Harry Houdini's Paper Magic: The Whole Art of Paper Tricks, Including Folding, Tearing and Puzzles

by Harry Houdini

Aspiring illusionists can learn from one of the world's greatest magicians with this facsimile of a 1922 book by Harry Houdini. The master sleight-of-hand artist explains how to use the simplest of props ― sheets of paper ― to completely captivate audiences. Houdini's easy-to-follow directions, many of them accompanied by illustrations, are accessible to readers of all ages and skill levels.
The manual consists of four paper tricks, paper folding, paper tearing, and paper puzzles. The first section reveals the secrets behind such magic tricks as "The Dancing Sailor" and "The Spirit Communication." Subsequent sections offer guides to folding a bird, a bullfrog, a hat, and other traditional origami models and to carefully tearing paper to produce a ladder, a five-pointed star, a string of dancing skeletons, and other intricate figures. The final part presents several challenging paper puzzles based on geometric forms.

Genres: Magic

224 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2001

About the author

Harry Houdini, whose birth name in Hungary was Erik Weisz (which was changed to Ehrich Weiss when he immigrated to the United States), was a Jewish Hungarian American magician, escapologist (widely regarded as one of the greatest ever) and stunt performer, as well as a skeptic and investigator of spiritualists, film producer and actor. Harry Houdini forever changed the world of magic and escapes.

Reviews

[Barry · Rating 4 out of 5]

If written today, most, if not all, of the book would never get published. As it is, it stands as a snapshot into time 100 years ago. The part of the book that would get published today, the magic tricks, is pretty neat to read, though I found it hard to imagine how things would work. Perhaps that speaks more to my own mental limitations than anything else. The writing itself is clear and straightforward, so the instructions seem well-written.

The historical part, the part that wouldn't get published today, contains then-unknown origami and tangrams. To us today, it seems almost shocking that the folding of a paper crane is considered 'magic', but if you had never seen such things before it would have been magical. For the introduction of origami and tangrams, Mr. Houdini is to be applauded. I don't know the history of origami in the West to know if he was instrumental in making origami known to a wider audience, but he did well to introduce the readers of his book to the wonders of paper folding.

While not earthshaking today, Paper Magic is an interesting window into the past and a neat read.