talkmagic.co.uk

Hello,
Bored so thought id start a discussion thread.

The topic for discussion is what is the true value of books?

A typical book costs about £20 and rarer ones as much as £150 upward.

How much is the material inside worth, how much value has it added to your act which inturn enables you to earn higher fee's?

Do the more expensive books justify that cost for the "gems" that are inside, or is it just because they are rarer that they are higher in value?

Thoughts, comments and abuse below please.

F x

expect my abuse later!

i'll be quick cos im going out in a little while...

books - i think the whole thing boils down to performing...

i've started gigging again, so i recently bought one privately printed book for £150 or so, had it signed...but that one book has got me a few other little gigs...purely cos of whats in it...

i know in the scheme of things, £150 isnt a great deal for a magic/mentalism document...but more than a typical online purchase, lets say that...

i suppose what im saying is, apart from studying, which lets face it, costs us all hundreds and thousands of pounds - its to get that knowledge..and that in turn, ties into character doesnt it...

you fairie - you have a certain character, a persona if you perform for someone, therefore, whatever appeals to you, you're probably gonna buy...same as me...same as anyone...

i think the key thing is, is learning when to stop and re-examine what you already own, and change things around...

i digress..

i think, in summing up m'lud - is you may read a book and think its fantastic - give it to me, and wipe my bum on it cos i hate it..and i like wiping my bum..

i suppose ultimately, its percieved value...

also, you can get some wierd and interesting jumping off points from reading something, that'll lead you off elsewhere...i was reading a banachek book, and he mentioned a mr. john riggs..i hadnt heard of him at the time...but investigated..

and riggs ended up being a big influence on me...

bit like that 6 degrees of seperation thing...which, ironically ties in with banachek again, cos greg arce talks about that with swami work in PS2...

many a gem is hidden inside small, cheap books. you dont have to splash out on expensive tomes.
however, the true value of any book, is only as good as the readers ability to process the information.
In my collection, i have quite a lot of books, some quite pricy in their day.
a few, ive only skimmed through, whilst others get a damn good thrashing on a regular basis.

as a perfect example, i have most of the Karoll Fox books. now you never see these on anybodys wish list, you hardly see anybody even mention teh guys name these days, yet between the pages of this books, are some of the most practical, commercial magic that has ever been invented.
a couple of years ago, Max Maven produced his dvds, Nothing.

what was overlooked by the hundreds of people splashing out on these dvds, is the fact that much of the stuff on them, was inspired by Karolls books.

when i bought these books, they were not expensive.
If you can get them on ebay, there still not that expensive.

Yet id find it hard to part with them.

Right as far as I'm concerned Royal road,Corinda,Mark Wilson,Expert at the card table,165 tricks and stunts and Annemanns card magic are a few book's on my shelf at a quick glance and all of these to me are worth 5 time's as much as I paid for them because I use something from all of them whether it's just a little subtely or a full blown routine these book's have woven my magic into a professional act instead of a me just being that guy down the road who play's with cards and does a few trick's. Each and everyone of these book's have contributed greatly to making my act what it is and if I didn't have any of these books my act would only probably be half as good as it is. All these book's that I have mentioned are all cheapish book's singulaly and probably cost me about £55 to £60 for the lot. On the other hand I have brought book's for £30-£40 singulaly and got nothing out of them but this doesen't nessesarily mean there bad just because I didn't like them someone else could use the material in there and the book's could be worth treble to them. I have also got some valuble information from more expensive book's so these are worth trble to me.

To sum up thoe I would say it all depend's on what type of performer you are and what appeal's to you, I don't care if a book cost's me 50p at a bootfair, £10 or £150 as long as I personally get something out of it and if I don't I should hope all my good buy's make up for my personal bad one's which I think over the course of my magic life has tenfold.

daleshrimpton wrote:many a gem is hidden inside small, cheap books. you dont have to splash out on expensive tomes.
however, the true value of any book, is only as good as the readers ability to process the information.
In my collection, i have quite a lot of books, some quite pricy in their day.
a few, ive only skimmed through, whilst others get a damn good thrashing on a regular basis.

as a perfect example, i have most of the Karoll Fox books. now you never see these on anybodys wish list, you hardly see anybody even mention teh guys name these days, yet between the pages of this books, are some of the most practical, commercial magic that has ever been invented.
a couple of years ago, Max Maven produced his dvds, Nothing.

what was overlooked by the hundreds of people splashing out on these dvds, is the fact that much of the stuff on them, was inspired by Karolls books.

when i bought these books, they were not expensive.
If you can get them on ebay, there still not that expensive.

Yet id find it hard to part with them.

I have to add a comment here. I don't perform in the style of Karoll Fox, nor do I perform the same effects or to be more accurate I dress them differently so they seem to be entirely different. Yet I agree with this post 100% in my opinion these books are a must for anyone who goes out there and performes on a regular basis. While the stuff is not technically difficult (and really the good stuff is not in the effects themselves but in the routining) I'm not sure this is for the beginner or armchair magician. At first glance it is very easy to flip through and think this is really hokey or filler, but for somebody who has been out there will look at these with a different eye and see the bounty of value these books offer. I had them long before I saw Karoll Fox perform and didn't pay all that much attention to them. Then I saw him as an MC at one of the IBM Conventions and well lets just say the showmanship is second to non. Then we had him at one of our convections and I could sit and talk to him his wisdom and generosity is priceless, as are his books although they are not expensive to purchase.

