All 10 Back Issues of Gibecière:  $299!

For a limited time, Conjuring Arts is offering a complete collection of back issues of our flagship journal, Gibecière, for the low package Member price of $299, US postage paid.

That means nearly 1,900 beautifully bound pages of engaging, groundbreaking, and intelligent writing on and images of magic history discussed by renowned contributors such as Ricky Jay, Juan Tamariz, Volker Huber, Vanni Bossi and many others.  Edited by Stephen Minch, Gibecière is the only journal of its kind in the world.  Bought individually, without Membership, this set costs $434.50 + shipping.  But we’re giving everyone a discount on this bundle of 10 issues!

Members who live in the US: All 10 back issues: $299 and we pay the postage!  (Save $165.50!)
Members outside of the US: All 10 back issues: $369 shipping Priority Mail  (Save $195.50!)

Non-Members in the US: All 10 back issues: $329 and we pay the postage!  (Save 135.50!)
Non-Members outside of the US: All 10 back issues: $399 shipping Priority Mail  (Save $165.50)

Best Deal:
Buy/Renew a Charlier Membership ($95 Domestic/$122 International) and the 10 Back Issue Bundle and get our most special deal:

• Charlier Membership + Membership Price Bundle of 10 Gibecieres:  $389  (Outside of the US:  $489)

This Deal is 1 Year of Charlier Level Ask Alexander Access, 10 Back Issue Gibecieres + the 2 issues forthcoming = 12 issues in all!

The number of sets is limited, so get yours today.  Gibecière also makes the perfect holiday gift for that insatiably curious friend or family member.

• Already a Member?  Buy your Bundle at our Shop or give us a call at 212-594-1033.

• Would you like to join and get the Bundle deal?  Just go to our Memberships Page!

Below is a sample of what you can find in our back issues.  Find all the summaries of each of the 10 issues on our Gibeciere page at conjuringarts.org.

• Volker Huber on the history of the Himber Wallet
• Vanni Bossi chronicling Mnemonic Decks
• Robert Jutte on card mechanics of the Middle Ages
• Ricky Jay on the Davenport Brothers & Fay

• A study of Récréations Mathématique by Albrecht Heeffer
• Mike Caveney on Del Adelphia, the Cowboy Magician

• The Educated Swan – Volker Huber
• Part II of An Investigation into Magic in Japan After the Opening of the Country – Mitsunobu Matsuyama
• Notes on Pietro Aretino’s LE CARTE PARLANTI – Aurelio Paviato
• Abraham Bamberg: The Augmentation of a Dynasty – Peter Bräuning

This rare treasure, which is only known in two examples, has been translated into English by Lori Pieper.

More importantly, we have the distinct pleasure of publishing the esteemed late Vanni Bossi’s detailed analysis of this wonderful book.

• Part III of Mitsunobu Matsuyama’s Investigation into Magic in Japan After the Opening of the Country
• William E. Spooner traces the dubious and fascinating history of the ideomechanic pendulum commonly known as The Sex Detector.
• Max Beckmann and His Magic Mirror by Volker Huber

• Vernon the Mesmerist – Peter Lamont
• Lessons Written with a Small Gimmick – Loren Pankratz

I recently had a spirited conversation with a group of magic collectors over the pros and cons of our very own database: Alexander – The Computer That Knows. Some suggested that any publisher who allowed his books to be scanned and uploaded onto the data base, was diluting the value of his books. The thinking being, if the information is available on line, why would anyone purchase a hard copy of the book? Others believed that the availability of this wealth of information far outweighed the potential loss of revenue to the publisher. As the owner of a niche publishing house myself (Mike Caveney’s Magic Words) it might surprise some to learn that I came down firmly in favor of the fattest possible Alexander. To my way of thinking, it’s a no brainer.

Fortunately for me, people who collect books on magic have an inherent flaw: they like the way books feel in their hands. Of course they enjoy the information these books contain but they also like the dust jacket, the gold stamping, the printed end sheets, the feel of the paper, and they enjoy seeing the spine of that book as is sits on their bookshelf. All elements that are not provided by a database. The fact that every word of these books is now on line does not change the fact that they enjoy holding that bound volume in their hands.

You might also say that with the advent of the Alexander database, I can take my entire collection of periodicals to the paper mill and have them pulped. Why not, its all on line anyway. Think of the space you’d save.

The truth is that Alexander has made my periodical collection even more valuable to me. There is nothing I enjoy more than finding numerous obscure references to some arcane subject on the Alexander database, then walking downstairs, pulling the original magazines off the shelf and settling into a comfortable chair to peruse magic history in its original form. Alexander has directed me to magazines that I haven’t peeked into for years and for that he has my undying gratitude.

