Self-titled sorcerer, healer and hypnotist Yury Longo used to be a household name.
A practitioner of white magic, Longo was the star of his own weekly television show, "The Third Eye," which aired on ORT for several years during the 1990s. The show -- in which he levitated over streams or cast spells on corpses to make their toes move -- made Longo a celebrity for a time, but was canceled in 1998 due to low ratings.
Born in Southern Russia, Longo first began experimenting with magic as a child, when he says he hypnotized a teacher. Later, he began calling himself a sorcerer, practicing tricks like setting grass on fire and moving objects from across the room.
The former head of the now defunct Moscow School of Wizardry and Magic, which he also founded, Longo is the author of several books on sorcery, fortune telling and dream interpretation -- and has even claimed that he can raise the dead. One much publicized attempt, however, to resurrect Vladimir Lenin, failed.
In addition to these exploits, Longo says he has developed original methods for curing disease. Today, he spends most of his time presiding over private hypnosis sessions. He talked with The Moscow Times this week.
Q:Do you consider yourself a white magician or a sorcerer?
A: Sorcerer is a word that is more universally understood. In fact, I'm a master of white, practical magic. A master is like an engineer of magic, but not of the class of people who can work miracles. I'm good at love magic and solving family problems and problems related to white magic, such as breaking curses. However, I can do sorcery as well.
Q:How do you define magic?
A: Magic means controlling the events related to a person's destiny. Simply speaking, magic is working with a person's soul. The soul is nothing but energy, the internal psychosomatic condition of a person's body. Things that we can't see or touch do exist. Most people believe in the existence of a soul. This is magic: working with this energy, with the unidentifiable phenomenon of the human soul
Q:In the early 1990s, Russia experienced a boom in the popularity of psychics and white magicians. How has the country's attitude toward magic changed over the last few years?
A:People have cooled toward it. The popularity of magic here is now about the same as in Europe, maybe a little higher. Now, only people who really know something about it or who find themselves in a desperate situation show an interest. As for the 1990s, there are a number of reasons for the boom. In other countries, there has always been a certain level of interest in magic, but it was totally banned in Russia until perestroika. ... At that point, people didn't believe in anything. They hadn't even started believing in God yet, but they'd certainly stopped believing in themselves, in politics and in communism. This all caused an upsurge in interest in magic. Of course, a number of charlatans emerged ... but things are better now.
Q:What services does a white magician provide? Which are popular today?
A:My clients are mostly women. People come to me when they don't understand their own minds, or when they don't understand some phenomenon that is affecting them, that they cannot deal with on their own. Many of my clients come to me for help removing the evil eye. When a person notices some negative influence, feels nervous or unwell, or thinks someone has put a curse on him, he comes to me. ... Sometimes, clients want to bewitch someone, to return a loved one who has left them or fallen out of love. Sometimes, it's the other way around -- they want someone to leave them alone. Women also come to me when they can't get along with their children.
Q:Have your clients included any celebrities?
A: Quite a few, but it wouldn't be right to say which ones. I've had clients from every kind of show business, but mostly female singers -- and politicians. Politicians are always interesting in finding out the results of upcoming elections, or they ask me for help in winning elections.
Q:You have traveled all over the world. In your opinion, does magic as it is practiced abroad differ from its practice here? And is it perceived differently?
A: It's completely different. If we look at civilized countries, the most powerful in terms of magic are Spain and Italy. Russia is somewhere on the middle of the scale: We have many sorcerers, but very few true sorcerers. Note that I'm not even including the African countries, where voodoo magic is very powerful. ... The truth is that there are only about a dozen true sorcerers in the whole world. Strange as it may seem, the most suggestible country in terms of hypnosis is Germany. The Germans have an absolute belief in magic. ... In Russia, it's just the opposite. You have to constantly prove that you can do magic. "Show me a miracle," the people here always say.
Q:Did you really think you could bring Lenin back to life?
A:It was kind of a joke. Of course, it would have been impossible to do. When the Communist Party found out I'd tried to resurrect another corpse, they asked me to do the same with Lenin. Some retirees also wrote asking me to bring back Stalin. As for bringing people back to life, I've studied it and know that a corpse has seven points through which energy can be forced. I conducted 40 unsuccessful experiments and one successful one. I drove energy into the corpse and it began to raise its arms and legs, opened its eyes, began to stand and then fell down. That was it, the brain couldn't be brought back to life.
Q:Critics say that all of this is just charlatanism. How do you respond?
A: I don't argue because I believe that everyone is entitled to an opinion. Those who say they don't believe are often very susceptible to hypnotic suggestion. An intelligent person won't insist that a thing doesn't exist just because he cannot see it. We don't see germs, but they exist.
Q:You say that you've developed your own method for curing cancer. What is it?
A: A return to childhood. As a rule, no one is born with cancer, although they may have a hereditary predisposition to the disease. ... I put the person into a trance and regress them back to their childhood, or to a previous life, if the person believes in reincarnation.
Q:Some experts say that hypnosis can lead to psychological trauma.
A: I partly agree. All excess is bad. If you drink French wine every day, you could become an alcoholic, but a moderate amount of French wine is good for the heart. If a person is hypnotized 10 times in a month, it's very harmful. But to experience hypnosis once a month is very good. No one should ever be forced to be hypnotized.
Q:Do you find that your extrasensory abilities help you in your personal life?
A: No, I'm a deeply unhappy person, a shoemaker without shoes. I was married four times to very good women, and I left each one because I couldn't make her happy. My profession sometimes requires that I be alone. No woman can forgive the need to go away, move away for a while or take long business trips.
