MixedThe Times UKIn The Empire of Enchantment, John Zubrzycki explores the history of magic rituals in India and the way they shaped western imaginations. The book reaches from the present to the distant past. Zubrzycki tells us about the ancient pagan civilisations of the Indus Valley, who worshipped creatures with human faces, the horns of a goat and the legs of a bird. Later, he visits modern-day Delhi to find the last courtly magicians serving chai in a slum ... Zubrzycki...packs a lot in — too much sometimes; it can feel as though he is rushing us too quickly through 5,000 years of religious history ... He has a pleasing sense of humour, though, and an eye for the absurd.
