Teaching Notes for A Brief Encyclopedia of Modern Magic:
Use in the classroom to discuss: illusions; allusions; magicians; creeping horror; trickster figures; tricks you can do; characters in uncanny environments; brevity; (sur)realism; relation dynamics; furtive love affairs; hidden presence/motive of narrator; relationship between narrator and reader; aggressively weird prose; pretense; disguise, curses, spells.
Pairs well with You On Mars: Failed Sci-Fi Stories, Last Days of the Microsaurs, Weird Weeks.
A Brief Encyclopedia of Modern Magic by M. Stewart
53 pages. Perfect-bound.
Every illusion carries a price and no one is more aware of that than the wondrous, tragic magicians detailed here. They know darkness that leaves scars. They know failure that gives birth to terrible life. They know their journey is one of haunting, their competition one that doesn’t end with this world. Did it never occur to us they keep their tricks a secret to protect us Plus tricks you can do at home! (You should never do these tricks at home.)
Michael Stewart is the author of four books including Almost Perfect Forms and The Hieroglyphics. In 2011, he was chosen by Starcherone Books as one of the thirty under thirty most innovative young writers, and in more recent years, the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts has awarded him fellowships for both his fiction and his poetry. Michael received his MFA from Brown University, where he currently teaches. MichaelHughStewart.com.