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This House Is Haunted: The Investigation of the Enfield Poltergeist
In 1977, normal life ended for the Harper family. It began with a bang on the walls of their council house in Enfield. Then furniture started moving of its own accord. Poltergeist activity usually stops as suddenly as it started, but there are exceptions, and this book is about one of them.
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First published January 1, 1980
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April 25, 2024
The Enfield Poltergeist has always fascinated me. In 1977 it made headlines around the world, spawning numerous films and documentaries. I recently watched the latest docuseries, and wanted to learn more!
The author, Guy Lyon Playfair, was one of the main investigators on the case. He originally published this book in 1980 (I read the 2011 edition). Along with Maurice Grosse from the Society of Psychical Research, they spent countless hours with the family investigating these strange events. Things happened so fast they couldn’t even keep count - losing track of incidents around 400.
“Furniture was flung all over the place, beds shook, sheets and blankets were pulled and even ripped off their beds, while knocks and assorted bumps would disturb both the Harpers and the Nottinghams next door at all hours, day and night.”
For such wild phenomena, the writing could be quite dry and scientific – though I was still engaged. Playfair never tried to oversell the story. I really felt for the whole family – especially 11-year-old Janet, who was admitted to various institutions.
“I was getting worried. We had tried mediums, we had called doctors, we had had Janet in hospital, but still the trouble went on and on, and was definitely getting worse as well.”
The heart of this story is very human, yet it still gave me chills and goosebumps. As the book progressed, things took a more sinister turn. Janet began talking in a deep, gravelly voice, as if possessed, and complaining of an old man sitting in a chair beside her bed, putting hands over her nose and mouth.
“She was sitting by the window in the living room when she suddenly clutched her throat and let out a cry. One of the curtains had wrapped itself around her neck and seemed to be trying to strangle her.”
It’s certainly a unique read. I’ve never encountered an author thanking a poltergeist in the acknowledgements. The various theories behind the phenomena were also intriguing. There were parallels to my own experiences growing up, which somehow felt reassuring. Reading this turned out to be as much about trying to make sense of my own strange experiences from childhood.
This House is Haunted makes a great companion piece to The Enfield Poltergeist docuseries. You can’t help but pause for thought and come up with your own ideas. It’s a mind-boggling case that’s best absorbed from multiple sources. It’s either the greatest hoax in history, or the most well-documented case of paranormal activity. The sheer volume of witnesses, including police, make me think it could be the latter.
I hope Janet and her sister, Margaret, have been able to find peace later in life.
“There is still a great deal we have to learn about both the full potential of the human mind and the real nature of physical matter, and about ways in which they interact.”
The author, Guy Lyon Playfair, was one of the main investigators on the case. He originally published this book in 1980 (I read the 2011 edition). Along with Maurice Grosse from the Society of Psychical Research, they spent countless hours with the family investigating these strange events. Things happened so fast they couldn’t even keep count - losing track of incidents around 400.
“Furniture was flung all over the place, beds shook, sheets and blankets were pulled and even ripped off their beds, while knocks and assorted bumps would disturb both the Harpers and the Nottinghams next door at all hours, day and night.”
For such wild phenomena, the writing could be quite dry and scientific – though I was still engaged. Playfair never tried to oversell the story. I really felt for the whole family – especially 11-year-old Janet, who was admitted to various institutions.
“I was getting worried. We had tried mediums, we had called doctors, we had had Janet in hospital, but still the trouble went on and on, and was definitely getting worse as well.”
The heart of this story is very human, yet it still gave me chills and goosebumps. As the book progressed, things took a more sinister turn. Janet began talking in a deep, gravelly voice, as if possessed, and complaining of an old man sitting in a chair beside her bed, putting hands over her nose and mouth.
“She was sitting by the window in the living room when she suddenly clutched her throat and let out a cry. One of the curtains had wrapped itself around her neck and seemed to be trying to strangle her.”
It’s certainly a unique read. I’ve never encountered an author thanking a poltergeist in the acknowledgements. The various theories behind the phenomena were also intriguing. There were parallels to my own experiences growing up, which somehow felt reassuring. Reading this turned out to be as much about trying to make sense of my own strange experiences from childhood.
This House is Haunted makes a great companion piece to The Enfield Poltergeist docuseries. You can’t help but pause for thought and come up with your own ideas. It’s a mind-boggling case that’s best absorbed from multiple sources. It’s either the greatest hoax in history, or the most well-documented case of paranormal activity. The sheer volume of witnesses, including police, make me think it could be the latter.
I hope Janet and her sister, Margaret, have been able to find peace later in life.
“There is still a great deal we have to learn about both the full potential of the human mind and the real nature of physical matter, and about ways in which they interact.”
March 30, 2019
This book has received up and down reviews which did not deter me from reading it. I have read quite a few true haunting books and this one rates up there with the best of them.
The setting of the story is in London in a town called Enfield back in 1977. The Harper family (which includes Mrs. Harper and her four children) is an ordinary family that has to endure paranormal activity in their home. What becomes known as the Enfield poltergeist wrecks havoc on this family to the point that they have Maurice Grosse along with a friend Guy Lyon Playfair (the author of this book) from the Society of Physical Research come in to investigate the haunting.
The author, Guy Playfair, mentions in the beginning of the book that the story is kind of drawn out over a period of a year which when reading the book it does seem to get monotonous throughout the story as every day there is something going on in the house.
There is more to this poltergeist than just it banging on walls as it proceeds to drive the Harper family nearly insane with all of the antics it does to them. There is quite an extensive amount of activity with furniture moving, beds shaking, bodies levitating, doors opening and closing on their own, cold drafts, knocking on the walls, ceiling, and floors.
It is almost like a house possessed and the family within is caught in the middle of it. Some parts of the book I found to be scary and I felt bad that the family could not just leave this home.
Another interesting part of the book is it does contain pictures of some of the activity which I found to be interesting.
The author went into great detail with everything that the Harper family endured and that might be why this book has received mixed reviews, because there is quite a bit to take in all at one time. I just took my time reading it so that I could absorb the story so to speak. I think it is a very good detailed account of the what went on in Enfield in 1977 and I am giving this book four stars.
The setting of the story is in London in a town called Enfield back in 1977. The Harper family (which includes Mrs. Harper and her four children) is an ordinary family that has to endure paranormal activity in their home. What becomes known as the Enfield poltergeist wrecks havoc on this family to the point that they have Maurice Grosse along with a friend Guy Lyon Playfair (the author of this book) from the Society of Physical Research come in to investigate the haunting.
The author, Guy Playfair, mentions in the beginning of the book that the story is kind of drawn out over a period of a year which when reading the book it does seem to get monotonous throughout the story as every day there is something going on in the house.
There is more to this poltergeist than just it banging on walls as it proceeds to drive the Harper family nearly insane with all of the antics it does to them. There is quite an extensive amount of activity with furniture moving, beds shaking, bodies levitating, doors opening and closing on their own, cold drafts, knocking on the walls, ceiling, and floors.
