 Fist edition | |
| Author | Cathy Day |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Vaughn Andrews (design) Jonathan Blair (photographer) [1] |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Harcourt |
Publication date | 1 May 2004 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | |
| Pages | 274 |
| ISBN | 0-15-101048-X |
The Circus in Winter is the debut novel/short story collection by American author Cathy Day published in 2004. It was a runner up in the inaugural Story Prize. [2] and a finalist for the GLCA New Writers Award and the Great Lakes Book Award. [3]
The book comprises connected tales about the fictional "Great Porter Circus", which made its winter home in the "Lima, Indiana", which stood in for the author's home town of Peru, Indiana. [4] The author is the great-niece of Henry Hoffman, an elephant trainer of the Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus who was killed by an elephant in 1901. [5]
Display No. 1: WALLACE PORTER - or What It Means to See the Elephant
Wallace Porter from Lima, Indiana ran a large livery stable. The struggling 'Hollenbach Circus and Menagerie' paused at the town and Wallace decides to buy the circus, which became the Great Porter Circus.
Display No. 2: JENNIE DIXIANNA - or The Secret to the Spin of Death
During the winter months the circus retires to Lima. Jennie Dixianna speciality was the Spanish rope who lured Wallace and became his mistress.
Display No. 3: THE LAST MEMBER OF THE BOELA TRIBE:
Chapter the First - How Boscombe Bowles Went from Honey-bucket Boy to Pinhead
Zip the Pinhead was displayed by P. T. Barnum. Hollenbach asked Boscombe Bowles to pose as a pinhead, starting the Boela tribe. Boscombe then married Pearly the 'Zulu Queen' and had a son named Gordon, royal prince of the Boela Tribe of African Pinheads.
Chapter the Second - How Gordon Bowles Came to Know More Than He Ever Wanted to Know About Elephants
Gordon grew up in the Great Porter Circus, in the spring of 1901, Caesar the elephant broke free, killing the trainer, Hans Hofstadter. The elephant was shot but it was revealed that it was mistreated.
Chapter the Third - How Verna Bowles Learned about the Relative Nature of Beauty and Truth
Verna Bowles was Gordon's daughter, born long after the circus was sold in 1939. She lived in Lima where her father told her about tales of the circus.
Chapter the Last - How Chicky Bowles Avenged Caesar and Found His Place in the World
Chicky was the son of Verna, born a dwarf. He stole Caesar's skull from the town's museum and threw it in the river, to try to bury Caesar's story of killing his trainer. Chick then set off for Gibsonton to be with other dwarves.
Display No. 4: THE CIRCUS HOUSE - or The Prettiest Little Thing in the Whole Goddamn Place
Wallace Porter in 1900 hired the Colonel Ford from P. T. Barnum. Ford's wife wanted to remain in Lima so Wallace agreed that she could live in his old house. Mrs. Ford asked the circus painter to decorate the house with scenes from the circus.
Display No. 5: WINNESAW - or Nothing Ever Stops Happening When It's Over
In 1913 the Winnesaw river floods Lima, killing many animals and also Jennie Dixianna.
Display No. 6: THE LONE STAR COWBOY - or Don't Fence Me In
In 1957 Stella, her husband Wayne and her twin sons Ray and Ricky moved to Lima to Wallace's old house, with its circus themed murals. Stella imagines the pictures on the walls coming to life. Then tragedy strikes as Ricky accidentally shoots Ray.
Display No. 7: THE JUNGLE GOOLAH BOY:
Preface - So Many Stories Begin Just Like This, on a Ship Sailing to a Place That's Not Yet America
Chapter the First - The Jungle Goolah Boy's Family Tree, According to the Tree's Proprietors
Chapter the Second - The Jungle Goolah Boy's Circus Career, According to the Circus's Proprietors
Chapter the Last - How Sugar Church became the Jungle Goolah Boy - According to his Brother - According to the WPA
Display No. 8: THE KING AND HIS COURT - or Boy Meets Girl, Boy Marries Girl, The End
In 1967 Ethan Perdido was the best baseball player in the state. Ethan was ready to join The King and His Court when his girlfriend Laura Hofstadter became pregnant. He proposes to her and he decides to join the family Funeral Parlour business in Lima where Laura toys with disappearing to Chicago.
