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Sorcerers Apprentice
Interweaving the real and the surreal, Charles Johnson spins eight extraordinary tales of transformations and metamorphoses.
An Illinois farmer teaches a young slave everything he knows - with fatal consequences. A young boy growing to manhood as a country sorcerer's apprentice learns the difference between power and strength. From the first piece to the last, these stories capture very real human experiences in a new and startling light.
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First published January 1, 1986
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About the author
Charles R. Johnson
85 books244 followersCharles R. Johnson is an American scholar and author of novels, short stories, and essays. Johnson, an African-American, has directly addressed the issues of black life in America in novels such as Middle Passage and Dreamer. Johnson first came to prominence in the 1960s as a political cartoonist, at which time he was also involved in radical politics. In 1970, he published a collection of cartoons, and this led to a television series about cartooning on PBS.
1990 National Book Award Winner.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
April 1, 2014
From the book description, I expected more magical realism here. But although this collection wasn't quite what I expected, I'm glad to have been introduced to Johnson as a writer, through these stories. Originally published between 1977 and 1986, many of them have won or been nominated for awards and included in prestigious collections. Rightfully so. I don't think I necessarily agree with all of Johnson's perspectives, but these tales are both entertaining and erudite.
The Education of Mingo
Ooh, this is a disturbing one. A short story, but with some seriously weird and complex dynamics going on. A nineteenth century hillbilly farmer buys a young, strong slave - partly for his labor, and partly because of his isolation. The farmer comes to see the man as an extension of himself. When the slave becomes murderous, his ideas about responsibility and blame are... interesting. There's at least one academic article written about this story [Master-Slave Dialectics in Charles Johnson's "The Education of Mingo" Linda Selzer African American Review Vol. 37, No. 1 (Spring, 2003)], and it mentions a quote that I'm guessing did inspire this piece: Aristotle, Politics: "The slave is part of the master, a living but separated part of his bodily frame."
Exchange Value
This is one all hoarders should read. A couple of young hoodlums break into a neighbor's apartment and find the fortune she's squirreled away all these years. They steal it - but may be cursed to follow her unsavory fate. It's another very disturbing, and very effective tale. It may be a story of an actual curse, or it may be a cautionary tale against miserly behavior. The author seems to think that financially struggling people are prone to the kind of behavior he describes and that it's a social ill - but I'm not so sure. You hear more stories about people unused to managing money blowing their entire lottery winnings, inheritance or insurance payout, than you do stories of people being afraid to spend what they have.
Menagerie, a Child's Fable
Another disturbing one! (I'm sensing a theme here). When the owner of a pet shop fails to return, a monkey and a dog team up to try to maintain order and social welfare. However, what actually happens is pretty much what you'd expect if all the animals in a pet store were left to their own devices. The tale makes it explicit that this is an allegory for humanity's inability to cooperate and get along - made particularly bleak by the reader's knowledge that due to animal nature, the disaster portrayed was fairly inevitable. (And, if the pet shop owner is standing in for 'god,' it's not a very positive view of 'the divine,' either.)
China
A longtime husband and wife have been growing older, getting fat, ill, and decrepit together. Their marriage may have lost its passion, but the wife is content and comfortable with her sedentary life of TV watching and snacking, broken up by visits to church on Sundays. However, when her husband randomly discovers kung fu movies and is inspired to start a martial arts regimen, his wife finds his new interests and friends to be pulling him away from her, to her great dismay. I felt like this story, to some extent, was probably about the author's own discovery of Buddhism. it can be read both as an incisive study of a relationship and as an allegory of an individual's relation to the greater community.
Alethia
An aging philosophy professor finds himself attracted to a failing student - who then tries to blackmail him into giving her a passing grade. Again, that's what the story's about on one level. On the other, it's about self-doubt, the wonderings of an academic who has separated himself from an aspect of culture in favor of another aspect, if he has taken the right path. And about how a fresh idea can rejuvenate one.
Moving Pictures
Hmm. I think this one may be the weakest in the book. I found the narrative voice (addressed directly to the reader) distracting. The narratee is a filmmaker who only pursued filmmaking because it was more lucrative than other options, whose dreams have fizzled, and whose life in general isn't going so well.
Popper's Disease
A doctor out on his way to make a house call is abducted by a UFO. Disconcertingly, the sole alien inhabitant is in quarantine, having been struck by an incurable plague. The alien hopes the doctor can help him. Like most of these stories, it slides into commentary on relationships, race, and some (here a bit heavy-handed) philosophy.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice
"There was a time, long ago, when many sorcerers lived in South Carolina, men not long from slavery who remembered the white magic of the Ekpe Cults and Cameroons..." This tale tells the story of a young man who is honored to be chosen as one of these sorcerers' apprentice. He is full of the youthful idealism and confidence of any young person embarking on their chosen career, applies himself to his studies, and works hard. At the high point of his apprenticeship, he truly believes he has magically cured a suffering client (perhaps he has). But it seems that success is never to be recaptured... A sad, thoughtful, and well-crafted piece.
