#book lore

The Young Acrobat and The New Jersey Postcard

(Pictures by me)

I'm back at it again! With thanks for a good rest, because I'm just really settling back in after the Tampa show (which was incredible and life-changing). My last book lore post for six months possibly, but it's a good one! We've got clowns, baby!

We once again have two "texts" to consider with MCR Tampa: the book, The Young Acrobat of The Great North American Circus by Horatio Alger, Jr. and the New Jersey postcard. Since the Jersey postcard is mostly functioning as prop, we are going to focus a lot of Alger's work, partially because Alger's work is something I can speak more directly to, given my finished MA and in-progress Ph.D in Victorian literature. Rare, fun intersection of my interests!

Horatio Alger was an American author who specialized in serialized young adult boys' fiction (a genre you should consider less like modern YA, and more like modern comic books, since Golden Argosy serialized pulp and penny dreadful writing) and published between the 1860s and 1890s. Alger is often speculated as a gay man by academics, and unpacks a early homoerotic subtext in his work. Lots to read about there that, in my opinion, make Alger complicated as a literary figure, but important to understanding the tenuous situations lived by the historical queer author. Alger's work has often been attributed to the myth of the "American Dream" and how we understand that today, which is also complicated.

The Young Acrobat of The Great North American Circus is, at its summary, already easy to connect to LLTBP: the main character, Kit Watson, is a plucky young Victorian boy, who lives in a loosely contructed Greek city where Barlow's Great American Circus is coming to town. This circus consists of exotic animals and a curiousity show, both of which we need to discuss. Of the plot, Kit has ideas of becoming an acrobat and joining the circus, because being a blacksmith's apprentice sucks, and this disappoints his remaining family. Through a series of misadventures and daring escapes, Kit decides to leave the circus and returns to Greece. I've linked the Gutenberg copy for easy reading.

The circus is a classic metaphor for disillusionment with fame/performance, and speaks heavily to the plot of the show. The Black Parade is being forced to tour for DRAAG and trot out music week to week as the underbelly of their situation becomes more corrupt.

The section with the "curiousity" circus workers is particularly telling of this, in Chapter 3. Each of the "curiousity" workers tells of a longer and longer stay with the circus, and quiet resignment to their fates as Barlow seems to be the only place they can find employment (this was often historically true). But of course, there's more to Kit Watson's story that we can take apart- always a second layer. And my particular interest lies with Chapter 4 and 5: here, Kit learns that his late father has squandered his fortune, and so he turns to the circus for distraction. Kit and his friend are warned about an aggressive lion. When they enter the show, the following occurs:

So, the lion (traditionally a symbol of strength and power, and here- a particularly cruel portrayal of violence) strikes down one of clowns and poses a threat to the circus audience. In the Tampa show, the Clerk/Pierrot has clearly become a target and victim of DRAAG, if we're comparing clowns to clowns.

This brings us to Chapter 5, where Kit realizes that he can defeat the lion using a snuffbox he has previously pocketed.

Kit's clever (perhaps plot-contrived) thinking ultimately saves the clown- and the circus-goers from the violence of the lion.

Which makes its place in Tampa's show interesting, because this both does and does not happen. The inteludes reveal increasing empathy to the Clerk's position as victim of DRAAG, focusing us fully on the violence of DRAAG as the final opposing force. But there is no happy ending for the Black Parade, or the Pierrot, at the end of this show, but perhaps defeating DRAAG (as discussed in previous texts) is not so easy as taking out lions in YA serializations. Perhaps there are no plucky Victorian heroes for this story. As the song says, "I'm just a man, I'm not a hero."

I find this piece important as well, because it's disrupted by the postcard from New Jersey, a very clear visual callback to the band's hometown that seems to help break Gerard out of his reading, which makes this text a lot more like Boston's, and I wonder what it means to disrupt a story where a plot point comes so close- and diverges, from the events of the show?

Bringing my Hobbit to Life

Originally, the skirt and brooch were made for last year's Comic-Con, where I had the incredible chance to meet some of the cast.

The Details:

Smaug: Designed after the drawing on Thrór's map, featuring a single glass bead for an eye. Because of how the fabric is pleated, he sits right above the dwarven names on the hem.

The Brooch: Colored in Bilbo's palette, featuring the acorn alongside beads fashioned from semi-precious stone and glass.

The 13 Dwarves: All written in Cirth Erebor along the pleats, sorted strictly by family branch and age! Each has a glass bead above their name (pinned here for better viewing). Thorin's section stands out because I included his full regnal number and epithet (Thorin II Oakenshield).

The Hidden Baggins: Lastly, Bilbo's signature from the Red Book of Westmarch and Bag End, complete with a little green glass bead for the round door.

My favorite design choice: When the skirt hangs normally, Bilbo is entirely hidden beneath the flap that Smaug is embroidered on. He only becomes visible when I move.

Bonus:

https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Green_men

The green men are a sacred order entrusted with the guardianship of the Isle of Faces in the riverlands. Some nursery tales claim they are horned and have dark, green skin. According to Old Nan, the green men ride elks and sometimes have antlers. Most maesters believe their clothes are green and they wear headdresses with horns.

After many years of war between the First Men and the children of the forest, their respective wise men came to the conclusion that the bloodshed had gone on too long. They came together to make peace on the Isle of Faces in the Gods Eye, agreeing to the Pact which would give the First Men all the land except for the deep forests, which would remain under the dominion of the children of the forest. The First Men agreed they would cut down no more trees. So that the gods could bear witness to the historic agreement, all the trees on the island would have a face carved into it and the order of the green men would be created to guard them.

William "Willie" Moore (Great Great Uncle) - Murdered by Claude Heroux in 1905 at The Sleepy Silver Dollar while playing poker with his buddys. (Book Refrence)

Agatha Moore (Distant Cousin) - went missing while walking to the bookstore with her friends in 1935

Tobias Moore (His Great Grandpa) - shot to death in 1962 during a robbery gone wrong at the same bar his uncle was killed in 27 years earlier.