Rule 15: Focus on Uniqueness
In 1911 Nevil Maskelyne and David Devant, two of the premier magicians of the day, published Our Magic. In the first section, The Art in Magic, Maskelyne outlines 20 rules for magic performance. After well over 100 years, are these rules still relevant, and do they apply to more than magic?
Rule 15: When presenting an effect of pure transition, the first and most important essential is the avoidance of every possible cause of distraction.
Unusually for this blog series, I’m going to go into some (relative) depth with magic theory, specifically categories of magic.
Many magicians, though not all, believe that types of effect can be categorised. The categories I most often hear quoted are:
Production: The magician makes an item appear from nowhere.
Vanish: The magician vanishes an object.
Restoration: The magician returns an object to its original state.
Transposition: The magician swaps the position of two objects.
Teleportation: The magician instantly moves an object from one place to another.
Levitation: The magician makes an object defy gravity.
Penetration: The magician moves one solid object through another solid object.
Transformation: The magician turns one object into another.
It should be noted that this is by no means an exhaustive list - for a start it ignores the type of magic called ‘mentalism’. Other lists do exist. For example, magician Dariel Fitzkee lists 19 different categories in his book The Trick Brain. Also, not all magicians fully subscribe to the idea that magic effects can be categorised in this way, arguing that some effects might display features from multiple categories, while others disagree on what is or isnt’t an effect. However, to fully understand this rule, it’s important to understand that Maskelyne chose to specifically highlight the transformation of an object. Why?
This is one of the few times where the age of this book shows. Our Magic was written at a time when transformation effects were a scarcity. “Indeed, owing to the mere fact of their comparative rarity, they appeal strongly to an artist's appreciation.” This was a rare effect. The audience needed a chance to appreciate exactly what was happening, and so it was imperative there were no distractions. This is a recall of Rule 4, a fact which the book acknowledges, they felt it was so important because of the relative rarity of the effect.
So if two of the leading magicians of the day felt a rule was worth emphasising specifically when presenting the audience with something they might not be at all familiar with or expect, let’s underline it again ourselves. Whilst distraction is rarely helpful within a presentation or talk, an alien concept is going to demand absolute concentration from your audience. Ensure that they’re not still thinking about the last thing you said when you introduce it to them, or that you’re not talking straight off the back of something. All eyes should be fixed on this one point at this one moment.
If you haven’t already, I would recommend taking a look at my LinkedIn article on this rule, which looks at what happens when too many people rely on the same trick.
TFT
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