The Man Who Could Read Minds

In The Man Who Could Read Minds (1928), Jean Pilgrim manufactures strange spectacles that permit the observation of what is happening in the minds of others. Paul Gsell’s novel begins as a Voltairean satire, but soon changes both tone and direction as it progresses from relatively amiable exploration of the hypocrisies of art and science to scathing accounts of contemporary science and politics, before the comedy turns jet black in its account of modern warfare.

The book combines a striking philosophical vision with a unique love story and a brief but graphic utopian fantasy. The sum of that multiple endeavor makes it one of the most remarkable examples of twentieth-century roman scientifique.