The strange case of Mademoiselle P.

Hardbound; 228 pp., comprising five numbered chapters, an endnote with biographical details of the historical persons portrayed in the novel, and "About the Author." From the endnote: "This novel is based on an incident in the life of Franz Anton Mesmer. The manuscript that Mesmer discovers in chapter five is freely adapted from Captain V. R. Myers's 1948 translation of Dr. Mesmer's 1779 treatise, 'Mémoire sur la découverte du magnétism animal.' See 'Mesmerism,' introduction by Gilbert Frankau (London, 1948)." From Brian O'Dohoerty's obituary in the "Dublin Review of Books" by Luke Gibbons, dated November 16, 2022: ". . . The story weaves a compelling fictional account of the complexity of real-life events surrounding the alleged restoration of sight to the accomplished musician Marie Thérèse Paradies, by Dr Franz Mesmer, the founder of modern hypnosis. The real-life Marie Thérèse’s talent was such that Mesmer’s friend Mozart wrote a concerto for her, but for Mesmer, 'the darkness … was in her mind and not her eyes'. His theories of animal magnetism and universal fluids regulating behaviour obscured his real discovery for subsequent psychology – that of unconscious forces shaping the self, and the mind’s exertions on the senses. On leaving Mesmer’s care, 'Mademoiselle P' reverted to blindness but regained her musical prowess: the ultimate casualty, in a world where powers of suggestion rule, is truth – 'How does the truth survive at all?'"