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Author: Alex Stone
Publisher: Bond Street Books
ISBN: 0307368211
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 263
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Book Description
An exploration of the world of magic that teaches the reader many tricks--including how better to understand the real world. Alex Stone--journalist and part-time conjurer--is here to amaze you. But first he had to amaze his fellow magicians. Fooling Houdini is his fascinating, revealing, and nailbiting account of his attempt to win the 23rd World Championships of Magic, the "Magic Olympics," the largest and most prestigious competition of its kind. Alex Stone managed to qualify for entry and began preparing to astonish people who astonish others for a living. It didn't help his nerves that he was placed on the bill straight after Canadian magician Shawn Farquhar, winner of more magic competitions than anyone in history. Stone's preparations and participation provide his readers with in-depth exploration of the world of magic, and magic's meaning. He spills many professional secrets, arguing that what is important is to ask questions about what lies behind the tricks: how the mind perceives the world and parses everyday experience, about how the mind works--and why sometimes it doesn't, about why people need to believe. As we become more attuned to the limits of our own perception, we become better at distinguishing reality from illusion, at reading the angles and decoding the fine print, he says. We gain intuition and understanding into how people behave. We even learn ways to influence this behavior. This makes us less susceptible to all manner of deception. It is to gain and maintain this sixth sense that Alex Stone--a schoolboy prestidigitator--has continued performing magic well into adulthood. In Fooling Houdini he takes us into that other world, populated by truly astounding characters, and leaves us with a heightened sense of awareness about the supposedly real world.
Author: Alex Stone
Publisher: Bond Street Books
ISBN: 0307368211
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 263
Get Book
Book Description
An exploration of the world of magic that teaches the reader many tricks--including how better to understand the real world. Alex Stone--journalist and part-time conjurer--is here to amaze you. But first he had to amaze his fellow magicians. Fooling Houdini is his fascinating, revealing, and nailbiting account of his attempt to win the 23rd World Championships of Magic, the "Magic Olympics," the largest and most prestigious competition of its kind. Alex Stone managed to qualify for entry and began preparing to astonish people who astonish others for a living. It didn't help his nerves that he was placed on the bill straight after Canadian magician Shawn Farquhar, winner of more magic competitions than anyone in history. Stone's preparations and participation provide his readers with in-depth exploration of the world of magic, and magic's meaning. He spills many professional secrets, arguing that what is important is to ask questions about what lies behind the tricks: how the mind perceives the world and parses everyday experience, about how the mind works--and why sometimes it doesn't, about why people need to believe. As we become more attuned to the limits of our own perception, we become better at distinguishing reality from illusion, at reading the angles and decoding the fine print, he says. We gain intuition and understanding into how people behave. We even learn ways to influence this behavior. This makes us less susceptible to all manner of deception. It is to gain and maintain this sixth sense that Alex Stone--a schoolboy prestidigitator--has continued performing magic well into adulthood. In Fooling Houdini he takes us into that other world, populated by truly astounding characters, and leaves us with a heightened sense of awareness about the supposedly real world.
Author: Walter Brown Gibson
Publisher: Courier Corporation
ISBN: 0486203840
Category : Conjuring
Languages : en
Pages : 337
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Book Description
Written by the master magician himself, this fascinating work reveals the secrets behind how Houdini escaped numerous death-defying stunts and exposed a variety of fake spiritualists. He also gives instructions for 44 eye-catching stage tricks, as well as other fascinating material. 155 illustrations.
Author: Susana Martinez-Conde
Publisher: Profile Books
ISBN: 1847652956
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 371
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Book Description
What can magic tell us about ourselves and our daily lives? If you subtly change the subject during an uncomfortable conversation, did you know you're using attentional 'misdirection', a core technique of magic? And if you've ever bought an expensive item you'd sworn never to buy, you were probably unaware that the salesperson was, like an accomplished magician, a master at creating the 'illusion of choice'. Leading neuroscientists Stephen Macknik and Susana Martinez-Conde meet with magicians from all over the world to explain how the magician's art sheds light on consciousness, memory, attention, and belief. As the founders of the new discipline of NeuroMagic, they combine cutting-edge scientific research with startling insights into the tricks of the magic trade. By understanding how magic manipulates the processes in our brains, we can better understand how we work - in fields from law and education to marketing, health and psychology - for good and for ill.
