Culture Society, Identity and Belonging
It took 86 years for the Magic Circle to accept female magicians to their band of illusionists, escapologists and card tricksters, but no time at all to kick one out. Now the Magic Circle wants to track down Sophie Lloyd, who threw off her wig when the organisation voted to admit female members in October 1991 and was promptly expelled for “deliberate deception”. She’d been accepted 18 months earlier disguised as a man called Raymond. Her finest trick was making a bank note burst into flames and then reappear intact, although she later confessed she wasn’t into magic. The society wants to apologise to Lloyd and readmit her, but has no information about her post-Circle life beyond two newspaper articles from 1997. The Magic Circle has a female chair – Laura London, who is leading the hunt – but just 5 per cent of its members are women.
