- Hardcover: 323 pages
- Publisher: Penguin (1998)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0140285717
- ISBN-13: 978-0140285710
- Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
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Amazon.co.uk Review
Do you nurse the fond desire to try your hand--or feet, that is--at firewalking? Go ahead. In Sorcerer's Apprentice Tahir Shah writes "Contrary to popular belief, firewalking is dead simple. The skin on the soles of the feet and the ash which covers the coals are both poor conductors of heat. Anyone can do it."
Do we dare trust Shah's word on this point? Maybe so, maybe not, for, though another character in his book bears the sobriquet, Shah is a superbly engaging trickster. The English-born scion of Afghani nobility, Shah takes his readers on a whirlwind trip across southern India that has at its heart one of the most unusual missions in the goal-directed travel literature: namely, to find and learn the art of magic from one of India's greatest practitioners, a mysterious fellow named Hakim Feroze. Finding the master in Calcutta, Shah begs Feroze to accept him as a student; unfortunately, as we see, Feroze does so, though not without hesitation. Shah takes us inside sorcery boot camp, which involves strange drills such as digging a deep hole with a dessert spoon, left-handed; separating dried rice and lentils blindfolded; and catching a dozen cockroaches at once in a small tin mug. In recounting his education, Shah reveals a few professional secrets. For one, the Indian rope trick, that classic of conjuring, is effected not by legerdemain, but by the use of hallucinogenic smoke. And as to snake charming, well, 90 per cent of India's snakes are non-venomous, and it's easy enough to find a nonfatal variety that looks like one of the killer breeds.
Full of conjuring and trickery, Sorcerer's Apprentice offers an often humourous, sidelong education in the dark arts. And more: it brings readers along on a surreal tour of India, affording a window on places well off the tourist track. It all adds up to a first-rate adventure. --Gregory McNamee --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.
Mail on Sunday
"This is a terrific book: learned, funny and completely spellbinding."
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Wonderfully engaging and affectionate look at Indian 'magic' Although this is not a novel it reads with the fluidity of good fiction and, if you didn't know otherwise, you would assume that is what this book is. In fact it is the story of a young man's journey through the world of Indian streetcorner trickery and 'miracles'. As a young boy the author was visited in England by an Indian historically linked to his family. Having been introduced by this man to the world of illusion, and its borders with magic and religion, a spark is set off in Shah's imagination. As a young man he sets off to find his teacher and in the process learns of the mythical conjuror Hakim Feroze who he must track down in order to learn the nature of miracles. This wonderful book takes us on a memorable journey through modern India with all its superstitions, scams and sorcery. The narrative is packed with oddball characters reminiscent of John Irving's finest and Shah keeps the pace fast with a fine eye for the comical and absurd. If there has been a better book published this year I would love to know what it is.
12 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is narrative nonfiction you'll want to read aloud, tell people about at parties, and generally recommend to anyone with an inquisitive mind and a sense of humor. It starts 20 years ago, when, as a young boy living in England, Shah is visited by Hafiz Jan, the burly Pushtun caretaker of Shah's ancestor's mausoleum in Burhana (northern India). Hafiz Jan spends several weeks in England, in which he bonds with the boy and teaches him many feats of "magic" before returning to India. Fast-forward 20 years as Shah tracks down Hafiz Jan with the intention of resuming his studies in illusion. After a joyous reunion, complemented by comically monumental feasts, Shah is sent to learn from Hafiz Jan's master, the famous sorcerer Hakim Feroze.
