Elizabeth Stuart Phelps’s The Gates Ajar was the second most popular religious novel of the 19th century with 80,000 copies sold by 1900. This and its sequels Beyond the Gates and The Gates Between are known as her “Spiritualist novels.” The book is presented as a diary of a young woman, Mary, who has lost her brother, Roy, a soldier in the Civil War. Struggling with her faith as she grieves, she believes her brother appears to her. She finds comfort only with her widowed aunt: The book is mostly a dialogue between the two about the afterlife. In her version of heaven, the dead have “spiritual bodies” and participate in everyday activities the same as they would on earth. The book ends with a positive outlook, her faith restored. You’ll also find “The Gates Ajar” as a visual motif in funeral flowers, memorials, and cemetery monuments.

This Victorian sheet music refers to the book and features amazing black and white graphics on the cover. Refer to photos for size and condition.