It is almost like a house possessed and the family within is caught in the middle of it. Some parts of the book I found to be scary and I felt bad that the family could not just leave this home.
Another interesting part of the book is it does contain pictures of some of the activity which I found to be interesting.
The author went into great detail with everything that the Harper family endured and that might be why this book has received mixed reviews, because there is quite a bit to take in all at one time. I just took my time reading it so that I could absorb the story so to speak. I think it is a very good detailed account of the what went on in Enfield in 1977 and I am giving this book four stars.
May 15, 2025
I don't think I've ever read a non fiction about ghost or in this case poltergeist. it was very interesting and I don't know what to belive. interesting subject to read about and would like to read more. this was a great find in a thrift store.
October 17, 2015
Description: Sky Living announces a brand new original drama commission The Enfield Haunting - a three part dramatisation of the terrifying and bizarre real events that took place at an ordinary house in Enfield during the autumn of 1977.
Adapted from Guy Lyon Playfair's book This House is Haunted, the show is a supernatural drama based upon real events surrounding the phenomena, and draws on extensive documentation, recordings and witness statements. The incident remains to this day the most documented account of poltergeist activity in British history.
British actor Timothy Spall OBE, recently bestowed the Best Actor accolade at this year's Cannes Film Festival for his role in Mike Leigh's Mr Turner, will play Maurice Grosse, a rookie paranormal researcher. After a recent personal tragedy, he is drawn to the house on Green Street after disturbing reports of a desperate family terrorised by malevolent unseen forces. BAFTA nominated actress Juliet Stevenson CBE will star alongside Spall to play his wife Betty.Source
3x 45min episodes where one should, ideally, be Roman Catholic to buy into the supernatural dualism on offer here in the name on non-fic. *cough*
Unfortunately, I am neither RC nor prone to unrealistic 'true' stories. Move along please, I have better books to read.
April 24, 2015
This was far less interesting then I had hoped. The author does warn you it isn't very exciting at the start, and boy... is he right!
I also found myself becoming increasingly annoyed with the investigators apparent blank acceptance that the event MUST be caused by a ghost or spirits.
Not a lot of time seems to be devoted to performing any kind of experiments to gather some scientific information. It was more along the lines of "We tried doing X ourselves a couple of times and couldn't manage it so it must have been a ghost." If you have people 'investigating' who are perfectly happy to get in psychic aura cleaners then I think all bets are off when it comes to impartial investigation.
I also found myself becoming increasingly annoyed with the investigators apparent blank acceptance that the event MUST be caused by a ghost or spirits.
Not a lot of time seems to be devoted to performing any kind of experiments to gather some scientific information. It was more along the lines of "We tried doing X ourselves a couple of times and couldn't manage it so it must have been a ghost." If you have people 'investigating' who are perfectly happy to get in psychic aura cleaners then I think all bets are off when it comes to impartial investigation.
January 20, 2019
Something strange happened in the north London suburbs of Enfield in the late 1970s. Featured in the movie The Conjuring 2, the Enfield poltergeist was a year-long disturbance to a low-income family in council housing. It was investigated by a number of people, some of whom declared it a fraud. The most serious and sustained investigation, however, was by two members of the respectable Society for Psychical Research, one of whom was Guy Lyon Playfair. This book is his record of what happened in a case that still stirs strident controversy. Maurice Grosse, the head investigator, was drawn into the happenings due to a set of strange coincidences in his own life. With their nearly daily involvement Grosse and Playfair remained convinced that this was an authentic haunting.
Besides my natural interest in a good ghost story, I was drawn to this particular book due to my research on Ed and Lorraine Warren (I discuss this aspect more on my blog: Sects and Violence in the Ancient World). Instead I was drawn into an account that will, I suspect, polarize readers. Either they will dismiss it out of hand or they will believe it. There seems to be no middle ground when it comes to the supernatural. Playfair notes that they did engage scientists, but most refused even to consider it. One who did had some ideas as to how poltergeists and physics might indeed work together to explain such happenings.
As Playfair himself notes at the beginning, the account contains plenty of repeated incidents and it doesn’t really build to a climax. Strange episodes happened nearly constantly for the period of the disturbance and were witnessed by people only tangentially involved. In the end, Playfair offers what he thinks was happening there, but this will not satisfy most. It will, however, make anyone willing to consider the possibilities think. No matter the conclusions drawn, all can agree that strange things took place in Enfield in the late 1970s.
Besides my natural interest in a good ghost story, I was drawn to this particular book due to my research on Ed and Lorraine Warren (I discuss this aspect more on my blog: Sects and Violence in the Ancient World). Instead I was drawn into an account that will, I suspect, polarize readers. Either they will dismiss it out of hand or they will believe it. There seems to be no middle ground when it comes to the supernatural. Playfair notes that they did engage scientists, but most refused even to consider it. One who did had some ideas as to how poltergeists and physics might indeed work together to explain such happenings.
As Playfair himself notes at the beginning, the account contains plenty of repeated incidents and it doesn’t really build to a climax. Strange episodes happened nearly constantly for the period of the disturbance and were witnessed by people only tangentially involved. In the end, Playfair offers what he thinks was happening there, but this will not satisfy most. It will, however, make anyone willing to consider the possibilities think. No matter the conclusions drawn, all can agree that strange things took place in Enfield in the late 1970s.
May 3, 2022
Playfair's account of the Enflield poltergeist, which wrought havoc in a London household between 1977 and 1979, is the most satisfying study of a haunting I have read. Although inclined toward a supernatural interpretation of events, Playfair lives up to his name by pursuing purely materialistic explanations as well, and as one of the two main investigators of the haunting while it still in progress, he generally kept an eye open for trickery.
What makes it all so fascinating is that there was, indeed, evidence of trickery, conveniently enabling glib rationalists to mock the whole affair; but as Playfair clearly demonstrates, it's one thing to imagine a clever young girl pulling off a difficult parlour trick once, but to keep it up for hours, months, and years, is another matter. And not just one parlour trick: she would have had to produce knocks, voices, flying objects, toppling furniture, weird writing on the walls, and several dozen other phenomena for long periods of time and in the presence of witnesses without being detected, which would surely have taxed a professional illusionist, let alone an untrained fourteen year old.
Forteans will be intrigued by the truly strange pile-ups of coincidences that run through the investigation; Playfair doubts spirits of the dead are at work in poltergeist phenomena, and hints at something closer to Keel's Ultraterrestrials—while adducing more "prosaic" ideas, such as that the girl's production of strange, unnatural voices might be related to Tourette's Syndrome.
Evenhanded, detached, and engagingly written, with an afterword from 2011 bringing the story (nearly) up to the present, the biggest problem with the book is its lack of an index—strange, given that Playfair criticizes another book in the field for that very same flaw!
