Gillian Arrighi - Böcker

This volume establishes the historical foundations of the modern circus, tracing its development from pre-Astley entertainments to nineteenth-century British performance culture. Drawing extensively on rare archival materials, it situates circus within a wider entertainment ecology that includes pantomime, music hall, and theatre. The collection reveals intersections between innovation, engineering, and spectacle, highlighting animal training, aerial performance, and creative experimentation as key sites of development. Attention to provincial activity, particularly in Bristol, enriches understanding of regional practice. Scholarly commentary and primary sources together illuminate the social, cultural, and technological forces that shaped circus as a dynamic popular form.

This volume of documentary sources and critical commentary provides a history of circus in Australia in the long nineteenth century. Taking root by the 1840s, Australia’s lively circus culture became the region’s dominant entertainment by the century’s end. Cultivated through exchanges with visiting international circuses and nurtured by the energetic synergy that flourished between colonial audiences and home-grown enterprises, the region’s largest circuses were also touring internationally by late in the century, contributing to global circus networks. Sources from newspapers, journals, private collections, and government archives track the growth and diversification of circus in Australia, providing insight into its business, aesthetics, experience, and social life.

The Cambridge Companion to the Circus provides a complete guide for students, scholars, teachers, researchers, and practitioners who are seeking perspectives on the foundations and evolution of the modern circus, the contemporary extent of circus studies, and the specialised literature available to support further enquiries. The volume brings together an international group of established and emerging scholars working across the multi-disciplinary domain of circus studies to present a clear overview of the specialised histories, aesthetics and distinctive performances of the modern circus. In sixteen commissioned essays, it covers the origins in commercial equestrian performance during the late-eighteenth century to contemporary inflections of circus arts in major international festivals, educational environments, and social justice settings.