A practitioner of white magic, Longo was the star of his own weekly television show, "The Third Eye," which aired on ORT for several years during the 1990s. The show -- in which he levitated over streams or cast spells on corpses to make their toes move -- made Longo a celebrity for a time, but was canceled in 1998 due to low ratings.
Born in Southern Russia, Longo first began experimenting with magic as a child, when he says he hypnotized a teacher. Later, he began calling himself a sorcerer, practicing tricks like setting grass on fire and moving objects from across the room.
The former head of the now defunct Moscow School of Wizardry and Magic, which he also founded, Longo is the author of several books on sorcery, fortune telling and dream interpretation -- and has even claimed that he can raise the dead. One much publicized attempt, however, to resurrect Vladimir Lenin, failed.
In addition to these exploits, Longo says he has developed original methods for curing disease. Today, he spends most of his time presiding over private hypnosis sessions. He talked with The Moscow Times this week.
Q:Do you consider yourself a white magician or a sorcerer?
A: Sorcerer is a word that is more universally understood. In fact, I'm a master of white, practical magic. A master is like an engineer of magic, but not of the class of people who can work miracles. I'm good at love magic and solving family problems and problems related to white magic, such as breaking curses. However, I can do sorcery as well.
Q:How do you define magic?
A: Magic means controlling the events related to a person's destiny. Simply speaking, magic is working with a person's soul. The soul is nothing but energy, the internal psychosomatic condition of a person's body. Things that we can't see or touch do exist. Most people believe in the existence of a soul. This is magic: working with this energy, with the unidentifiable phenomenon of the human soul
Q:In the early 1990s, Russia experienced a boom in the popularity of psychics and white magicians. How has the country's attitude toward magic changed over the last few years?
A:People have cooled toward it. The popularity of magic here is now about the same as in Europe, maybe a little higher. Now, only people who really know something about it or who find themselves in a desperate situation show an interest. As for the 1990s, there are a number of reasons for the boom. In other countries, there has always been a certain level of interest in magic, but it was totally banned in Russia until perestroika. ... At that point, people didn't believe in anything. They hadn't even started believing in God yet, but they'd certainly stopped believing in themselves, in politics and in communism. This all caused an upsurge in interest in magic. Of course, a number of charlatans emerged ... but things are better now.
Q:What services does a white magician provide? Which are popular today?
A:My clients are mostly women. People come to me when they don't understand their own minds, or when they don't understand some phenomenon that is affecting them, that they cannot deal with on their own. Many of my clients come to me for help removing the evil eye. When a person notices some negative influence, feels nervous or unwell, or thinks someone has put a curse on him, he comes to me. ... Sometimes, clients want to bewitch someone, to return a loved one who has left them or fallen out of love. Sometimes, it's the other way around -- they want someone to leave them alone. Women also come to me when they can't get along with their children.
Q:Have your clients included any celebrities?
A: Quite a few, but it wouldn't be right to say which ones. I've had clients from every kind of show business, but mostly female singers -- and politicians. Politicians are always interesting in finding out the results of upcoming elections, or they ask me for help in winning elections.
Q:You have traveled all over the world. In your opinion, does magic as it is practiced abroad differ from its practice here? And is it perceived differently?
A: It's completely different. If we look at civilized countries, the most powerful in terms of magic are Spain and Italy. Russia is somewhere on the middle of the scale: We have many sorcerers, but very few true sorcerers. Note that I'm not even including the African countries, where voodoo magic is very powerful. ... The truth is that there are only about a dozen true sorcerers in the whole world. Strange as it may seem, the most suggestible country in terms of hypnosis is Germany. The Germans have an absolute belief in magic. ... In Russia, it's just the opposite. You have to constantly prove that you can do magic. "Show me a miracle," the people here always say.
Q:Did you really think you could bring Lenin back to life?
A:It was kind of a joke. Of course, it would have been impossible to do. When the Communist Party found out I'd tried to resurrect another corpse, they asked me to do the same with Lenin. Some retirees also wrote asking me to bring back Stalin. As for bringing people back to life, I've studied it and know that a corpse has seven points through which energy can be forced. I conducted 40 unsuccessful experiments and one successful one. I drove energy into the corpse and it began to raise its arms and legs, opened its eyes, began to stand and then fell down. That was it, the brain couldn't be brought back to life.
Q:Critics say that all of this is just charlatanism. How do you respond?
A: I don't argue because I believe that everyone is entitled to an opinion. Those who say they don't believe are often very susceptible to hypnotic suggestion. An intelligent person won't insist that a thing doesn't exist just because he cannot see it. We don't see germs, but they exist.
Q:You say that you've developed your own method for curing cancer. What is it?
A: A return to childhood. As a rule, no one is born with cancer, although they may have a hereditary predisposition to the disease. ... I put the person into a trance and regress them back to their childhood, or to a previous life, if the person believes in reincarnation.
Q:Some experts say that hypnosis can lead to psychological trauma.
A: I partly agree. All excess is bad. If you drink French wine every day, you could become an alcoholic, but a moderate amount of French wine is good for the heart. If a person is hypnotized 10 times in a month, it's very harmful. But to experience hypnosis once a month is very good. No one should ever be forced to be hypnotized.
Q:Do you find that your extrasensory abilities help you in your personal life?
A: No, I'm a deeply unhappy person, a shoemaker without shoes. I was married four times to very good women, and I left each one because I couldn't make her happy. My profession sometimes requires that I be alone. No woman can forgive the need to go away, move away for a while or take long business trips.
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