the month of June

but the folks on the outside don’t know”

A couple of weeks ago, D and I along with a couple of friends, went to see Cirque du Soleil in Hartford. None of us had ever seen a live Cirque performance, and for the first time in my life I could actually afford to go (though barely, the ticket prices are outrageous), so why not? While watching the performers, I was in awe. I began thinking about how I know very little about the circus, because, after all, that is how it is intended to be — all illusion, all facade, all of the time. We’re not intended to think during the circus. What little I do/did know related to tales of freakshows and those not accepted by/into mainstream society escaping, running away, finding some realm of protection (although potentially not much); accusations of animal mistreatment; and Depression era escapism. Cirque de Soleil doesn’t use live animals, so I began wondering more about treatment of humans/workers than animals and assumed there must have been at one point clear hierarchies in circus life and maybe that still continues. I also wondered if the human body is intended to do some of the things these performers were doing. I was particularly struck by the girls with gymnasts-sized bodies who could twist and contort in ways that made them look as if a few ribs and/or vertebrae had been removed. Ultimately I decided I wanted to find out a lot more about all of this…and this realization struck just in time for summer reading! So, I have begun to compile a summer reading list with a circus/carnival/freakshow them. So far I have:

Water for Elephants by Sarah Gruen

Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

Under the Big top by Bruce Feiler

Josser: Secret Life of a Circus Girl by Nell Stroud

The Circus Age: Culture and Society Under the American Big Top by Janet Davis

Sideshow USA: Freaks and the American Cultural Imagination by Rachel Adams

I’ve considered reading Geek Love by Katherine Dunn but am a little wary of it after reading the reviews. I can’t tell whether I’m intrigued enough to read or if I’ll end up just plan horrified.

I’ve started reading and have almost completed Water for Elephants and will follow up with a review of that, as I’m pretty surprised by my intense interest in a book that is so poorly written.

I’m looking for more suggestions/ideas. The list so far is a mixture of fiction and nonfiction, academic and popular, and I’m open to any and all of these genres/perspectives. I’d also love recommendations for documentaries on this topic, as I haven’t explored that angle so much yet.

All of this, of course, has nothing to do with the diss and is, what a friend of mine calls, “productive procrastination.” I just thought I’d become a circus expert while productively procrastinating.

Additions to the list/reader recommendations:

The Giant’s House by Elizabeth McCracken

The Notorious Dr. August: His Real Life and Crimes by Christopher Bram