Chang and Eng - Darin Strauss

Chang and Eng Bunker (1811-1874), conjoined at birth in Siam, were the original "Siamese twins." After growing up and meeting the King, they moved to America, gained fame as a circus act, married sisters, and fathered 21 children.

Chang and Eng is a historical novel based on their unique lives. Narrated by the more bookish twin, Eng, it blends fact and fiction to explore their public careers and private lives. The novel gives a poignant, human voice to their legendary story, exploring themes of identity and individuality, the nature of the self, the complexities of intimacy and human relationships, and the exploitation of difference and "otherness."

Chang and Eng (Darin Strauss, 2000) was named a "Best Book of the Year" by both the Los Angeles Times and Newsweek. For his other work, author Darin Strauss has also received the National Book Critics Circle Award and a nomination for the Joyce Carol Oates Literary Prize.

Chang and Eng:

• Pdf
• Amazon

Supplemental:

• Circus Stories podcast
• Those Extraordinary Twins by Mark Twain
• The Siamese Twins by Edward Bulwer-Lytton

Extracts:

• "Now envy and antipathy, passions irreconcilable in reason, nevertheless in fact may spring conjoined like Chang and Eng in one birth. Is Envy then such a monster?" (Billy Budd, 12)
• "’Tis side-by-side entwined in ease / Of Chang and Eng the Siamese / When leaning mutually embraced; / And so these improvised twin brothers Dance forward and salute the others" (Clarel, 3.13)
• "It seemed more an intestine feud, than a fight between strangers. Or, rather, it was as if the Siamese Twins, oblivious of their fraternal bond, should rage in unnatural fight." (Israel Potter, 19)
• "Every fine evening, about sunset, these two, the cook and steward, used to sit on the little shelf in the cook-house, leaning up against each other like the Siamese twins, to keep from falling off..." (Redburn, 17)
• "... the two stood together; the old miser leaning against the herb-doctor with something of that air of trustful fraternity with which, when standing, the less strong of the Siamese twins habitually leans against the other." (Confidence-Man, 21)
• "So, then, an elongated Siamese ligature united us.... I saw that this situation of mine was the precise situation of every mortal that breathes; only, in most cases, he, one way or other, has this Siamese connexion with a plurality of other mortals." (Moby-Dick, 72)
• "At variance in their revery move / The spleen of nature and her love: / At variance, yet entangled too— / Like wrestlers." (Clarel, 3.5)
• "O city yonder, / Exposed in penalty and wonder, / Again thou seest me! Hither I / Still drawn am by the guilty tie / Between us; all the load I bear / Only thou know’st, for thou dost share. / As round my heart the phantoms throng / Of tribe and era perished long, / So thou art haunted, sister in wrong!" (Clarel, 3.19)
• "... the mere fact of there being twins always seemed curious; in fact, to me at least, all twins are prodigies; and still I hardly know why this should be; for all of us in our own persons furnish numerous examples of the same phenomenon. Are not our thumbs twins? A regular Castor and Pollux? And all of our fingers? Are not our arms, hands, legs, feet, eyes, ears, all twins; born at one birth, and as much alike as they possibly can be? Can it be, that the Greek grammarians invented their dual number for the particular benefit of twins?" (Redburn, 53)

This meetup is part of the series Circuses and Snake Oil.