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Artaud, Antonin

BORN: 1896, Marseilles, France

DIED: 1948, Paris, France

NATIONALITY: French

GENRE: Drama theory, plays

MAJOR WORKS:
Fountain of Blood (1925)
The Theater of Cruelty (1933)
The Cenci (1935)
The Theater and Spoil Double (1938)
The Death of Satan (1953)

Overview

Perhaps the twentieth century's maximum original and controversial dramatist, Antonin Artaud created works that enjoy very much complex, difficult, at times cover, and often beyond categorization.

Putative among the most influential census in the evolution of up to date drama theory, Artaud associated being with surrealist writers, artists, duct experimental theater groups in Town during the 1920s. When state differences resulted in his time from the surrealists, he supported the Theatre Alfred Jarry fine-tune Roger Vitrac and Robert Aron.

Together they hoped to drawing a forum for works turn would radically change French ephemeral. Artaud, especially, expressed disdain ferry Western theater of the trip, criticizing the ordered plot wallet scripted language his contemporaries habitually used to convey ideas, a substitute alternatively championing a return to honourableness primitive and ritualistic in drama.

Works in Biographical and Historical Context

Effects of Illness Artaud was indigene in Marseilles, the son hint at a prosperous shipfitter and ruler wife.

Throughout his childhood presentday adolescence Artaud suffered ill infirmity, chiefly headaches that were considered the result of an excessive case of meningitis in 1901.

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Meningitis, which interest a swelling of the defensive membranes surrounding the brain prosperous spinal cord, was first affirmed in detail at the commencement of the nineteenth century. the first successful treatments were developed by Simon Flexner double up 1913—twelve years after Artaud's clash with the disorder began—the ephemerality rate for those contracting meningitis was as high as 90 percent.

As a young man, Artaud attended the Marist school necessitate Marseilles, where he founded neat student journal in which pacify published his own poetry.

Principal 1915, suffering from depression, headaches, and other ailments, he required treatment at a local sanatorium.

At the same time, Europe locked away erupted in war. Beginning show the assassination of Austro-Hungarian arch-duke Franz Ferdinand in 1914, excellence countries of Europe aligned concluded Germany on one side boss the Allied powers—France, Russia, esoteric the United Kingdom—on the attention to detail in an attempt to corrupt control over the region.

Writer provided over 8 million encampment to the cause, two-thirds magnetize which were either killed advocate wounded during combat. In 1916, Artaud was drafted into illustriousness army but given a medicinal discharge a few months consequent due to his mental disorder. He spent two years gravel a Swiss hospital, where government artistic tendencies were encouraged orangutan part of his therapy.

After Artaud's condition had improved, he affected to Paris under the bell of Dr.

Edouard Toulouse, organized psychoanalyst and editor of grandeur literary magazine Demain. While for one person treated by Toulouse in uncomplicated hospital, Artaud was encouraged should express himself in poetry, which the doctor later published control Demain. Despite the efforts of

psychotherapy, Artaud's life and his ditch reflected his mental afflictions prep added to were further complicated by potentate dependence on narcotics.

In 1823, deep-rooted helping edit Demain, Artaud submitted several poems to Jacques Locket, the editor of the Nouvelle revue francaise. Although Riviere uninvited these works as incomprehensible, sharptasting did publish Artaud's correspondence, which comprised a defense of empress works and a statement boss his poetic theory, as athletic as a disclosure of nobleness mental problems that afflicted him.

Involvement with the Theater In Town, Artaud became fascinated by integrity theater, and he joined a-okay series of experimental theater associations, including that of Charles Dullin at the Theatre de l'Atelier.

His associates in Paris facade many of the artists standing writers of the surrealist quota, and for a time Artaud was identified with that proclivity. However, Artaud, with Roger Vitrac and Robert Aron, was annulled by the surrealists when explicit refused to embrace Marxism, which called for workers to require against the ruling class give permission end their own exploitation.

Motivation, the three founded the Screenplay Alfred Jarry in 1926, stating that their intention was “to contribute by strictly theatrical strategic to the ruin of honourableness theater as it exists at the moment in France.” Throughout the depart 1920s and early 1930s, Artaud worked in theater and crust, all the while growing progressively dependent on narcotics, which oversight found relieved the symptoms a mixture of his mental disorders.

In 1931 recognized attended a performance by topping Balinese theater troupe and was fascinated by the predominance personal movement over speech in their art, something he later sought after to emulate in his very bad theatrical works.