What makes it all so fascinating is that there was, indeed, evidence of trickery, conveniently enabling glib rationalists to mock the whole affair; but as Playfair clearly demonstrates, it's one thing to imagine a clever young girl pulling off a difficult parlour trick once, but to keep it up for hours, months, and years, is another matter. And not just one parlour trick: she would have had to produce knocks, voices, flying objects, toppling furniture, weird writing on the walls, and several dozen other phenomena for long periods of time and in the presence of witnesses without being detected, which would surely have taxed a professional illusionist, let alone an untrained fourteen year old.
Forteans will be intrigued by the truly strange pile-ups of coincidences that run through the investigation; Playfair doubts spirits of the dead are at work in poltergeist phenomena, and hints at something closer to Keel's Ultraterrestrials—while adducing more "prosaic" ideas, such as that the girl's production of strange, unnatural voices might be related to Tourette's Syndrome.
Evenhanded, detached, and engagingly written, with an afterword from 2011 bringing the story (nearly) up to the present, the biggest problem with the book is its lack of an index—strange, given that Playfair criticizes another book in the field for that very same flaw!
October 9, 2011
Another of my childhood reads! (You must be wondering what crap my parents bought- but there's a long and funny story behind this! Lol). Anyway, this is a well written and documented book about a family living in Enfield whose house had allegedly been possesed by poltergiests. Not dangerous murderous scary movie time but still creating enough havoc. Many events were documented by two senior respectable scholars so seemed authentic. Recently however the girls have admitted some of the stuff that happened was done by them, but have also added that most stuff was unexplainable. So the authenticity does go down. But not bad read. Specially if you’re twelve!
May 20, 2015
For anyone fascinated, as I am, by alleged real-life hauntings, this is a must-read - the Enfield Poltergeist case is extremely famous and this is an eye-witness account of it by one of the paranormal investigators who spent time with the family supposedly targeted by an angry spirit. For that reason alone, it's worth reading.
However, it doesn't really stand up as part of an objective investigation, and really raises as many questions as it answers. If you absolutely 100 per cent believe in ghosts, you might well be nodding along with Playfair's assertions: if you are in the slightest bit sceptical, however, you will find many things to question here, which makes it a frustrating read.
What does seem pretty certain is that *something* very strange was going on at this otherwise unexceptional surburban council house - whether that was a ghost, however, or something entirely different, is certainly not a question answered definitively by this book, whatever Playfair claims.
However, it doesn't really stand up as part of an objective investigation, and really raises as many questions as it answers. If you absolutely 100 per cent believe in ghosts, you might well be nodding along with Playfair's assertions: if you are in the slightest bit sceptical, however, you will find many things to question here, which makes it a frustrating read.
What does seem pretty certain is that *something* very strange was going on at this otherwise unexceptional surburban council house - whether that was a ghost, however, or something entirely different, is certainly not a question answered definitively by this book, whatever Playfair claims.
August 13, 2011
Another creepy read, this one I feel was scarier than the other one (The ghosts on 87th lane) As this one creeped me out when I was a child. Remember sitting with my papa watching this tv show called Strange but True, and this was a case on it. It creeped the hell out of me so when I found the book in a charity shop I had to buy it and read it!! Yeah I probably won't read it again, mainly for the fact it creeped me out that much. I kept thinking I was being watched when I read it even when others were in my house!! A gripping yet scary read from start to finish.
February 23, 2022
Lata siedemdziesiąte, północny Londyn, Enfield. Rodzina Harperów (w rzeczywistości Hodgson) zasiada do kolacji i zaczyna słyszeć ciąg niesprecyzowanych dźwięków. Harperowie jeszcze nie wiedzą, że od tej pory hałasy niewiadomego pochodzenia będą towarzyszyć im przez bardzo długi czas. Zniszczą spokój panujący w ich domu, wprowadzą chaos i zamęt. To preludium do serii wydarzeń natury paranormalnej, którymi będą nękani przez najbliższe lata.
Gdy wyobrażasz sobie występowanie zjawisk parapsychicznych z pewnością przed oczyma staje Ci niemałe spustoszenie - hulający porywisty wiatr, przerażające błyskawice w akompaniamencie dudniących w rytm przerażonego serca grzmotów. Do tego koniecznie złowieszcza melodia wzmacniająca suspens i pohukiwanie sowy w tle. Playfair, będąc naocznym świadkiem zdarzeń, które miały miejsce w Enfield, postanowił stworzyć kompendium wiedzy na temat nawiedzeń przez Poltergeista i położył kres wszystkim powyżej wymienionym przeze mnie mitom. Autor przedstawia nam najlepiej udokumentowany i najbardziej aktywny przypadek występowania Poltergeista, któremu towarzyszą wszelkiego rodzaju lewitacje, ciskanie przedmiotami przez ściany, różnorakie głosy. Sprawa została przebadana przez wielu naukowców, psychologów, wzywano medium, księży. Próbowano modlitwą pozbyć się natrętnego ducha, który wprowadzał regularny chaos w sypialni, a na podłogach i ścianach rozmieszczał uporczywe fekalia. Zaangażowana istota pogrywała sobie ze wszystkimi obserwatorami...
Pomimo dość monotonnej, bezemocjonalnej narracji, która jest niejako charakterystyczna dla reportaży, Playfair zaprezentował obszerne studium przypadku, stanowiące idealną lekturę dla pasjonatów zjawisk parapsychicznych. Z pewnością ta książka zyskałaby więcej jako treść fabularyzowana, podkoloryzowana, aczkolwiek autor już na wstępie przygotowuje nas na swego rodzaju nudę, wynikającą z powtarzalności występujących zajść i sytuacji prowokowanych przez Poltergeista. Jako osoba interesująca się tematyką, jestem zadowolona z lektury, dowiedziałam się wielu ciekawostek, o których nie miałam pojęcia np. fakt w wystąpienia miesiączki u dziewczynki jest czynnikiem wpływającym na zainteresowanie sił nieczystych daną osobą. Poltergeist z Enfield posłużył za inspirację dla ekranizacji horroru Obecność 2, sprawa miała również powiązanie z małżeństwem Warren.
Ps. Wiedzieliście, że osoby wierzące w duchy są bardziej narażone na nawiedzenie?
Gdy wyobrażasz sobie występowanie zjawisk parapsychicznych z pewnością przed oczyma staje Ci niemałe spustoszenie - hulający porywisty wiatr, przerażające błyskawice w akompaniamencie dudniących w rytm przerażonego serca grzmotów. Do tego koniecznie złowieszcza melodia wzmacniająca suspens i pohukiwanie sowy w tle. Playfair, będąc naocznym świadkiem zdarzeń, które miały miejsce w Enfield, postanowił stworzyć kompendium wiedzy na temat nawiedzeń przez Poltergeista i położył kres wszystkim powyżej wymienionym przeze mnie mitom. Autor przedstawia nam najlepiej udokumentowany i najbardziej aktywny przypadek występowania Poltergeista, któremu towarzyszą wszelkiego rodzaju lewitacje, ciskanie przedmiotami przez ściany, różnorakie głosy. Sprawa została przebadana przez wielu naukowców, psychologów, wzywano medium, księży. Próbowano modlitwą pozbyć się natrętnego ducha, który wprowadzał regularny chaos w sypialni, a na podłogach i ścianach rozmieszczał uporczywe fekalia. Zaangażowana istota pogrywała sobie ze wszystkimi obserwatorami...
