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Title: “Scarne on card Tricks” By John Scarne.

Supplier: Amazon

Cost: £7

Difficulty: 1 because it’s self-working card magic.

Review:

The best way of starting this review is, I think, to quote something from Scarne’s own preface:

“Five years ago, I decided that the card trick enthusiasts deserved a better grade of card tricks than they had been accustomed to performing. On the whole, the tricks performed by the non sleight of hand card enthusiasts at that time were so simple that the secret was easily discovered by the person or persons they were intended to mystify. Then and there I decided that something should be done to remedy the situation, and that is when I started to write this book.”

First, he contacted the greats of the day - Cardini, Gardner, Hummer, Lorayne, Stebbins, Tarbell, Vernon, etc. and got them to provide some of their favourite sleight-based tricks. He then added thirty of his own to the list, and some by all-time greats like Harry Houdini, to finish with a grand total of 155. He then stripped each trick down and rebuilt it, removing all the original sleights. In each trick, he substituted these for novel non-sleight mechanisms that achieve the same result.

As he goes on:

“I spent hours on each one, devising new methods of execution to replace the sleight of hand used in the original trick. The next move was to test the individual tricks in their new form. Each trick was performed before a critical group of magicians, and all weaknesses were removed…I went back to the magicians who contributed the tricks and performed them, using the new methods. That these men could not believe that no sleight of hand was involved in the trick was the supreme accolade.”

Okay, that’s John Scarne himself doing them to the original magicians, but doesn’t it also go to show that, really, if we're in the business of achieving the seeming impossible, it's the effect that matters? There are those that love sleights, those that love self-working. When the performer just mechanically goes through the motions, I heartily agree that self-working is inferior to sleight magic. But when there’s real ability to apply new principles to create the same effects, I can't help thinking they're parallel schools of card magic.

Card sleights to me are about enviable skills that I'm simply never going to have. In self-working, however, the first time you perform a trick, you do it to yourself. With really good, completely counter-intuitive self-working, you actually get that magical feeling because you see a trick done before you know how it works. You know what the spectator feels when it gets him too, and I think that's partly why I like it so much. There are quite a few tricks that good in here. The Allerchrist Card Trick got me three times. I simply couldn't see how it worked until I sat and really thought about how the cards related to eachother. Muggles get no such repeats to study.

Overall:

Scarne first published this book in 1950, but it doesn’t feel over half a century old. Some of the greats in card magic have had their favourite tricks re-worked so that they impress their original authors. All for seven quid. For me it might be a 1 on the difficulty scale, but it’s a definite 10/10 on the CUPS.

Tomo wrote:Card sleights to me are about enviable skills that I'm simply never going to have.

Sounds like you're in the same boat as me lol - I can do basic sleights and that's about it, so self-working card tricks are right up my street.
Hmmm now where did I put my credit card

Nice review btw m8

Thanks for that excellent review - I didn't know that book was a reworking of favourite "sleighted" routines with the sleights removed.

Although I like sleights, there's no better way to fool fellow magicians than to throw in a sleightless trick.
It's great watching them stare hard at your hands and still not seeing anything!!

Most of Wayne Dobson's routines in recent years use the same priciples - take a slighted card trick and rework it to remove all the difficult stuff.

Damn, and I thought I was recovering.

If it helps the link to the book on Amazon is this.

Kati

Looking back at my review, it reads to me a bit like a rant. It's not meant to; I was rushing to finish it before Horizon came on.

It might be a provocative thought, but It's got me wondering how much there is left to discover in both sleight and mechanism based card magic. I'm guessing it's a lot in both cases, but what do others think?

As technology develops there's always a possibility that new techniques will arise which can be used for Magic. In the meantime, we musn't forget the old stuff which worked fine 100 years ago and will probably work just as well in 2106!

Just a few things:
1) This book is so good it's almost obscene. When I read magic books that explain tricks, I have a habit of marking the pages that contain ones I'll want to remember with mini Post-its. Halfway through this book, I had to go out and buy more Posti-its. It contains some poor - or plain old fashioned - tricks, yes; but the proportion of these is far lower than in most magic books, let alone ones published in the 1950s.
2) Scarne, as has been said, has removed all the sleights. Good on him, but you can put them back in - to your own ideal level. For example, a particular trick requires a card be removed from the top of the deck (unnoticed); Scarne gives a method of achieving this but, for me, simply using a sleight to do it is more comfortable. I'd really recommend the book for complete beginners because I this. I remember the bleak sorrow of knowing how to *do* a trick, but not being able to perform it because it required a move two-years ahead of my ability. Here, you can do the trick right away, then - as your ability improves - bring the sleights online and (often) make it even better*. The trick will grow with you.
3) It's a wonderful source of ideas - effects that simply scream at you to adapt them to your own presentation and/handling. So often I found myself going, 'Yeah, OK... But - wait a minute! - if...'
4) It's great for us adults, but there's lots for kids too. My youngest (8) is forever asking me to teach him a card trick. It's hard because (a) he couldn't possibly cope with any sleights and (b) I don't want to tell him my favourite secrets (it's always important to maintain a domestic hierarchy). But there are lots here that I can show him how to do.
5) Seven quid. Unbelieveable. I really can't recommend this book highly enough.

*I completely agree about the performance being the thing, and that self-working stuff allows you to concentrate on it fully, but doing an easy sleight (when it *has* become easy for you) can take up less of your concentration than the workaround.

Sexton Blake wrote:1) This book is so good it's almost obscene. When I read magic books that explain tricks, I have a habit of marking the pages that contain ones I'll want to remember with mini Post-its. Halfway through this book, I had to go out and buy more Posti-its.

Tee hee. I must admit that mine has about half the pages turned down. So many that I can't really find anything in it any more.

For ref.
http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/sutra157456.php#157456

Any book available on Amazon can always be found at Book Depository
Scarne on cards costs 7.16 pounds delivered. I have used this site many
times - I live in Germany - so the free postage makes a big difference.

Ordered. Coming tomorrow. This purchase merely confirms my hatred towards reviews and CUPS

LeftEye wrote:Ordered. Coming tomorrow. This purchase merely confirms my hatred towards reviews and CUPS :(

You speak for so many of us. However, you made a good decision in this case. I can't even conceive of anyone regretting buying SoCT. It's a book you don't need to grow into (even a complete beginner will find lots of stuff s/he can do almost immediately) but you'll never grow out of (I'm reading it yet again, for the Lord knows how manyth time, and still going, 'Ah, yes, I'd forgotten about that. Splendid.')

I just got this book in june I love it. it's got some great tricks in it.

I'm still reading through my copy at the moment. This book is superb and should be in everyone's library. I think I paid £8 for mine, which is ludicrously cheap considering what you get for your money.