bookshelf

THE CIRCUS FIRE

Name: THE CIRCUS FIRE
Author: Stewart O’Nan
ISBN: 0-385-49684-2

A TRUE STORY

by Stewart O’Nan ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 20, 2000

O’Nan alleviates his gripping, tragic story with wry glances at circus history and its better-known personalities and...

bookshelf

Agonizing hour-by-hour retelling of the worst American circus disaster and its aftermath, seen with a restless, unflinching eye for the details—touching, ironic, and depraved.

“The fire was the size of a baseball, a football, a basketball, a dishpan, a briefcase, a small window, half a tablecloth. . . . One thing people agreed on was that it was small.” How the blaze started on July 6, 1944, in Hartford, Connecticut, remains unknown. At least 167 people died, and several thousand were injured. The resulting bad publicity (and nearly $5 million in civil judgments) not only pushed Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey’s into receivership, it eventually forced the Greatest Show on Earth to discard its sideshow and abandon the outdoor “big top” for the gloomy (but fireproof) confines of concrete sports arenas. For novelist O’Nan (A Prayer for the Dying, 1999, etc.), the event is a small-town tragedy that grew quickly into a national scandal: the show business equivalent of the sinking of the Titanic, inspiring works of fact and fiction and setting off a nationwide hunt for a crazed arsonist, 25 years of courtroom battles, thousands of dollars in donated funds for survivors, and mountains of sensationalist journalism. O’Nan finds epic pathos in the heroics of common individuals and circus performers (clown Emmet Kelly and the Flying Wallendas among them), the bellowing of doomed animals, the panic of the mob, the shameless buck-passing of local officials, and the disgraceful efforts of circus staff to avoid responsibility. Fortunately, co-owner Robert Ringling’s fatuous claim that his paraffin-coated tent could not be fireproofed during wartime without military approval did not sway a Connecticut judge from fining the circus $10,000 and convicting (and imprisoning) five circus staffers for involuntary manslaughter.

O’Nan alleviates his gripping, tragic story with wry glances at circus history and its better-known personalities and performers, as well as interviews with numerous survivors whose lives the fire changed (not always for the worst). (96 photos and illustrations)

Pub Date: June 20, 2000

ISBN: 0-385-49684-2

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2000

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
CITY OF SECRETS
by Stewart O’Nan

- BOOK REVIEW
WEST OF SUNSET
by Stewart O’Nan

- BOOK REVIEW
THE ODDS
by Stewart O’Nan

bookshelf

NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

bookshelf

This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

bookshelf

TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

bookshelf

An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.