Read one press agent’s circus literature and begin to understand that
the resources of the language are less limited than you suppose. He is
the world-renowned alliterator of the show business. He is better known
in the profession than Shakespeare, although Shakespeare never did much
for circuses. He has no acknowledged rival in the successive use of
the initial letter. The advance matter which he sends abroad for his
“moral” enterprises where presumably only moral people are admitted,
forms an extraordinary narrative.
During each winter he writes, writes, writes, writes, whether he feels
right or not, but the annual incessant drain does not subtract from his
elaborate eloquence. He tells of “real and royal races for reward,
huge heroic hippodromes, genuine contests of strength, skill and speed,
superb struggles for success and supremacy between the short and the
stout, the tall and the tiny, the fat and the frail, the mammoth and
the midget, the adipose and the attenuate, the large and the little,
the massive and the minute, the swift and the slow; elephants in
ponderous, pachydermic progress, camels in cross and comical cantering,
horses in hurricane hustling for home, donkeys in deliberate,
dragging, droning pace, monkeys in merry meanderings on meek and mild
mules, whippets in whirlwind dashes swifter than a horse, runners in
record reducing running in rivalry, ponies in carts with clowns for
conductors, and the celebrated charioteer contestants of the Coliseum.”
[Illustration: FAIR EQUESTRIENNE ON HER FAVORITE HORSE.]
Proceeding in his product, after this gaudy prologue, this
adjective-millionaire is impressed with the “astral array of aerial
artists. The very air is filled with their flying forms, describing
the most intricate figures, far flights, swallow-like sweeps, gymnic
gyrations, castings and catches, revolutions and returns, swings
and somersaults, leapings and lightnings, soarings and sailings,
altitudinous ascensions, diving descensions, keeping the dizzy heights
of the lofty canvas dome alive with activity. Never before have the
satiated public seen a spectacle to so surely stir their sluggish
blood, arouse their admiration, excite their enthusiasm and command
their applause.”
The clowns appeal to him. As phrased by him they are “a phenomenal
phalanx of phantastical, phuriously phunny phellows; silly and sedate,
short and stout, smile securers set scot free; loyal legion of long
and lean laugh liberators let loose. These extraordinary experts in
the creation of laughter have invented this year a new, novel, unique,
irresistibly comic, excruciatingly funny and simply surprising series
of skits, scenes, screaming sallies and silly situations.”
Danger is “defiantly defied by one audacious aerial athlete, whose
deed is daring, desperate and death deriding, a fearless, fearful,
fascinating feat, the veritable pinnacle of perillous performances.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account