Principles Of Magic Book
Richard Osterlind
Why can two performers do the same piece of material yet one consistently gets much more enthusiastic audience responses?
Is it possible that some of magic's most sacred axioms such as "never repeat a trick" and "never tell an audience what you're going to do" may ultimately be responsible for the huge amount of mediocre magic that abounds?
What is magic's biggest lie?
These are just a few of the topics that Richard Osterlind tackles in what may be his most passionate argument yet for a return to the fundamental principles that once made conjuring one of the most respected of the performing arts. Over the years, these principles have become misinterpreted, misunderstood or largely ignored, resulting in magic's unfortunate and undeserving loss of its rightful place in the public's estimation. The Principles of Magic is Richard Osterlind's warning flag that, as performers, we have to change many of our approaches and attitudes before it's too late and magic vanishes forever.
As a bonus, Richard offers "Inside The Fold," one of the strongest openers possible for a magic or mentalism program. It's a surefire way to gain the respect and attention of any audience immediately.
More than just a reasoned appeal to mystery performers everywhere to once again lift magic to its highest artistic potential, The Principles of Magic is about rediscovering what it was about magic that you first loved...and perhaps relearning how to share its original wonder with others.
Reviews
(Top ▲)
If this were only so.
Part one is composed of five very short essays on the nature of art and magic as an art. The author's observations on art in general are rather peculiar (his painters always know what they will end up before they pick up the brush), and the application of these observations to magic somewhat shallow. He holds magic forth as the art of mystery but fails to make any useful observations on what this actually implies or how to achieve it.
Part two is a hodgepodge of five essays over a disparate range of subjects: guilt, ego, religious faith, mentalism, and TV magic. The author's prescription to avoiding getting caught is to realize that magic is not unethical -- boy, am I glad that got sorted out! Things go downhill from there, with the exception of the essay "How Far is Too Far?", which discusses recent trends in television magic and is head and shoulders above the rest of the part two.
Part three consists of five short essays on various matters of
practical nature: stage presence, handling volunteers, pre-show
nerves, etc. This is clearly the strongest part of the book, but still
remains fairly trivial. While the advice contained herein is
undoubtedly solid and grounded in decades of experience it is also
fairly standard fare for any text dealing with these issues, though
Mr. Osterlind does make a couple of points regarding volunteers I do not recall seeing elsewhere in print.
Part four is five short essays on various magical "rules" -- like
"Never Repeat A Trick". Unlike parts one and two the time spend
reading this was not entirely wasted, but the essays still remain on
par with most of the book: grand titles but disappointingly little content.
Part five contains the requisite effect, which will surely play well
in the hands of any competent performer, but the basics of which most people buying this book will already be familiar with.
All in all the essays are extremely short, averaging at less then
three pages. For the most part this is merciful, but whenever the
author does have something worthwhile to say he almost never manages to properly develop his subject. The style of the essays is occasionally reminiscent of political or religious tracts: the things
the author would like us to belive come across strongly, but the
argumentation is weak and the implications remain unexplored. Various parts of the books are also slightly at odds with each other, as the author seems to think of mentalism and magic in fundamentally different ways but fails to tackle the tension in his essays on "Mentalism" and "Mentalism and Magic".
In short: there is little worth saying here that hasn't been said before and better by others. Not recommended.