Poltergeist: A Classic Study in Destructive Haunting by Colin Wilson Page A

upbringing made her resist his overtures. If he had been more subtle, and succeeded in persuading her to become his mistress, then the “old” Esther would have slipped into the background, and the new, sexually experienced Esther would have taken her place.
    We all spend our lives trying to get rid of our “old” selves and develop new—and less constricting—personality structures. This is why we all crave experience, why every boy wants to run away to sea and every girl wants to marry a millionaire with a yacht. But then, we also spend most of our lives reacting “automatically” to familiar circumstances, hardly aware of anything that is further than the end of our noses. So it is difficult to escape the “old self,” which consists largely of a set of habits. It is easy to see how rather dull people—like Mary Reynolds and Esther Cox—become trapped to the point of suffocation in this mechanical, habit-bound personality structure, and how the unconscious life urges—perhaps working through the right brain—can plan to overthrow the dreary tyrant.
    But before we allow ourselves to be persuaded by this explanation, there are still a few curious points about the Doris case to consider. One of these is how several personalities could apparently reside together in the same body. While Doris was “in” the body—i.e., in charge of its movements—Margaret might be also “in,” aware of everything that Doris was watching and thinking, and having her own ideas and opinions. Doris could be fast asleep, while Margaret was awake, observing her dreams. Moreover, the “guardian angel,” who explained all this to Walter Prince, was also able to be “in,” observing both Doris and Margaret, unobserved by both.
    It is difficult to see how this could take place inside the head of a normal person, even if she happened to be torn by self-division. What the “guardian angel” is explaining sounds like a number of independent spirits, or entities, making use of Doris’ body. (Significantly, Doris herself was unable to be aware of any of her other “selves” and their activities.)
    Again, there exist a number of photographs of Doris’ different personalities. One photograph shows Doris herself, and the caption explains that “Sick Doris” had sat down for the picture, but Doris had “taken over” for a few moments as the camera clicked. Another photograph of “Sick Doris” reveals that she is, indeed, a quite different person from Doris—she looks wooden and stolid, quite unlike the gentle, sensitive Doris. Margaret looks so completely unlike both Dorises that it is hard to realize that she is using the same body. In the Proceedings of the American Society for Psychical Research, Prince also describes another case of amnesia, a man he calls Heinrich Myer. Again, the photographs of the primary and secondary personalities are incredibly different. Physically, they are very similar, yet a different person looks out through the eyes of each. It is tempting for the non-professional observer to say simply that the same body has been taken over by different spirits.
    Let us consider again the assertion of the “guardian angel” (and of Doris’ mother) that the Doris case is basically one of “benevolent possession.” Prince tries to explain the coming and going of the personalities in terms of weariness and exhaustion. Doris was easily tired out, and when she grew tired, Margaret would take over. While Margaret was “in” the body, she would say that Doris was “resting.” Prince’s theory is that Doris became a dual personality as a three-year-old child—to save herself from total breakdown. The shock of being snatched from her mother’s arms and hurled on the floor might have seriously damaged her, perhaps turned her into a timid, listless, miserable child. Instead, the “guardian angel” took over the body (she insisted to Prince that she came first, before Margaret), and was later assisted by