Beginner Magic

The most common mistake a new magician makes is buying twenty tricks and learning none of them. The second most common is assuming that "easy" means "weak".

It doesn't. Some of the strongest material in magic is self-working or nearly so, because the method's cleverness is structural rather than manual. What separates a beginner's performance from a professional's is almost never finger-flinging — it is knowing where to look, when to pause, and what to say.

Everything here is achievable in an evening and worth performing for years. Start with one. Perform it for real people until it stops going wrong. Then buy the next.