Author: Alex Stone
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 0434019666
Category : Magic
Languages : en
Pages : 322
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Book Description
A PhD candidate in physics at Columbia University, Alex Stone is also part of the underground magic circuit, an exclusive community whose members convene regularly in pizza parlours and coffee shops to swap tips and develop new illusions. Determined to take his lifelong hobby to the professional level, Stone embarks on a personal quest to reach the pinnacle of this bizarre world, and become a master magician. But he has some learning to do. In Fooling Houdini, we journey through a strange and colourful subculture of obsessive, brilliant and dysfunctional geniuses - blind card sharps, street-hustlers and Las Vegas showmen - learning the principles and history of some of the greatest tricks ever performed. Seeking answers to broader questions about decision making, the limits of perception, and the nature of deception, Stone helps us understand what happens as we attempt to distinguish reality from illusion, and discovers the link between magic and psychology, physics and even crime. From back-street scams to laboratories to the Magic Olympics, Fooling Houdini reveals the mysterious world of magic as never before.
Author: Laurie Carlson
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
ISBN: 1613741952
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 146
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Book Description
&&LDIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&&RIllusionist, escape artist, movie star, aviator, and spy—Harry Houdini was all these and an international celebrity and the world’s most famous magician. This fascinating biography looks at all the facets of Houdini’s amazing life and includes 21 magic tricks and illusions for a hands-on learning experience. Children will be inspired by this Jewish immigrant who grew up in poverty and, through perseverance and hard work, went on to become one of the most popular and successful entertainers of all time. Houdini was an artist who created his acts carefully, practicing them for years in some cases. He performed such seemingly impossible stunts as escaping several sets of handcuffs and ropes after jumping off a bridge into a flowing river. &&L/P&&R&&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&&R &&L/P&&R&&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&&RKids will learn how he devised his most legendary stunts and will also learn the science and logic behind many of Houdini’s acts including his famous milk can escape. Kids can amaze their family and friends with these simple, entertaining, and fun tricks and illusions: &&L/P&&R Stepping through an index card Performing an odd number trick Making a coin appear Mind reading with a secret code Making a magic box Lifting a person with one hand Making a talking board And much more &&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&&R &&L/P&&R&&L/DIV&&R&&L/DIV&&R
Author: Terry Catasús Jennings
Publisher: Arbordale Publishing
ISBN: 162855861X
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 19
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Book Description
Dena loves using magnets to perform magic tricks for the kids at the pool. When Enrique arrives in town, he doesn’t like that Dena is fooling the others. He gives her a century-old treasure map and Dena uses her compass and tools to plot the location of the treasure. To her surprise, the treasure is not where it should be! What could cause her compass to lead her off course? When she discovers the answer, will Dena keep fooling the other kids with magic tricks or will she help them learn about magnetism and the earth’s shifting magnetic poles?
Author: Persi Diaconis
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691169772
Category : Crafts & Hobbies
Languages : en
Pages : 258
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Book Description
"Magical Mathematics reveals the secrets of amazing, fun-to-perform card tricks--and the profound mathematical ideas behind them--that will astound even the most accomplished magician. Persi Diaconis and Ron Graham provide easy, step-by-step instructions for each trick, explaining how to set up the effect and offering tips on what to say and do while performing it. Each card trick introduces a new mathematical idea, and varying the tricks in turn takes readers to the very threshold of today's mathematical knowledge. For example, the Gilbreath principle--a fantastic effect where the cards remain in control despite being shuffled--is found to share an intimate connection with the Mandelbrot set. Other card tricks link to the mathematical secrets of combinatorics, graph theory, number theory, topology, the Riemann hypothesis, and even Fermat's last theorem. Diaconis and Graham are mathematicians as well as skilled performers with decades of professional experience between them. In this book they share a wealth of conjuring lore, including some closely guarded secrets of legendary magicians. Magical Mathematics covers the mathematics of juggling and shows how the I Ching connects to the history of probability and magic tricks both old and new. It tells the stories--and reveals the best tricks--of the eccentric and brilliant inventors of mathematical magic. Magical Mathematics exposes old gambling secrets through the mathematics of shuffling cards, explains the classic street-gambling scam of three-card monte, traces the history of mathematical magic back to the thirteenth century and the oldest mathematical trick--and much more"-
Author: David Jaher
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0307451062
Category : Spiritualism
Languages : en
Pages : 450
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Book Description
In 1924 the wife of a Boston surgeon came to embody the raging national debate over Spiritualism, a movement devoted to communication with the dead. Reporters dubbed her the blonde Witch of Lime Street, but she was known to her followers simply as Margery. Her most vocal advocate was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who believed so thoroughly in Margery's powers that he urged her to enter a controversial contest, sponsored by Scientific American. Her supernatural gifts beguiled four of the judges. There was only one left to convince ... the acclaimed escape artist, Harry Houdini. Jaher captures their electric public rivalry and the competition that brought them into each other's orbit.