Pomimo dość monotonnej, bezemocjonalnej narracji, która jest niejako charakterystyczna dla reportaży, Playfair zaprezentował obszerne studium przypadku, stanowiące idealną lekturę dla pasjonatów zjawisk parapsychicznych. Z pewnością ta książka zyskałaby więcej jako treść fabularyzowana, podkoloryzowana, aczkolwiek autor już na wstępie przygotowuje nas na swego rodzaju nudę, wynikającą z powtarzalności występujących zajść i sytuacji prowokowanych przez Poltergeista. Jako osoba interesująca się tematyką, jestem zadowolona z lektury, dowiedziałam się wielu ciekawostek, o których nie miałam pojęcia np. fakt w wystąpienia miesiączki u dziewczynki jest czynnikiem wpływającym na zainteresowanie sił nieczystych daną osobą. Poltergeist z Enfield posłużył za inspirację dla ekranizacji horroru Obecność 2, sprawa miała również powiązanie z małżeństwem Warren.
Ps. Wiedzieliście, że osoby wierzące w duchy są bardziej narażone na nawiedzenie?
December 21, 2012
This book has become -- for better or worse -- the standard template for what people regard as 'a poltergeist infestation'. But what took me by surprise is the extent to which it was also a 'high strangeness' case. Because there wasn't just the 'usual' poltergeist stuff, but apparitions, weird synchronicities, demonic possession, and even -- at one point -- a whiff of UFO-related stuff. A delightful mess of weirdness!
I got a bit pissed off by the investigators' assumption that the case had anything to do with spirits of dead people, but after a certain point they seemed to disabuse themselves of that unwarranted hypothesis. I was also annoyed by the constant arguments for authenticity along the lines of, 'X didn't strike me as the sort of person who would do Y; therefore X didn't do Y'. You just can't make that argument, because anyone can do anything! Why not? And if weird stuff is going on, this quite likely a possible cause for it.
Overall, some of the evidence collected seemed to me pretty strong. But what was it evidence *for*?
Loved it more than 'The South Shields Poltergeist', which reads as a kind of homage to Enfield in many respects. If 'This House is Haunted' has its own, secret inspiration, my guess would be 'The Exorcist' (the film appeared just a few years before it was written).
This book is a paranormal classic. Loved it. Recommended!
I got a bit pissed off by the investigators' assumption that the case had anything to do with spirits of dead people, but after a certain point they seemed to disabuse themselves of that unwarranted hypothesis. I was also annoyed by the constant arguments for authenticity along the lines of, 'X didn't strike me as the sort of person who would do Y; therefore X didn't do Y'. You just can't make that argument, because anyone can do anything! Why not? And if weird stuff is going on, this quite likely a possible cause for it.
Overall, some of the evidence collected seemed to me pretty strong. But what was it evidence *for*?
Loved it more than 'The South Shields Poltergeist', which reads as a kind of homage to Enfield in many respects. If 'This House is Haunted' has its own, secret inspiration, my guess would be 'The Exorcist' (the film appeared just a few years before it was written).
This book is a paranormal classic. Loved it. Recommended!
May 6, 2015
Very well written and structured book. Gives a well balanced view of all sides whether they are believers or sceptics all bases are covered.
It just lacked a little passion for me. I was scary undoubtedly but it came across as too matter of fact.
Well worth the read though particularly if you have watched the mini series on Sky Living as I have.
It just lacked a little passion for me. I was scary undoubtedly but it came across as too matter of fact.
Well worth the read though particularly if you have watched the mini series on Sky Living as I have.
March 23, 2020
3.5 🌟
April 24, 2022
The Conjuring 2 is way better than this book. Lol
July 10, 2016
Guy Lyon Playfair was one of the first on the scene when cabinets started moving on their own. A member of the Society for Psychical Research, Playfair was returning from some Brazilian poltergeist activity when the Enfield situation was seemingly dropped into his lap.
The book tells the tale of the ‘Harper’ family (although in 2016 their anonymity has been well and truly blown) and their experiences that spanned 18 months of terror. There’s disembodied voices, levitation, spoon bending and all sorts of paranormal phenomena.
Playfair’s aim of the game was to document and provide evidence back to the SPR. He takes great care to divide events into those which can be verified as occurring via unknown sources and those that can be explained. So a lot of the book may be a bit dry as he catalogues these types of events.
Playfair also attempts to provide examples of when the children could have been playing around with them. Through identifying some incidents that can be chalked down to the children and those that can’t, the aim is to attempt a subjective analysis of the occurrences.
However I am of the opinion that he doth protest too much at times, when he’s saying ‘see? I’m unbiased! I gave you examples of when the kids did it! See?!’ and I have walked away with more of the feeling that there was some sort of psychological mass hysteric event happening in this house, rather than anything being paranormal being the culprit.
I won’t spoil the ending for you – but there was a brief mention of a particular syndrome that seems to provide a very reasonable explanation for what was going on, that seems to have been added at the end just for the sake of providing all elements of the case. However it really wasn’t provided the amount of space it deserved as a theory, and one might suspect that this explanation would take away from the fantastical nature of the rest of the book.
An interesting read, and certainly the tapes that were recorded through the investigation are worth a listen. A creepy story that lives on, and is good fun to read about!
The book tells the tale of the ‘Harper’ family (although in 2016 their anonymity has been well and truly blown) and their experiences that spanned 18 months of terror. There’s disembodied voices, levitation, spoon bending and all sorts of paranormal phenomena.
Playfair’s aim of the game was to document and provide evidence back to the SPR. He takes great care to divide events into those which can be verified as occurring via unknown sources and those that can be explained. So a lot of the book may be a bit dry as he catalogues these types of events.
Playfair also attempts to provide examples of when the children could have been playing around with them. Through identifying some incidents that can be chalked down to the children and those that can’t, the aim is to attempt a subjective analysis of the occurrences.
However I am of the opinion that he doth protest too much at times, when he’s saying ‘see? I’m unbiased! I gave you examples of when the kids did it! See?!’ and I have walked away with more of the feeling that there was some sort of psychological mass hysteric event happening in this house, rather than anything being paranormal being the culprit.
I won’t spoil the ending for you – but there was a brief mention of a particular syndrome that seems to provide a very reasonable explanation for what was going on, that seems to have been added at the end just for the sake of providing all elements of the case. However it really wasn’t provided the amount of space it deserved as a theory, and one might suspect that this explanation would take away from the fantastical nature of the rest of the book.
An interesting read, and certainly the tapes that were recorded through the investigation are worth a listen. A creepy story that lives on, and is good fun to read about!
