This is a most interesting book. I hadn’t heard anything about it, but happened to notice it on the rather exciting little “indigenous books” middle table in the Kirstenbosch Bookshop and it turned out to be a real gem. Ever since seeing Pippa Skotnes’s exhibition “Miscast” at the SA National Gallery and reading Sue’s book choice on the Bleek/Lloyd interviews of !Xam prisoners at the Breakwater Prison, I have been really intrigued by how little we actually know about the San and Khoe. They were just always there, and then one day they had almost vanished. But tantalizing bits of knowledge exist, and this book is one such little bit.
I had never heard of Franz Taibosch, although he seems to have been fairly well known (and even the subject, albeit rather romanticized, of a Laurens van der Post book called A Mantis Carol). Parson’s wonderful account of his life is spellbinding. Franz was a Korana, his family living mostly as farm labourers, but he could trace his roots back quite a few generations to the turbulent times when trekboers clashed with his ancestors. As a bright young man with a penchant for performing, he was virtually kidnapped by a rather dodgy Irishman who spirited him away from Kimberley and set him up as a “Wild Dancing Bushman” on the freak show – circus routes of Europe, keeping him in a state of abject captivity both physical and mental. Once again, one is astonished by the crass racist abuse of those days, and there is one photo in the book that I found exceptionally degrading and desperately sad – a “study” of a man posing in the nude, pathetically holding a bow and arrow. It was used as a “publicity shot”.
Anyway, Franz gets his break one day when his “captor” is ill, and he is, for all intents and purposes, liberated by a man who is the legal advisor and organizer of one of the famous American circuses of the Victorian era. Life improves for Franz, who chooses to stay in the world of show biz perpetuating the myth of the wild African man in Europe and the United States, and even, Parsons points out, providing the prototype of Jung's wild man who helps him hunt down Freud in his famous dream.
I highly recommend this book. Although did a bit of skimming here and there, it really opens up the era of the big top and all the "fun" of the fair while telling the story of a most unusual man.
I had never heard of Franz Taibosch, although he seems to have been fairly well known (and even the subject, albeit rather romanticized, of a Laurens van der Post book called A Mantis Carol). Parson’s wonderful account of his life is spellbinding. Franz was a Korana, his family living mostly as farm labourers, but he could trace his roots back quite a few generations to the turbulent times when trekboers clashed with his ancestors. As a bright young man with a penchant for performing, he was virtually kidnapped by a rather dodgy Irishman who spirited him away from Kimberley and set him up as a “Wild Dancing Bushman” on the freak show – circus routes of Europe, keeping him in a state of abject captivity both physical and mental. Once again, one is astonished by the crass racist abuse of those days, and there is one photo in the book that I found exceptionally degrading and desperately sad – a “study” of a man posing in the nude, pathetically holding a bow and arrow. It was used as a “publicity shot”.
Anyway, Franz gets his break one day when his “captor” is ill, and he is, for all intents and purposes, liberated by a man who is the legal advisor and organizer of one of the famous American circuses of the Victorian era. Life improves for Franz, who chooses to stay in the world of show biz perpetuating the myth of the wild African man in Europe and the United States, and even, Parsons points out, providing the prototype of Jung's wild man who helps him hunt down Freud in his famous dream.
I highly recommend this book. Although did a bit of skimming here and there, it really opens up the era of the big top and all the "fun" of the fair while telling the story of a most unusual man.
Neil Parsons is a Professor of History at the University of Botswana. He is author of King Khama, Emperor Joe, and the Great White Queen, which details the journey of the Batswana delegation to England of 1895. Comment on Clicko, the Wild Dancing Bushman by Neil Parsons ( Jacana, 2009) from Caroline.
Woodland book no 2219, Caroline.
Rating: 5.
Rating: 5.
