Dec 10 2008
Secrets and What You Can Do With Them
Magicians guard an empty safe. - Jim Steinmeyer (Hiding the Elephant)
The field of Magic is the only field in which, if the audience can suss out what you’re actually doing out there, you are considered to have failed. Isn’t that odd? No other area of endeavor has that handicap.
Of course, no other area of endeavor walks that line between ‘this is what I’m doing’ and ‘this is what I’m telling you I’m doing’.
An actor can walk out on stage holding a stick and we’ll believe him when he says it’s a sword. If a magician walks out on stage with something he claims is a sword, it had better look like a sword.
- Teller (paraphrase, I’ll fix it when I find that interview in Genii again)
Even when a magician tells you he’s going to lie to you (which I do with frightening regularity), everything he does is geared to hiding whatever technique, gadget, gizmo, or bit of psychology allows him to do the seemingly amazing things he does.
… and it is because of the fact that we are taught the secret must be hidden that motivates such strong feelings around the very subject of Secrets itself.
Every few years, back before the Web was so prevalent, someone would go off and put on a Television show in which magicians’ “Secrets” were revealed. Magicians would, predictably, flip out, even though these secrets were usually decades old and already published in numerous books, magazines and newsletters.
Mind you, these books, magazines and newsletters were intended for magicians, which made it all right. After all, we were all brothers and sisters in the family of magic, sharing our secrets with a select few…
… a select few who will pay money to buy these books, magazines or newsletters, or who will go to the library to check out these items.
… or who know someone who has the items and can borrow them.
… or know someone on the internet who will let them get a copy or scan or rip or whatever.
The funniest part of our mania with keeping secrets is the fact that the secret we are so serious about keeping is, at the root, a very small, sometimes depressingly mundane piece of information. It’s a thing held here, or hidden there, or moved then.
And that secret isn’t what makes magic so wonderful.
Let’s expose the “secret” to painting.
Painting is the layering of liquidified pigments upon a media by means of a tool of some sort to give a sense of shape, color, shading, depth and texture.
… now that you know the “secret” of painting, does a well-executed painting lose its appeal?
… do smart people walk past it looking smug and telling each other “Oh, I know how he did that.”
Understanding the mechanics of an effect or trick or “demonstration” (and that word is rolling around in my head clamoring for a rant all its own) does not equate mastery of the art form any more than being able to squeak out “Happy Birthday to You” means you are now qualified to declare yourself an opera star.
And yet, Magic is the one art form where a spectator “knowing the secret” of how it’s done can be seen as a detriment to the art form itself.
Now I’ve told you all of that so I can say this: In this blog I will discuss techniques, principles and mechanical and psychological concepts which are often considered “secrets” by many (if not almost all) individuals who call themselves, or associate themselves with magicians.
… I will now wait for some of my readers to scamper off to a message board to denounce me as an “exposer”. This probably won’t take long.
If you’re reading this blog to get “secrets”, well, you’ll probably find some. Nothing earth-shattering. No, I don’t know every one of David Blaine or Criss Angel’s “secrets” and honestly I don’t think I wanna know. If you’re a collector of such things, you’ll probably be disappointed by this blog.
If, on the other hand, you want to talk about how to take these secrets and turn them into entertainment (and entertainment, not secrets, is what makes the wily “Lay person” give their hard-earned money to us to keep doing this stuff), then I think you’ll enjoy yourself here.
Secrets or no secrets.
