Houdini's Library: Inside the Spellbinding Collections of the Great Illusionist

A landmark volume in the history of magic-the first-ever book on Houdini’s legendary personal collection, published on the centennial of his death. Harry Houdini (1874-1926) was not only a great magician but a great collector.Every corner of his townhouse at 278 West 113th Street in New York was filled with books, pamphlets, prints, clippings, playbills, and photographs documenting the history of magic and theatrical performance. “It would cost fully a million dollars to forge the collection of evidence now in my hands,” Houdini wrote in 1908. “These programs, advertisements, newspaper notices, and crude cuts trace the history of magic as no romancer, no historian of a single generation possibly could.They are the ghosts of dead and gone magicians, rising in this century of research and progress to claim the credit due them.” This handsome oversize volume is published to coincide with a major exhibition at the Harry Ransom Center in Austin, where much of Houdini’s library is preserved.