A copy of this book was provided by NetGalley and Open Road Media. Much appreciation.
The Education of Mingo
Ooh, this is a disturbing one. A short story, but with some seriously weird and complex dynamics going on. A nineteenth century hillbilly farmer buys a young, strong slave - partly for his labor, and partly because of his isolation. The farmer comes to see the man as an extension of himself. When the slave becomes murderous, his ideas about responsibility and blame are... interesting. There's at least one academic article written about this story [Master-Slave Dialectics in Charles Johnson's "The Education of Mingo" Linda Selzer African American Review Vol. 37, No. 1 (Spring, 2003)], and it mentions a quote that I'm guessing did inspire this piece: Aristotle, Politics: "The slave is part of the master, a living but separated part of his bodily frame."
Exchange Value
This is one all hoarders should read. A couple of young hoodlums break into a neighbor's apartment and find the fortune she's squirreled away all these years. They steal it - but may be cursed to follow her unsavory fate. It's another very disturbing, and very effective tale. It may be a story of an actual curse, or it may be a cautionary tale against miserly behavior. The author seems to think that financially struggling people are prone to the kind of behavior he describes and that it's a social ill - but I'm not so sure. You hear more stories about people unused to managing money blowing their entire lottery winnings, inheritance or insurance payout, than you do stories of people being afraid to spend what they have.
Menagerie, a Child's Fable
Another disturbing one! (I'm sensing a theme here). When the owner of a pet shop fails to return, a monkey and a dog team up to try to maintain order and social welfare. However, what actually happens is pretty much what you'd expect if all the animals in a pet store were left to their own devices. The tale makes it explicit that this is an allegory for humanity's inability to cooperate and get along - made particularly bleak by the reader's knowledge that due to animal nature, the disaster portrayed was fairly inevitable. (And, if the pet shop owner is standing in for 'god,' it's not a very positive view of 'the divine,' either.)
China
A longtime husband and wife have been growing older, getting fat, ill, and decrepit together. Their marriage may have lost its passion, but the wife is content and comfortable with her sedentary life of TV watching and snacking, broken up by visits to church on Sundays. However, when her husband randomly discovers kung fu movies and is inspired to start a martial arts regimen, his wife finds his new interests and friends to be pulling him away from her, to her great dismay. I felt like this story, to some extent, was probably about the author's own discovery of Buddhism. it can be read both as an incisive study of a relationship and as an allegory of an individual's relation to the greater community.
Alethia
An aging philosophy professor finds himself attracted to a failing student - who then tries to blackmail him into giving her a passing grade. Again, that's what the story's about on one level. On the other, it's about self-doubt, the wonderings of an academic who has separated himself from an aspect of culture in favor of another aspect, if he has taken the right path. And about how a fresh idea can rejuvenate one.
Moving Pictures
Hmm. I think this one may be the weakest in the book. I found the narrative voice (addressed directly to the reader) distracting. The narratee is a filmmaker who only pursued filmmaking because it was more lucrative than other options, whose dreams have fizzled, and whose life in general isn't going so well.
Popper's Disease
A doctor out on his way to make a house call is abducted by a UFO. Disconcertingly, the sole alien inhabitant is in quarantine, having been struck by an incurable plague. The alien hopes the doctor can help him. Like most of these stories, it slides into commentary on relationships, race, and some (here a bit heavy-handed) philosophy.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice
"There was a time, long ago, when many sorcerers lived in South Carolina, men not long from slavery who remembered the white magic of the Ekpe Cults and Cameroons..." This tale tells the story of a young man who is honored to be chosen as one of these sorcerers' apprentice. He is full of the youthful idealism and confidence of any young person embarking on their chosen career, applies himself to his studies, and works hard. At the high point of his apprenticeship, he truly believes he has magically cured a suffering client (perhaps he has). But it seems that success is never to be recaptured... A sad, thoughtful, and well-crafted piece.
A copy of this book was provided by NetGalley and Open Road Media. Much appreciation.
July 3, 2012
The first two of the eight stories in this amazing book were so disturbing that I immediately put it aside and began something else. But CJ is a compelling storyteller and quite soon I was back,
enthralled and relieved to be able to relate more easily to the rest of the stories.
