Gibecière Vol. 3 No. 1

Contents Pocket Notes—Stephen Minch 7 An Investigation into Magic in Japan After the Opening of the Country, Part III—Mitsunobu Matsuyama 11 The Pendulum “Knows”—William E. Spooner 49 Max Beckmann and His Magic Mirror— Volker Huber 77 Introduction to The Adventures of Barolomeo Bosco— Ricky Jay 95 The Adventures of Bartolomeo Bosco — F. A. Rosental 99 Contributors 159

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Courtesy of Mike Caveney’s Egyptian Hall Museum

Soto Sunetaro poster with discrepant Kanji spelling 1

AN INVESTIGATION OF MAGIC IN JAPAN AFTER THE OPENING OF THE COUNTRY Part III: Unraveling the Ultimate Deception of Soto Sunetaro

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Mitsunobu Matsuyama In previous installments we have examined the histories of several of the earliest native magicians to travel from Japan to the west: Namigoro, Asakichi and Chonosuke. However, in western literature, another name is recorded as the first Japanese magician to perform in foreign lands during the chaotic years of Japan’s opening to the rest of the world: Soto Sunetaro. This brave pioneering work and the sustained success of his performances abroad would be enough to assure Sunetaro’s place in magic’s history and in the present series of articles. But there is yet another fact about Soto Sunetaro that makes him a subject demanding further investigation. His name appears in no Japanese book on the history of magic in Japan!

Before Foreign Travel was Permitted, Did Soto Sunetaro Leave Japan?

Bart Whaley’s Who’s Who in Magic states that Sunetaro was born in Japan in 1858, and was brought to the United States in 1860.

There he became a professional conjurer, performing Japanesestyle magic in the west for the rest of his life. He died in New York City on February 10, 1910. His name also appears in Le Livre d’Or (The Golden Book), an historic Who’s Who of magic published in France in 1949. He is the only Japanese ­magician Winter 2008 \ Gibecière

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Courtesy of David Haversat of the S. S. Adams Company

The S. S. Adams “Sex Detector”

THE PENDULUM “KNOWS”

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WILLIAM E. SPOONER Since ancient times, hand-held pendulums have been used to obtain occult knowledge. In more modern days, fortunes reportedly have been made selling a deceivingly simple device consisting of a length of string with a small object attached to one end. Advertisements claim that the sex of an unborn child or the sex of any creature dead or alive can be detected simply by how the pendulum swings. Like the well-known Ouija board, the pendulum is alleged to divine hidden knowledge as it provides answers to perplexing questions. The public has enthusiastically embraced the pendulum, due largely to their fascination with the occult and psychic phenomena.

The magic community has seen vacillations in the popularity of the pendulum during the past eighty-five years. During that time, magic literature abounds with interesting anecdotes and controversies. One thing is sure. Magicians also recognize a good trick with entertainment value when they see one. George Anderson states it well when he notes, “Obviously you can’t get caught on this trick, because there’s nothing to catch.”1

The History and Background of the Pendulum Long before the pendulum was applied to magical entertainment, it was believed to divine knowledge and tap the inner workings of the human mind (see p. 7). The relationship between mind and body has been recognized for centuries.

Maurice Kouguell summarizes the position: Ideodynamic communication describes all the relationships between ideas, thoughts and the dynamic or physiological

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Cover subject of Der Zauber-Spiegel: Armida

MAX BECKMANN AND HIS MAGIC MIRROR

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Volker Huber In May 1925, in volume 9 of the professional magic journal Zauber-Spiegel (Magic Mirror), the editor, F. W. Conradi-Horster, recalled an experience from his youth.

Women have played a large role in my life, and so it was also a woman whom I still have to thank today for awakening a love of magic in me. This woman was none other than the famous Austrian magician Armida (Frau Amanda Lilge-Oeser), whose picture we find today on the title page.

It was in Tetschen a.d. Elbe in 1879 when Armida set up her magic theater across from our little villa. Even the preparations were an event for a nine-year-old boy. For days, my friends and I watched as there, where the stage would later stand, the earth was deeply excavated. When these works were completed, the theater rose virtually overnight, a sturdy building made of wood, one which could not have been designed more beautifully for that time. [...]

