The Parasite

Name: The Parasite
Rating: 3.67 (1058 reviews)

by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

First published 1894

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3.7(1,058)

Professor Austin Gilroy approaches mesmerism as a sceptical physiologist and agrees to investigate the abilities of Miss Penclosa. What begins as a controlled experiment becomes increasingly personal when Gilroy discovers that his actions, impulses and relationships can be manipulated beyond the limits he thought scientific reason could explain.
Presented through Gilroy’s record of the case, the novel turns hypnosis into psychological horror. Conan Doyle uses the contest between observer and subject to explore suggestion, obsession and loss of agency, steadily undermining the narrator’s confidence in his own rational control.