Pierrot´s character developed from being a buffoon to an avatar of the disenfranchised. Many cultural movements found him amenable to their respective causes: Decadents turned him ...
[Read more]
into a disillusioned foe of idealism; Symbolists saw him as a lonely fellow-sufferer; Modernists made him into a silent, alienated observer of the mysteries of the human condition. Much of that mythic quality ("I´m Pierrot," said David Bowie: "I´m Everyman") still adheres to the "sad clown" in the postmodern era.