December 2, 2018
My interest in the Enfield poltergeist case began back when I watched GHOSTWATCH as a kid; the Enfield case was a huge influence on that programme. I heard a lot about it in the years since, but only now did I decide to actually read the book about the case in order to make my own mind up. In terms of my belief system, like Fox Mulder "I want to believe", but I find myself often sceptical when reading about so-called "real life" cases due to the investigation methods being deeply flawed.
And so it ended up with THIS HOUSE IS HAUNTED. The first thing you notice about this book is that Guy Lyon Playfair is one of the most credulous witnesses ever. Instead of being dispassionate and sitting on the fence, he seems to go for a paranormal explanation each time. The book follows his observations as haunted child Janet is subject to various phenomena, from flying objects to mysterious voices, and 99% of them would seem to have obvious explanations: the flying objects are being thrown by the kids, they're putting on the voices themselves. Not so for Playfair, who sees a ghostly influence every time. Reports of excrement in the sink and the like just seem to me to be examples of kids desperate for attention and making up 'events' to get it.
The thing that makes me chuckle about this book is that the kids are even caught playing around and faking stuff, yet Playfair continues to believe in a supernatural explanation. It's obvious that the kids would want to be the centre of attention and play up for the adults in their home, but this never seems to cross his mind. You'd think that Maurice Grosse might be a more impartial witness, but it turns out he'd just lost his daughter in an accident, so can hardly be viewed as an unbiased observer; his goal seems to be to 'prove' the existence of the afterlife. In the end, I think the whole thing was a flight of fancy spurred by hysteria, nothing more, although it is an entertaining one.
And so it ended up with THIS HOUSE IS HAUNTED. The first thing you notice about this book is that Guy Lyon Playfair is one of the most credulous witnesses ever. Instead of being dispassionate and sitting on the fence, he seems to go for a paranormal explanation each time. The book follows his observations as haunted child Janet is subject to various phenomena, from flying objects to mysterious voices, and 99% of them would seem to have obvious explanations: the flying objects are being thrown by the kids, they're putting on the voices themselves. Not so for Playfair, who sees a ghostly influence every time. Reports of excrement in the sink and the like just seem to me to be examples of kids desperate for attention and making up 'events' to get it.
The thing that makes me chuckle about this book is that the kids are even caught playing around and faking stuff, yet Playfair continues to believe in a supernatural explanation. It's obvious that the kids would want to be the centre of attention and play up for the adults in their home, but this never seems to cross his mind. You'd think that Maurice Grosse might be a more impartial witness, but it turns out he'd just lost his daughter in an accident, so can hardly be viewed as an unbiased observer; his goal seems to be to 'prove' the existence of the afterlife. In the end, I think the whole thing was a flight of fancy spurred by hysteria, nothing more, although it is an entertaining one.
May 7, 2024
Three things I know to be true:
1) A childhood friend and I practiced forming a telepathic connection until we achieved alarming accuracy
2) Several unexplainable things happened to me and my friends in my freshman dorm, which had a reputation of being haunted
3) I saw a light in the sky when I was walking my dog one evening that did not behave in any way I could explain
Three things I hold to be true:
1) Anyone claiming to be psychic is either a scam artist or a liar
2) Souls aren't real, therefore neither are ghosts
3) It is impossible for any extraterrestrial life to have reached our solar system
I always liked the way Stephen Crane described the supernatural as "preternatural" in the first episode of Netflix's adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House, because it argues that unexplainable things are real, but that doesn't mean they defy explanation. (Of course, Stephen was lying when he said that, but I still think it's true.) After all, the doctor who discovered germs were real was locked in a psychiatric hospital for the rest of his life because he dared to argue that surgeons should wash their hands before operating. Galileo was excommunicated from the Catholic church until the 1990s for positing something we've known to be true for centuries now. Hell, no one can figure out how MAGNETS work, but we know what they do is real. Everything is explainable, but so many things have been presupposed as hoaxes or superstitions that trying to figure out how to take the "super" out of "supernatural" has made scientific examination practically impossible. I've always considered myself an open-minded skeptic, so reading about the Enfield incident was an absolute delight.
A lot has been talked about Enfield Poltergeist, probably more than ever needed to be, but debate and reexamination persist because of its anomalous nature: not only was it widely publicized, not only did it last substantially longer than other poltergeist incidents, but because of those two reasons, massive amounts of empirical data were able to be gathered from it. Recording technology was still in its infancy at the time, but it was fully utilized in observing things that had never really been documented before or since. And reading all about this case and all the research done into it, I think it's UNreasonable to argue that it was a hoax. No matter how much someone is unwilling to accept the validity of the events, it takes a certain kind of willful stubbornness to argue that none of it was real.
Some things I found most interesting (and substantiating) were the analyses of sound waves taken from the marbles being thrown around, the knockings on the walls, and Janet's vocal chords when the Voice was talking, and how none of them aligned with how sound waves are produced normally by the same things. I also find the idea that the girls were faking the whole thing for 13 months to be not just unreasonable but downright insulting to all parties involved. Considering the overuse and misuse of the word, I'm hesitant to call it gaslighting, but I do think it's appropriate here. Two preteen girls were being gaslit and bullied by the public for something they very much did not want to experience, something that was traumatizing to them and the people they loved, something that physically and mentally exhausted them long before it ended, and something that became so convoluted that even if they WANTED to fake the whole thing, two little girls would've never been clever enough, strong enough, or resourceful enough to consistently fool all the adults around them for over a year.
I do realize, of course, that most anyone who reads this book is probably predisposed to err on the side of its validity, but even for me there were parts I found suspect. Not the least of which was a near-constant littering or punctuation errors, with most chapters having at least four or five missing periods, and frequent misplaced quotation marks throughout, all of which was a bit annoying coming from a guy who's written multiple books. But mainly for me, some of the company kept by the more "credible" experts consulted for the poltergeist included people such as Uri Geller (who was publicly exposed as a fraud by Johnny Carson five years before the events of this book began), and the Warrens (who, despite being James Wan's cash cows, have generally been considered to be little more than fraudulent media whores). It's hard for me to take seriously the testimony of a man who chats with Geller on the phone every week, or the man who values the advice of Elaine Warren.
On the other hand, I also kept having my own stubborn preconceptions get in the way of my ability to accept some events. Whenever a spirit medium would come to help out the Hopkins family (someone who isn't Elaine Warren, so by all accounts is probably more legit), I'd immediately disregard anything they ever said simply because I personally don't believe in spirits or the persistence of human consciousness after death. Even though I believe that things interpreted as ghosts are real, since the concept of souls doesn't fit with my own antitheist mentality, I'm hostile to the idea of even trying to consider it. Despite the fact that I am willing to accept everything that happened at Enfield to be true, as soon as an explanation doesn't fit with the way I think the world works, I close my mind off as readily as anyone who chooses to deny any of it could be real. How can I be so judgmental of naysayers when my own suspension of disbelief is only a little higher than theirs? At a certain point, I realized that I was being skeptical of my own lack of skepticism, and that hurt my brain so much that I decided it was better just to read the book as the gospel truth as believed by those involved. The way it forced me to constantly reexamine my own prejudices (or lack thereof) was brilliant, and I don't know if it was intentional or not.
