![]() ![]() Its defining feature is its manifestation as an event, a key term in contemporary ‘Continental’ philosophy. Pathognomy, the art of tracking the ephemeral or elusive across varied terrain, as opposed to the systematizing impulse of physiognomy and its logic of recognition, is revived as an approach to exploring this phenomenon. Within this theme, anomalous disturbances in normal ‘states of affairs’, both on and off-stage, are shown to give rise to a specifically ethical experience of audience. Drawing on the work of contemporary philosophers, such as Nancy, Derrida, Lingis, Lévinas, Blanchot, Badiou and Deleuze, it elaborates the theme of ‘becoming unaccommodated’. This book-length work offers a theatre-philosophy in the form of an ethics of appearing. ![]() In adapting his popular stage illusions for incorporation into the new film medium, Méliès prompted comparisons between the different versions of the same tricks, thus highlighting the distinct and defining characteristics of each medium. This kind of collusive illusionism is carried into the filmic realm, as demonstrated significantly by the work of the French film-maker Georges Méliès. Spectators were encouraged, directly or indirectly, to make comparative assessments of the illusions with which they were presented, based on their knowledge of earlier instances of the same tricks or on their awareness of published exposés of popular effects. The stated aims of the magicians’ art, as evidenced by their published statements, but also by the nature of their applied techniques, was that audience response was not to be a simple form of stupefac- tion, but a lively interaction with the performance as both a meticulously composed spectac- ular sight and as a contribution to a broader fascination with technology and illusionism. This article draws upon a range of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century accounts of magic performance to argue that the success of an illusion was dependent upon the spectator’s engagement with the trick as a conscious application of mechanical effects. ![]()
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