On the High Wire by Philippe Petit

Author:Philippe Petit
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780811228657
Publisher: New Directions
Published: 2019-06-25T00:00:00+00:00

The king poles

The ­high-­wire walker no longer lives among the low branches of the trees. A new wire is waiting for him.

A solid gray wire, perhaps fifteen meters long, stretched out six or eight meters above the ground between two poles painted in the performer’s favorite color. On these poles the wire walker can rest, place his different balancing poles, store his chair or his bicycle, as well as his juggling clubs and unicycle. The platform floor should be a square of wood strong enough to support all the equipment and the aerialist himself. It is positioned below the cable. The platforms of ­low-­wire artists and ropedancers are positioned above the cable. They step down onto their cable. The ­high-­wire walker, however, steps up onto his. Along the vertical axis of the walk cable, and on each side, an ungreased cable is stretched down to the ground. One of these inclined cables is drawn out to maximum length for the Death Walk. It is along this path that you will climb up to the installation, unless you have the patience to build a ­hemp-­rope ladder with oak rungs.

Each pole is held vertically by the “obseclungs”—­two thin cables attached to the top of the pole that come down perpendicular to the walk line and form a ­forty-­­five-­degree angle with the ground. These guy wires are pulled into place by pulleys attached with “beckets” to “stakes.” The whole installation is thus anchored by the stakes, thick steel ­bars—­formerly wooden ­bars—­that are driven into the ground with sledgehammers. These in turn have a sling of steel or hemp attached to them. This is called the becket.

Putting up the king poles will be your first great joy as a ­high-­wire walker.

You measure the terrain. In the designated spots you lay out the pole sections that you will later fit together; these are hollow tubes or trussed pylons. Then you proceed to the “dressing”: one by one jibing the platforms and poles with all their cables, in an order so complicated that the neophyte will have to go through it several times before he can assume sole responsibility for it. It goes without saying that you must have won the friendship of an old ­high-­wire walker who will share his rigging secrets with you, and that he is with you now. If not, you will have to go about it according to your own ideas, and sooner or later you will pay for it with your life.

When the equipment is ready, you drive in the stakes. If five men produce a series of strokes in rapid ­succession—­“a flying five”—­watch out for the pieces of steel that whistle down, to land in a tree trunk twenty feet away, or in the flesh of a man who was not paying attention.

You raise up the king poles. One after the other. With the aid of a ­six-­sheave block and tackle. Then you attach the tightening device: a heavy chain hoist or a giant turnbuckle. This latter should not

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