Overall, the prose of this book is pretty average (I've certainly read much drier nonfiction, but it's definitely not something that'll hold your interest by the quality of writing alone), but the approach it took to the story it told was fantastic and informative, and I really enjoyed it.
1) A childhood friend and I practiced forming a telepathic connection until we achieved alarming accuracy
2) Several unexplainable things happened to me and my friends in my freshman dorm, which had a reputation of being haunted
3) I saw a light in the sky when I was walking my dog one evening that did not behave in any way I could explain
Three things I hold to be true:
1) Anyone claiming to be psychic is either a scam artist or a liar
2) Souls aren't real, therefore neither are ghosts
3) It is impossible for any extraterrestrial life to have reached our solar system
I always liked the way Stephen Crane described the supernatural as "preternatural" in the first episode of Netflix's adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House, because it argues that unexplainable things are real, but that doesn't mean they defy explanation. (Of course, Stephen was lying when he said that, but I still think it's true.) After all, the doctor who discovered germs were real was locked in a psychiatric hospital for the rest of his life because he dared to argue that surgeons should wash their hands before operating. Galileo was excommunicated from the Catholic church until the 1990s for positing something we've known to be true for centuries now. Hell, no one can figure out how MAGNETS work, but we know what they do is real. Everything is explainable, but so many things have been presupposed as hoaxes or superstitions that trying to figure out how to take the "super" out of "supernatural" has made scientific examination practically impossible. I've always considered myself an open-minded skeptic, so reading about the Enfield incident was an absolute delight.
A lot has been talked about Enfield Poltergeist, probably more than ever needed to be, but debate and reexamination persist because of its anomalous nature: not only was it widely publicized, not only did it last substantially longer than other poltergeist incidents, but because of those two reasons, massive amounts of empirical data were able to be gathered from it. Recording technology was still in its infancy at the time, but it was fully utilized in observing things that had never really been documented before or since. And reading all about this case and all the research done into it, I think it's UNreasonable to argue that it was a hoax. No matter how much someone is unwilling to accept the validity of the events, it takes a certain kind of willful stubbornness to argue that none of it was real.
Some things I found most interesting (and substantiating) were the analyses of sound waves taken from the marbles being thrown around, the knockings on the walls, and Janet's vocal chords when the Voice was talking, and how none of them aligned with how sound waves are produced normally by the same things. I also find the idea that the girls were faking the whole thing for 13 months to be not just unreasonable but downright insulting to all parties involved. Considering the overuse and misuse of the word, I'm hesitant to call it gaslighting, but I do think it's appropriate here. Two preteen girls were being gaslit and bullied by the public for something they very much did not want to experience, something that was traumatizing to them and the people they loved, something that physically and mentally exhausted them long before it ended, and something that became so convoluted that even if they WANTED to fake the whole thing, two little girls would've never been clever enough, strong enough, or resourceful enough to consistently fool all the adults around them for over a year.
I do realize, of course, that most anyone who reads this book is probably predisposed to err on the side of its validity, but even for me there were parts I found suspect. Not the least of which was a near-constant littering or punctuation errors, with most chapters having at least four or five missing periods, and frequent misplaced quotation marks throughout, all of which was a bit annoying coming from a guy who's written multiple books. But mainly for me, some of the company kept by the more "credible" experts consulted for the poltergeist included people such as Uri Geller (who was publicly exposed as a fraud by Johnny Carson five years before the events of this book began), and the Warrens (who, despite being James Wan's cash cows, have generally been considered to be little more than fraudulent media whores). It's hard for me to take seriously the testimony of a man who chats with Geller on the phone every week, or the man who values the advice of Elaine Warren.
On the other hand, I also kept having my own stubborn preconceptions get in the way of my ability to accept some events. Whenever a spirit medium would come to help out the Hopkins family (someone who isn't Elaine Warren, so by all accounts is probably more legit), I'd immediately disregard anything they ever said simply because I personally don't believe in spirits or the persistence of human consciousness after death. Even though I believe that things interpreted as ghosts are real, since the concept of souls doesn't fit with my own antitheist mentality, I'm hostile to the idea of even trying to consider it. Despite the fact that I am willing to accept everything that happened at Enfield to be true, as soon as an explanation doesn't fit with the way I think the world works, I close my mind off as readily as anyone who chooses to deny any of it could be real. How can I be so judgmental of naysayers when my own suspension of disbelief is only a little higher than theirs? At a certain point, I realized that I was being skeptical of my own lack of skepticism, and that hurt my brain so much that I decided it was better just to read the book as the gospel truth as believed by those involved. The way it forced me to constantly reexamine my own prejudices (or lack thereof) was brilliant, and I don't know if it was intentional or not.
Overall, the prose of this book is pretty average (I've certainly read much drier nonfiction, but it's definitely not something that'll hold your interest by the quality of writing alone), but the approach it took to the story it told was fantastic and informative, and I really enjoyed it.
July 31, 2019
It started out strong, but, to be honest, was kind of a disappointment.
Playfair plays strongly on having evidence to back-up the claims of poltergeist activity, but as the story progresses most claims seem to be pathos and character-based rather than hard evidence. At the end of the book, before the afterthoughts that were added in 2011, he implicates that Tourette’s may be a paranormal disorder, which threw a lot of credibility that he had tried to build up.
The copy I had (White Crow Publishing) was also littered with grammatical mistakes, which made it borderline impossible to read sometimes (for example, interchanging the number “1” with a capitalised “I”).
Playfair plays strongly on having evidence to back-up the claims of poltergeist activity, but as the story progresses most claims seem to be pathos and character-based rather than hard evidence. At the end of the book, before the afterthoughts that were added in 2011, he implicates that Tourette’s may be a paranormal disorder, which threw a lot of credibility that he had tried to build up.
The copy I had (White Crow Publishing) was also littered with grammatical mistakes, which made it borderline impossible to read sometimes (for example, interchanging the number “1” with a capitalised “I”).
April 6, 2009
a famous case of a poltergeist in the UK that many folks witnessed and heard. the manifestations surrounded 4 children and a mother. great read.
May 10, 2015
Terrifying. Mainly because this is no Hollywood blockbuster, or Blair Witch project , but a story that I remember hearing about in the seventies. If you scare easily, leave it alone.
October 23, 2023
A well written and informative book on a case that has been taken and twisted for entertainment purposes. I thoroughly recommend.
September 19, 2025
In the opening authors note the author makes it very clear that this is nonfiction and therefore slower and more repetitive than your usual horror stories. This is a fair thing to say because it is slow and very repetitive but what I wasn’t prepared for after that warning was how in a rush the author would be to get to the slow and repetitive bits.
There is very little scene setting in this book and it is just supernatural activity after supernatural activity. Which arguably was very creepy and got under my skin a bit but this reporting style left very little room for context or character. We learn very little about any of the family until it is relevant to the poltergeist phenomenon. Jimmy, the youngest of the three children is practically invincible throughout, despite living in the house the entire time and after about 30 or so pages it’s revealed they have pets!
