Читать книгу The Unmasking of Robert-Houdin - Harry Houdini - Страница 6

Poster used by Robert-Houdin during an Easter engagement at the St. James Theatre, London. From the Harry Houdini Collection.

When Torrini was able to resume his performances, Jean-Eugene returned to his family in Blois. During the next few years he mixed amateur acting with his daily labor, leaning more and more toward the profession of public entertainer. But his ambitions along this line were nipped in the bud by marriage. Mademoiselle Houdin, whose father was a celebrated watchmaker in Paris, visited old friends in Blois, their native town, and became the fiancée of young Robert. As the new son-in-law was to share the elder Houdin’s business and naturally wished to secure such benefits as might accrue from so celebrated a family of watch and clock makers, he applied to the council of state and secured the right to annex “Houdin” to his name, Jean-Eugene Robert, and thereafter was known only as Robert-Houdin.

His life between 1838 and 1844 was divided between reading every work obtainable on magic, and his duties in his father-in-law’s shop, where he not only made and repaired clocks, but built and repaired automata of various sorts. His family shared with him many financial vicissitudes, and about 1842–43 his first wife died, leaving him with three young children to raise. Earlier in his “Memoirs” he speaks of having four children, so it is more than likely that one died before his wife. He married again soon, and though he gives his second wife great credit as a helpmate he does not state her name.

Robert-Houdin as he appeared to the English critics. Reproduced from the Illustrated London News, December 23d, 1848.

ROBERT HOUDIN’S SOIREES FANTASTIQUES Poster used in 1848 in London by Robert-Houdin. From the Harry Houdini Collection.

By this time he had acquired more than passing fame as a repairer of automata, and in 1844 he mended Vaucanson’s marvellous duck, one of the most remarkable automata ever made. Doubtless other automata found their way to his workshop and aided him in his study of a profession which he still hoped to follow. During these discouraging times he was often assisted financially by one Monsieur G——, who either advanced money on his automata or bought them outright. In the same year, 1844, he retired to a suburb of Paris, and there, he asserts, he built his famous writing and drawing figure.

Poster for the Emile-Houdin benefit at St. James’s Theatre in 1848. From the Harry Houdini Collection.

The next year, 1845, he was assisted by Count de L’Escalopier, a devotee of conjuring and automata, who advanced the money to fit up and furnish a small theatre in the Palais Royal. Robert-Houdin went about the work of decorating and furnishing this theatre with a view to securing the most dramatic and brilliant effects, surrounding his simple tricks with a setting that made them vastly different from the same offerings by his predecessors. He was what is called to-day an original producer of old ideas. On June 25th, 1845, he gave his first private performance before a few friends. On July 3d of the same year his theatre of magic was opened formally to the public. The programme of this performance is shown on page 37.

It will be noted that the famous writing and drawing figure was not then included in Robert-Houdin’s répertoire, nor does it ever appear on any of his programmes. He exhibited it at the quinquennial exhibition in 1844, received a silver medal for it, and very soon sold it to the late P. T. Barnum, who exported it to America.

Poster used by Robert-Houdin when he played at Sadler’s Wells, London, in 1853. He never refers to this engagement in his writings because he was not proud of having appeared in a second-class theatre, while his rival, Anderson, held the fashionable audiences at the St. James’s, where Robert-Houdin had worn out his welcome. From the Harry Houdini Collection.

This question naturally arises: If Robert-Houdin built the original writing and drawing figure, why could he not make a duplicate and include it in his programme? Surely it was one of the most remarkable of the automata which he claims as the creations of his brain and hands.

In 1846 he claims to have invented second sight, and at the opening of the season in 1847 he presented as his own creation the suspension trick. During the interim he played an engagement in Brussels which was a financial failure.

In 1848 the Revolution closed the doors of Parisian theatres, Robert-Houdin’s among the rest, and he returned to clockmaking and automata building, until he received from John Mitchell, who had met with great success in managing Ludwig Döbler and Phillippe, an offer to appear in London at the St. James’s Theatre. This engagement was a brilliant success and for the first time in his career Robert-Houdin reaped big financial returns.

Later Robert-Houdin toured the English provinces under his own management and made return trips to London, but his tour under Mitchell was the most notable engagement of his career.