Display No. 9: BOSS MAN - or The Gypsies Appear and Poof! They're Gone
Earl Richards is to become the new manager of thed KOA Kampgrounds in Lima, but when the gypsies arrive they cause problems...
Display No. 10: THE BULLHOOK
Ollie was born in a blizzard in 1900, the son of Hans Hofstadter the elephant trainer. He married Mildred and they had a daughter Laura, but their marriage was not a happy one, and later Laura disappeared.
Display No. 11: THE CIRCUS PEOPLE - or WMLA, Your Hometown Music Station, 1060 on the AM Dial
Jenny returns to Lima for her grandfather Ollie's funeral, where her father Ethan runs the Funeral Parlour.
The novel was adapted into a musical in 2011 by students at Ball State University by Hunter Foster and Beth Turcotte, with lyrics by Ben Clark, and was first performed at the Circus Hall of Fame in Peru, Indiana, and went on to play at Drury Lane Theatre, Chicago. [8] [9] In 2014, Goodspeed Musicals launched a full production of the musical. [10]
Cole Albert Porter was an American composer and songwriter. Many of his songs became standards noted for their witty, urbane lyrics, and many of his scores found success on Broadway and in Hollywood films.
A circus is a company of performers who put on diverse entertainment shows that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, ventriloquists, and unicyclists as well as other object manipulation and stunt-oriented artists. The term circus also describes the field of performance, training and community which has followed various formats through its 250-year modern history. Although not the inventor of the medium, Newcastle-under-Lyme born Philip Astley is credited as the father of the modern circus.
Phineas Taylor Barnum was an American showman, businessman, and politician remembered for promoting celebrated hoaxes and founding with James Anthony Bailey the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. He was also an author, publisher, and philanthropist, although he said of himself: "I am a showman by profession ... and all the gilding shall make nothing else of me." According to Barnum's critics, his personal aim was "to put money in his own coffers". The adage "there's a sucker born every minute" has frequently been attributed to him, although no evidence exists that he had coined the phrase.
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The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, also known as the Ringling Bros. Circus, Ringling Bros., the Barnum & Bailey Circus, Barnum & Bailey, or simply Ringling, is an American traveling circus company billed as The Greatest Show on Earth. It and its predecessor have run shows from 1871, with a hiatus from 2017 to 2023. They operate as Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey. The circus started in 1919 when the Barnum & Bailey's Greatest Show on Earth, a circus created by P. T. Barnum and James Anthony Bailey, was merged with the Ringling Bros. World's Greatest Shows. The Ringling brothers purchased Barnum & Bailey Ltd. in 1907 following Bailey's death in 1906, but ran the circuses separately until they were merged in 1919.
Barnum is an American musical with a book by Mark Bramble, lyrics by Michael Stewart, and music by Cy Coleman. It is based on the life of showman P. T. Barnum, covering the period from 1835 through 1880 in America and major cities of the world where Barnum took his performing companies. The production combines elements of traditional musical theater with the spectacle of the circus. The characters include jugglers, trapeze artists and clowns, as well as such real-life personalities as Jenny Lind and General Tom Thumb.
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The Hagenbeck–Wallace Circus was a circus that traveled across America in the early part of the 20th century. At its peak, it was the second-largest circus in America next to Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus. It was based in Peru, Indiana.
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Tarzan is a musical based on the Walt Disney Animation Studios 1999 film of the same name, with music and lyrics by Phil Collins, and a book by David Henry Hwang. The musical follows Tarzan, who is raised by gorillas in West Africa. He meets Jane, a young English naturalist, and falls in love, unknowing that Jane's entourage plans to kill the gorillas.
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