CJ's is an acute observer,a cutting yet sympathethetic writer,a master of dialect with a laconic way of emphasizing his points. I especially loved the playful Menageri:,A Child's Fable and China,a cleverly presented tale of transformation from the point of view of a close but ignorant witness. It was the title story though that brought me to sharpest attention and demands an immediate rereading.
Heres a few gems. This first one is from the wickedly hilarious Alethia: p108 Civil rights is high comedy. The old values are dead. Our money is plasic. Our art is murder. Our phlosophy is a cackle....The universe explodes silently nowhere,and you're disturbed, you fossil, by decadent,erotic dreams....
from Poppers Disease p130 Certain abberations in an Age might be so universal as to be unquestioned,and not recognized as problems for a thousand years.
and from the sorcerers apprentice p150 ...you wish to do good, but you cant be too faithful,or too eager.or the good becomes evil.
p167How dreadful that love could disfigure the thing loved.
enthralled and relieved to be able to relate more easily to the rest of the stories.
CJ's is an acute observer,a cutting yet sympathethetic writer,a master of dialect with a laconic way of emphasizing his points. I especially loved the playful Menageri:,A Child's Fable and China,a cleverly presented tale of transformation from the point of view of a close but ignorant witness. It was the title story though that brought me to sharpest attention and demands an immediate rereading.
Heres a few gems. This first one is from the wickedly hilarious Alethia: p108 Civil rights is high comedy. The old values are dead. Our money is plasic. Our art is murder. Our phlosophy is a cackle....The universe explodes silently nowhere,and you're disturbed, you fossil, by decadent,erotic dreams....
from Poppers Disease p130 Certain abberations in an Age might be so universal as to be unquestioned,and not recognized as problems for a thousand years.
and from the sorcerers apprentice p150 ...you wish to do good, but you cant be too faithful,or too eager.or the good becomes evil.
p167How dreadful that love could disfigure the thing loved.
May 5, 2025
"among watchdogs in Seattle, Berkeley was known generally as one of the best. not the smartest, but steady. a pious German Shepherd (Black Forest origins, probably), with big shoulders, black gums, and weighing more than some men, he sat guard inside the glass door of Tilford's Pet Shoppe, watching the pedestrians scurry along First Avenue, wondering at the derelicts who slept ever so often inside the foyer at night, and sometimes he nodded when things were quiet in the cages behind him, lulled by the bubbling of the fishtanks, dreaming of an especially fine meal he'd once had, or the little female poodle, a real flirt, owned by the aerobic dance teacher (who was no saint herself) a few doors down the street..."
bought this one blind because the title jumped out to me on the shelf of course. i didn't know it was a short story collection, which is good, because if i had i might not have bought it! the past few times i've read a short story collection there's just something that doesn't click within me. probably because i have been expecting what a novel promises instead of what a collection does. that being said, this is how the short story collection is done. all 8 stories are weaved with the same fabric, and yet they feel very different from each other. this is obviously an author with a very coherent perspective and style, so only getting to read bite-sized pieces from each slice didn't leave me wanting more. some of the endings, however, did leave me with that hanging feeling, like something is missing but even that absence completes the story. it goes without saying that i deeply enjoyed all the magical realism, and it was nice to see those elements used outside of the latin american school. oftentimes magical realism feels like an imitation of some of the great authors who originated the genre, but this felt like a different branch of the lineage.
bought this one blind because the title jumped out to me on the shelf of course. i didn't know it was a short story collection, which is good, because if i had i might not have bought it! the past few times i've read a short story collection there's just something that doesn't click within me. probably because i have been expecting what a novel promises instead of what a collection does. that being said, this is how the short story collection is done. all 8 stories are weaved with the same fabric, and yet they feel very different from each other. this is obviously an author with a very coherent perspective and style, so only getting to read bite-sized pieces from each slice didn't leave me wanting more. some of the endings, however, did leave me with that hanging feeling, like something is missing but even that absence completes the story. it goes without saying that i deeply enjoyed all the magical realism, and it was nice to see those elements used outside of the latin american school. oftentimes magical realism feels like an imitation of some of the great authors who originated the genre, but this felt like a different branch of the lineage.
June 16, 2009
Johnson has a talent for gab to match the interesting topics he utilizes in his stories---philosophy, sorcery, African-American tradition and culture, etc. The stories are entertaining, his wording is original, and a lot is clever. Still, I'm left feeling that Johnson's writing reflects a disjointed one part entertainer and one part professor. After reading all the stories, his characters seem to come off as little more than caricatures and a big idea is brought forth with too much tongue-in-cheek and not enough originality. Something about the stories leave me feeling they lack some genuineness. "Exchange Value" was easily my favorite.
