The Man Who Loved Clowns

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of bullying, ableism, and death.

The Man Who Loved Clowns exposes how prejudice can isolate people with disabilities while also illustrating the great mutual benefits that arise when communities collaborate in close support of them. Delrita has seen people around her act with prejudice toward Punky her entire life, noting that people often stare at him in public, and some even seem afraid. As a result of incidents like these, Delrita and her family are defensive and protective of Punky and keep him close to home, unintentionally isolating him.

Delrita’s understanding of how people react to meeting Punky is formed early in her life. One particular incident, when Delrita brought a friend home in second grade, showed her the extent to which people’s prejudices are formed at an early age: “The girl had taken one look at [Punky’s] dwarflike body and his child-man face and run screaming from the house in terror” (6). Another formative experience Delrita has is when she hears a classmate, Georgina, and her brother laughing at Punky. Furious, she confronts them, but when school starts, Georgina warns all the others to stay away from Delrita because “she’s got a weird relative” (10). These incidents are enough to convince Delrita that people will both laugh at and fear Punky. Through incidents like these, Delrita began to understand that people who have not interacted with people with disabilities often react poorly to Punky. She and her family respond to incidents like these by protecting Punky and avoiding taking him into the public, which results in both Punky and the family being isolated and alienated, drawing an unnecessarily deep divide in the community. 

With Punky’s role in his family and his emergence into the sheltered workshops, however, the novel illustrates the positive effects on both him and the community from his engagement. Punky’s family creates their own small community, and he benefits greatly from their love and care. The family benefits from Punky, too—he is loving, happy, and creative, filling his family with joy. When he emerges from his relative isolation to join the workshop, Punky’s positive impact on the community expands beyond the family. He learns new skills, makes new friends, and starts a job, becoming noticeably more independent and fulfilled. Delrita notices the change, reflecting, “His bald spot sprouted wiry brown hair, and he’s stopped chewing on his fingers. He even went to bed earlier now, and every morning when his feet hit the floor, he was a man with a purpose” (168). The public profits, too: The workforce becomes stronger, and Punky’s new friends and coworkers are thrilled to have him in their lives. Punky’s involvement in the workshop also changes the way that Delrita and her family view him and others with disabilities. Delrita is surprised to see that people with Down syndrome can perform in their jobs just as well as people without disabilities, and when she sees the workshop’s parade float, she realizes that the negative reactions she was braced for never came. Delrita begins to understand that she and her family have been underestimating both the community’s response to Punky and what he has to offer. In the end, The Man Who Loved Clowns reinforces the importance of overcoming prejudice by juxtaposing the pain of Punky’s former isolation with the fulfillment he gets from his work. It also highlights Punky’s positive impact on both the workshop and the larger community, emphasizing the many gifts that people with disabilities offer society.