Word: clown
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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DOUBTING THOMAS, by Winston Brebner. A brief, deceptively simple novel whose hero, a clown, brings a timely reminder that the fatal flaw of any totalitarian regime is its congenitally inhuman disregard of humanity's best impulses...
...never wrong. Thomas of the title is a district agent of The Agency, hated by the people of his district, and returning each night to a termagant wife and a supercilious daughter. But for two days every year Thomas is transformed into that classic figure of irreverence, a clown...
...fatally wrong anywhere after the first page. This one stays right all the way, and ends as one of the most satisfying novels of the year. For Thomas is both a symbol of common humanity and an intensely human individual. Ten years before, Agent Thomas first dressed as a clown for the masquerade that was part of the Holiday. For the first time in years he had fun and added to the fun of others. Thus he discovered the real Thomas, the human being obscured by the forbidding facade of the soulless Agency...
...even his wife knows of his annual release from the horrors of his job and the drabness of his life. For those two days every year he becomes simply Clown, a living legend, cherished by the very people who hate Agent Thomas. "His costume was human frailty, human helplessness . . . His comedy was misfortune, and his endearing grace the patience and dignity with which he survived an existence of interlinked catastrophes." As Clown, Thomas learns the thrill of being loved. In return, "he gave his life away, as much as he could...
Then by accident his identity is discovered. He is persecuted by the people, who believe that Agent Thomas must be an imposter pretending to be Clown. He is persecuted by The Agency for being Clown. In scenes that strongly recall the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, Thomas is first brought to despair and then raised to ecstasy. Through a neat twist of his plot, Novelist Brebner turns the tables on The Agency and restores Thomas to his rightful place. The happy ending-inconceivable in Orwell's 1984 or Kafka's The Castle-is in happy accord with the love...