Clown Books reviewed and recommended

How to go about learning to be a clown? One of the best ways is by finding the right books, but this can be difficult at first because there are so many available, not all of which are very useful or relevant to the budding Clown. On this page we review our favourite Clown books and where possible, help you to buy them. The clown books reviewed here are our personal favourites, we have found each of them to be a great help and source of inspiration in our own journey towards being better entertainers and I am sure you will find plenty of inspiration from any of these! I am lucky in having a fellow reviewer, Carey Linsley, who has also written the party magic page. If you would like to buy any of these excellent books, please use the links on the page as this helps us slightly in offsetting the costs of keeping this great site going for you.

Be a Clown! (Mark Stolzenberg, 1989)

One of my personal favourite clown books, this one really helped when I was first starting out. 160 pages of practical clown advice. This book is well written, fun to read, and well illusratated with photos on every page of the author and many famous clowns past and present which are sure to fire up your imagination. There are great chapters on finding your own clown character, how to do makeup either as whiteface or auguste, how to create your own routines, then how to put it all together with your unique clown image and costume, with lots of ideas on all the different types of clown you might be.... all in all a really good clown book that will take you from the first steps to great performances. Theres plenty of inspiration and ideas for experienced clowns too. I wouldnt be without it!!

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Kevin's rating: 5 clown hats!

Clown Skits for Everyone (Happy Jack Feder,1991)

This book is subtitled - "Clown skits for everyone" and there must be something in here for just about every performer, with dozens of fully scripted sketches for one or two clowns. They are all easy to learn and don't need lots of complicated or expensive props, and will catapult you right into the deep end of getting laughs and applause from an audience. There are skteches and skits for the solo clown and for 2 working together covering every type of performance from clown Magic to Policeman to Photographer - including tips on how to make the camera, etc, etc... Between the sketches are plenty of wise musings and tips on such subjects as how to deal with difficult kids, how to speak and get your patter over, working in a team, relaxing and enjoying the performance, techniques for beginners, rehearsing, and many other useful hints like how to adapt ond modify existing skits to make the your own. A wealth of invaluable material and advice.

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Kevin's rating: 4 clown hats!

Creative Clowning (Bruce Fife, [et al.], Picadilly Books, 1988, 1993)

A clown book with everything a person interested in Clowning needs to know. Its a big book with 20 chapters covering every aspect of clowning. It takes you from an explanation of the art of clowning through character development and clown faces with several closely illustrated pages on makeup in detail for whiteface, auguste and hobo.
The book goes on to explain about mime and physical comedy, covering physical expression, clown movement, slapstick, working with partners, etc.
Later chapters go into every aspect of performing as a clown, including Magic, ballon modelling, working with Puppets of all sorts, comedic juggling , stilt walking, Music, Unicycling, creating an act, doing birthday parties, etc.
Considered the "Clown's Bible", every Clown's library should have this book in it. You'll read it again, and again, learning more with each read. A must have. If you dont have it get it NOW!

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RATING: Sadie, Sadie rates this book five hats! Kevin's rating: 5 clown hats too!

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RATING: Sadie, Sadie The StoryLady" rates this book also five red hats.