We’re back with our first special episode for a while. After our recent look into Victorian Spiritualism, Sean F Smith contacted us, offering to discuss the topic from the perspective of stage magic.
Sean is a magician and mentalist by profession, with a special interest in séances and mediums. We discussed the history of Victorian magic and how it relates to fraudulent mediums. There are also a few diversions into the psychology of trickery, techniques to encourage creativity, and the secret of how to hammer a nail into your face.
You can find Sean’s work on DriveThruRPG, and you can check out his websites below.
Links
Things we mention in this episode include:
- Victorian Spiritualism
- Mentalism
- Hiding the Elephant by Jim Steinmeyer
- Harry Houdini
- The Prestige by Christopher Priest
- The Prestige (2006)
- Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin
- Nevil Maskelyne
- Penny Dreadful: City of Angels
- James Randi
- Derren Brown
- The Davenport Brothers
- Davenport’s magic shop
- Spirit cabinet
- The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens
- Domain-specific learning
- Practical Mental Effects by Theodore Annemann
- Spirit slates
- Dedi
- Penn & Teller
- Ectoplasm
- Proportionality bias
- Sideshow/geek magic
- Blockhead trick
- Jim Rose Circus Sideshow
- Phossy jaw
- Cold reading
- Hot reading
- Barnum statements
- The Fox Sisters
- Surrealism
- Automatic writing
- Pareidolia
- Edward de Bono
- Lateral thinking
- PO: Beyond Yes and No by Edward de Bono
- Six Thinking Hats by Edward de Bono
- Nightmare Alley by William Lindsay Gresham
- Nightmare Alley (2021)
- Arthur Conan Doyle
- The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
- Cottingley Fairies
- Shell game
- Find the lady
- Birds aren’t real
- Chung Ling Soo
- Bullet catch
- The Expert at the Card Table
- The Indian Rope Trick
- The Good Friends of Jackson Elias Discord server
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