All Cockney but definitely no sparrow, Fevvers in instead
part-woman, part-swan. Hatched from an egg, abandoned on a doorstep, and raised
in a bordello, Fevvers has grown up to be the world’s greatest aerialiste.
Listening to her tall tale whilst sat amongst her unwashed knickers and tokens
from admirers is journalist Jack Walser. Soon smitten, Jack joins the circus in
which she’s the star attraction, and then we’re off...
Instead of joining the rest of the crowd in the stands, we take
a peek under the tent-flaps where it reeks not of greasepaint and cotton candy
but of stale vodka-breath and tiger shit, and we get to see the people (and
animals) behind those painted on smiles. Run by Colonel Kearney, who takes
advice from his pig Sybil, the circus’s menagerie of characters include the brutal
Ape-Man and his incredible troop of chimps, a Strong Man who’s learning that
love doesn’t mean possession and a troop of sad and, at times, homicidal
clowns. But more than anything it’s the female characters, presented in all of
their fleshy, earthy glory, that stand out and none more so than Fevvers –
although she’s given more than a run for her money by poor, horribly abused
Mignon, clothed in bruises and crusted semen, being reborn in the loving arms
of the mute tiger-taming Princess.
Brilliantly mixing the magic of fairytales and the stinkily
real, Angela Carter is one very interesting writer indeed.
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