talkmagic.co.uk

Mentalism, very litterally, becomes more interesting to me by the day.

I've been browsing around previous topics and on websites, but need a more direct answer.

I was wondering if anybody could tell me a good book to get started with?

I've heard a lot of good hings about 13 Steps, and that the Brown books are good, but I don't know if they're advanced or not?

Cheers
Mike

Absolutely positively 13 Steps. Buy nothing else until you've read and digested it. In fact, you actually need nothing more than 13 Steps...ever! All the rest is just icing on the cake. 13 Steps is the cake.

In case you missed the point: buy 13 Steps! And welcome to the journey that is quite frankly mental!

Oh, and there's a Craig Browning sticky somewhere that is worth it's weight in gold. I think it's called "Becoming a Mentalist". And it's at the top of this very section! Go view!

13 Steps contains just about everything you need to know. There are many other works but they're best left for much later on after you've got Corinda's basics fully understood.

Put 'mentalist' into the search function and follow some of the earlier threads - Craig Browning has been very informative and certainly gets straight to the point on this topic.

For starters, try http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/ftopic15707.php , http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/ftopic14429.php , and most important, the one Paul mentioned above, http://www.ipswichmagicalsociety.co.uk/ ... talist.pdf

Have fun!!

The Annemann's "Practical Mental Magic" is another excellent grounding. The two books really compliment each other.

Karl Fulves Self Working Mentalism is good for a few nice, simple ideas.

Yep! do what Mandrake and others says. Read Craig's piece and get 13 steps to mentalism. Then slowly go through the material learning each piece stage by stage until you can do it perfect. Then see what else the mighty Mr B recommend's next. My next material after 13 was a very SLOW and careful study of the Banacheck material.

or you could just buy a one way deck and fake it.

hm, i might go watch some derren brown

I would say 13 steps is a definate and also Karl fulves self working mental magic is also very good for some simple but effective effects.

Lawrence wrote:or you could just buy a one way deck and fake it.

hm, I might go watch some derren brown

Good point. When it really comes down to it, it's all about the story you wrap around what you're doing - the presentation. The gulf between cause and effect in mentalism is just a lot wider than it is in straight card magic. One asks "is this your card" the other says "Your card is", type of thing.

Oooh, philosophy this early into my second pint of coffee

Yeah, one thing I've learned about mentalism (and really magic in general) is that the presentation is far more important than the effect. We've been here before, haven't we? Probably many times.

Anyway, the biggest "trick" in mentalism is to get the audience to perceive you as a dark, mysterious person. Once you've achieved that (and you've got all of...oooh...5 seconds from approaching your audience to them deciding whether you're a mysterious stranger or just an idiot), then all the stunts you pull will have a dark, mysterious edge to them. That's the idea anyway. And belief. Belief is hugely important and under-rated. If you're making a card dissapear, you have to believe internally that you're actually making the card disappear. Whatever you do, don't be thinking "and there goes the card down my pants" or whatever. You need to fool yourself into beleiving that you have super-natural powers - otherwise the audience will pick up on those tiny subliminal messages you're sending out.

Complicated. It soon will be.

Anyway, the biggest "trick" in mentalism is to get the audience to perceive you as a dark, mysterious person.

So that's it! I've been doing the pink & fluffy New Ager all these years... no wonder I get it wrong

Bob Cassidy's Fundamentals has helped me more than anything else. I'm far more concerned with presentation than technical handling, because if you're reading minds, why would there be any manipulation/sleight-of-hand/whatever?

A solid presentation is, in my opinion, the single most important part of mentalism. If you force a card in a magic trick, you've still got to control it, manipulate the deck, etc. If you force a card in mentalism, you're done. All that's left is the presentation.