Through the eyes of a clown : Dickens and Fellini’s vision of life

An attempt to analyse the central role of the circus and of the figure of the clown in Charles Dickens and Federico Fellini’s visions of life. For both, the circus represents the possibility to escape an uncomfortable reality in favour of a saving imagination. Hard Times offers Mr. Sleary’s positive values in order to overcome the constraining Mr. Gradgrind’s “philosophy of fact,” while Fellini insists on the necessity to screen existence through the eyes of the clown, both the Whiteface and the Augusto. The author and the film director, fascinated to the theatrical, meet each other within the circus ring.