Book #38 – The Wonders

Prompt – A book with the same title as a movie/TV show, but unrelated. There is a very arty Italian film called ‘The Wonders’ as well as the beautiful ‘Wonder’ film directed by Stephen Chbosky.

Medium – Book

About the Book – John Woolf charts the history of the ‘freak show’, from the performers of the Stuart period, right the way through to the modern day. As the freak show was most celebrated in the Victorian era (and popularised by Queen Victoria, no less), much of the discussion of these shows takes place between 1840-1900. The book talks through key figures such as ‘The Greatest Showman’ P.T. Barnum, ‘General Tom Thumb’ a.k.a. Charles Stratton and the conjoined twins Chang and Eng Bunker among others. Within the book, Woolf uncovers the often tragic lives of the circus performers and the differing attitudes they themselves had to exhibiting themselves.

My Rating – 9.5/10. I found this book eminently readable and fascinating, a really interesting insight into the world of the circus in the Victorian era. I really enjoyed Woolf’s style of writing and the way that he organised his chapters around the main characters for each act (which broadly covered the rise and then fall of the shows in popular culture). Woolf uses a range of sources, including lots of interesting portraits, pictures of handbills and photographs, and the book feels extremely well researched. Even more importantly, Woolf discusses each of his subjects with warmth and respect – whilst they are historical figures, they are also people – and often people who were exploited and taken advantage of in the most awful ways.

The book also delves in greater depth into the life of P.T. Barnum, who was played by Hugh Jackman in ‘The Greatest Showman’. Now, honestly, I LOVE the movie – the singing is amazing, the choreography is phenomenal and I have the smallest crush on Hugh Jackman. However, I have always tried to separate the Barnum of the movie from the Barnum of history. In real life, Barnum was extremely problematic. One of his first exhibits was a dementia-stricken elderly black lady called Joice Heth. Under Barnum, she was forced to perform for hours every day, transported all over America. She was publicised as the oldest woman in the world (161 years old), the nanny of George Washington and in order to make her look older, Barnum extracted her teeth by force. When she died, Barnum arranged for her to be autopsied in public so that people could see inside the oldest woman in the world (the doctor soon demonstrated that she was about seventy). And of course, he charged people for the pleasure…

Would I read it again? Yes. It’s also such a beautiful book in looks that I am displaying it with my other lovely looking history books!