Cutting Room Floor Series, part 4, The Clown Motif

In my new paper, "A Theory of Humor (Abridged) and the Comic Mechanisms of John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces," just published as a book chapter in Theology and Geometry: Essays on John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces, I had to toss out some thoughts because of space constraints. This series of posts, called "The Cutting Room Floor," publishes some of those items dropped from the final paper.

Cutting Room Floor Item Number 4: The Clown Motif

In my book chapter, I have a brief discussion of physical comedy. I had a paragraph that ties physical comedy to clowns. Here it is:

Related to physical comedians are clowns, and Confederacy has a clown motif. Gus’s factory produces what look like clown pants; Irene’s bad makeup is similar to a clown’s; and Ignatius’s hospital gown is “clownlike.” At one point, Ignatius prays to St. Mathurin, the patron saint of clowns. FN: Toole, Confederacy, 83, 100, 291, 197.