I'm a right little bookworm, there's nothing I like better than to curl up in a corner and flick through a book. The great thing with books is that there's always a little something extra to get from them. It doens't matter how many times I read a book, I always seem to find something in there that I can use, mostly it's something that I didn't have any use for when I first read it but now I have.

Books generally are very cheap, I always add one or two random little booklets to my order when I buy something online, those booklets only usually cost a couple of pounds but so often I've found a realy little gem in there.

When it comes to the expensive books, I guess their worth is much more of a personal thing. Is what that book is going to add to your act worth the price? For some it'll yes and for some it'll be no.

I spotted a reduced price book on Saturday (no names!) and there was only one effect in there which I didn't already know but that one effect was well worth the price of the whole book. As far as I'm concerned it was a bargain.

The book that got me into magic reading was Derren Brown's Pure Effect, although interestingly enough, I've never read it, or even seen it!

During my initial amazement at what he does, I looked in to it a bit and found he'd written books and the main ideas that caught me were;
The book is rare as fluff, not available to the general public through normal channels, written for proper magicians and is expensive.

The only thing that saved me was my poor bank balance. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to read it but not yet and not at that price. It's just that it appeared as though it was a 'real' magic book and I thought i wouldn't find that anywhere else. Even still, the cover to Mark Wilson's Complete Course looks like a regular 'cheesey' magic book. I never would have expected to find serious material in it. Shouldn't real magic be found in back alley books printed years ago on aged looking pages, barely held together at the seams? More of a manuscript?

I know better now, having been shown by members here, otherwise I probably would've splashed the 100-150 that Pure Effect costs.
It is priced for its rarity, not for its content. Although that content may be worth any amount to the right person, i dont think its worth that much yet to me.


Knowledge is Priceless.

I get just as much value out of children's magic books as I do from advanced texts. Actually beginner's magic books are the best value. I am completely self taught in magic and I never met a magician for two years after I started. I learned from books.

I thank God that I never met a magician for a long while otherwise I would have picked up their bad habits and been just as bad as everyone else.

Books are the way, the truth and the light where magic is concerned. And in general the old books are better than the new books. Cheaper too.

mark lewis wrote:
Cheaper too.

and I thought you detested anything Yorkshire

Also I forgot to mention you can pick up magic books from ordinary bookshop which you should never just disregard there can be some real beauties in them I have created many a routine from a principle in such book's, saying that in Zavvi they had a deal when I walked in ther 2 items for a tenner so I got the missuss an 3 disk Elvis compilation with a value of £7.99 so that pleased her and I picked up Mind magic by Marc Lemezma with a value of £9.99 and got them both for a cool ten pound note but I haven't had time to read it yet but I was as pleased as punch aswell. Also Mark Lewis makes a great point about kid's book's I regulaly use a routine I found in a children's book and it is just as powerful as most of the other stuff I do.

I will probably always prefer books over PDFs/ DVDs etc. To start with, I love being able to hold the material in your hands (innuendo anyone?). Books are far more convenient to access than having to log on to a computer or start a DVD- just jump to the right page! I also seem to have this idea that surely all magical texts should be books- old and dusty and crumbling- yes a very romantic ideal I know. Plus, I've always been a bit of a bookworm, so I've always loved reading, and that applies in magic too

I think you get more out of reading a book than watching a dvd. Although some video material is good but, you will enjoy reading a book a lot more and you, like cymru1991, said, you can carry it around with you, read it where you want, and you get more for your money.

So that's my view, I can also read fast. But there is a downside for some magicians, which means they miss out on a lot. Some people are visual learners and can't learn anything from a book.


Now, I'm rambling as your question was which one is worth more... Books hands down.

Books, books, books.....Well I am going to disagree with everyone here and in the process show my self up to be a right lil' philistine in the process.
I dont like books...there I said it

This is in regard to books of a magicial instructional content only of course as I very much enjoy reading books on magic theory, science, and other such stuff.

As far as magic instruction books go they actually bore me rigid as they are generally a list of instructions which I then find hard to follow.
The endless frustration of sitting there with a prop trying to decifer what the author of the effect is getting at with regards to a move almost always makes me get up and storm off whilst spitting out obscenities.
I always return however as I wish to learn the effect described and almost always succeed which is, I admit, very satisfying but watching the trick performed and explained on dvd would save me so much yelling and killing.
Yes dvd's are less economical but I reckon if two people of the same level of skill were given the same trick to learn but one gets it from a book and one from a dvd then the dvd person is going to learn it faster. I see a dvd as like taking a personal lesson with the effects creator.

Duck and cover

I think you actually make quite a good point, Greedo. Books can be quite hard to understand at times, trying to figure out exactly how that complicated move really works isn't always easy.

Perhaps that's where DVDs come in really, they'll point you down the basic path and make it easier to understand how that move works. But once you've got that basic understanding, books are so much clearer and it doens't take all that long to get the jist of the trick because you've already got that basic understanding.

I often hear of people having trouble with Royal Road to start with, I never had any trouble with it when I started out. But I think that's because I started with Mark Wilson first, a book that's very easy to follow and has clear pictures all the way through. This gave me the basic idea, which made Roayl Road far easier to understand. Perhaps DVDs can do the same thing.