And lastly, the number of people who are willing to join the Conjuring Arts Research Center so they can gain access to our wonderful pool of knowledge is not that large. I imagine they are mainly people actively engaged in the writing of a book or article about a subject that I will most likely enjoy reading. If having my books included in this pool of knowledge assists them in their task, and ultimately results in a more complete article, then we all win. And if that researcher finds him or her self reading a digitized book filled with interesting text, they might just decide to buy a copy. All of a sudden, instead of losing a customer, I just gained a new one.

If there is a down side to the Computer that Knows, I just don’t see it.

DELUXE EDITION features a tipped-in, hand-tinted portrait of Harry Willard along with an extra page with a color photograph of Eugene, Madeline and Frances Willard. Each of them, along with the author David Charvet, has signed this page. The book is housed in a matching slipcase stamped in two colors. Only 150 copies of this hand-numbered, deluxe edition have been produced.

Price: $195 //  Available from Mike Caveney’s Magic Words at www.mcmagicwords.com

“Anyone familiar with TASCHEN books knows they are of the highest quality and some might say as beautiful as the art they showcase. Expensive books they are (a few limited editions sell for upwards of $10,000), MAGIC is no exception and priced at $200. However, for a 650 page master archive of our arts history (1400-1950), is a fair price in my opinion and well worth it. I have already placed my order and can’t wait to divulge its pages.” —- dananddave.com

Available at www.dananddave.com

My wife, Tina Lenert, and I were recently invited to perform at a magic festival in Badalona, Spain, a suburb of Barcelona. It was not a magic convention, but rather a festival geared to the lay community. We did three shows in a beautiful, hundred-year-old theater and the sold-out audiences were great.

Before leaving the States, I was told that this festival was honoring that great magician from the past – Chang. Upon hearing this, I was immediately transported back to age thirteen when I attended my first real magic show: Milt Larsen’s It’s Magic. The closing act was Chang – Latin America’s Greatest Magician.

I thought it a bit odd that a festival in Spain would be honoring a Panamanian illusionsit but that didn’t stop me from pulling a number of posters, programs and photographs out of Egyptian Hall Museum and carrying them with me to Spain. I thought I would surprise them with a nice display.

Every night after the show the entire cast enjoyed a huge dinner that never ended before 1:00 am. On the first night we were joined by Joan Maria Forns, the son of Chang. He was anxious to see what I had so I ran back to the theater to retrieve my treasures. Upon seeing the first photograph Joan said, “That’s not my father.”

Now it was my turn to be surprised.

To make a long story short: there were two Changs. The man that I saw in my youth was Juan José Pablo Jesorum and he was indeed born in Panama on December 2, 1889. Early in his career he used the name Li Ho Chang, later shortening it to simply Chang. He enjoyed a very long career that took him to Australia, China, Africa, India, Europe and America but his greatest success came in Central and South America where he lived and worked most of his life.

When I saw him in 1963 he was well past his prime at the age of 74. Being the first great illusionist I ever saw, my memories of him include gorgeous costumes, beautiful girls, well-trained assistants and huge illusions. Many years later, Milt Larsen told me the real behind-the-scenes story.

Milt had been instructed to meet the Great Chang at the bus station in downtown Los Angeles. There he encountered an old man carrying two battered suit-cases. Milt looked around for the truck carrying Chang’s show.

He soon learned that the suitcases were filled with costumes and a few tricks. That was the show.

Springing into action, as he had so many times before, Milt rallied the forces. Bob Towner, Bob Fenton, Bev Bergeron and George Boston were enlisted as assistants and there were always plenty of pretty girls around the newly opened Magic Castle. Some illusions were trucked in from Dante’s ranch. Having spent his entire career presenting a full-evening show, Chang was in no way intimidated by the props and people that now swirled around him. His vast experience and abilities as a showman would serve him well. To a wide-eyed, thirteen-year-old kid, this master mystifier commanded the stage and did not disappoint.

The father of the man I was dining with in Badalona, Spain was named Joan Forns and he also enjoyed a long career performing a Chinese magic act as Li-Chang. As a young man he had seen Fu Manchu’s spectacular show and by 1933 he had assembled his own show and was performing at Circ Olympia in Barcelona. It would appear that most of his career was spent in a circus ring. Europe has always been home to dozens and dozens of small, one-ring circuses and they often featured a magician. Of course Li-Chang’s act had to be carefully constructed to safely work in the round but once that was accomplished, he found plenty of work on the “sawdust circuit.”

It would also appear that the majority of Li-Chang’s career was spent performing in Spain though he did make limited forays into France (at the Moulin Rouge in 1956), England (Bertram Mills Circus 1964), Italy, Portugal, Germany and North Africa.

