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Books > Arts & Architecture > Performing arts > Other public performances & spectacles > Circus
Now available in paperback, The Greatest Shows on Earth takes us
from eighteenth-century hippodromes in Britain to intimate one-ring
circuses in nineteenth-century Paris, where Toulouse-Lautrec and
Picasso became enchanted by aerialists and clowns. We meet P. T.
Barnum, James Bailey and the enterprising Ringling Brothers, who
created the golden age of American circuses. We explore
contemporary transformations of the circus, from the whimsical
Circus Oz in Australia to New York City's Big Apple Circus. Circus
people are central to the story: trick riders and tightrope
walkers, sword swallowers and animal trainers, contortionists and
clowns - these are the men and women who create the sensational,
raucous, titillating and incomparable world of the circus.
Beautifully illustrated, rich in historical detail and full of
colourful anecdotes, Linda Simon's vibrant history is as enchanting
as a night at the big-top itself.
![Grit (Hardcover): Karen Luke Jackson](//media.loot.co.za/images/x80/427653751905179215.jpg) |
Grit
(Hardcover)
Karen Luke Jackson
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R718
Discovery Miles 7 180
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Ships in 10 - 15 working days
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'A book of instructions to those who will dare one day the
impossible. I bow my head in reverence' Werner Herzog 'Petit is an
artist whose theatre is the sky' Robin Williams 'Fascinating. You
will learn about the man, his work, his passion, his tenacity and
lucidity' Marcel Marceau 'Petit outlines a whole approach to life.
The lessons are simple, universal. Be committed. Feel alive. Give
everything' Independent In cities you travel to, always remember to
visit the highest monument. Remain at the top for many hours,
looking into the void. In this poetic handbook, written when he was
just twenty-three, the world-famous high-wire artist Philippe Petit
offers a window into the world of his craft. Petit masterfully
explains how preparation and self-control contributed to such feats
as walking between the towers of Notre Dame and the World Trade
Center. Addressing such topics as the rigging of the wire, the
walker's first steps, his salute and exercises, and the work of
other renowned high-wire artists, Petit offers us a book about the
ecstasy of conquering our fears and reaching for the stars.
Translated and introduced by Paul Auster A W&N Essential
The nineteenth century saw the American circus move from a reviled
and rejected form of entertainment to the "Greatest Show on Earth."
Circus Life by Micah D. Childress looks at this transition from the
perspective of the people who owned and worked in circuses and how
they responded to the new incentives that rapid industrialization
made possible. The circus has long been a subject of fascination
for many, as evidenced by the millions of Americans that have
attended circus performances over many decades since 1870 when the
circus established itself as a truly unique entertainment
enterprise. Yet the few analyses of the circus that do exist have
only examined the circus as its own closed microcosm-the "circus
family." Circus Life, on the other hand, places circus employees in
the larger context of the history of US workers and corporate
America. Focusing on the circus as a business-entertainment
venture, Childress pushes the scholarship on circuses to new
depths, examining the performers, managers, and laborers' lives and
how the circus evolved as it grew in popularity over time.
Beginning with circuses in the antebellum era, Childress examines
changes in circuses as gender balances shifted, industrialization
influenced the nature of shows, and customers and crowds became
increasingly more middle-class. As a study in sport and social
history, Childress's account demonstrates how the itinerant nature
of the circus drew specific types of workers and performers, and
how the circus was internally in constant upheaval due to the
changing nature of its patrons and a changing economy.
I believe hugely in advertising and blowing my own trumpet,
beating the gongs, drums, to attract attention to a "show, "
Phineas Taylor Barnum wrote to a publisher in 1860. "I don't
believe in 'duping the public, ' but I believe in first
"attracting" and then pleasing them."
The name P.T. Barnum is virtually synonymous with the fine art
of self-advertisement and the apocryphal statement, "There's a
sucker born every minute." Nearly a century after his death, Barnum
remains one of America's most celebrated figures.
In the "Selected Letters of P.T. Barnum, " A.H. Saxon brings
together more than 300 letters written by the self-styled "Prince
of Humbugs." Here we see him, opinionated and exuberant, with only
the rarest flashes of introspection and self-doubt, haggling with
business partners, blustering over politics, and attempting to get
such friends as Mark Twain to endorse his latest schemes.
Always the king of showmen, Barnum considered himself a museum
man first and was forever on the lookout for "curiosities," whether
animate or inanimate. His early career included such outright
frauds as Joice Heth, the "161-year-old nurse of George
Washington," and the Fejee Mermaid-the desiccated head and torso of
a monkey sewn to the body of a fish. Although in later years he
projected a more solid, respectable image-managing the
irreproachable "legitimate" attraction Jenny Lind, becoming a
leading light in the temperance crusade, founding the Barnum &
Bailey Circus-much of his daily existence continued to be
unabashedly devoted to manipulating public opinion so as to acquire
for himself and his enterprises what he delightedly termed
"notoriety."
His famous autobiography, "The Life of P.T. Barnum, " which he
regularly augmented during the last quarter century of his life,
was itself a masterpiece of self-promotion. "Will you have the
kindness to announce that I am writing my life & that
fifty-seven different publishers have applied for the chance of
publishing it," he wrote to a newspaper editor, adding, "Such is
the fact-and if it wasn't, why still it ain't a bad
announcement."
The "Selected Letters of P.T. Barnum" captures the magic of this
consummate showman's life, truly his own "greatest show on
earth."
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