Mystic Voices

'It is a strange experience. I don't know that I envy you your curious faculty.' This statement is addressed to Fr Philip Rivers Pater, the squire-priest who is at the heart of the stories in MYSTIC VOICES. The 'strange faculty' is what Fr Philip refers to as 'clair-audience': he can hear voices from the unconscious or subconscious, and occasionally from the dead - voices which can warn of events which have, or are about to happen. Sometimes the voice announces a recent or forthcoming death; in other cases, it seeks to rectify, or explain, actions which took place years - or even centuries - before. In all the cases which come before him, the wise and humane priest strives to do his best to comfort the living - and the dead. In creating Fr Philip, Roger Pater - the pen name of Dom Roger Hudleston, a member of the Order of St Benedict - undoubtedly drew on himself, investing his character with the religious convictions and questions which formed a part of his own life and experiences. In a companion work, MY COUSIN PHILIP, Pater created a complete 'biography' of his fictional creation, and a chapter of that work, which presents the author's theories on clair-audience and also expands on the stories contained in MYSTIC VOICES, has been included in this volume. Editor David Rowlands discusses the collection and its place in the ghost story world, and also provides a valuable synopsis of MY COUSIN PHILIP, while a contemporary obituary of Dom Roger paints a fond portrait of a man who was as esteemed in reality as his creation was in fiction.

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