From this point on, Shah encounters scams and cons to put any American grifter to shame, and a busload of outlandish characters. Predictably, after confidently announcing that one has to beware on the infamous Farakka Express train, he gets slipped a mickey and is robbed of everything. In Calcutta he finds Hakim Feroze and finds him to be a fully Westernized and sartorially splendid person. After agreeing to follow Feroze's regime to the letter, he discovers the despotic nature of the man, who seems to suffer from an obsessive-compulsive disorder. Soon, Shah is regurgitating on command, reading ten books a day on illusion, and performing minor feats of legerdemain. While in Calcutta, Shah talks to the country's foremost hangman and learns a few tips, visits a shanty restaurant that serves food prepared solely from garbage, In one of the best chapters, he spends an evening with bodysnatchers. While in the West many have the vague impression that Indians are all cremated and scattered in the Ganges, Shah takes us to a field outside the city where corpses are dumped by those unable to afford proper rites. There, he encounters a small industry engaged in stripping the flesh off bodies, cleaning the skeletons, and exporting them to medical schools overseas. Another fine Calcutta sequence is his detailing of the ghamelawalla industry. Ghamelawallas pay for the privilege of sweeping out goldsmith's shops. They then wash and treat the dirt with chemicals to extract gold. Then they sell the remaining dirt to a poorer bunch who do the same thing. Then they sell the dirt to people who pan for any remaining dust, and then they sell the remaining dirt to brick-makers... And of course there are the guys who rent babies to women beggars, and the women who rent cows and charge people to feed them...
At the midpoint of the book, after passing his initial tests, Shah is sent to wander India on a "journey of observation," during which he will mail weekly reports to Feroze. He is soon joined by a 12-year-old con artist he accurately describes as a "walking crime wave," who becomes his fixer and translator in the madcap journey to follow. The duo bounce from city to city to witness various miracle workers, healers-and other tricksters why prey on superstitions-ply their trade all over the country, ending in Bombay. Shah is quick to reveal the props, trickery, and chemistry behind all he observes. He relates the journey not in the breathless or overwrought style common to many travelogues, but with an amused and skeptical wonder. There's a great chapter in which he and the boy adjudicate in the trial of witch in a small town. Another one is when he meets the world's ostensibly richest man. He discovered three gemstones larger than any known to man, so large no person has the wealth to buy them. So he remains relatively poor, with his sole consolation being his gems' entries in the Guinness Book of Records. Then there is the "duel of miracles" between to magicians... Shah's journey amongst India's practitioners of illusion is great stuff, warmly and engagingly told, and sure to delight.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
With humour and incredible astuteness Tahir Shah manages to both entertain and educate us on the subject of Indian magicians and gurus. This book, though couched in the language of travel literature,has a serious message: most gurus and magicians are bogus. The author is incredibly resourceful and very often daring; he not only has a unique ability to inveigle himself into some bizarre and surreal situations, but manages to convey his experiences with admirable eloquence. This book is unputdownable.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Mostly about street magic in India
When I purchased this book, due to the title of the book, I expected the book to have an esoteric, occult, flavor and to describe some of the esoteric practices of India - perhaps... Read more
Published 5 months ago by Laura De Giorgio
wrongly classified - fiction, not "non-fiction/travel"
Some of the scenarios and situations in this book - and the people he is supposed to have met - are not at all credible. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Clive Power
A delightful read
This is a hugely entertaining book and a great read. I have never been to India, but it made me want to go and visit the places that were in the book (but perhaps not eat the same... Read more
Published 21 months ago by tim
elementary, my dear Vatson?
Having spent over six weeks rereading Sorcerer's Apprentice I have come to the last page. I don't claim to have finished the book because it will live on in my mind, waiting for... Read more
Published 23 months ago by Anteater
Mystify and annoy your friends
If ever a you needed a book that could get you off your sofa, make you put down the remote you were using to book the Magaluf holiday and start to dreaming the dream there is a... Read more
Published on 29 Oct 2003
A small pearl of wisdom, wrapped in a simple attitude.
It is in fact a most entertaining, laughable and completely funny book.
It deserves every star it can get, for the honest description of fake Gurus and the Indian attitude,... Read more
Published on 4 Aug 2001 by Isabella Balkert
Tahir Shah you are a Magician!
Sorcerer's Apprentice rates up there with Bruce Chatwin and Eric Newby's classics in travel writing.
Published on 18 Nov 2000
Entertaining, but I don't believe a word of it.
Obviously, he did go to India (there are photos to prove it), but I just can't manage to believe in some of the 'characters' he met along the way, or the general thrust of the... Read more
Published on 25 Oct 2000
Excellent
I think it is a wonderful book-----the book goes deep into the heart and soul of Calcutta . It explores certain parts of Calcutta which I, inspite of being a Calcuttan, am not... Read more
Published on 9 May 2000
KILL TO GET A COPY
Without doubt the best book written about in Indian in the last hundreds years.
Published on 25 April 2000
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