Bernard Zufall - Memory Trix 1

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Zuffall's Memory Trix No. 1

Method for Memorizing Magazines, Etc.

Originally published by BERNARD ZUFALL of Forest Hills, New York The Mental Magician

Copyright 2007 by José Antonio González Campos

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EFFECT Members of the audience call out the page numbers of the Magazine, pages of which have been distributed, and you describe them, or vice versa. Or they name the ad., story, cartoon, etc., while you name the page, location and other details. The feat is based on a few simple natural laws of memory such as Attention, Assimilation, Imagination, Association and Repetition--and the use of an artificial Mnemonic series of code words to aid in location of pages. The length of the list of code words can be arranged to suit the ambitions of the entertainer. One hundred or so will usually suffice for one who intends to do the trick occasionally with one magazine only. The code lists are based on a phonetic system using a figure alphabet which is explained on the inner pages and the idea of which you can easily understand. Mental Vision or Imagination also plays an important part, so a brief explanation of that should be given first. It is necessary that you practice the method regularly to become expert. Polish comes with patient practice. While a serious conscious effort will have to be made at the start, the subconscious mind will aid greatly with each succeeding effort and it will become easier and easier as you go along. You may become so interested later that you will want to attempt two or more magazines in your demonstrations, and you should be able to memorize the high spots in a complete magazine in an hour or so. MENTAL VISION, Mental Photography, Visualization or Imagination might be considered as one. To "work" the mental camera you should first use the principle of Attention. ATTENTION is necessary to get a deep impression of anything upon the memory. To obtain this, Interest must be manifested in the matter. When deep impressions have been made on the memory the matter of recall is easy. So Attention to details is all important. And next is Concentration of Attention, which is the mental condition where the entire mental energy of the individual is focused on what he is thinking or doing. ASSOCIATION ranks next to Attention in Memory training. It is a most important law of Memory Culture--Association of Ideas. By means of Association we connect new things with those we already know. CODE WORDS, our next step, is probably the most difficult step in the method. These code words will be the "things we know" and used to connect the things we want to remember in sequence--as in this trick, the magazine pages--so we can recall their location later. A Figure Alphabet is used to construct the list of code words. The code words are based on a phonetic arrangement from the Figure Alphabet.

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THE COMPLETE FIGURE ALPHABET (Based on Phonetics) 1

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T NMR L J D as in Dog Sh as in Shoe Th as in Thief soft G as in Age " " Ch as in Church " " T as in Nation " " Z as in Seizure " " S as in Sure " " C as in Ocean " " DG as in Dodge " " Tch as in Dutch

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K Q as in Queen hard G as in Egg " " Ch as in Ache " " C as in Cow " " Ck as in Check * ing as in King * arbitrary as below Sing = 07 Singe = 026

F P S V as in Wave B as in Boy (Sharp) Z as in Zoo Ph as in Photo (Sharp) C as in Ace Gh as in Tough

Note: The letter X when pronounced KS as in Ox = 70 KSH as in Anxious = 76 Z as in Xenia = 0 Vowels A-E-I-O-U and letters W-H-Y have no numerical value. The above complete alphabet may at first seem difficult to understand. Just bear in mind we will only use the basic consonant letters to represent the figures and this simple sentence will help to easily keep those basic letters in mind at the start. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 The New Mayo r wi ll sha ke o ff a

9 0 Bo ss

The above sentence gives you the exact order of consonants as they occur.

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DUAL LIST OF CODE WORDS (1 to 100) (Based on Figure Alphabet) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33

Hat Inn Home War Hole Age Hack Wife Pie Dose Date Dawn Dime Door Doll Dish Duck Deaf Dope News Nut Nun Name Honor Nail Inch Neck Knife Nap Miss Mat Man Mum

34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66

Mayor Mail Match Meek Muff Mob Race Rat Run Rum Roar Rail Rush Rock Reef Rap Lass Lady Lane Loom Liar Lull Lash Luck Life Lip Jews Jet Jane Jam Jar Jail Judge

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67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100

Joke Jeff Jap Gas Goat Gun Game Gear Gale Gash Gag Guff Gap Face Fit Fun Foam Fair Fool Fish Fake Fife Fop Pose Pot Pan Poem Pear Pail Push Pick Puff Pope Disease

The use of a "Review Card" size about 1-3/4" x 3" which can easily be slipped in your vest pocket, taken out and reviewed from time to time will help to impress the code words quickly upon your mind and enable you to recall and repeat them instantly. You observed that the code words were formed by using the consonant to give a definite figure for instance T for one--"T" has one downstroke, N for two, M for three. Tabulated it looks like this: T = one --one downstroke N = two --two downstrokes M = three --three downstrokes R = four --fourth letter in word four L = five --A ride in the "el" is five cents or Roman for 50 is L. J = six --J resembles 6 reversed K = seven --K by stretch of imagination looks like a key. Kay and Key are synonymous. F = eight --Small letter f has two loops as does the figure 8. P = nine --P resembles 9 reversed. Z or S = cipher --Z or S for Zero.

