History Main / CircusBrat

* The protagonist of MargaretMahy's ''Maddigan's Fantasia'', Garland, is the daughter of the titular circus' Ringmaster.

* Johnny Blaze, the original GhostRider. Stunt motorcyclist, later circus owner. Gives much plot in that the sideshow acts are often supernaturally real.

* Bob Snarly from AnthonyHorowitz' YA novel ''The Switch'' is close to a deconstruction of the trope. He's a brat raised by circus people alright, but he's far from open-minded, instead behaving like common trailer trash. AnAesop is learned.

* Marion Begnini from ''KaleidoStar'', as well as Pamela's twin girls. [[spoiler: Yuri and the Oswald siblings are more tragic examples: Yuri's dad died on-stage, and the Oswalds joined a circus after leaving their abusive step-parents.]]

* Sophia, a girl from an itinerant circus that a MagicalGirl named [[HananoKoLunlun Lunlun]] meets in her travels through Europe. In a subversion this ''does'' have repercusions in her emotional state, as she's stated to have few to no friends and [[spoiler: refuses to work onstage as a clown, despite having inherited her DisappearedDad's talent for acting and making people laugh.]]

* In at least one strategy guide, [[MadScientist Doctor Neo Cortex]] of ''CrashBandicoot'' is said to have been raised in a family of circus performers, and was literally branded a nerd due to his preference to science over the performing arts (hence the "N" on his forehead).

* Allen from ''{{DGrayMan}}''.

* Fear's [[BackStory back story]] as written in the ''MetalGearSolid3'' fanfic ''[[FanFic/TheJoyOfBattle The Joy of Battle]]'' was the son of two circus performers. It seems that he got his [[OverlyLongTongue tongue]] from his mother and his ability to dislocate joints from his father. His story may or may not be based on [[XMen Nightcrawler]].

-->'''Scharlotta:''' (...) When I was a little girl my father and mother used to go round fairs and give very good performances and I used to do the ''salto mortale'' and various little things...
* Parodied (with a partial reference to John Major's backstory, see below) in the ''{{Discworld}}'' novel ''Discworld/MakingMoney''. It turns out that [[spoiler:Mr. Bent, the ObstructiveBureaucrat chief cashier was the illegitimate son of a particularly famous clown. Because of his natural talent for clowning, he was asked to perform after he reunited with his father; alas, he was traumatized because ''everybody was laughing at him'', and they somehow neglected to warn him that it was ''supposed'' to happen. Bent ran away, and joined a group of Traveling Accountants, swearing off laughter, humor, and "silliness" for decades.]]
* Eddie, the protagonist of ''{{The Five People You Meet In Heaven}}'' grew up (and spent the rest of his life) at a seaside amusement park. It was where he met his wife and eventually died; one of the eponymous people is the Blue Man from the freak show; a flashback shows Eddie using his ability to juggle to fight off his captors during the war in the Phillippines, etc.

* Bob Snarly from AnthonyHorowitz' YA novel ''The Switch'' is close to a deconstruction of the trope. He's a brat raised by circus people alright, but he's far from open-minded, instead behaving like common trailer trash. AnAesop is learned.

* Ellis from ''VideoGame/BattleArenaToshinden''. Thanks to horrific events in her past, her [[BadassLongHair fa]][[PapaWolf ther]] sent her to be raised anonymously as a dancer in a Turkish traveling circus in order to keep her safe from the mysterious organization hunting them. As result, she became an extremely skilled {{Dance Battler}}, arguably one of the fastest playable characters in the game and capable of jumps and acrobacies that [[NotQuiteFlight actually makes the viewers think she can fly]].

* Sumire Nozaki in ''[[TokimekiMemorial Tokimeki Memorial 2]]''. A SecretCharacter in this game, [[ADayInTheLimelight she gets]] [[IncrediblyLamePun more spotlight]] in the ConceptArtGallery spin-off game ''Tokimeki Memorial 2 Music Video Clips : Circus de Aimashou''.

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* ''School's Out: The Musical'', a movie spawned from ''The FairlyOddParents''. Flappy Bob's childhood life as a clown and his secret love for it, despite his boring Pixie-life, is a vital part of the plot.

* Ellis from ''BattleArenaToshinden''. Thanks to horrific events in her past, her [[BadassLongHair fa]][[PapaWolf ther]] sent her to be raised anonymously as a dancer in a Turkish traveling circus in order to keep her safe from the mysterious organization hunting them. As result, she became an extremely skilled {{Dance Battler}}, arguably one of the fastest playable characters in the game and capable of jumps and acrobacies that [[NotQuiteFlight actually makes the viewers think she can fly]].

