The Sporting Life: How to Help Yourself with Hoodoo from the Streets to the Sheets

by Charles Porterfield, Catherine Yronwode (Editor), Charles Dawson (Illustrator)

Enter into the sporting life, the world of prostitutes, pimps, madams, gamblers, bootleggers, and drag queens. From the ritzy clubs, hidden speakeasies, luxurious brothels, and down-on-their-luck dives of old to the seedy massage parlours and back alleys of today, the sporting life has always intersected with the culture of African-American hoodoo, conjure, and rootwork. Now Professor Porterfield takes you into the clandestine milieu of underworld beliefs and secret practices, and shows the impact that the sporting life has on the world of magic and spirituality. With more than 150 practical spells, charms, recipes, and authentic old-style tricks, The Sporting Life pulls back the velvet curtain that has for too long concealed the life, times, and history of the demimonde.
Presenting the magic of the prostitutes of the Bible, the working girls of Storyville and Memphis, the high-stakes bettors, the magnetic madams, the persuasive pimps, the cagey corner dope dealers, and members of oppressed lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer, and transgender communities of colour — The Sporting Life is sure to startle your senses and thrill your heart. This exhaustively researched book blows open the hidden world of love, lust, vice, and danger that is the sporting life.

Professor Charles Porterfield is an Old Testament, old-school reader and rootworker. His previous books include Hoodoo Bible Magic and A Deck of Spells. He is a natural man who specializes in men's issues and the Biblical and historical aspects of hoodoo and conjure. Texas born and raised, he lives with his wife, children, grandchildren, and two cats.

CONTENTS

Dedication 4
Acknowledgement 4
Preface 5
Hoodoo, Conjure, and Rootwork 7
What is the Sporting Life? 8
Slinging Slang 9
Working Girls and Hustling Women
Fancy Ladies, Call Girls, and Hookers 14
Madams and Aunties 18
Spells for Prostitutes and Escorts 20
Flesh Peddlers and Gentlemen of Leisure
Pimps, Loverboys, and Sugar Daddies 26
Bringing Them In and Turning Them Out 30
Spells for Procurers and Panderers 32
Sissy Men and Bull Dagger Women
Boy-Girls, Queers, and Drag Queens 38
You Sure Gotta Prove It On Me 42
Spells for Gay Men and Lesbian Women 44
Gamblers, Runners, and Players
Policy and the Numbers 50
Beating the Odds 54
Spells for Games of Chance and Skill 56
Bootleggers, Traffickers, and Pushers
To Live Outside the Law You Must Be Honest 62
Keeping The Man Away 66
Spells for Breaking the Rules While Staying Safe 68
Dives, Houses, and Holes
Brothels and Cathouses 74
The Juke Joint 79
Spells for Drawing Trade to an Illegal Business 81
Dressing for the Demimonde
Nice Shoes and the Walking Blues 86
Hide My Eyes 89
Spells for Looking Good and Staying Sharp 92
Bibliography 96

Genres: Occult

96 pages, Paperback

Published May 13, 2016

About the author

A 'Redback', Professor Porterfield is a native Texan. Raised by his grandparents in the small town of Boyd, he grew up among the cottonwoods and Indian paintbrushes of North Texas. At an early age his grandparents decided that it was best for him to learn and experience the ways of their neighbours and friends, and so he was brought up in both the white Southern Baptist church and the black Pentecostal church. Leaving home at 15 in the back of a pickup truck, he set out on his own. He has worked as a cook, a day labourer, a printer’s devil, a Montessori teacher, and, of course, a spiritual worker. He has been blessed to be both a father and a grandfather. Originally a member of the Hasidic branch of Orthodox Judaism, he is an observant Jew and student of the Torah, Talmud, and Zohar.

Reviews

[Onyx · Rating 5 out of 5]

Warning: This book is not for the timid.
This is about magic and the underworld, otherwise known as the "sporting life." It's a life I was vaguely aware of when I was growing up, but was basically kept ignorant of for fear of me making the "wrong" choices in life paths. After all, my dad was a professional musician once.
It's a very good book...it's bursting full of nice descriptive background for just ninety-six pages.
I suppose this magical assistance to making it in a life that mainstream society rejects...yet is still fascinated with...could also be useful to those who live as artists and bohemians....the "artistic life." There seems to be a number of crossovers between these two lifestyles, since both sets of people tend to be viewed as undesirables. So I can see artists using this book just as much as those who are inclined to sport.
Even politically speaking, I can see at least some of this being useful in the present Black Lives Matter protests...which is what's happening at the time of this commentary...since it also tends to fall under the realm of the unacceptable. What this book offers in terms of spells and choices of curios could be made flexible enough, that those who find themselves on the short end of the stick as dispossessed outcasts can bring even more of a sense of liberation, freedom, and empowerment to their political and social causes. I can see multiple possibilities for this book. It's probably not what the author originally intended, but sometimes "desperate times require desperate measures."
In true hoodoo style, there's a lot of heavy leaning on the Bible as a kind of grimoire. The Black Southern form of Christianity is the backbone...indeed, the skeleton...of this magical system. The author makes a point then that this form of magic is a lot like cooking...only African-American Southern style...you really don't want to mess with the basics if you want the Southern cooking. So *my* suggestion, if you would like to do magic like this, is to familiarize yourself with its rules first so you'll know the right ones to break.

[Steve Cran · Rating 5 out of 5]

The sporting life is not about football ,soccer or even other athletics rather it refers to an alternate way of life. This way of life includes prostitution, gigolos, pimps, gambling houses, alcohol running and lgbtq life style.

In this book you will find several spells that can help you in this way of life. Well heck most of us gamble at one period of time or another so we could probably use this magic the most.

I do not think that many who read this review will engage in much of the others stuff like being or going into prostitution . This stuff at the times as on the wrong side of the law but it was not dishonest . You had to be honest with your client and you had to keep the law away.

For a seduction sugar bath take a handful of dried juniper berrie, sugar, chopped ginger boil and strain then take a bath with it.

Good luck aftershave you soak three pieces of frankincense, some high John the conquerors root chip., some nutmeg, Sampson snake root and some five finger grass. Load that up into Jockey club perfume.

Those are just a few of the spells this short nifty book has. Loaded not only with spells but also a history of hoodoo, of gambling and prostitution here in America. Highly recommended .

[Justin Sanders · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has a lot of historical value and brought me into understanding that I never would have considered. I find it quite amazing that I found out the definition of gorilla pimp meaning from here. A lot of cool insights related to history of bootlegging and conjure hands, rites, and tools that help in various aspects related to business whether its on the legal side or even on the shady side.

I know for sure I will be revisiting this one. Great tools for a hustler for sure!