The multitalented Ricky Jay (sleight-of-hand artist, author, actor, film consultant, and scholar of the unusual) wrote and published a unique and beautifully designed quarterly called Jay's Journal of Anomalies. Already a coveted collector's item, the complete set is gathered here for the first time. A brilliant excursion into the history of bizarre entertainments, the journal covered such subjects as dogs stealing acts from other dogs, an anthropological hoax involving the only survivors of a caste of ancient Aztec priests, and the ultimate diet: ingesting only air.
The journal was described in The New York Times as "beautiful and elegant...a combination of rigorous scholarship and personal rumination."
In a delectably deadpan and winning style, Jay conveys his admiration and affection for the offbeat that characterized his bestselling Learned Pigs and Fireproof Women. He explains how wags since the sixteenth century have cheated at bowling; he explores the ancient relationship between conjuring and dentistry; and he chronicles the exploits of ceiling walkers and human flies. Crammed full of illustrations drawn from the author's massive personal archive, Jay's Journal of Anomalies will baffle, instruct, and, above all, delight.
Probably the greatest living practitioner in our field, Ricky Jay is the epitome of what those in our art should strive for. Nothing compromises his mysteries and he refuses to pander to the fraternity by releasing his secrets. Instead he gives us sorely needed texts on historical matters and fascinating individuals, as well as his public performances which represent the high water mark of magic performance.His books include Cards as Weapons, Learned Pigs and Fireproof Women, Jay’s Journal of Anomalies, Extraordinary Exhibitions, Dice: Deception, Fate, and Rotten Luck, Many Mysteries Unravelled, The Magic Magic Book, and Celebrations of Curious Characters. Many of his books should be readily available while others will be, perhaps purposefully, quite difficult to find. Additionally, he has compiled a number of songs related to poker in Ricky Jay Plays Poker, an excellent purchase, as it includes a custom deck of cards as well as a DVD with many excellent demonstrations.In the theater, Mr. Jay has starred in the shows Ricky Jay and His 52 Assistants, On the Stem, and A Rogue’s Gallery. All of these are excellent, and you should make every effort to see them should the opportunity present itself. The 52 Assistants show was broadcast on HBO at one point, so you may be able to view a recording of the show.Anything by or about Mr. Jay is heartily recommended. For a wonderful reading experience, visit his website and try to locate the article on him for the New Yorker. Fascinating material and you can do no better than to read the descriptions of how lay people describe his effects. This is how you want your magic described after you have left.
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Extraordinary Exhibitions |
For Jay's subjects are so stupefyingly surprising. They almost all have to do with some sort of performance, and the stranger the better. There is a chapter on, of all things, crucifixion for showmanly profit. Tommy Minnock, at the beginning of the twentieth century, gained wildly enthusiastic response from his audiences as, nailed to a cross on the stage in a supposed hypnotic trance, he crooned, "After The Ball Is Over," one of the most popular tunes of the time. "I am told by those who saw me," he wrote "nailed to the cross that I presented a weird but impressive spectacle." Evatima Tardo around the same time was regularly nailed to a cross, suspended there for over two hours. She seldom had volunteers from the crowd who would come up to run the nails through her limbs, so her assistants had to do so. The nails were dipped in poison beforehand; she was quoted as saying, "There wouldn't be any fun unless I had prussic acid on the ends." She laughed and sang, and declared that she had never had such a pleasant time: "This is so easy, I am going to do it all over again tomorrow night, and three nights next week." Jay writes that, "while no one would claim that Minnock and Tardo inspired a trend of copycat crucifixions," there were successors, including Faith Bacon, who hung nude from a cross and gyrated to Ravel's Bolero. Some fakirs participated in crucifixions in the spirit of competition, outdoing each other by staying aloft for days at a time. You will find here surprising chapters on such thing as the magical amputation of the nose. You will learn of the surprising, longstanding connection between legerdemain and dentistry. There are trained dogs and pigs, and a description of how flea circuses worked. There are those who made their fortunes by making faces; the means by which performers were able to dance upon the ceiling (including "The Great Philosophical Antipodean Pedestrian from Ohio"); the rascally ways in which hustlers would gain the trust and the pocketbooks of novices in ninepins; the adventures of professional fasters; and much more. The careful, quietly amused way in which Jay tells these odd histories is perfect for his subject matter, and shows a matchless enthusiasm for his themes. "I really do love this stuff," he tells us at the end, and there is easily sufficient evidence here to show that in that there is no deception.