Keel, John A.

John A.Keel (1930– ) Ufologist and parapsychologist John A. Keel is perhaps best known for his book The Mothman Prophecies, about a mysterious being called the Mothman. However, Keel has also written extensively on UFOs and paranormal phenomena, and during the 1960s he collected first-person accounts related to these subjects, interviewing thousands of witnesses to paranormal occurrences. He noted many similarities among these accounts and various elements of folklore and religious stories, leading him to believe that whatever inspired stories about extraterrestrial beings also inspired stories about demons, fairies, and other fantastical beings. Eventually he developed the theory that intelligent entities, whom he has called “intelligences” or “ultraterrestrials,” have been behind all stories of UFOs, mysterious beings, and other paranormal phenomena throughout history.

Keel says that these beings have been promoting a belief in such things so as to distract humans and keep them from discovering beings’ true activities and purpose. In interviews, Keel has called this distraction a new kind of enchantment, whereby people accept paranormal experiences as real when they actually are not. In calling the entities behind paranormal phenomena ultraterrestrials, he has suggested that they do not come from another planet—though he does think they are nonhuman. In fact, he has speculated that they might be demonic beings from other dimensions of existence. He has also suggested that UFOs might be living beings rather than machines.

Publications:

• Jadoo (1957)
• The Fickle Finger of Fate (Fawcett, 1966)
• Operation Trojan Horse (1970)
• Strange Creatures From Time and Space (1970)
• Our Haunted Planet (1971)
• The Flying Saucer Subculture (1973)
• The Mothman Prophecies (1975)
• The Eighth Tower (1975)
• Why Ufos (1978) (reprint of Operation Trojan Horse)
• The Cosmic Question (1978) (British version of The Eighth Tower)
• Disneyland of the Gods (1988)
• The Complete Guide to Mysterious Beings (1994) (revised version of Strange Creatures from Time and Space)
• The Best of John Keel (Paperback 2006) (Collection of Keel’s Fate Magazine articles)
• Flying Saucer to the Center of Your Mind: Selected Writings of John A. Keel (2013)
• The Outer Limits of the Twilight Zone: Selected Writings of John A. Keel (2013)
• Searching For the String: Selected Writings of John A. Keel (2014)
• The Great Phonograph in the Sky: Selected Writings of John A. Keel (2015)
• The Perspicacious Percipient: How to Investigate UFOs and Other Insane Urges – Selected Writings of John A. Keel (2015)
• The Passionate Percipient: Illusions I Have Known And Loved – Selected Writings of John A. Keel (2015)
• Pursuing the Addenda: Supernatural Reports From the Natural World (2016)

SEE ALSO:

• Mothman;
• UFOs

SOURCE:

The Greenhaven Encyclopedia of Paranormal Phenomena – written by Patricia D. Netzley © 2006 Gale, a part of Cengage Learning