A Chapter on Clowns and such like comicalities

urn:iso:std:iso:639:ed-3:eng

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text excerpt

If his [Joseph Grimaldi’s] drollery had at times a smack of vulgarity, a breadth of colouring, the smallest spice, as it were, of that ruder mirth in which our grandfather’s delighted, he did so varnish over it with his irresistible humour […]

 In none of his performances was this rare quality, which so distinguished Grimaldi from all other Clowns, more effectively manifested than in the pantomime Harlequin Gulliver which, to the best of our judgment, was one of his masterpieces. Cruickshank has immortalized the Brobdignagians of this piece in one of the admirable sketches with which he illustrated Grimaldi’s life ; but this pantomime alone would have furnished him with subjects for a dozen such. There was the brobdignagian Princess Glumdulditch in a go-cart with, if we recollect rightly, poor Joe as her doll. Then, again, there was the giant canary, which Grimaldi pronounced, in his unctuous voice, to be a “Casso-wa-ry”, and with which he sang the duet beginning, 

“Say, little, foolish, fluttering thing,
If you’re a cock-bird, why not sing ?”

excerpt from 'A Chapter on Clowns and such like comicalities' pp. 623 (183 words)

1521809114273:

1521809114273