academic obscurity had some enterprising writer not plucked them from the depths and held them up for the delight of feminist history nerds. This was what I experienced with Sexual Outlaw, Erotic Mystic, which is part biography and part collected works of Ida Craddock. The editor and biographer intersperses five (long) chapters of Craddock's own writings with well-written biographical detail explaining Craddock's often puzzling rhetoric.

Ida C. Craddock was a writer and teacher and at the age of twenty-five, she challenged the status quo by being the first woman to apply for admission to the University of Pennsylvania. She passed the entrance exam and was recommended for admission, but the board of trustees quickly passed a resolution barring women from attending the school. Her career as a teacher would be limited as a result of this setback. She spent the next several years traveling, teaching stenography, and studying spirituality, until 1893 when the Chicago World's Fair opened. The belly dancers imported from the Middle East scandalized America—and Anthony Comstock in particular. Comstock was a powerful proponent of “blue laws” (laws created to enforce strict moral and religious standards of behavior) and the self-appointed postal inspector. Craddock took advantage of the scandal by writing an editorial in the New York World defending the dancers and poking gentle fun at Comstock. It's what she said at the end of the piece; however, that caught the attention of the world: Craddock claimed she had a “spirit husband” named Soph, with whom she had sex nightly.

Craddock’s editorial and claims of spirit-world sexual relations aside, she made a powerful enemy of Comstock by publishing and distributing “sex manuals.” Craddock, though an ardent freethinker, was not a proponent of sex outside of marriage and her sex manuals were intended for married couples only, but this was not good enough for Comstock (or Ida's mother). Both sought to have her institutionalized and jailed. Avoiding the asylum but not an arrest, Craddock refused to plead insanity and was sentenced to five years in prison for distribution of obscene material. Viewing this as a life sentence (she was forty-five years old then), Craddock penned a lengthy suicide note condemning Comstock and the society that judged her and then killed herself. Comstock, for his part, merely added Ida's name to the list of fifteen persons whom he proudly claimed he had driven to suicide.

Craddock's personal writings read as completely lucid, intelligent, and intense; they are not the scribblings of a deranged mind. Whether her “spirit husband” was a hallucination, a tale to prod her enemies, or (who knows?) a real experience, is anyone's guess. Her work was important to feminism, spiritualism, religion, history, philosophy, freethinking, and social reform, and her name deserves to be better known. I'm personally not a religious/spiritual person, but I loved Ida's utter outrageousness in her public claims of “spirit sex” and her audacity in flouting convention in her writings and speech. Her pieces are long-winded and full of references to obscure academia, but they are entirely absorbing. Craddock was clearly a learned woman with plenty to say. I think her suicide note, the last piece of writing she left the world, is my favorite. It's a nice “you can't fire me—I quit” and a scathing indictment of Comstock as well. Read Sexual Outlaw, Erotic Mystic so more people will know of Ida Craddock, and not just the warped ideas of Anthony Comstock.

Written by: Natalie Ballard, March 6th 2011

Cosmic Connection: Messages for a Better World

admin — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 23:12:00 +0000

By Carole Lynne

Red Wheel/Weiser

Cosmic Connection is a difficult book. Difficult because if you are not used to thinking about the world in multiple dimensions, the physical and spiritual, you will be taken aback by the author’s basic assumptions about life. If you are not initiated into the ideas and lingo of mediums, psychics, and the whole section of our culture with their ears attuned to another world, you will probably find this book to be “way far out there.” Author Carole Lynne tells the story of her journey as a medium, and reveals her experiences traveling through multiple dimensions and dreams. The book provides transcripts of the author’s communications with spirits or energies like “The Energy,” a “higher being” that she and the other mediums talk to.

It’s a shame there are so many charlatans posing as psychics or mediums, because it definitely hurts the credibility of the entire group. It’s unfortunate for both the author and most readers that these exploitative few have given our society such a suspicious and negative view of “supernatural” occurrences because the message the book offers is a truly positive and unifying one. Lynne posits that, with the many problems of the modern world, humans need to reach out to each other and open themselves up to a spiritual life to truly evolve. It’s hard to argue with the idea that our interconnectedness, or “Oneness,” gives humans a special interest in ending war, poverty, and pollution.

I approached Cosmic Connection with skepticism. Its content is outside of anything I’ve experienced (or anyone I know has experienced). Some of the terminology and visions that Lynne described seemed a little bit clichéd or implausible, and I found that I couldn’t discern a difference in the voice of “The Energy” Lynne channels and her own authorial voice. That said, Lynne’s acknowledgement of her uniqueness and the obvious sincerity with which she tells her story make it a compelling and interesting journey.

Written by: Jennifer Wedemeier, June 10th 2009