"I feel my spine tingle and my heart leap as I relive the wonder of seeing for the first time my most private nightmares on public display out there," wrote 1960s and '70s social and literary critic Leslie Fiedler about the "freak show." Adams, assistant professor of English at Columbia University, explores this common critical perception of the "freak"—including, over the centuries, carnival performers, people with physiological disabilities, hippies, people who blur gender conventions and people from radically different, non-Western cultures—as distorted visions, or metaphors, of viewers' inner fears. In this wide-ranging, wonderfully imaginative and often startlingly provocative analysis of U.S. representations, displays and marketing of "otherness," Adams exposes the dark side of the mainstream. Documenting the traditional sideshow with sensitivity and shrewd examples, she expands into such diverse phenomena as Carson McCullers's use of "freaks" as a metaphor for nonconformist sexuality in Member of the Wedding, Diane Arbus's disturbing photography and the treatment of freakishness in Toni Morrison's Beloved. While frequently uncovering shocking facts—in 1906, a Batwa Pygmy from Central Africa named Ota Benga shared a cage with an orangutan at the Bronx Zoo—Adams's prodigious research also renders witty, insightful and original readings of such cultural artifacts as Tod Browning's 1932 film, Freaks; Katherine Dunn's 1983 novel, Geek Love; and Fiedler's 1978 analysis of Browning's movie, also called Freaks. A final chapter deals with how postmodern counterculture attempts to reclaim the idea of the freak—Jennifer Miller, head of Circus Amok, calls herself a woman with a beard, not a "bearded lady," and gives feminist lectures during her act—bringing all of Adams's themes to an intellectually, politically and emotionally satisfying conclusion. B&w photos. (Dec.)
Forecast:This smart, academic book is a natural for students of the sociology of deviance, but it should have a life outside of academic circles, too. It has the quirkiness to receive substantial mainstream press attention, and if other major review outlets endorse it, it could be one of the press's biggest books.
