![]() With this history in mind, Adams turns from live entertainment to more mediated forms of cultural expression: the films of Tod Browning, the photography of Diane Arbus, the criticism of Leslie Fiedler, and the fiction Carson McCullers, Toni Morrison, and Katherine Dunn. Sideshow U.S.A. begins by revisiting the terror and fascination the original freak shows provided for their audiences, as well as exploring the motivations of those who sought fame and profit in the business of human exhibition. Empty of any inherent meaning, the freak’s body becomes a stage for playing out some of the twentieth century’s most pressing social and political concerns, from debates about race, empire, and immigration, to anxiety about gender, and controversies over taste and public standards of decency. Freak shows, she contends, have survived because of their capacity for reinvention. But as Rachel Adams reveals in Sideshow U.S.A., images of the freak show, with its combination of the grotesque, the horrific, and the amusing, stubbornly reappeared in literature and the arts. ![]() Sideshow U.S.A: Freaks and the American Cultural Imagination Rachel AdamsĪ staple of American popular culture during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the freak show seemed to vanish after the Second World War. ![]()
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![]() ![]() ![]() Kale, a young girl who knows very little about anything outside her village, must undertake a long and arduous journey with unfamiliar companions to save her world from evil. On the surface, Paul's novel is an epic fantasy in the style that Tolkien made famous. Along the way, Kale learns much about camaraderie and faith. Kale joins members of the other six high races (those created by supreme being Wulder) in search of one of the great wizards who can help them defeat Risto and recover the egg. When the leaders of Kale's village discover her aptitude for inadvertently finding dragon eggs, they ship her off to the Hall of Paladin, who is in need of such talents to find a rare dragon that has fallen into the hands of an evil wizard. This book tells the tale of slave girl Kale Allerion, who is sent into the service of Paladin, a wise and well-loved ruler. Lewis's allegorical Chronicles of Narnia). Paul's Dragonspell brings fantasy back into the Christian reading world with a story that non-Christians can also enjoy (a feat that has not been accomplished since C. While religious groups have praised some fantasies (a local religious newspaper said that The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King was a movie not to be missed), they have misunderstood many, and even considered some sacrilegious.ĭonita K. ![]() Rowling's Harry Potter - struck a sour note with a few Christian fundamentalist groups, ending up on their lists of banned books. One of the most popular fantasy series to come along in decades - J. ![]() ![]() And if you're an anthropomorphic personification, you can't be helped by humans - but perhaps a, shall we say 'colleague', could assist. Someone, or something, wants the Hogfather out of the way. But this Hogswatch, they may have to wait quite a while. The Hogfather - a jolly fat man, dressed in red - is distributing presents from his flying sleigh and all the children wait to hear trotter-beats on the roof. ![]() In the city of Ankh Morpork, most important city on the Discworld (in the opinion of the Morporkians, and what other opinion is worth considering?) it is Hogswatch - a midwinter festival of celebration and gift-giving which might remind you of quite another holiday on another world entirely. ![]() ![]() What begins as a case of literary curiosity turns into a race to find out the truth behind the life and death of Julian Carax and to save those he left behind. This man is tracking down every last copy of Caraxs works in order to burn them. ![]() Then, one night, as he is wandering the old streets once more, Daniel is approached by a figure who reminds him of a character from La Sombra del Viento, a character who turns out to be the devil. But as he grows up, several people seem inordinately interested in his find. Daniel is allowed to choose one book from the shelves and pulls out La Sombra Del Viento by Julian Carax. To this library, a man brings his 10-year-old son Daniel one cold morning in 1945. Hidden in the heart of the old city of Barcelona is the cemetery of lost books, a labyrinthine library of obscure and forgotten titles that have long gone out of print. ![]() |