The Circus. 1870s–1950s (Bibliotheca Universalis) (Multilingual Edition) Hardcover – June 8, 2016

I loved the history and all of the photos in this book! It is very thick because it is written in English and another language (I believe French but I am not sure). If you are a history buff, this is a great, interesting read with tons of wonderful information and photos. I found it wonderful, especially now that the Ringling Brothers and Barnum Bailey Circus are a thing of the past. It brings back a lot of childhood memories. Debbie E,

Three stars is fair because the information is there; if you can read it. This book has some great content in it, but the poorly-designed layout makes it very hard to read. The fonts in many sections are minuscule at best (even with reading glasses, 4 to 6 font print is barely legible!). Many pages have the content printed over various colors, making it nearly impossible to read (in such small fonts). The font on the white pages is not standard 10 or 12; it, too, is quite difficult to read. The content repeats itself on all pages in three languages; English, French and German, making the visuals even more muddied. The color photos are wonderful, however, the photo captions are on pages other than where the actual pictures are, making them hard to follow -- and having them in three languages makes it worse. Because, apparently, the editors and publishers chose to shrink, combine and overlap content ... probably to save money in the production cost ... I recommend accessing this book from your public library before deciding on whether this purchase is right for you.

Be aware that this is NOT the gigantic book on the Circus that Taschen has published, but a physically much reduced one, only about 8 inches high. The product statistics do include this information, but I missed it. It probably has the same content (my copy was shrink-wrapped and I planned to return it, so I didn't open it), but the images would have to be much smaller. If you want to save money or don't want a coffee-table-size book, this one is probably fine, but if you really want to see the beautiful images in large format, bite the financial bullet and get the big one

The book itself is phenomenal. And a must read, must have for anybody interested in vaudeville, circus or performance arts.But I was expecting to receive the A3-sized book to accompany the wonderful MAGIC book in the same series. This one is a regular-sized (reduced) print. That diminished my joy of owning the book sizeably.

This book is a wealth of information about the Circus along with awesome pictures. If you love the Circus this book is for you.

Good book

Great circus book.

Beautiful Graphics!

A huge book with amazing pictures. Have not read it all yet but what I have is great. A step back in time

この本は、わりと海外では有名な本で、サーカスの記録とも言える貴重な資料を集めた本です。しかしながら、海外のレビューを見ての通りこの評価が良くない人も言えるのは、この本の元ともなる大判の本があるからです。ポスターの美しさを隅々まで見るには、大きい方が良いに決まっています。金銭的に余裕がある人は是非そちらをお求めください。

I bought for my Mother who is into vintage circus books.

Arrived super fast! Very happy with the book.

Great coffee table book