November 3, 2008
It is worth it for the story Menagerie about a pet shop.
May 22, 2016
Johnson's MIDDLE PASSAGE is one of my favorite American novels, and this collection is sharp. Worth it alone for the opening "The Education of Mingo" and especially "China"!
October 28, 2022
I did enjoy this quite a bit. I read this because a friend had suggested "China" a story in this collection. He read it in an anthology and when I looked it up online I couldn't find a PDF so I ordered the collection from the library. Listen folks, this guy is a genius and armed with huge amounts of knowledge. This is not going to be everyone's cup of tea, but it is very good.
I thought the pacing and complexity of the story "China" amazing and then come to find out that Johnson writes like that all the time, almost all of the stories here are very rich and have little in the way of pauses. I have his debut novel on hold at the library but I think a novel length work written like his short stories might be exhausting. I will let you know.
Franzen taught the story "Exchange Value" many years ago, that is what he told me anyway. This guy Johnson is the kind of writer a writer should read, he takes you out of your element and into his. Getting outside yourself is always good for a writer.
A good bigger-city library will have this. I don't know if I would pay money for a used copy. I won't read these again probably.
I thought the pacing and complexity of the story "China" amazing and then come to find out that Johnson writes like that all the time, almost all of the stories here are very rich and have little in the way of pauses. I have his debut novel on hold at the library but I think a novel length work written like his short stories might be exhausting. I will let you know.
Franzen taught the story "Exchange Value" many years ago, that is what he told me anyway. This guy Johnson is the kind of writer a writer should read, he takes you out of your element and into his. Getting outside yourself is always good for a writer.
A good bigger-city library will have this. I don't know if I would pay money for a used copy. I won't read these again probably.
November 7, 2023
2.5*
It may be that standards for short stories were different in the 1970s-80s when these seem to have been written. I found most of them underwhelming although the first two ("The Education of Mingo" and "Exchange Value") give a reader something abstract to think about. I thought "China" was pretty good, as well.
It may be that standards for short stories were different in the 1970s-80s when these seem to have been written. I found most of them underwhelming although the first two ("The Education of Mingo" and "Exchange Value") give a reader something abstract to think about. I thought "China" was pretty good, as well.
June 26, 2025
I don’t normally like short stories, but these were very good. The writing is excellent as would be expected from this author, and the stories pulled me in right away, made me think, and I wanted to find out how they ended.
October 5, 2020
Interesting short stories...not my cup of tea. But very well written and very interesting.
March 13, 2021
Liked one story, kinda liked another one, the rest seemed at times self-indulgent and capricious. Kinda blah, to me.
December 1, 2021
Good stuff. I really liked “China” the best.
July 1, 2019
stick with it. gets better and better as you go.
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June 5, 2024Tagged for Exchange Value
May 3, 2014
As readers of this blog will know I have a liking for short stories, indeed some of my favourite magic realist books are short story collections. The Sorcerer's Apprentice did not live up to my high expectations. For starters there is less magic realism in this collection than the blurb suggests, although there is sufficient to merit inclusion in this blog and my list of magic realist books.
To go through the stories in order:
The Education of Mingo
A disturbing Frankestein story about how a lonely elderly white farmer buys a young African slave and tries to educate him.
Exchange Value
A tale about the love of possessions. Two young thieves steal the belongings of a dead old hoarder and then something strange happens.
Menagerie, a Child's Fable
An Animal Farm story about what happens in a pet shop when the owner disappears.
China
A middle-aged man's discovery of martial arts threatens his marriage. An allegory about relationships and the self.
Alethia
An aging black professor is threatened by an attractive female student and by the questions she raises about his life choices.
Moving Pictures
The weakest story in the book - a writer opts for lucrative script-writing over his art.
Popper's Disease
A sci-fi philosophical piece - a middle-aged black doctor is asked to heal an alien.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice
There was a time, long ago, when many sorcerers lived in South Carolina, men not long from slavery who remembered the white magic of the Ekpe Cults and Cameroons...
This is a story of an apprentice sorcerer who tries too hard against the advice of his mentor.
There are some obvious themes here: mid-life crisis and race, both of which I am interested in. But the stories did not engage me. This was partly due to the author's tendency towards philosophizing; and there was also something about the author's language that jarred. But these are personal bugbears and other people will not share them.
I received this book from the publisher via Netgalley in return for a fair review.
This review first appeared on the Magic Realism Books Blog http://magic-realism-books.blogspot.c...
To go through the stories in order:
The Education of Mingo
A disturbing Frankestein story about how a lonely elderly white farmer buys a young African slave and tries to educate him.
