THE METHOD OF MODERN MAGIC
I
"Autobiography," said Longfellow—altho the remark does not seem especially characteristic of this gentle poet—"is what biography ought to be." And in the long list of alluring autobiographies, from Cellini's and Cibber's, from Franklin's and Goldoni's, there are few more fascinating than the 'Confidences of a Prestidigitator' of Robert-Houdin. A hostile critic of Robert-Houdin's career has recorded the fact—if it is a fact—that Robert-Houdin once confided to a fellow magician that his autobiography had been written for him by a clever Parisian journalist; and it must be admitted that not a few amusing French autobiographies have not been the children of their putative parents—for instance, the memoirs of Vidocq, the detective. Yet this is not as damaging an admission as it may seem at first sight since the clever Parisian journalist may have been little more than the amanuensis of the prestidigitator, hired only to give literary form to the actual recollections of his employer. Such a proceeding would not deprive Robert-Houdin's autobiography by its authenticity. It remains a classic, beloved by all who joy in the delights of conjuring. Unfortunately the hostile critic has gone further in his attack upon Robert-Houdin's reputation, and he has succeeded in showing that the renowned French conjurer claimed as his own invention not a few illusions which had been already exhibited by his predecessors in the art of deception.
Yet this unjustified boasting does not invalidate Robert-Houdin's title to be considered the father of modern magic. Even if he was treading in the path of those who had gone before, he attained at last to a consistent theory of the art, far in advance of that held by earlier magicians. Many of his marvels, and perhaps more than one of the most striking of them, may have been but improvements upon effects originally contrived by others; yet every succeeding generation can rise only by standing upon the shoulders of the generations that went before, and it is justified in availing itself of all that these earlier generations may have discovered and invented. Robert-Houdin tells us himself that he was greatly indebted to the Comte de Grisy, whose stage-name was Torrini. In fact, Robert-Houdin might be called a pupil of Torrini, as Mr. John S. Sargent is a pupil of Carolus Duran. It was upon Torrini's dignified simplicity as a magician that Robert-Houdin modelled his own unpretending presentation of his feats of magic. Apparently it was a famous conjurer named Frikell, who first discarded the cumbersome and glittering array of apparatus which used to be displayed on the stage to dazzle the eyes of the spectators; but this discarding of obtrusive paraphernalia was not deliberate, being due only to the accidental destruction of Frikell's stage-furniture by fire, whereby the performer was suddenly forced to rely upon the less complicated experiments, which could be exhibited without extraneous aid. The abandoning of overt apparatus, which Frikell was forced into by misfortune, Robert-Houdin adopted as an abiding principle. He kept his stage as unencumbered as possible, altho, of course, he brought forward from time to time the special objects necessary for the illusions he was about to exhibit.
Not only did he perform on a stage which was intended to resemble a drawing-room, he also eschewed any other costume than that appropriate to a drawing-room. Earlier performers had not hesitated to deck themselves in Oriental apparel or in the flowing garb of a medieval magician. Robert-Houdin was always modern and never medieval; and he adopted this attitude deliberately. He was the first to formulate the fundamental principle of the modern art of magic—that a conjurer should be "an actor playing the part of a magician." One of the foremost exponents of modern magic, Mr. Maskelyne, notes that many conjurers strive only to play the part of some other conjurer; and it might be added that there are not a few who fail entirely to see the necessity for playing a part and who content themselves with a purposeless display of their misplaced dexterity. But the masters of the art are men like Robert Heller and Buatier da Kolta, who were accomplished comedians, each in his own fashion, and who presented a succession of little plays—for a truly good experiment in magic is really a diminutive drama.
It may be brief and simple—a play in one act; or it may be prolonged and complicated—a play in three or five acts. But like any other play it ought to possess a central idea and to have a definite plot. It should tend straight toward its single conclusion, which must be the logical development of all that has gone before; that is to say, it must possess what the critics of the drama term Unity of Action. It should have a beginning, a middle, and an end, in accord with Aristotle's requirement for a tragedy. It must work up to its culmination with a steadily increasing intensity of interest. It must contain nothing not directly contributory to the startling climax which is its surprising and satisfying conclusion. It must not digress or dally in by-paths, however entertaining these may be in themselves, but push onward to its inevitable finish. It is only by conceiving of every one of his successive experiments as a play, complete in itself and governed by the inexorable laws of the drama, that the magician can rise to the summit of his art. He is a conjurer and a comedian at the same time, making his dexterity the servant of his drama, and never for a single moment allowing this dexterity to force itself upon the attention of the audience. Indeed, the one thing he ought to conceal is his possession of any special gift in manipulation. He should keep his audience ever guessing as to the method of his apparent miracles.
II
It is because Robert-Houdin was seemingly the first conjurer to adopt these principles as his irrefragable code of procedure that he is to be accepted as the father of modern magic. He never allowed himself to parade his skill in manipulating coins and cards at the risk of distracting the attention of the spectators from the central and culminating effect around which he had constructed his plot. No doubt, he possessed dexterity in abundance, but it was subordinate to his dramatic intent. No doubt, again, some of the devices he used had sometimes been employed by a long succession of his predecessors in conjuring. As a matter of course he availed himself of all sorts of mere tricks, of ingenious sleights, and of artful apparatus that the conjurers who went before him had devised for their own use long before he was born. An experiment in magic—to use the term that Mr. Maskelyne prefers, is not a mere trick—or at least it ought not to be. It is not the exhibition of a device or of a sleight or of an adroit mechanical apparatus. Rather is it a coherent whole, direct in its development, no matter how many subtleties of concealment and deception it may employ in the course of its accomplishment.