In 1947-48 Panama’s Chang was appearing in Barcelona, Spain and it was here that the two Changs finally met.

Juan Pablo Jesorum was still performing at the age of 82 when he died in Yucatan, Mexico in 1972. Joan Forns died at age 81 in Barcelona, Spain on January 12, 1998.

Before leaving Badalona I was given a full-color book published by the Badalona Museum in 2004 on the life of Joan Forns: Li-Chang. The text is written in Catalan (a language spoken in the northeast region of Spain) but it is filled with beautiful graphic images from througout Li-Chang’s long career.

Returning home, I checked the usual sources (David Price, Milbourne Christopher) and found no refrence to Spain’s Li-Chang which led me to suspect that I was not the only one who believed in the one-Chang theory.

Having recently examined a number of photos, programs, letters, Christmas cards, newspaper reviews and posters, I now believe that Panama’s Juan José Pablo Jesorum was always called Li Ho Chang early in his career and Chang later on. Spain’s Joan Forns always used the name Li-Chang.

Egyptian Hall has a number of Li-Chang posters subtitled El Demonio Amarillo (The Yellow Demon). I always assumed that these advertised Panama’s Chang but I now believe that they were printed for Joan Forns in Spain (perhaps Valencia) in 1946.

I would like to thank Enric Magoo for inviting us to Spain where this entire mystery was ultimately solved. And thanks also to Joan Maria Forns, son of Li-Chang, who spent years working as an assistant in his father’s show, for a wonderful evening of stories that brought another small piece of magic history into clearer focus.

During the first couple of decades of the twentieth century “ask Alexander” meant drop a question (along with a dollar bill) into an envelope and send it to 239 South Oxford Avenue in Los Angeles. By return mail your question would be answered by Claude Conlin aka Alexander the Man Who Knows.

These days, to magic historians around the world, “ask Alexander” are the words spoken just before you sit down at your computer and type a name into AskAlexander, the Conjuring Arts Research Center’s massive data base. Claude Conlin pretended to have all the answers but AskAlexander seemingly does have all the answers.

A few months back I needed some answers about Alexander the mentalist and instead of visiting my favorite web site, I turned off my computer and actually visited The Man Who Knows. OK, it was the son of The Man Who Knew but at this late date, that was as close as anyone was going to get to the man.

In 2004 I published David Charvet’s book on Alexander and it proved to be the fastest selling book in our series of Magical Pro-Files. Within eighteen months, it was out of print. During that time, Alexander’s son, John Conlin, moved from Arizona to within a half-an-hour drive from my house. David Charvet and I joined him for dinner one evening and we soon learned that he was indeed a chip off the old block. The stories were unceasing and each one was more incredible than the last.

I believe John Conlin is the only person I’ve ever met who can say he shook hands with Harry Kellar. When John described a photo he had of a Pantages Theater with crowds of people lined up outside and a huge Alexander billboard visible above the entrance, I said we would love to see it. “Sure,” John said, “it’s up in my room.” Later that evening he pulled four huge scrapbooks out of his closet and said, “Here, it’s in one of these.” David and I sat there slack-jawed as we paged through the mother lode of Alexander memorabilia.

Any thoughts I had of merely reprinting the Alexander book vanished in an instant. Anything less than a whole new book would be an insult to this wonderful archive. With the generous help of John and his son, Alexander Patrick Conlin, these scrapbooks traveled to the Magic Words office where dozens of images were scanned. And just when David thought his days of researching the life of Alexander were over, he was back in the thick of it.

Since the publication of the first book, I have come to know Cathy Stevenson, granddaughter of Alexander’s brother, CB Conlin, and the Conlin family historian. Cathy agreed to organize the results of her considerable research into an appendix. Here we learn that CB Conlin starred as Psycho in his own mind-reading act and experienced adventures that rivaled those of his infamous brother.

The new expanded edition of Alexander – The Man Who Knows is now available at Mike Caveney’s Magic Words

The first article marks the beginning of Mitsunobu Matsuyama’s enlightening series of articles, “An Investigation into Magic in Japan after the Opening of the Country”.

Albrecht Heeffer contributes the next article, “Recreations Mathematiques: A Study of Its Authorship, Sources and Influence”. Here Dr. Heefer presents a new candidate for the authorship of the book as well as a detailed look at its place in the literature.

We round out these pieces with a biographical article by Mike Caveney on “Del Adelphia, The Cowboy Magician”, a previously forgotten, yet fascinating character in our history.

These articles cover a broad spectrum of wonderful topics, and it is with pleasure that we offer them to the fraternity.

Back issues of Gibecière are available in our Store.