![]() ![]() Most of these works, while perhaps not terribly difficult to obtain, are not available in current editions, and so the book serves double duty, not only providing a convenient single-volume compendium, but also rendering the entire Robert-Houdin oeuvre readily available to contemporary students who may have not yet had the chance to read some of these landmark texts. Todd Karr now provides us with The Essential Robert-Houdin as a potent single-volume gathering of the master's literary output. ![]() Of course, both men are far more complex creatures than the fables would have it, and we have a wealth of information available to help as discover the truth behind the tales in the case of Robert-Houdin, much of that information has been penned by the great French conjuror himself. Just as every schoolboy was once raised to know that George Washington was the father of our country, chopped down a cherry tree, and could not tell a lie about it, it seems that every magician knows that Jean Eugene Robert-Houdin was the father of modern conjuring, freshly costumed the stage magician in common evening wear, and put down the Marabout rebellion with his trick of the "Light and Heavy Chest." Although Robert-Houdin was not the first stage magician to cast off traditional wizard's garb, our general sense of the man seems a bit more accurate than our Washingtonian dogma. Reviewed by Jamy Ian Swiss (originally published in Genii January, 2007) ![]()
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