+ Review 2:436 Ap 24 ’20 420w R of Rs 61:336 Mr ’20 80w + Spec 125:573 O 30 ’20 180w The Times [London] Lit Sup p638 S 30 ’20 180w
MAGNUSSEN, JULIUS. God’s smile; tr. by Daniel Kilham Dodge. *$1.75 (4½c) Appleton 134
20–13992
A work translated from the Danish. The author is a Danish dramatist whose plays have been produced at the National theater. At the age of thirty-seven and at the height of his popularity he suddenly lost interest in the comedy he was writing and found his attention turned to psychic matters by a series of curious experiences. These are described in this book. They began with table rappings, which aroused only amusement and derision, and continued with automatic writings which finally routed his scepticism. The book is said to have run thru ten editions in the first month of publication in Denmark.
“There is little imaginative power and no trace of originality in these supposed communications from the spirit world, which bear a familiar stamp of vague and grandiloquent optimism. The translation does not impress us as particularly good.”
− Ath p678 N 19 ’20 70w
“Deeply sincere, and well told in spite of excessive egoism and introspection.”
+ − Booklist 17:7 O ’20
“The book is spiritism watered and sugared; its ‘God’ will make converts for atheism, and its ‘smile’ will beget pessimists.”