Dea Birkett

As circus gets serious, is all the fun of the fair lost?

There aren’t many laughs in The Cambridge Companion to the Circus, but much analysis of how the Big Top became embedded in our culture

A circus act in 1882. [Getty Images]
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  • The Cambridge Companion to the Circus

    Gillian Arrighi and Jim Davis

    CUP, pp. 320, £75

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