Sharps and Flats

Maskelyne, John Nevil, 1839-1917Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

4.0

Word count: 446K words
Chapters: 45

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Sharps and Flats by John Nevil MaskelyneAuthor: Maskelyne, John Nevil, 1839-1917,Language: English, Class: GV: Geography, Anthropology, Recreation: Recreation, Leisure, Release Date: Oct 24, 2012

Editor's review

Written by the magician John Nevil Maskelyne, Sharps and Flats takes its title from the marked cards and concealed-card maneuvers of card sharping. From an insider's professional perspective, the author dissects the tricks of the gambling table, peeling back layer after layer of the chicanery involved in dealing, shuffling, and palming. It is at once a warning exposé of fraud and a firsthand source for observing nineteenth-century card gambling. The prose carries the calm and restraint characteristic of Victorian magicians; the narration is never sensational, yet its solid detail gives it considerable tension. Readers interested in magic history, card technique, and anti-gambling issues will see the psychological contest behind the technique, while general readers can treat it as a popular book about deception and seeing through deception. Note that the book describes specific techniques; it should be read to understand and guard against them, not to imitate them.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in magic history and card technique
Readers who want to understand gambling fraud in order to recognize and guard against it
Readers who enjoy Victorian popular nonfiction
Students of the psychology of deception and the evolution of its techniques

Not a good fit for

Younger readers with limited judgment
Those hoping to learn gambling techniques for practical use
Readers seeking modern anti-gambling laws and case analyses

Reading tips

Read the preface and table of contents first to understand the author's background and the book's framework, then move on to the chapters on specific techniques.
Read the techniques as historical material, thinking as you go about how similar frauds might be recognized in real life.
Reading alongside magic history or card-game rules will make the terminology easier to follow.
After finishing, try restating several of the frauds' key points in your own words to test whether you truly understand how they work.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Does this book teach gambling cheating?

The author's purpose is to expose the frauds of card gambling so that readers understand how they work and can guard against them. The book does describe specific techniques, but it should be read as historical and cautionary material, not imitated or used in actual gambling.

What is the background of the author, Maskelyne?

Sources indicate that John Nevil Maskelyne lived from 1839 to 1917 and was a magician. He wrote this book from an insider's perspective, dissecting card-cheating techniques, and this identity gives the narrative a practitioner's angle of observation.

Can I understand it without a card-playing background?

Yes, but the book uses terminology of dealing and shuffling, and prior knowledge of basic card-game rules will make it smoother. When you meet unfamiliar terms, look them up first, then return to the text to grasp the key steps of each technique.

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About the author

Maskelyne, John Nevil, 1839-1917 Author · British · 1839–1917

Maskelyne, John Nevil (1839–1917), was a British magician and inventor active on the British stage from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century. He took part in founding a magic organisation and devoted himself over the years to practising and refining stage illusions, helping to advance the development of the modern magic performance. One work by him is held in this collection, Sharps and Flats. Judging from its title and the author's background, the book is likely written on the subject of magic, sleight of hand, or deception, with an air of exposure and warning, reflecting his tendency to turn stage experience into written knowledge. Public information about the details of his life is limited, and his early years and specific inventions cannot be reliably established; what can be confirmed is that he combined the roles of performer and writer, and that his writing, grounded in firsthand practice, is concrete and credible, offering some reference value for understanding the magic trade and audience tastes of his time.