From circus acts to violent clowns: The parasite as performer

With the growing awareness of the contribution of parasites to life, their influences on humans also become clearer. The parasite's footprints can be seen everywhere, in genetics, epidemiology, medicine, history and, as this article clarifies, parasites play a vivid part in our cultural imagination surrounding popular entertainment. Drawing and expanding on Michel Serres' and Enid Welsford's discussions of the parasite as a cultural force, this article explores the line of filiation and interplay between biological parasites, circus arts and their comic emblem, the clown, in different narratives and media. It documents not only fantasies of a collaborative relationship between flea performers and their 'masters', and of the relationship between clowns and parasites, both of which are mischievous 'characters', but also circus-related imaginaries of parasitic remote control.