Author: Joe Posnanski
Publisher: Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster
ISBN: 1501137247
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 336
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Book Description
Joe Posnanski enters the colorful world of Harry Houdini and his legions of devoted fans to explore the illusionist’s impact on global culture—and why his legacy endures to this day. Nearly a century after Harry Houdini died on Halloween in 1926, he feels as modern and alive as ever. The name Houdini still leaps to mind whenever we witness a daring escape. The baby who frees herself from her crib? Houdini. The dog who vanishes and reappears in the neighbor’s garden? Houdini. Every generation produces new disciples of the magician, from household names in magic like David Copperfield and David Blaine to countless other followers whose lives have been transformed by the power of Houdini. In rural Pennsylvania, a thirteen-year-old girl finds the courage to leave a violent home after learning that Houdini ran away to join the circus; she eventually becomes the first female magician to saw a man in half on television. In Australia, an eight-year-old boy with a learning impediment feels worthless until he sees an old poster of Houdini advertising “Nothing on earth can hold Houdini prisoner,” and begins his path to becoming that nation’s most popular magician. In California, an actor and Vietnam War veteran finds purpose in his life by uncovering the secrets of his hero. But the unique phenomenon of Houdini was always more than his death-defying stunts or his ability to escape handcuffs and straitjackets. It is also about the power of imagination and self-invention. His incredible transformation from Ehrich Weiss, humble Hungarian immigrant and rabbi’s son, into the self-named Harry Houdini has won him a slice of immortality. No one has withstood the test of time quite like Houdini. Fueled by Posnanski’s personal obsession with the magician—and magic itself—The Life and Afterlife of Harry Houdini is a poignant odyssey of discovery, blending biography, memoir, and first-person reporting to trace Houdini’s metamorphosis into an iconic figure who has inspired millions.
Author: Derek DelGaudio
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0593081110
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 257
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Book Description
Truth and lies are two sides of the same coin. But who's flipping it? A thought-provoking and brilliantly entertaining work of nonfiction from one of the world's leading deceivers, the creator and star of the astonishing theater show and forthcoming film In & Of Itself. Derek DelGaudio believed he was a decent, honest man. But when irrefutable evidence to the contrary is found in an old journal, his memories are reawakened and Derek is forced to confront--and try to understand--his role in a significant act of deception from his past. Using his youthful notebook entries as a road map, Derek embarks on a soulful, often funny, sometimes dark journey, retracing the path that led him to a world populated by charlatans, card cheats, and con artists. As stories are peeled away and artifices are revealed, Derek examines the mystery behind his father's vanishing act, the secret he inherited from his mother, the obsession he developed with sleight-of-hand that shaped his future, and the affinity he felt for the professional swindlers who taught him how to deceive others. And once he finds himself working as a crooked dealer in a big-money Hollywood card game, Derek begins to question his own sense of morality, and discovers that even a master of deception can find himself trapped inside an illusion. A M O R A L M A N is a wildly engaging exploration of the fictions we live as truths. It is ultimately a book about the lies we tell ourselves and the realities we manufacture in others.