REVIEW CARDS Place number on this side--as No. 13

Place code word on this side--as Dime or Team (if you use it)

Front

Reverse

As you "review" the cards, let us say 13 comes up after you "shuffle" them. You at once know the consonants T (or D) and M must be used:--T or D for 1 and M for 3. Repeat DM or TM and Dime or Team will come to mind. You should soon be able to count as fast by code words as you do by numbers so instead of 1-2-3, etc., it should be Hat, Inn, Home, etc. You will notice that in preparing the list of code words nouns were used in all cases, because associations can more easily be made with words that can readily be mentally visualized. If you want to make changes in this list or to make up another one, you can do so by referring to the figure alphabet. For instance, you will observe that I have used words beginning with the consonant "D" rather than "T" in the series of code words from ten to twenty. If you care to start a second list from 1 to 100 you might start with the following, using "T" rather than "D" from 10 to 20, and in the series from go to 100 use "B" rather than "P." 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Hut Hen Hem Hero Hill Hedge Hook

8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Hoof Hope Toes Tot Town Team Tower

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15 16 17 18 19 20

Tool Touch Tag Thief Tube Noise and so on.

PROCEDURE After mastering the code words you must tie up or associate the pages of the magazine with the code words so they can later be located. First of all, "browse" through the magazine--hit the "high" spots. Notice the relation of one page with another. Observe the layout, the colors, etc., on each page. Study it. Find out whether there is any imaginary tie up of ads: such as Arrow shirts with Wembly ties, for instance. Get your mental camera working. Practice and use the laws of Assimilation, Attention, Interest, Observation, and Association spoken of earlier. Look over the outstanding articles or stories. Who wrote them? Who did the illustrations, what is the story about? Just as with a book, get a little of it at first; then add a little more to it on second reading, and so on. Look for unusual details. Make a conscious effort in analyzing to get everything you can. Scan each page carefully. Concentrate. Try to do this slowly and carefully in a quiet place where you won't be disturbed. You will find it easier to get more details as you become experienced in observing things. Then outside influences won't bother you so much. You can do the same--it will help in many ways. When riding in trains or buses notice the ads and after looking at them, close your eyes and try to recall them. Constantly practice "Mental Photography." There are many other ways of doing it besides using magazines. Now after you have mentally photographed each and every page in the magazine you wish to memorize and have carefully reviewed them, you are ready to "hitch them up", so to speak, with page numbers. For this purpose the code words come into play. Page one will be known by code word Hat--or whatever you intend to use as a code word for one. Page 13--Dime, page 40--Race, page 84--Fair, 95--Pail, etc. Let us now take a magazine and try a few pages as they actually are laid out. As you take the individual pages, "boil" all you see thereon down to one word at the start--hitch that one word, the name of the advertiser, his product or whatever else it is--the most outstanding word on the page-associate it with the code word representing the number of that page. For example:

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SAT U R DAY E V E N I N G P O S T Vol. 212 No. 31 Jan. 27-1940 EXAMPLES Page

Code Word

Ad. or Story

Mental Tie up or Association

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Hat

Western Clock Co. ad (Westclox) (full page)

A "Western" Hat is familiar.

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Inn

Vaseline Hair Tonic ad. and Table of Contents

"Vaseline Hair Tonic" should be rubbed "in" but not the entire "Contents"

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Home

Plymouth Cars (full page ad)

Driver seems at home in his "Plymouth" or "Play" at Home.

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War

"Next Week" column and Central Ins. Co.

Maybe War "Next Week" in "Central Europe" insure yourself.

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Hole

Arrow Shirts (full page ad)

"Arrow" made hole in shirt.

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Age

"Keeping Posted" column and N. E. Mutual Life Ins. Co. ad.

"Keep Posted" and enjoy "Life" before Age creeps up on you.

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Hack

General Motors Acceptance Corp. (full page ad.)

"General Motors" made many a Hack.

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Wife

Log Cabin Syrup (Gen. Foods Corp. (full page ad in colors)

Wife says "Log Cabin Syrup is good and colorful.

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Pie

"All Right, Gentlemen, do we get the money?"-Article by Florabel Muir.

Seems easy as Pie asking question like "All Right, Gentlemen, do we get the money?"(or shall we "floor" you and get "more," said the Bad Boy.

While the above are given to you in exact sequence it is not my intention to take every page in the issue to show you how to make all the tie-ups between code words and pages. The above should give you the idea. Remember that these associations or tie-ups need not be perfect, since you will want to forget them by the following week so you can tackle the next issue. Don't be "fussy" about trying to avoid associations that at the time seem silly, for sometimes because they are silly, they "stick" better. So take them as they come to you. Just get enough of a "hold" so you can mentally "see" the page if you close your eyes. The mental photographs should automatically "erase" themselves from your mind in a week or so-then the plate will be clear for a new mental photograph. If it isn't, use your second or dual list of code words to avoid any mental confusion. For Example: were we to use Liberty, Life, or any other magazine, issued under same date, the use of the secondary list of code words is advisable to avoid confusion. Although it is not absolutely necessary since the ads or other subject matter are likely to appear on different pages. 8