The program itself was in three parts: the first consisted of salon magic [...] the second began with a violin virtuoso. [...] Then there followed an ample presentation, popular at that time, of dissolving views. The third part was made up of spirit apparitions. I have never again seen these portrayed on so large a scale and so exquisitely. It was only the deep excavations, which we boys wondered at in the building of the theater, that gave Armida an opportunity to stage such spirit apparitions, in which from four to six people performed together.1

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Volker Huber

“Pepper’s Ghost” from Physik in Bildern (Schreiber, Esslingen, 1881) seher (the Ghost-Seer, an unfinished novel published in 1789).

The basis of the illusion was a large pane of glass which, unnoticed by the spectators, separated the stage from the audience.

It was commonly understood that such a sheet of glass, under appropriately directed lighting, can either appear transparent or act as a mirror. What Dircks discovered was that, with the right lighting, the pane of glass can be transparent and reflexive at the same time. And that was the secret of Pepper’s Ghost! 11 Max Beckmann may have attended such a spirit show. Most certainly, though, he read a description of this illusion in a book with instructions for magic tricks. We thus accompany Max Beckmann to a fair booth and experience with him what ­Conradi-Horster saw as a boy in 1879, the “Magic Mirror,” which conjures up for us a woman with three heads. The following Gibecière / Vol. 3, No. 1

Max Beckmann

and

H i s M ag i c

mirror

description by H. F. C. Suhr explains the illusion.

The Three-headed Woman We entered a dimly lighted room and took a place opposite a small stage, set rather high up, which was located behind a barrier. After we had waited for a time, a note was sounded on a bell, the room darkened and the curtains swept open. We now saw, on the stage with black décor, a lady dressed in light-­colored clothing, on whose torso three well-defined heads sat: one in the

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INTRODUCTION TO The Adventures of Bartolomeo Bosco

~@% Ricky Jay

This newly translated monograph is notable, not for unearthing revelatory biographical data about Bartolomeo Bosco, but rather for the glimpse it yields into show-business publicity promoting one of the great theatrical personalities of the mid-nineteenth century. A puff piece thinly disguised as a narrative of adventures, this account is all-too-transparently intended to provide a laudatory portrait of its hero. It is a collection of well-crafted encomia—folk biography, poetic tributes and reviews—­masquerading as more than the sum of its parts.

These episodes were drawn, we are told, from Bosco’s voluminous “press books,” a gathering of notices so international that only the polyglot Cardinal Mezzofanti could decipher them.

Humorous hyperbole aside, Bosco was one of the most famous magicians of his day and indeed achieved stardom in numerous countries. One tribute to his reputation was that he spawned many imitators, a trial to later investigators trying to unravel the details of his life and repertoire. (I now doubt, for example, that the original Bosco appeared at Balmoral Castle, despite the “evidence” of a lavish souvenir broadside and a pamphlet devoted specifically to chronicling that performance.)

Among the achievements described here are stunts later claimed in the repertoires of magicians such as Carl and Alexander Herrmann. As I read this tribute, however, the conjurer Winter 2008 \ Gibecière

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Th e A d v e n t u r e s

of

B a rto l o m e o B o s c o

S ATA N

EU RO P E A N C O L L E CT I ON PASTIME IN THE INTERMISSION BETWEEN SESSIONS

OF EGYPTIAN MAGIC

BY THE CAVALIERE

BARTOLOMEO BOSCO OF TURIN

FREE VERSION FROM THE FRENCH EDITED BY

F. A. ROSENTAL

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MILAN, 1853

PRINTER AND BOOKSELLER GIO. SILVESTRI On the Corner of the Piazza S. Paolo, No. 913

[Translated from the Italian by Lori Pieper]

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F. A . R o s e n ta l

A deep disappointment showed itself in the audience. In the midst of a profound silence, the Sultan replied: “Let it be as the infidel desires! We grant him three weeks.”

Eight days later, Bosco was called to Russia and he obtained a passport by mediation of the French embassy.

Portrait of Bosco from Il Pasquino, 1860 Gibecière / Vol. 3, No. 1