I have been reading Scarne's and Fulves books recently and I tend to discount those tricks which involve putting the deck behind the back of under the table. It just seems kind of hokey to me to do this. Anyone else feel the same or am I just being too critical.

Don

Definitely not just you. I usually think badly of most tricks that involve the deck going blatently out of sight.

No, it's not just you!

I posted about this very same thing some time ago.

As soon as I read "put the deck behind your back..." I read no more and move on to the next. It has to be the worst instruction in magic!!

I tend to agree, although I do like 'Stop at an Ace' from Fulves' Self-Working Close-Up Card Magic (pp.29-31). The spectator chooses four cards, they prove to be the four aces (or whatever).

Just tell them to close their eyes!

I don't like this either. When the deck is out of sight the audience becomes immediately suspicious ; although they don't know exactly what's happening, they are sure that this is the moment when You're doing something 'tricky'...and your routine looses effectiveness.

Scarne and Fulves take a lot of tricks that can be done with sleight of hand and make them self working. Usually you can do the trick without putting it behind your back or under the table if you use sleight of hand or some other method at that point.

The books are, basically, designed for those that don't wan't to devote the time to learning complicated sleights or are just beginning. There is no LAW that says you can't use the patter and the plots in those books and use sleight of hand to make them stronger.

If you just breeze by those tricks you may be missing out. If you read the line "put the deck behind your back" and decide that there is nothing at all worth looking at, you may be passing up something very strong. I suppose that if you simply stop reading when you come across an instruction such as "put the deck behind your back" you wouldn't be willing to put in the work to improve the trick through other methods anyway. So, yeah, maybe it is best to just turn the page.

But you may want to take a few seconds to read and find out what is being done at that moment and see if you can do it another way.

There's also Dai Vernon's 'The Bent Corner Prediction' from Inner Secrets of Card Magic. I've used it a few times. A card whose name the magician has written down in advance is found to be at a number freely chosen by a spectator.

I agree.

When my eyes read "Place the deck behind your back", my brain receives "Turn the page".

I recently saw Martin Nash have a selected card returned to the deck, he put the deck behind his back for perhaps a second, maybe less, he instantly pulled the selected card from the deck.

It nailed quite a few in the audience (all magicians). It nailed them enough that he sold quite a few copies of the notes based on that trick alone.

I think the reason his trick worked was:

1. The motivation for having the deck behind his back didn't appear to be hiding
it from the audience, it was to make the feat more impressive, (i.e. HE couldn't see the deck).

2. The action of putting the deck behind his back and then emerging with the card in the other hand was instantaneous, there didn't seem to be time for any messing about. It was one swift action.

In short, putting the deck behind your back won't in itself turn an audience off. Making the audience feel you "NEED" to put the deck behind your back is the problem.

-Richard

Perhaps some magic clubs have done this, but I'd love to see a competition where entrants are randomly assigned tricks from some of Karl Fulves books, and they have a month to prepare their assigned trick and present it.

I'm guessing you'd see a lot of people revisiting Mr Fulves Books after a night of magic like that.

-Richard

On 2006-06-24 06:22, NeoMagic wrote:
I tend to agree, although I do like 'Stop at an Ace' from Fulves' Self-Working Close-Up Card Magic (pp.29-31). The spectator chooses four cards, they prove to be the four aces (or whatever).

This got me to pull out the book to see the effect, but I couldn't find it anywhere. Must have been in his second book. If I'm wrong, NeoMagic, could you check on the title of the effect, because there isn't one by that name in my copy.

Thanks!
-Phil in KC

Here's something I learned from the little cube vision trick everyone got as a kid.

If you can do the "behind the back" work quickly, try it this way:

Turn your back but leave the cards in view and ask them to place the card on top, at the cut, whatever. Or just turn your back and take the card behind you so there's not chance of you peeking. In other words, the deck is behind your back, but in plain view.

Then, as you turn to face them again, the deck remains behind your back for that second you need to do the "dirty work" and then you bring the deck into view again.

Mentally, all they'll remember is you turned your back, they returned the card, you turned around, and then "something magical" happened. That instant while you face forward and the deck hasn't yet completed it's journey will most likely be forgotten.

That's a great insight, Dave. Thanks!

--d.

Thanks for the great tip Dave. It's wonderful to get advice from those with a lot of experience.

What's the exact title of the book you are looking in?

Hi, NeoMagic! Thanks for pointing that out. Mine is the "Self-Working Card Tricks", not the "Self-Working Close-up Card Magic". Sometimes I'm not too swift!

-Phil in KC

Vandy's idea of changing method ( use sleights instead of keeping the deck out of sight ) is no doubt good. The problem is that, sometimes, it can be difficult, if not impossible...e.g. in a trick like "Scarne's knock-out card trick" ( SOCT, pag. 224 ), how could You separate a lot of cards, one by one, making two piles, if not hiding the deck ?
( It's just an example, one of few tricks I know that is based on that 'stratagem' )

Yea I don't like those either, also the add cards on top that matches your card.I feel if you direct them to much its not magic.

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