Another great booklet from Annemann. It describes in detail his one man routine. Annemann wove together some of the greatest mental tricks. He discusses the question Magic vs. Mindreading and shares other invaluable advice with the reader. If you do mental magic you already know that anything from Annemann is a must read. If you just start with mental magic, read as much from Annemann as you can get your hands on.
No one who knows about the work of Joseph Dunninger and the size of the fees he receives for his performances is likely to doubt that the public is interested in "mental phenomena." For Mr. Dunninger, though a remarkable showman in any field of magic, is doubtless best known for his mind-reading feats. One of his warmest admirers was the late Theo Annemann, who undertook, in his Complete One-Man Mental and Psychic Routine, to explain a "mental act" which, though it will scarcely make a Dunninger out of the reader, should enable him, after adequate practice, to present a mystifying half-hour of "one-man" mental magic.
Mr. Annemann's "routine" includes the following items:
- Magic vs. Mindreading. An effective "card-spelling" trick, in which a thought-of card is revealed by the performer, and the feat immediately repeated with a second pack.
- The Telephone Drama. The performer "thought reads" a name and telephone number which a spectator has written down.
- The Dead Name Test. Another spectator writes the name of a deceased person on a slip of paper, which he holds. The performer now discovers the name.
- The New Nile Divination. Five or six persons write one figure each on a slip of paper. The total of these figures is found to equal a number previously written on a slate by the performer.
- Book Mentalism. A telephone-book test.
- Telepathy Plus. The performer reproduces on a slate (a) a series of figures, (b) a name, line of poetry, or question, and (c) a picture, which have been written on slips of paper by three spectators.
The methods used for obtaining these effects are well explained. The author gives special attention to teaching "billet switching," a process that enables the performer secretly to exchange one folded slip of paper (technically, a "billet") for another. The successful presentation of the above routine is based largely upon the mastery of this sleight, though it also depends upon the carefully conceived "moves" that have been devised by the author.
In addition to this complete mental act, Mr. Annemann includes in this pamphlet a revised form of The Master Mind, a twenty-minute "close-up" routine with cards and slips of paper which he contributed to The Sphinx in 1925. Other items of interest and importance are The Mirror Reflector, A Living and Dead Combination, The Sealed Envelope Dodge, The Spirit Pencil, Advance Information, and Pencil Reading. All in all, this little book of 24 pages (bound in soft boards) should be of great assistance to all magicians who aspire to entertain their audiences with one-man mental feats.
