The term magic is derived from the Old Persian word Magi, who were a tribe from ancient Media who were originally responsible for religious and funerary practices. The best known Magi are the "Wise Men from the East" in the Bible.  In the modern world a Magician is a performing artist who entertains an audience by creating illusions of impossible or supernatural feats, using purely natural means.

Much of modern entertainment magic owes its origins to Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin (1805-1871), who was originally a clockmaker and who opened a magic theatre in Paris in the 1840s.  For much of the 20th Century magic shows were marginalized as children's entertainment. As the twentieth century progressed so magic transformed into many its many different forms. Some performers such as The Mentalizer Show in Times Square dared to mix themes of spirituality with the art of magic whilst others successfully made the transition to TV.

TV opened up new opportunities for magicians and brought the performers to huge audiences, making some of them, like James Randi, and Penn and Teller household names. A good ‘patter’ helps distract the audience just enough to keep them from guessing how the magical feats are achieved.  This created TV personality magicians, complete with magic wand and catch phrase, such as the British genius Tommy Cooper’s  ‘Just like that’.

Keeping the secrets preserves the professional mystery of magicians who perform for money.  This code of secrecy has been formalised into the romantic sounding “Magic Circle”.  Membership in a professional magicians' organization often requires a solemn commitment to the "Magician's Oath'. The ‘Oath' takes the following, or similar form "As a magician I promise never to reveal the secret of any illusion to a non-magician, unless that they swear also to uphold the Magician's Oath.  I promise never to perform any illusion for any non-magician without first practicing the effect until I can perform it well enough to maintain the illusion of magic.”

Once sworn to The Oath, you are considered a magician, and are expected to uphold the oath.  A magician, who reveals a secret, either purposely or through insufficient practice, may typically find oneself without any magicians willing to teach them any more of the secrets.  Some magicians develop their act around pretending to show the audience how a trick works, only to leave them baffled with a final twist. It is argued that once the secret of a trick is fully revealed to someone then that person can no longer fully enjoy subsequent performances of that magic, as the amazement has gone.

The purpose of a magic show is to amuse and create a feeling of wonder; the audience is generally aware that the magic is performed using trickery, but derives enjoyment from the magician's skill and cunning.  Magicians classify their art into a number of categories such as vanishes, productions, penetrations, teleportation and transformations.  Some tricks involve using more than one category at a time.

There are some new forms of magic still evolving.  Shock magic is a genre of magic that shocks the audience, hence the name.  It is also sometimes referred to as "geek magic," and takes its roots from circus sideshows, in which "freakish" performances were shown to audiences.  Common shock magic or geek magic effects include eating razor blades, needle-through-arm, string through neck and pen-through-tongue.
Whatever form that the magic takes it is a source of wonderment. Arthur C. Clarke summed it up with his Third Law which states that “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”  If you don’t know how something works then it is magic until the secret is revealed.  Personally I hope that there will always be some magic in this world.

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