In regard to the house itself you’re just left up to your own devices to figure out the layout and what everyone else is doing during the paranormal activity. People are just vaguely “in the other room” when certain things happen. Doing what we’re not sure because it’s not relevant to the plethora of supernatural happenings.
All we know is that everyone is incredibly down to earth and truthful and wouldn’t lie about these kind of events. The events themselves later just come across as more of a nuisance in the end. Even when children are started to be thrown around it’s followed by the painfully British saying of “anyone for a cup of tea?” Usually said by the mum which just made me more frustrated with her and the narrative choices as whether factually or not she doesn’t tend to do a lot to help without the SPR men telling her to.
A lot of these faults are that of its nonfiction so it may not be that exciting but also where the focus lies. This is very much the story of Guy Playfair, Maurice Grosse and the poltergeist and I just wish there was more focus on the family and the home. I did enjoy the things about Grosse and his daughter though.
My understanding was that Playfair and Grosse just seemed to want to collect evidence for someone else to take over and explain everything which isn’t all that exciting either but good on both of them for collecting as much data as they did and putting it into this book even if Playfair used the same anecdote about sceptics twice and dedicated too many pages to a ring going missing.
As exhausted as I am now that it’s done it was interesting and it did leave me thinking about it often, peering at things out the corner of my eye and thinking about possible answers to the unanswerable. Just not the book I wanted.
Also, hilariously, Ed and Lorraine Warren are not even mentioned let alone in the house singing Elvis in the front room.
There is very little scene setting in this book and it is just supernatural activity after supernatural activity. Which arguably was very creepy and got under my skin a bit but this reporting style left very little room for context or character. We learn very little about any of the family until it is relevant to the poltergeist phenomenon. Jimmy, the youngest of the three children is practically invincible throughout, despite living in the house the entire time and after about 30 or so pages it’s revealed they have pets!
In regard to the house itself you’re just left up to your own devices to figure out the layout and what everyone else is doing during the paranormal activity. People are just vaguely “in the other room” when certain things happen. Doing what we’re not sure because it’s not relevant to the plethora of supernatural happenings.
All we know is that everyone is incredibly down to earth and truthful and wouldn’t lie about these kind of events. The events themselves later just come across as more of a nuisance in the end. Even when children are started to be thrown around it’s followed by the painfully British saying of “anyone for a cup of tea?” Usually said by the mum which just made me more frustrated with her and the narrative choices as whether factually or not she doesn’t tend to do a lot to help without the SPR men telling her to.
A lot of these faults are that of its nonfiction so it may not be that exciting but also where the focus lies. This is very much the story of Guy Playfair, Maurice Grosse and the poltergeist and I just wish there was more focus on the family and the home. I did enjoy the things about Grosse and his daughter though.
My understanding was that Playfair and Grosse just seemed to want to collect evidence for someone else to take over and explain everything which isn’t all that exciting either but good on both of them for collecting as much data as they did and putting it into this book even if Playfair used the same anecdote about sceptics twice and dedicated too many pages to a ring going missing.
As exhausted as I am now that it’s done it was interesting and it did leave me thinking about it often, peering at things out the corner of my eye and thinking about possible answers to the unanswerable. Just not the book I wanted.
Also, hilariously, Ed and Lorraine Warren are not even mentioned let alone in the house singing Elvis in the front room.
January 2, 2024
2,5. Dawno nie przeczytałam tak irytującej książki. Ciągłe wątpliwości i podejrzewanie dzieci o rzucanie przedmiotami, robienie psikusów. No na pewno nastoletnia dziewczynka dla zabawy udaje, że jej domem zawładnął poltergeist. Rok badają sprawę i nadal pojawiają się komentarze typu: "nie widziałem ani nie nagrałem tego że mógł to zrobić jakiś byt więc może to sprawka Janet".
August 18, 2017
Seguiremos sempre em direção à porta. A verdade pode estar do outro lado.
August 10, 2023
While I've read before about this incident, this account by Mr. Playfair bored me. This is just full of rehashed information each chapter. Two stars from me.
April 9, 2024
I think the best thing about this book...well...two things. The poltergeist activity went on far, far longer than usual, meaning that a LOT of information was gathers. The other thing is how matter-of-factly the information is presented. There is utterly no sensationalism to the writing at all. Simply, we observed this, we were told this, A very sane look at a very odd occurance.
November 2, 2014
This is one of the most famous cases of paranormal activity in the world – The Enfield Poltergeist. These events took place in Enfield, North London between August 1977 and 1978, where an innocent family were subjected to prolonged paranormal activity.
“Just before I died, I went blind, and then I had a haemorrhage, and I fell asleep, and I died in the chair in the corner downstairs.”
This is believed to be the voice of Bill Wilkins, a man who died long before the Hodgson family moved into his Enfield, North London home. The family consisted of Peggy Harper, and her four children, Rose, thirteen, Janet, eleven, Pete, ten, and Jimmy, seven. The voice came through the body of eleven-year-old Janet Hodgson, through her false vocal chords as she was used as a conduit for hours of conversation. Other events included flying objects such as lego pieces, large items of furniture being upturned, books passing through walls, fires, bangs, ghostly apparitions, recorded conversations and the young girls being thrown out of their beds in acts of levitation.
Investigator Guy Lyon Playfair, a poltergeist expert, wrote a book about it, named This House is Haunted. There was none better qualified to write such a book. A member for the SPR, Society for Psychical Research, Playfair and fellow member Maurice Grosse supported the family for over fourteen months, spending many nights at the premises and witnessed paranormal activity on a regular basis. The story became an overnight sensation when covered by a journalist from the Daily Mirror, and later appeared on television.
A succession of witnesses provided statements, including police. Teams of people visited the Enfield home. However doubt was cast when Janet, the main focus of the attention, admitted playing tricks on the investigators.This admission was repeated on an ITN news programme on 12th June 1980 when she stated: “Oh yeah, once or twice [we faked], just to see if Mr Grosse and Mr Playfair would catch us. And they always did.” Playfair continued with his investigation. He knew Janet could not be responsible for the majority of incidents he witnessed first hand.
I found the book on the case to be a fascinating read. It is well written and well documented. I have no reason to doubt any of the events, and was amazed to read some of the similarities to our case. The family had nothing to gain by going public about this case and I feel very sorry for Janet in particular, who was recently interviewed on ‘This Morning’ during ‘Paranormal Week’ and treated very badly. It begged me to ask the question yet again, why are victims of paranormal attack treated with such distain?
As author Guy Playfair puts it “Neither I nor anybody else can explain what a poltergeist is, I can only tell you what it does. Whatever it eventually turns out to be would appear to us today as strange, unbelievable and impossible as, say, the idea of an internet would have appeared to Newton or even Einstein.”
“Just before I died, I went blind, and then I had a haemorrhage, and I fell asleep, and I died in the chair in the corner downstairs.”
