Author:
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416968784
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 82
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Book Description
A chance encounter with Harry Houdini leaves a small boy in possession of a mysterious box--one that might hold the secrets to the greatest magic tricks ever performed.
Author: Adam Phillips
Publisher: Pantheon
ISBN:
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 200
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Book Description
Houdini’s Box explores four different escape artists. There is the case history of the little girl who is oddly committed to playing her own wayward version of hide-and-seek. There is Harry Houdini, “the greatest magician the world has ever seen,” an assimilated Jew and immigrant escapee who compulsively reinvents and re-enacts his own confinement. There is a patient of Phillips’s who has come to him after being badgered by his (ex-) girlfriend, who says she wants to help “his next ex.” He is a man who has become entranced, not with woman as object of desire, but with flight from woman, a man hypnotized by the infinite freedom of escape, always arriving at the place from which he is escaping. And finally, there is the poet Emily Dickinson, who for the last twenty years of her life found freedom in self-imposed solitary confinement. Whether we are getting away from something or getting away with something, we cannot describe ourselves without also describing what we need to escape from and what we want to escape to. In this, his most captivating book to date, Adam Phillips reminds us why people often feel most alive in the very moment of escape.
Author: William Kalush
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1847396194
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 998
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Book Description
Using exclusive access to newly uncovered archives, Kalush and Sloman reveal the clandestine agreements in which the British and Americans recruited Houdini to be an active secret agent. In exchange for his cooperation, the governments of these two countries facilitated his rise to the top of the world stage. The authors give thrilling accounts of his assignments, such as his participation in early aerial surveillance and his use of his own magic magazine to communicate espionage-related information. After the war, Houdini embarked upon what became his most dangerous mission when he took on the Spiritualist movement. Convinced that Spiritualist mediums were frauds, he became obsessed with exposing them. But the Spiritualists were a powerful adversary. An organized network of fanatics, led by Sherlock Holmes creator Arthur Conan Doyle, worked relentlessly to orchestrate a campaign that would silence Houdini forever. Grounded in solid research, but as exciting and dramatic as a good thriller, THE SECRET LIFE OF HOUDINI traces the magician's long and circuitous route from struggling vaudevillian to worldwide legend.
Author: Harry Houdini
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780894740251
Category : Games & Activities
Languages : en
Pages : 136
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Book Description
Author: Michael Mangan
Publisher: Intellect Books
ISBN: 184150985X
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 282
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Book Description
Magic and conjuring inhabit the boundaries and the borderlands of performance. The conjuror’s act of demonstrating the apparently impossible, the uncanny, the marvellous, or the grotesque challenges the spectator’s sense of reality. It brings him or her up against their own assumptions about how the world works; at its most extreme, it asks the spectator to re-evaluate his or her sense of the limits of the human. Performing Dark Arts is an exploration of the paradox of the conjuror, the actor who pretends to be a magician. It aims to illuminate the history of conjuring by examining it in the context of performance studies, and to throw light on aspects of performance studies by testing them against the art of conjuring. The book examines not only the performances of individual magicians from Dedi to David Blaine, but also the broader cultural contexts in which their performances were received, and the meanings which they have attracted.
Author: Derek Tait
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1473867967
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 492
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Book Description
This fascinating biography “brings to life the excitement and thrills” of the master escape artist’s legendary turn-of-century tour in Great Britain (Lancashire Post). Between 1900 and 1920, a century before endurance artist and street magician David Blaine, Hungarian-born Harry Houdini traveled Great Britain, performing in its major villages and cities. He befriended Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, immersed himself in spiritualism and most notably, escaped from jails, survived death-defying leaps into rivers while bound in chains, and executed amazing tricks and illusions. On each stop, he challenged locals to design “inescapable” contraptions. He was always triumphant, and his awesome, crowd-drawing feats made him the highest paid entertainer in the world at the time. Extensively researched, The Great Houdini: His British Tours follows Houdini’s decades-long UK tour through rare archival material, vintage newspaper clippings, photos, and original playbills and ballyhoo advertisements—many of which have not been seen since they were originally published. This “must read . . . cause for celebration . . . packed with new, fascinating facts” delivers a thrilling look into the life and career of history’s greatest escapologist (Wild About Harry).
Author: Tom Lalicki
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1497616239
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 82
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Book Description
Originally published as: SPELLBINDER: The Life of Harry Houdini. He was born Ehrich Weiss but, at an early age, he chose another name for himself. He wanted a name to suit his career of magic and entertainment and he chose a name that paid homage to one of the legendary magicians of all time: Robert Houdin. His illusions and escapes were more astonishing and more challenging than anyone had ever done before and he eclipsed the names of all other magicians as his fame reached around the world, made him famous and made him the most famous illusionist ever. Houdini disappeared through brick walls. He escaped from straitjackets and then straitjackets immersed in water. He performed escapes in public places and from jail cells in major cities--and the crowds flocked to his performances. Tom Lalicki tells Houdini's story with a fascinating mix of text and images, revealing the facts and juxtaposing them with startling images of a master entertainer performing masterfully and mysteriously, mesmerizing his audiences and mystifying experts with his skill and his invention.
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: Julia Holmes
Publisher: New York Review of Books
ISBN: 9781892145314
Category : Celebrities
Languages : en
Pages : 260
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Book Description
Author: Adam Phillips
Publisher:
ISBN: 0786749954
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 273
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Book Description
Written in his beloved epigrammatic and aphoristic style, Equals extends Adam Phillips's probings into the psychological and the political, bringing his trenchant wit to such subjects as the usefulness of inhibitions and the paradox of permissive authority. He explores why citizens in a democracy are so eager to establish levels of hierarchy when the system is based on the assumption that every man is created equal. And he ponders the importance of mockery in group behavior, and the psyche's struggle as a metaphor for political conflict.
