1890 Rare Victorian Book - More Magic by Professor Hoffmann, illustrated
An attractive late nineteenth-century edition of Professor Hoffmann’s classic manual of conjuring, extensively illustrated with 140 figures and preserved in its striking original pictorial cloth binding.
Author: Professor Hoffmann [Angelo John Lewis].
Title: More Magic.
Publisher: New York, George Routledge & Sons, Limited, 119 & 121 West 23rd Street, [circa 1890].
Edition: Early American edition, undated.
Language: Text in English.
Pages: xi-457 pages.
Size: 8" x 6".
Binding: Attractive and very good original publisher’s pictorial blue cloth binding, elaborately decorated and lettered in black and gilt to the front board and spine. Binding firm, with light sunning and discoloration to the spine and outer portions of the boards, minor rubbing and wear to extremities, as shown. Protected in a removable mylar cover.
Content: Very good content, tight and generally clean, with occasional light foxing, chiefly to the preliminary leaves, as shown. Previous owner’s name in ink on the front free endpaper.
Illustrations: Profusely illustrated throughout with 140 black-and-white illustrations, diagrams and figures explaining sleight-of-hand techniques, apparatus and stage illusions.
Estimate: $250–300 USD.
The book:
More Magic is Professor Hoffmann’s substantial continuation of his influential writings on conjuring, presenting an extraordinarily detailed survey of card and coin manipulation, sleight of hand, mechanical apparatus, tricks with watches, rings, handkerchiefs, balls and hats, feats of divination and elaborate stage illusions. The numerous diagrams reveal not merely the outward effect of each trick but the ingenious mechanisms and techniques concealed behind the performance.
First published in the closing years of the Victorian fascination with professional and parlour magic, the work remains an important document in the history of conjuring. This handsome New York Routledge issue is especially appealing for its wonderfully evocative pictorial binding, incorporating cards, coins, dice, a magician’s hat and other emblems of the conjurer’s art.
The author:
Professor Hoffmann was the professional name of Angelo John Lewis (1839–1919), an English lawyer and writer who became one of the most influential authors on magic and conjuring of the nineteenth century. Although not primarily a professional stage magician, his exceptionally clear descriptions of techniques and apparatus helped codify the practice of modern conjuring for generations of performers.
His books, particularly Modern Magic, More Magic and Later Magic, became foundational reference works for both amateur and professional magicians and are now sought after as important early works in the literature and history of stage magic.