The History of the Great Pyramid (Dead Yet Speaketh[: Treatise on Modern Science and Psychic Phenomena])

Burn (James)

The History of the Great Pyramid (Dead Yet Speaketh[: Treatise on Modern Science and Psychic Phenomena])

Description: 7 monochrome plates preceding text and 5 diagrammatic plates at rear, various diagrams and tables to the text, a few tiny spots to title-page, ownership stamp of Thomas Sykes to the title-page and at head of text, occasional underlining and marginal marking by Sykes (presumably), pp. 120, crown 8vo, original stapled green wrappers, the staples a little rusted, one gathering not met by staples and so loose, the front cover inscribed 'with the author's compliments', a 1p. ALs from Burn to Sykes tipped to inside, clipping regarding the pyramids laid in, very good

Publication Details: South Shields: [Privately printed,] n.d. [circa 1933]

Notes: [With:] Two variant copies of the 'Treatise' for this book – in stiff black wrappers (26pp.) and stapled blue wrappers (40pp.) respectively, each with the author's inscription and his note regarding an erratum to do with the moon's distance, also the recipient's ownership stamp[And:] 7 sets of printed addenda, 4pp., 8pp. or 12pp., all with the note 'Add to your book' in Burn's hand, these a little soiled and tatty[And]:] 5 leaflets expanding on various points, one with a manuscript correction, one dated 1937 (others undated), these a little soiled and tatty[And:] Two printed letters, one ...more[With:] Two variant copies of the 'Treatise' for this book – in stiff black wrappers (26pp.) and stapled blue wrappers (40pp.) respectively, each with the author's inscription and his note regarding an erratum to do with the moon's distance, also the recipient's ownership stamp[And:] 7 sets of printed addenda, 4pp., 8pp. or 12pp., all with the note 'Add to your book' in Burn's hand, these a little soiled and tatty[And]:] 5 leaflets expanding on various points, one with a manuscript correction, one dated 1937 (others undated), these a little soiled and tatty[And:] Two printed letters, one to 'the Mayor and Members of the South Shields Council' and one to 'Mr. Speaker and Members of Parliament and the Public Generally', with different text but both to do with 'gigantic frauds' perpetrated against Burn to effect the loss of his property and frustrate his attempts to remedy through the courtScarce. Burn was, images of his 'Continuous Depth Finder' for ships and his 'Artifical Electrical Horizon' generator preceding the text make clear, an inventor as well as an author, with a bullish sense of his own intelligence, gleaned – he tells us – 'from the academy of experience'. The present treatise, a mass of data heavily larded with speculation, is difficult to follow in its arguments concerning the nature and significance of the Great Pyramid – veering from biblical history to medicine and the afterlife, from spiritualism to astronomy, geometry and colour theory, and plenty more besides - but it is arresting in those moments where the author takes a view on contemporary affairs: Burn is critical of Hitler, whom he regards as being in league with both the financial elite and that 'blood sucker' and 'centre of intrigue', the Catholic Church – indeed, he and Mussolini are merely 'tools in the hands of the Pope', he avers, being used to hasten a profitable war.The recipient of these outpourings, Alderman Thomas Sykes, was a member of the South Shields Council on which Burn had also served (a fact he mentions at one point to support his 'qualified justification to express an opinion'). HIDE