About the Cover Illustration

The figure on the cover of JavaFX in Action is a “carny” which is a slang term for a carnival or fun fair employee. The word carnival means a time of merrymaking, and fairs with animals, magicians, jugglers, rides, and booths selling trinkets as well as food and drink have been popular in Europe and America for centuries.

The illustration is taken from a 19th century edition of Sylvain Maréchal’s four-volume compendium of regional dress customs published in France. Each illustration is finely drawn and colored by hand. The rich variety of Maréchal’s collection reminds us vividly of how culturally apart the world’s towns and regions were just 200 years ago. Isolated from each other, people spoke different dialects and languages. In the streets or in the countryside, it was easy to identify where they lived and what their trade or station in life was just by what they were wearing.

Dress codes have changed since then and the diversity by region, so rich at the time, has faded away. It is now hard to tell apart the inhabitants of different continents, let alone different towns or regions. Perhaps we have traded cultural diversity for a more varied personal life—certainly for a more varied and fast-paced technological life.