During the first month of this year, I read both Sisters of the Circus by Laila Manack (Penguin Random House) and The Circus Train by Amita Parikh (received from Jonathan Ball Publishers). Both, of course, are circus related and set in the early twentieth century, again confirming my theory that we often experience spells in our reading journeys where we inadvertently end up with books that follow a certain theme.
As a child who grew up in the 1960s and witnessed Boswell Wilkie Circus, which used to erect their familiar red-and-white tents in South Africa’s one-horse towns, I have a nostalgic fascination with the mystique, illusion, and exoticism that surrounds the circus world.
Sisters of the Circus, Laila Manack’s debut novel, is set in the 1920s and follows a travelling circus, ‘The Cirque du Ciel’, where twin trapeze artists, Noor and Kahina, mesmerise their audiences night after night.
At the age of four, Noor and Kahina are kidnapped from their home in India and sold to a European travelling circus, where they grow up and are trained as trapeze artists by a predictably cruel and heartless ringmaster. The twin girls grow up knowing nothing but gruelling daily drills, fantastical costumes, glaring lights, and the roaring crowds their twin act eventually draws.
But at age 21, when we meet them, it is the mid-1920s, and they are ready to escape their circus trailer and abusive ringmaster and make their way to India to find their birth parents. But their plans are derailed when Kahina is forced to train a handsome recruit, whose callow disdain for rules changes something in Kahina, broadening her horizons and leading to events that threaten to push the sisters apart.
Manack dextrously brings the thrill of the circus to life with vivid descriptions of the massive striped tent and the magic that happens inside, the smells of popped kernels and melted caramel wafting through the stands, and the excited, expectant energy punctuating circus nights. It is a captivating read that depicts both the glamour of the industry and the dark and cruel side of abuse and exploitation behind the scenes.
Amita Parikh’s The Circus Train is an equally vibrant and heart-warming novel about the extraordinary cast of the ‘World of Wonders’ travelling circus, which crisscrosses Europe and brings some light and joy to communities during the dark years before and during WWII.
It is 1938 when we meet protagonist Helena (Lena) Papadopoulos, the young daughter of Theo, a master illusionist. Having contracted polio as an infant, Lena is a wheelchair-bound, unseen, lonely child who does not feel like she fits in at the circus. As a result, while the cast rehearses, she spends her days helping the circus doctor and studying science.
Her life takes an exciting turn when she rescues Alexandre, a Jewish orphan with a mysterious past. As the war escalates around them, Lena and Alexander become friends, and Alexandre starts training as the illusionist’s apprentice. During a Nazi inspection on the train, Theo and Alexandre are transported to Theresienstadt Ghetto in Czechoslovakia, where they are forced to perform their acts every night after spending their days hungry and working in dire conditions. I’d never known about this so-called ‘Jewish town’, which was, in fact, nothing more than another concentration camp. Left without her father and best friend, Lena is forced to make her own way, compelled to confront her doubts, dare, and push herself to achieve the impossible.
Both novels are good reads and offer historical insight into yesteryear’s era of circuses, revealing both the magic and behind-the-scenes sinisterness that prevailed within this sub-culture.
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