The Tony Sarg Marionette Book - Softcover

Sarg, Tony

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1443783374 ISBN 13: 9781443783378

Publisher: Howard Press, 2008

Synopsis

This vintage book is a concise guide to marionettes, complete with historical information, directions of making puppets, ideas for performances, insights into tricks and techniques, and much more. With helpful illustrations and simple instructions, this volume is highly recommended for those with a practical interest in marionettes. Contents include: "Tony Sarg, Illustrator, Cartoonist and Creator of Marionettes", "The Toy Collection and What Came of It", "Some Marionette Miracles and How They are Done", "Puppet Play in History", "Home-Made Marionettes and Stagecraft", "Two Fairy-Plays for Home-Made Marionettes: With an Introduction Which Tells How to Give Marionette Entertainments at Home", etc. Many vintage books such as this are becoming increasingly scarce and expensive. It is with this in mind that we are republishing this volume now in an affordable, high-quality edition complete with a specially commissioned new introduction on puppets and marionettes.

About this title

About the Author

(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) Anthony Frederick Sarg (April 21, 1880 - February 17, 1942), known professionally as Tony Sarg, was a German-American puppeteer and illustrator, described as "America's Puppet Master", and in his biog-raphy as the father of modern puppetry in North America. Sarg was born in Coban, Guatemala, to Francis Charles Sarg, and his wife, Mary Elizabeth Parker. The elder Sarg was a consul representing Germany; Parker was English. The family returned to Germany in 1887; Sarg entered a military academy at age 14 and received a commission as lieutenant at 17; in 1905 (in his mid-20s) he resigned his commission and took up residence in Eng-land, where he pursued a relationship with Bertha Eleanor McGowan, an American he had met when she was a tourist in Ger-many. They were married in her hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio, January 20th, 1909, and returned to England where their daughter Mary was born two years later. In 1914, with the start of World War I, he sent Ber-tha and Mary to Cincinnati, followed them soon after, and settled the family in New York City in 1915. He had been raised around puppets, inherited his grand-mother's collection of them, developed them as a hobby that enhanced the impres-sion he made on other artists, and finally in 1917 turned them into a profession. In 1920, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States. In 1928, he designed, and his protege Bill Baird built tethered helium-filled balloons up to 125 feet (40 m) long, resembling ani-mals, for the New York institution of Macy's department store, involving a num-ber issues familiar from puppetry; these participated in the store's Thanksgiving Day parade. In 1935, he undertook the puppet-related work of designing Macy's elaborate animated window display be-tween Thanksgiving and Christmas. The pinnacle of Sarg's visibility was at the 1933 Chicago World's Fair, where his cumu-lative audience was 3 million; Baird was heavily involved in this production, as were Rufus and Margo Rose. Those three left his studio that year to start a new one them-selves. Sarg no longer innovated as much as com-peting puppet studios, and his economic fortunes declined as others gained a follow-ing; he both went into bankruptcy, and mounted his last production, in 1939. In mid-February of 1942, Sarg had surgery for a ruptured appendix, and died three weeks later of complications arising from it.

Edition details

• Publisher: Howard Press
• Publication date: 2008
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1443783374
• ISBN 13: 9781443783378
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 70