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Ohio State alumnus and world-renowned magician Joshua Jay '05 shares a card trick with kids during an event in 2019. Jay says faculty at Ohio State, "encouraged me and showed me that, ‘Hey look, not everybody who is an English major has to end up being a journalist or a writer. You can have unusual paths and use that degree.’"

Joshua Jay ’05 realized a fundamental understanding about his craft of magic while becoming one of the most accomplished performers in the world.

“If people come to magic with an open mind and are ready to be transported, then, truly, the possibilities are pretty exciting,” Jay says.

Jay feels the same way about Ohio State. He credits the university’s can-do culture for helping him find and navigate an unexpected path while shaping his approach to performing magic — storytelling lies at the core — in a manner he hadn’t considered before.

“Ohio State was all about possibilities — it was never about what couldn’t be done,” Jay says.

A world of success

Jay has turned those possibilities into a career that has seen him perform in 117 countries, in many of America’s best-known venues and on TV shows such as Good Morning America, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Penn & Teller: Try This at Home and the Masters of Illusion series.

The Society of American Magicians named Jay “Magician of the Year” in 2020, two years after that group recognized him with its highest proclamation for his contribution to the art of magic. He dreamed of such success and recognition while growing up in Canton, Ohio, but he was initially uncertain about where to attend college.

“There were a few candidates,” Jay says, “but Ohio State won out for me because it was the only institution where everybody I spoke with thought that my passion at the time, magic — as it is now — was cool. They were saying to me, ‘This is great! You'll be able to perform here, and at the Student Union! You'll be able to get involved in this and you can do this!’

“It was all possibilities. Some other places that I applied and was accepted, the attitude was, ‘You're going to have to put this magic aside for your studies.’ Whereas at Ohio State, every professor and everybody I encountered was like, ‘How can we find a way to make this work with magic for you?’“

Jay arrived at Ohio State as a freshman with the intention of earning a degree from Fisher College of Business.

“I thought that would be the best thing for my magic career,” he says. “That’s what made the most sense — it’s show business. I figured there's not a magic major anywhere in the world, so I might as well become well versed in business.

“What I didn't anticipate or understand, at that point, was that there was a major that would enhance my magic. It just wasn't called magic. It was called creative nonfiction. It's learning to tell stories. It's learning to communicate.”

Jay switched from pursuing a business degree to majoring in English after he took his first writing class.

“I recognized that that was my calling,” Jay says. “My professors encouraged me and showed me that, ‘Hey look, not everybody who is an English major has to end up being a journalist or a writer. You can have unusual paths and use that degree.’ I discovered that even with magic as my endpoint, getting there didn’t have to be a linear path.”

Disccovering new perspectives

From supportive faculty, Jay also discovered a new way to look at how he performed magic.

“It was at Ohio State that I realized telling a story on paper isn't so different than telling a story through a magic trick,” Jay says. “They abide by the same premise: a beginning, a middle and an end, with rising action and hopefully a resolution. When I started to look at it that way, I recognized that everything I was learning as an English major would be applicable as a magician.”

Today, Jay does more than perform magic. He writes books about magic, hosts a podcast, collects artifacts, consults and gives lectures and keynote presentations. And he’s co-owner of Vanishing Inc. — one of the largest online magic stores in the United States — and runs magic events, conferences and a nonprofit charity.

“I've always just jumped from whatever was interesting to whatever next sounded interesting,” Jay says. “I've carved out a career that really makes no linear sense on paper, but it is exactly the kind of career that has me truly leaping out of bed every morning, excited to check my inbox, see what's being thrown at me and seeing what's going to happen next. I appreciate that Ohio State kept an open mind about me and helped me sculpt the career that I eventually settled on.”