* The occult detective HieronymusBosch in the Danish comic with the same name was raised in a Russian circus by his acrobat mother and juggler father. He was trained in both conjuring and honest-to-karma real magic by the circus' illusionist, this being the original source of his occult knowledge.

* Scharlotta Ivanovna, Anya's {{Cloudcuckoolander}} governess from AntonChekhov's ''The Cherry Orchard''. The second act of the play starts with her thinking out loud to herself about her circus childhood.

[[quoteright:313:[[MichikoToHatchin http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/michiko_to_hatchin_rita.jpg]]]]

* Pictured above: Rita from ''MichikoToHatchin''.

* Regina Berry in ''PhoenixWright AceAttorney: Justice for All''. She's very sheltered in many respects, such as having no concept of death and finding nothing strange about [[spoiler: a marriage proposal from a ventriloquist's dummy. Not the performer, his dummy.]]

* Claire in ''Literature/{{Baccano}}'' grew up at a circus and worked as an acrobat, gaining a CharlesAtlasSuperpower in the process. He's also AxCrazy, but that's not connected to his background.

* Razputin from ''{{Psychonauts}}''. In an inversion, he ran ''away'' from the circus. He had a strict upbringing [[spoiler:because his father was trying to prepare him for encounters with their family's many enemies, who were hinted at in a SequelHook that never took off, sadly.]]

* Richard "Dick" Grayson, the original Robin from ''{{Batman}}''. He still returns to the circus whenever they pass by Gotham and Bludhaven. He even ended up using his sizable trust fund to buy them out to save them from financial ruin.

** It's implied she did this to stand out from her nearly-identical sisters-though it would be understandable if she did it to escape [[PoisonousFriend Azula]].

* The title character of ''ThePhantomOfTheOpera'' grew up in a circus (as a freak) and learned a real skill with magic and choreography there. In the book, his first job after leaving the circus as as an entertainer/TortureTechnician for an Ottoman ruler.

* Ty Lee of ''AvatarTheLastAirbender'' fame is this, by way of the 'ran away to join the circus' variant.

* Claire in ''{{Baccano}}'' grew up at a circus and worked as an acrobat, gaining a CharlesAtlasSuperpower in the process. He's also AxCrazy, but that's not connected to his background.

->''She was born in the wagon of a traveling show. Her mama used to dance for the money they'd throw.''\\

* From {{Berserk}} Judeau spent his childhood with a traveling performance group and that may have been were his knife throwing skill was picked up. Puck also lived with the same group.

* Johnny Blaze, the original Ghost Rider. Stunt motorcyclist, later circus owner. Gives much plot in that the sideshow acts are often supernaturally real.
* DC's first Trickster was a circus brat, which might explain his... eye-catching costume. Of course, this ''is'' DC...
* Hawkeye and his brother Barney both grew up in the circus, and this is where Clint learned his sharpshooting skills to begin with.
* The occult detective Hieronymus Bosch in the Danish comic with the same name was raised in a Russian circus by his acrobat mother and juggler father. He was trained in both conjuring and honest-to-karma real magic by the circus' illusionist, this being the original source of his occult knowledge.

* Fear's [[BackStory back story]] as written in the MetalGearSolid3 fanfic [[FanFic/TheJoyOfBattle The Joy of Battle]] was the son of two circus performers. It seems that he got his [[OverlyLongTongue tongue]] from his mother and his ability to dislocate joints from his father. His story may or may not be based on [[XMen Nightcrawler]].

* In ''Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle'', the assassin known as the Thin Man is revealed (in a detailed flashback) to have been the child of Romanian circus performers who died in a fire.

* Eddie, the protagonist of The Five People You Meet In Heaven grew up (and spent the rest of his life) at a seaside amusement park. It was where he met his wife and eventually died; one of the eponymous people is the Blue Man from the freak show; a flashback shows Eddie using his ability to juggle to fight off his captors during the war in the Phillippines, etc.

* Bob Snarly from AnthonyHorowitz' YA novel The Switch is close to a deconstruction of the trope. He's a brat raised by circus people alright, but he's far from open-minded, instead behaving like common trailer trash. AnAesop is learned.

* One of the girls in a book called "About Face" grew up with a traveling circus when her dream is to stay in one town and own a house.

* Ernie Devlin in ''Devlin'', as well as his siblings Sandy and Todd. Overlaps with PromotionToParent as he had to raise them too.

* Carlotta in EnidBlyton's Summer at St Clares grew up in a circus. [[spoiler: She keeps this a secret but is betrayed by the school sneak. Her friends, however, are thrilled by her exotic background.]]

* Fear's [[BackStory back story]] as written in the MetalGearSolid3 fanfic [[FanFic/TheJoyOfBattle The Joy of Battle]] was the son of two circus performers. It seems that he got his [[OverlyLongTongue tongue]] from his mother and his ability to dislocate joints from his father.