WRITINGS ABOUT JUGGLING
The writing posted here (https://sakari.substack.com/p/three-books-about-juggling) will hopefully one day be published as three books about juggling. The three books all have different purposes, although, they all follow, and spring from, the same idea. Namely that there are no rules in juggling, no right or wrong way to juggle and (in my opinion) there should not be any rational way to judge or organise juggling in a hierarchy. What I mean with ‘rational’, is something that can be intellectualised, something that can be explained and compared, quantified, levelled; explained why something is better than something else. The idea that there are no rules, but only conventions probably lends itself to most arts.
Then, if there are no rules, no laws, what we evaluate when we look at juggling, what we teach when we teach juggling, is only conventions, perspectives, and subjective ideals. Sure, there are ways to juggle that can make achieving a feat easier or even feasible, but the goal, the feat itself is completely arbitrary and made up. There is no objective true juggling technique, there are learned abilities within conventions.
First book is titled JUGGLING, it contemplates on what is juggling and how do we interact with it.
Second book is titled JUGGLE, which focuses on different approaches on juggling, presenting an array of conventional approaches, and propositions for conventions.
Book three is titled JUGGLER, and it is a collection of anecdotes and short stories about a juggler.
I started writing about juggling as I found that most (if not all) books about juggling are either someone’s collections and selections of historical events and past jugglers, or books on how to juggle, presenting an anecdotal view on how to learn juggling and what ‘tricks’ one should learn. There certainly are some academic papers on juggling too, which tend to focus on either the mathematics of juggling, or what happens in the jugglers mind or body as they juggle.
But, I feel like there is something to be said about juggling as a phenomena. I understand that my perspective is coloured by my cultural background, and it is not an objective description that everyone can subscribe to, but equally, I intend not to make any assumptions that this way of seeing and doing juggling is somehow better (or worse), than anyone else’s.
But, I feel like there is something to be said about juggling as a phenomena. I understand that my perspective is coloured by my cultural background, and it is not an objective description that everyone can subscribe to, but equally, I intend not to make any assumptions that this way of seeing and doing juggling is somehow better (or worse), than anyone else’s.
The first text I wrote was published on the first edition of YANA -magazine in 2021. I have since continued writing and developing the project with support from Kone – Foundation (FIN) and Cirko – Centre for New Circus (FIN).
Here we are now.