Robert-Houdin’s grave, in the cemetery at Blois, France. From a photograph taken by the author, especially for this work, and now in the Harry Houdini Collection.

In 1850, while playing in Paris, he decided to retire, and to turn over his theatre and tricks to one Hamilton. A contemporary clipping, taken from an English newspaper of 1848, goes to prove that Hamilton was an Englishman who entered Robert-Houdin’s employ. Hamilton signed a dual contract, agreeing to produce Robert-Houdin’s tricks as his acknowledged successor and to marry Robert-Houdin’s sister, thus keeping the tricks and the theatre in the family. During the next two years Robert-Houdin spent part of his time instructing his brother-in-law in all the mysteries of his art. In July, 1852, he played a few engagements in Germany, including Berlin and various bathing resorts, and then formally retired to his home at St. Gervais. Here he continued to work along mechanical and electrical lines, and in 1855 he again came into public notice, winning awards at the Exhibition for electrical power as applied to mechanical uses. In 1856, according to his autobiography, he was summoned from his retirement by the Government to make a trip to Algeria and there intimidate revolting Arabs by the exhibition of his sleight-of-hand tricks. These were greatly superior to the work of the Marabouts or Arabian magicians, whose influence was often held responsible for revolts. What Robert-Houdin received for performing this service is not set forth in any of his works. He spent the fall of 1856 in Algeria.

Bas-relief on Robert-Houdin tombstone. From a photograph taken by the author, especially for this work, and now in the Harry Houdini Collection.

From the date of his return to St. Gervais to the time of his death, June 13th, 1871, Robert-Houdin devoted his energies to improving his inventions and writing his books, though, as stated before, it was generally believed by contemporary magicians that in the latter task he entrusted most of the real work to a Parisian journalist whose name was never known.

He was survived by a wife, a son named Emile, and a step-daughter. Emile Houdin managed his father’s theatre until his death in 1883, when the theatre was sold for 35,000 francs. The historic temple of magic still stands under the title of “Théâtre Robert-Houdin,” under the management of M. Melies, a maker of motion picture films.

The last photograph taken of Robert-Houdin and used as the frontispiece for the original French edition of his “Memoirs,” published in 1868.

During my investigations in Paris, I was shocked to find how little the memory of Robert-Houdin was revered and how little was known of France’s greatest magician. In fact, I was more than once informed that Robert-Houdin was still alive and giving performances at the theatre which bears his name.

Contemporary magicians of Robert-Houdin and men of high repute in other walks of life seem to agree that Robert-Houdin was an entertainer of only average merit. Among the men who advanced this theory were the late Henry Evanion of whose deep interest in magic I wrote in the introduction, Sir William Clayton who was Robert-Houdin’s personal friend in London, Ernest Basch who saw Robert-Houdin in Berlin, and T. Bolin of Moscow, Russia, who bought all his tricks in Paris and there saw Robert-Houdin and studied his work as a conjurer.

Robert-Houdin’s contributions to literature, all of which are eulogistic of his own talents, are as follows:

“Confidence et Révélations,” published in Paris in 1858 and translated into English by Lascelles Wraxall, with an introduction by R. Shelton Mackenzie.

“Les Tricheries des Grecs” (Card-Sharping Exposed), published in Paris in 1861.

“Secrets de la Prestidigitation” (Secrets of Magic), published in Paris in 1868.

“Le Prieuré” (The Priory, being an account of his electrically equipped house), published in Paris in 1867.

“Les Radiations Lumineuses,” published in Blois in 1869.

“Exploration de la Rétinue,” published in Blois, 1869.

“Magic et Physique Amusante” (œuvre posthume), published in Paris in 1877, six years after Robert-Houdin’s death.

In his autobiography, Robert-Houdin makes specific claim to the honor of having invented the following tricks: The Orange Tree, Second Sight, Suspension, The Cabalistic Clock, The Inexhaustible Bottle, The Pastry Cook of the Palais Royal, The Vaulting Trapeze Automaton, and the Writing and Drawing Figure.

His fame, which has been sung by writers of magic without number since his death, rests principally on the invention of second sight, suspension, and the writing and drawing automaton. It is my intention to trace the true history of each of these tricks and of all others to which he laid claim as inventor, and show just how small a proportion of the credit was due to Robert-Houdin and how much he owed to magicians who preceded him and whose brain-work he claimed as his own.