“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(I asked no questions about other major topics, such as the envelope experiments, Dr. Instream, etc., preferring to have such answers in writing. Our exchange was leisurely and quiet, and Jane was dissociated as usual.

(The 36th envelope experiment was held tonight. See the tracings on pages 313-14. The drawing on 313 is the actual envelope object. The drawing on 314 is executed by myself, after my boss’s drawing and instructions, and enters into the envelope data in the manner in which the four letters became involved with the envelope object in the 234th session. The relationship tonight is simpler, however.

(At 10:16 I handed Jane the 36th double envelope; as usual she took it from me without opening her eyes, then sat holding it to her forehead with her right hand. Her eyes were still closed.)

(Without opening her eyes, Jane held the envelope before her in a horizontal position, and moved it from side to side to show horizontal movement. She then restedher elbow on the arm of her rocker and kept holding the envelope up as she continued.)

(See the tracing of the envelope object, and its accompanying drawing, on pages 313-14. We did not ask Seth to clear up each point in the data, so give below our own interpretations. As stated, the key drawing made by my boss was the actual envelope object. This is on thin white paper. The drawing on tracing paper was made by me, from instructions given to me by my boss, and is a schematic drawing to be traced onto Bristol board for final artwork.

(As can be seen, much of the envelope data given by Seth was transposed from the actual object to my own tracing-paper drawing. It might be noted that during the session, while Jane held the envelope in her hand, my tracing-paper drawing was in the same room with us, although I was unaware of this until after the session. It reposed in my jacket pocket in our front room closet; I had brought it home several days ago, then forgot about it, not having worn the jacket since. Both drawings were made about two weeks ago. Jane hadn’t known they even existed.

(“A small round object, with some inscriptions resembling a postmark.” Jane said she saw within a small round object, with horizontal lines running across it; she thought of a postmark on an envelope, with the cancellation lines, but knew this wasn’t it. When she looked at my tracing-paper drawing, she said this was evidently what she was trying to arrive at subjectively; my drawing is of a round object, although much larger. Jane said the straight-across lettering, Key Value, is in the position of the horizontal lines she saw within. There are also ruled-in horizontal lines on the drawing.

(“and with ribbonlike shapes. That is, long lines that are straight, perhaps two of these, and of dark color, I believe, or dark red. Black or red. Horizontal rather than vertical, in the position in which I hold this.” As stated on page 321, Jane held the rectangular double envelope up with its long edge parallel to the floor, and moved it back and forth to indicate most definitely her insistence upon the horizontal attribute. This is most interesting, for the envelope object itself contains neither vertical or horizontal lines or masses. Once again her actions and data seem to be an attempt to get at my tracing-paper drawing, which bears a close connection to the envelope object.

(“The color white background”, might be taken as a reference to the white paper the envelope object was drawn on, but Jane said that once again this referred to the tracing-paper drawing I made. Tracing-paper is a pale translucent gray or off-white color, but not really white as this typing paper is white.

(“and a paper item, folded like a card”, also referred, Jane said, to my drawing rather than the envelope object. Jane said she had a vague image of a small round object upon a rectangular folded object that was like a card, yet the circle was not placed as neatly in the center of the rectangle as my drawing is. It was more offset toward the upper right corner, hence her postmark reference on page 321 also. On page 314 note that my tracing-paper drawing is folded roughly like a card.

(“with suggestions of motion”, again refers to my drawing rather than the actual envelope object; the motion, Jane said, of my pencil smudges across the back of the drawing, and to the slant of the words This Week’s above the key and star.

(Jane said that out of all the connections we made, practically all of them referred to my tracing-paper drawing rather than to the actual envelope object itself. My boss made the envelope object. Jane knows him of course, and likes him; yet the fact that I made the tracing-paper drawing evidently exerted a stronger pull emotionally. Perhaps this diverted Seth/Jane’s focus from the envelope object to a closely related object. As stated, Jane didn’t know the two drawings existed.

(The first envelope experiment was held on August 18,1965, almost 8 months ago.)

(“What I mean is, will I be accused of giving him clues if I ask questions about the envelope data? Suppose I ask him to be more specific about a certain point, say a shape? Won’t he take the question as a sign that the point needs to be clarified?”)

(Reduced copy of the print of my right palm, used as the envelope object in the 37th envelope experiment, in the 237th session for March 2,1966. Made on February 27,1966.)