This is believed to be the voice of Bill Wilkins, a man who died long before the Hodgson family moved into his Enfield, North London home. The family consisted of Peggy Harper, and her four children, Rose, thirteen, Janet, eleven, Pete, ten, and Jimmy, seven. The voice came through the body of eleven-year-old Janet Hodgson, through her false vocal chords as she was used as a conduit for hours of conversation. Other events included flying objects such as lego pieces, large items of furniture being upturned, books passing through walls, fires, bangs, ghostly apparitions, recorded conversations and the young girls being thrown out of their beds in acts of levitation.
Investigator Guy Lyon Playfair, a poltergeist expert, wrote a book about it, named This House is Haunted. There was none better qualified to write such a book. A member for the SPR, Society for Psychical Research, Playfair and fellow member Maurice Grosse supported the family for over fourteen months, spending many nights at the premises and witnessed paranormal activity on a regular basis. The story became an overnight sensation when covered by a journalist from the Daily Mirror, and later appeared on television.
A succession of witnesses provided statements, including police. Teams of people visited the Enfield home. However doubt was cast when Janet, the main focus of the attention, admitted playing tricks on the investigators.This admission was repeated on an ITN news programme on 12th June 1980 when she stated: “Oh yeah, once or twice [we faked], just to see if Mr Grosse and Mr Playfair would catch us. And they always did.” Playfair continued with his investigation. He knew Janet could not be responsible for the majority of incidents he witnessed first hand.
I found the book on the case to be a fascinating read. It is well written and well documented. I have no reason to doubt any of the events, and was amazed to read some of the similarities to our case. The family had nothing to gain by going public about this case and I feel very sorry for Janet in particular, who was recently interviewed on ‘This Morning’ during ‘Paranormal Week’ and treated very badly. It begged me to ask the question yet again, why are victims of paranormal attack treated with such distain?
As author Guy Playfair puts it “Neither I nor anybody else can explain what a poltergeist is, I can only tell you what it does. Whatever it eventually turns out to be would appear to us today as strange, unbelievable and impossible as, say, the idea of an internet would have appeared to Newton or even Einstein.”
February 4, 2022
Well written but ultimately flawed compendium of second hand accounts and transcriptions of things recorded on audio tape (apparently the poltergeist would not perform for video cameras) which causes a skeptical twitch of the eye throughout most of the book. For a background, one must seek out relevant archive video of interviews with the family to get an idea of the impossible "voices " the girls were producing, and the evident enthusiasm of the investigators who are, to be honest, far more interesting than the alleged poltergeists they are supposed to be investigating.
One of the more telling paragraphs, and there are many, begins "It was becoming apparent that paranormal events only took place in the presence of people who believed them to be possible" There then follows an account of a visitor to the house catching one of the kids, creeping around. Playfair and Grosse continually exchange words dismissive of visitors - skeptics - determined to debunk the occurrences with repetitive banalities stating "we know this is genuine paranormal activity" which becomes, after a while, almost as tedious as the girls waiting until nobody is in the room with them before throwing items of furniture around. This smugness wears thin, after a while and I found myself losing interest in there ever being any resolution to the affair and just enjoying the continued moments when Playfair subjects the reader to more bouts of why things would only happen when either he or Grosse were present or even catching the girls faking poltergeist activity by throwing things around.
As the book continues, the inventiveness doubles as the girls begin to levitate, things are written on the toilet wall in excrement (whilst one of the girls is shut in the toilet) and even walk through the wall into the bedroom of the neighbours house.
Don't get me wrong, this is a very readable book and I'm fascinated by the whole story despite it's apparent subjective viewpoint, but ultimately Playfair seems more concerned with supporting whatever it is he believes to be true than casting a ferocious, objective eye over the whole affair. Indeed both he and Maurice Grosse become so emotionally involved with the family that the constant affirmation that "it must be real" wears as thin as the silly voices and poo daubing leaving one feeling that here was a family suffering some terrible emotional crisis which was only made worse by the intervention of paranormal researchers dreadfully ill equipped to deal with emotionally and behaviorally disturbed children. The family needed help, care, emotional support but all that was swept away by a series of newspaper stories and damaging television reports.
One of the more telling paragraphs, and there are many, begins "It was becoming apparent that paranormal events only took place in the presence of people who believed them to be possible" There then follows an account of a visitor to the house catching one of the kids, creeping around. Playfair and Grosse continually exchange words dismissive of visitors - skeptics - determined to debunk the occurrences with repetitive banalities stating "we know this is genuine paranormal activity" which becomes, after a while, almost as tedious as the girls waiting until nobody is in the room with them before throwing items of furniture around. This smugness wears thin, after a while and I found myself losing interest in there ever being any resolution to the affair and just enjoying the continued moments when Playfair subjects the reader to more bouts of why things would only happen when either he or Grosse were present or even catching the girls faking poltergeist activity by throwing things around.
As the book continues, the inventiveness doubles as the girls begin to levitate, things are written on the toilet wall in excrement (whilst one of the girls is shut in the toilet) and even walk through the wall into the bedroom of the neighbours house.
Don't get me wrong, this is a very readable book and I'm fascinated by the whole story despite it's apparent subjective viewpoint, but ultimately Playfair seems more concerned with supporting whatever it is he believes to be true than casting a ferocious, objective eye over the whole affair. Indeed both he and Maurice Grosse become so emotionally involved with the family that the constant affirmation that "it must be real" wears as thin as the silly voices and poo daubing leaving one feeling that here was a family suffering some terrible emotional crisis which was only made worse by the intervention of paranormal researchers dreadfully ill equipped to deal with emotionally and behaviorally disturbed children. The family needed help, care, emotional support but all that was swept away by a series of newspaper stories and damaging television reports.
October 18, 2025
I've always been fascinated by the paranormal, but there's only a handful of stories that have captured my attention quite like the Enfield poltergeist. The spectacle has so many flimsy and easily staged moments (the infamous bedroom "levitation" photo, or how the ghost's voice muffled whilst tape was on people's mouths etc) but there's still just enough there for a compelling "what if?" to lurk in the back of my mind. What if it's both? A haunting that got caught up in hysteria? One that became almost a joke to a family who lived with it for so long.
Having read this thoroughly detailed account of the events, I'm still undecided. Largely sceptical but not quite so confident to write it off like I do Amityville. It was occasionally a bit of a slog to read, with actions becoming knowingly repetitive, but I'm thankful for their inclusion all the same for completion's sake.
Not a book to make a definitive case for either side of the hoax or haunting argument, but still an interesting read for anyone interested in this particular poltergeist tale, regardless of which side of the fence you sit on.
Having read this thoroughly detailed account of the events, I'm still undecided. Largely sceptical but not quite so confident to write it off like I do Amityville. It was occasionally a bit of a slog to read, with actions becoming knowingly repetitive, but I'm thankful for their inclusion all the same for completion's sake.
Not a book to make a definitive case for either side of the hoax or haunting argument, but still an interesting read for anyone interested in this particular poltergeist tale, regardless of which side of the fence you sit on.
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