And, as I have said, it's made me think twice about the imagination. If the spirits aren't external, how astonishing the mediums become! Victor Hugo said of his voices that they were like his own mental powers multiplied by five.

When Merrill was 16 years old his father collected his short stories and poems and publiJames Merrilld them as a surprise under the name Jim's Book. Merrill's partner of more than four decades was David Jackson a writer and artist. Initially pleased Merrill would later regard the precocious book as an embarrassment.

Although most of his publiJames Merrilld work was poetry he also wrote essays fiction and plays. James Ingram Merrill (March 3 1926 – February 6 1995) was an American poet whose awards include the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1977) for Divine Comedies.