About
Part biographic inquiry, part lyric portraiture, radio producer Shawn Wen reanimates world-renowned mime Marcel Marceau's silent art. The book opens in darkness, a single figure standing in the spotlight. It's Marceau in his signature hat, painted face, black clothes, and ballet slippers. Over time, the text accumulates objects: dolls, paintings, icons, wives, children, cities, and performances. By turns whimsical and melancholic, this spare volume takes shape through capsule histories, interview clips, vivid scenes, and archival research.
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Reviews
"Threading the subtle seam between what lives and what remains, A Twenty Minute Silence Followed by Applause succeeds in conjuring the poetry of Marcel Marceau's performance as both a character on stage and in history…Like pulling a ghost from a dark room, this is an accomplished work of historical portraiture: precise in its objects, complex in its melancholy, and insightful in its humor."
Thalia Field