Spiritual sessions, supernatural phenomena, and ghosts: Thomas Knoefel narrates the story of modern occultism with rich anecdotes, rapid pace, and tension, presenting a fascination that endures to this day. For what would a world be without wonders? While Marx and Engels metaphorically speak of a specter haunting Europe, a perhaps real spirit makes itself heard in the New World: Through knocking sounds, it reveals itself to sisters Margaretta and Catherine Fox in the home of a Methodist farmer in Hydesville, New York. Something begins that will not soon come to an end. In doing so, occultism transcends the boundaries between social classes and genders, appearing modern: the avant-gardes are inspired in their artistic work by occult ideas and spirits, and even when a medium is exposed as a fraud or pathologized, it does not diminish its impact, as it continues to evoke a time when the occult flourished and faith and knowledge were still one. The medium knows how to testify to its continuity into the present. "Never before has the world of spirits been written about with such sharp intellect, nor has the supernatural been embraced with such sensuality. The Occult Breviary is a masterpiece, a fantastic journey of discovery into the borderlands between here and there." - Jan Schomburg.