Exchange Value
A tale about the love of possessions. Two young thieves steal the belongings of a dead old hoarder and then something strange happens.
Menagerie, a Child's Fable
An Animal Farm story about what happens in a pet shop when the owner disappears.
China
A middle-aged man's discovery of martial arts threatens his marriage. An allegory about relationships and the self.
Alethia
An aging black professor is threatened by an attractive female student and by the questions she raises about his life choices.
Moving Pictures
The weakest story in the book - a writer opts for lucrative script-writing over his art.
Popper's Disease
A sci-fi philosophical piece - a middle-aged black doctor is asked to heal an alien.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice
There was a time, long ago, when many sorcerers lived in South Carolina, men not long from slavery who remembered the white magic of the Ekpe Cults and Cameroons...
This is a story of an apprentice sorcerer who tries too hard against the advice of his mentor.
There are some obvious themes here: mid-life crisis and race, both of which I am interested in. But the stories did not engage me. This was partly due to the author's tendency towards philosophizing; and there was also something about the author's language that jarred. But these are personal bugbears and other people will not share them.
I received this book from the publisher via Netgalley in return for a fair review.
This review first appeared on the Magic Realism Books Blog http://magic-realism-books.blogspot.c...
February 2, 2018
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice highlights Johnson’s fascination with duality and with individuals who mirror others. He certainly drew from the craft and experience of these stories to develop the complexity of characters such as Chaym Smith, who embodies Martin Luther King, in his compelling novel Dreamer. The stories in this volume reflect Johnson’s well-rounded knowledge on topics ranging from medicine, martial arts, and sorcery. But primarily, Johnson’s tales address ideas of compassion and conscience. For example, in the impressive story “Menagerie, a Child’s Fable,” a state of doom is evident. Johnson personifies animals and shows through the perspective of those animals how men go mad. The story depicts man’s cruel motives and provides a clear picture of a manipulative, charismatic monkey abusing his power in order to kill. Haunting and real, Johnson’s tale has the same urgent and political aim as the Orwell’s classic Animal Farm. Both confront absolute rule, which uses death as a tool for conformity. In Johnson's story, he casts new light on the age-old problem of historical power in relation to the human conscience. Johnson does justice to art by furthering the call for responsibility and tolerance. The other stories in the collection are equally impressive with their fine literary construction and the many questions they bring to the surface.
July 12, 2010
Hmmm. Ummm. Hmmm. Don't know what to say. I like Johnson's writing, but this collection was extremely unusual. Seemed to be a little bit magical realism and a little science fiction, to be honest. Maybe what I'm thinking is that it's got some African folktale or fable vibe? Each story seemed to have some sort of "moral", but they were elusive or unusual. I think "Exchange Value" and "China" were the stories that I "enjoyed" - not exactly the word - the most. I really really did NOT like "Menagerie..." - probably because it involved a mean monkey and had sad things about a lovely dog.
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August 29, 2013"Each story is memorable and surprising, and while they fit together into a coherent collection, they never seem repetitive. These are stories with a hundred shades of sadness. The only triumphs these characters achieve are the triumphs of self-overcoming and surrender."
Read Eve Tushnet's full review, "In the Hour of Chaos," on our website:
http://www.theamericanconservative.co...
Read Eve Tushnet's full review, "In the Hour of Chaos," on our website:
http://www.theamericanconservative.co...
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July 27, 2009Dynamo writer and illustrator UW professor's early collection of short stories about big issues and black life; he's a good writer, but he tries to be universal and the stories end up seeming overly of their time and cocky. Great characters, though.
October 6, 2015
Johnson is an African American author, Buddhist, and philosopher, and all of those elements reveal themselves in his stories. There is much to mine in this book. "China" and "Exchange Value" were my favorite stories.
Want to read
December 25, 2024Read so far:
*The education of Mingo --
*Exchange value --
*Menagerie, a child's fable --
*China --
*Alēthia --
*Moving pictures --
Popper's disease --
The sorcerer's apprentice--
***
Kwoon --4
*The education of Mingo --
*Exchange value --
*Menagerie, a child's fable --
*China --
*Alēthia --
*Moving pictures --
Popper's disease --
The sorcerer's apprentice--
***
Kwoon --4
April 17, 2022
A short story collection, half fairy tale and half koan. These stories have the essential frightfulness, and weirdness, of folk-tales. Grimm via an African American Buddhist from the 1980s.
February 20, 2010
moments of brilliance (menagerie, the sorcerer's apprentice), disturbance (education of mingo), and forced oddity (popper's disease).
September 21, 2015
Enjoyed it as much as the first time I read it.
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews