Whitley Strieber and Communion
A horror novelist described being taken from his cabin by small beings and examined. His 1987 memoir Communion, with a Grey face on the cover, became a bestseller and put the image in every bookshop in the world.
- Date
- 26 December 1985
- Place
- A cabin in upstate New York, USA
- Witnesses
- Whitley Strieber
- Status
- Unresolved
What happened
Strieber, then known for the novels Wolfen and The Hunger, said he woke in the night to find a small figure in his bedroom, was paralysed, carried out of the house and into a craft, and subjected to procedures including a probe inserted rectally and a needle to the head. Fragmentary memories surfaced over the following weeks; he sought out the researcher Budd Hopkins, underwent hypnosis with Donald Klein, and wrote the account as Communion: A True Story.
The beings
Strieber described several types, but the one on the cover, painted by Ted Seth Jacobs from his description, is the definitive Grey: a smooth, tan-grey face with enormous slanted black eyes, a tiny nose and a slit mouth. He also described short, stocky blue beings and a slender, feminine figure he came to call 'the visitors' rather than aliens, refusing to say what they were.
Aftermath
Communion sold in the millions, was filmed in 1989 with Christopher Walken, and produced a wave of letters from readers reporting similar experiences, which Strieber collected. He has continued to write about the visitors for nearly forty years and remains agnostic about their nature.
Explanations
Strieber's own account describes sleep-onset paralysis and a professional life spent writing horror, and critics have pointed to both. He has acknowledged the ambiguity, which is part of why the book endures: it is a record of an experience, not a claim about spacecraft.
Beings described
Sources
- Whitley Strieber
- Whitley Strieber, Communion (1987)