I got this book through the Amazon Vine program to review. It was an interesting blend of handbook and memoir. I learned some interesting things about high wire walking, but it felt disjointed and was incredibly short.

This book kind of goes into how to start high wire walking, but it also talks about what high wire means mentally and emotionally to Petit. This is by no means a history of Petit’s high wire walking or a guide on how to get started.

While there are some interesting tidbits in here on high wire walking and some of the work that goes into it...they are just that, tidbits. You have to wade through a lot of philosophical thoughts on high wire walking to get to the meat of it.

I personally thought the writing felt a bit disjointed and that it didn’t flow all that well. It is a very quick read though; took me maybe 40 minutes to read it.

Overall this was okay but not great. There is a bit of interesting info in here, but you have to wade through a lot of soft ideas to get to that info. The writing wasn’t the best, although maybe that was the translation. I pretty much thought..”eh, well whatever” when I read this. I was happy it didn’t take a lot of my time to read but disappointed that I didn’t learn more about high wire walking. ( )

Unlike the stuntman, whose performance is calculated to emphasize every hair-raising risk, to keep his audience panting with dread and an almost sadistic anticipation of disaster, the good high-wire walker strives to make his audience forget the dangers, to lure it away from thoughts of death by the beauty of what he does on the wire itself.

Yes, the beauty! It’s what I most remember of the documentary, “Man on Wire” -- the delight and wonder that left no space for dread as Petit reclined…laughed…danced! on the high-wire between the twin towers of New York’s World Trade Center. That was as close as I’d come to experiencing Petit in person, until here -- where his vignettes of essay and poetry invite me into his physical and mental preparations and practices…and nearly onto the wire itself. ( )

Petit ha fatto del funambolismo un'arte, ha personalità ed ha cose da dire proprio e per questo si fa leggere (anche quando scrive di tecnica funambolica trasmette passione). Interessante come grande metafora in cui il filo del funambolo è la vita. ( )