(Blow Books) | Now you see it ....

(Blow Books)
A group of 24 late 19th- and early 20th-ccentury Blow Books

Generally without title-pages, various places and printers, various formats and conditions.

Grimoire ou le mystérieux livre d'images. France, ?late 19th century. 38 leaves (152 x 89 mm) comprising chromolithographs of caricatures, juvenile pastimes, farm and wild animals, and black-and-white printed music, abcdaries, and silhouetted people; browned, many leaves brittle and frayed. Red pictorial wrappers; very worn, disbound. — Le livre magique tombé de al lune 1500 avant la creation du monde. Metz: Gangel & P. Didion, 1868. 2 title pages and 64 leaves (302 x 133 mm) printed in color and black-and-white comprising characters from the Commedia dell'Arte, flowers, silhouetted acrobats, performers with monkeys and a dancing bear, soldiers, birds, finely dressed ladies and gentlemen, etc. Pale green and coral pictorial wrappers, spine lightly abraded. — Another copy. Metz: Gangel & P. Didion, 1870. A little foxing and toning. Tan and green pictorial wrappers; minor losses to spine. (Ricky Jay, Magic Magic Book, pp. 38–30) — [The Enchanted Album]. [London: E. Wallis, ca. 1840]. 61 leaves (203 x 140 mm) comprising a windmill, camel, evil clown, owl, roses, butterflies, a woman in country dress with a fan, head of a giant gap-toothed boy, a boy in a cap and Eton jacket (Ricky Jay, Magic Magic Book, pp. 47–49); incomplete, a few fore-edges dust-soiled. Disbound, lacking wrappers. — 2 variant copies of a diminutive blow book, [?Germany, late 19th to early 20th century]. Each with 24 chromolithographed leaves (146 x 89 mm), comprising jesters, silhouetted figures, stamp collections, a montage of household items, caricatures of a outdoorsmen, abcdaries, performers, Puss and Boots and an Elephant-headed gentleman, etc.; browned and brittle. Blue pictorial wrappers of a wizard in Arab dress, instructions printed in English and German on inside panels; spines abraded. Housed in a sturdy card album. —Another copy with variant wrappers. [Germany, ca. 1880s or 1890s]. 24 leaves (146 x 86 mm). Red pictorial wrappers of wizard in traditional dress conjuring cards from an urn and a snake from a basket, titled Magic Book. Bilder-Zauberei. Lower wrapper detached. — Bilder-Zaubereien. [Germany, ca. 1880s]. 40 leaves (156 x 105 mm) comprising chromolithographed Celtic entrelacs, silhouettes, stamp collections, caricatures (some heightened with gum arabic). Red and black pictorial wrappers depicting a wizard juggling images from the magic book; rebacked with a cloth spine, upper panel chipped. Accompanied by the gilt-stamped patterned black boards of another Bilder-Zauberei. — Magic Book. Bilder-Zauberei. [Germany, ca. 1880s]. 28 leaves (140 x 95 mm) comprising chromolithographed caricatures, silhouettes, vignettes from Grimm's fairy tales, musical scores, abcdaries, wild and domestic animals, etc. Copy 1: Grey wrappers with wizard juggling images printed in pink tones; upper wrapper and first leaf detached. Copy 2: Images printed on glossy paper; colors rather faded and tinged yellow. Identical wrappers. — Magic Picture Book [cover title]. Philadelphia: N. Snellenburg & Co., ca. 1880. Copy 1: 36 leaves (159 x 108 mm), comprising instructions in English and German, chromolithographed prints of entrelacs, birds, silhouettes, a pig-snouted officer and donkey-headed gent, montage of miscellaneous items, a well-dressed woman and hobo, domestic and wild animals, interspersed with 2-page advertisements for Snellenburg's clothing. Red pictorial wrappers featuring a wizard on the front and Snellenburg's stores on the rear; upper wrapper cracked in two, lower wrapper detached. Copy 2: 35 (of 36 leaves) lacking final leaf, penultimate leave torn on lower margin. Lacks wrappers. (Ricky Jay, Magic Magic Book, pp. 62–64 and illus. p. 51). — and a collection 11 others, comprising 8 British works (England, 1970-80s) and 2 Magic Picture Albums. Germany and New York, [1880s], and one additional Bilder-Zauberei [Germany, 1880s or 1890s]

The Snellenburg imprints are reprints of the Bilder-Zauberei, in which the blank leaves and those of the postage stamps have been replaced with advertisements for the store with illustrations of clothing, chiefly for boys—a clever marketing tool of the period.

The British collection features three variant issues of Charlie Edwards' Little Magic Book; of which one is accompanied by a typed letter signed by Harry Stanley (1905–1991), British magician, magic dealer, and co-publisher of The Gen, the organ for his Unique Magic Studio. It is addressed to John Fisher, an English television producer of magic shows and author and encloses a copy of the book, with duplicated instructions. Also in the collection: three different Flik-Flik Painting Books (of which one blank), copyright by The Magic Box, London; All Change: The Great Soccer Mystery, copyright by Charles Bowyer, Birmingham; and another with cartoons by Trevini. The two Magic Picture...