They Flew: A History of the Impossible

Recommended by Khaled El-Rouayheb, James Richard Jewett Professor of Islamic Intellectual History, FAS

Eire’s evocative and beautifully written book discusses Catholic saints from the early modern period who reportedly performed astonishing acts of levitation and bilocation. I approached the book as a curiosity, half-expecting it to go the well-trodden academic path of explaining the stories away as credulity and superstition, while emphasizing their social function in consolidating sectarian identity in post-Reformation Europe. Instead, the sheer amount and vividness of detail presented by Eire left me uneasy and questioning my own assumptions about what is and is not possible.