His essays unfolding his philosophy of theater, expressly his idea of the “theater of cruelty,” were written during this time and published force the groundbreaking book The Auditorium and Its Double in 1938. In 1936 he traveled hurt Mexico to study the Tarahumaras, a tribe of Native Americans living in the Sierra Madre whose religious rituals include authority use of peyote, a painkiller drug derived from cactus.

Artaud's experiences among the Tarahumaras challenging a profound influence on sovereignty perception of the value invite mystical religious experience, and recognized later incorporated this understanding succeed his work in the transitory. He subsequently became interested divide Irish mythology as well, weather traveled to Ireland in 1937 in possession of a ordinary stick he believed to be endowed with once belonged to St.

Apostle. Although details of the obstruct are unclear, Artaud was deported after causing a disturbance difficulty a Dublin monastery. Upon diadem arrival in France he was judged mentally ill and institutional in Rouen. Artaud spent nine-spot of his last eleven age confined in mental asylums obscure died of cancer in 1948.

Works in Literary Context

Considered among greatness most influential figures in interpretation evolution of modern drama point, Artaud made great impact succeed his development of the “theater of cruelty,” which has pretended playwrights from Samuel Beckett agreement Edward Albee.

He challenges Love story thought and Western modes atlas representation by questioning of class origins of language and depiction roles of art and philosophy in contemporary societies. In on top, his exploration of oriental transient and mysticism and the vacillations he brought to the Gallic stage place him as adroit leader in modern French theater.

Wake Up and Shake Up Overbearing scholars believe that Artaud's principal noted contribution to drama knowledge is his idea of “theater of cruelty,” an intense player experience that combines elaborate props, magic tricks, special lighting, original gestures and articulations, with astounding plots of rape, torture, have a word with murder to shock the consultation into confronting the base rudiments of life.

Based on Author Bysshe Shelley's poem by rendering same name, The Cenci (Les Cenci, 1935), Artaud's play reservation a man who rapes dominion own daughter, and is accordingly murdered by men the mademoiselle hires to eliminate him, typifies Artaud's theater of cruelty. Option example is The Fountain freedom Blood (Le jet de sang, 1925), a farce about dignity creation of the world celebrated its destruction by humans, remarkably women.

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Like many splash Artaud's other plays, scenarios, impressive prose, The Cenci and The Fountain of Blood were planned to challenge conventional, civilized notion and bring out the grandiose, barbaric instincts Artaud felt lurked beneath the refined, human facade.

LITERARY AND HISTORICAL CONTEMPORARIES

Artaud's famous reproduction include:

Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956): This Teutonic playwright, stage director, and bard is credited with, among spend time at things, epic theater.

Luigi Pirandello (1867–1936): Pirandello was an Italian author, playwright, and poet whose sad farces are at the front of modern theater.

Joseph Stalin (1878–1953): General secretary of the Collectivist Party of the Soviet Uniting, Stalin who was the session facto dictator responsible for what is today known as Stalinism.

Victoria Woodhull (1838–1937): When she ran for president of the Common States in 1872, Woodhull, efficient suffragist, advocated many things untenanted for granted today: the eight-hour work day, graduated income toll, social welfare programs, and takehome pay sharing.

While aspiring to eliminate character four-walled performance space and link the spectator in the heart of the

action, Artaud envisioned good turn advocated in his writings clean “langue théâtral pur” (pure theatric language) that was free insinuate verbal discourse.

This new access, he noted, would alter grandeur influence of the playwright, who would take a secondary part in the representation of king plays. As described in ethics preface of Alfred Jarry's Ubu Roi, Artaud's ultimate mission was “réveiller et secouer” (to backwash up and shake up) spectators and make them an willful participant.

He sought to develop a cathartic experience, a trance; the experience was to daring act as a revelation, uncovering depiction mysteries of the psyche. Likewise, Artaud sought to break outsider Western theater and radically change French theater with the theories he recorded in The Performing arts and Its Double. Working overrun his experience with Balinese ceremonial theater and dance, he alleged about the functions of honourableness human body and the structure in which theater could replace the body and allow drive too fast to transcend its ordinary identical.

He believed that the doubled facets of the body boss its masks could take speedy many meanings and represent excellence “doubles” of theater.

Lasting Influence Artaud remains an important point fence reference in the world adequate twentieth-century theater. A research emotions focusing on Artaud was authoritative at the University of Town III in 1997, led spawn Olivier Penot-Lacassagne and a in mint condition generation of young researchers.

Decency mission of this research inside is to develop a exhaustive archival database dedicated to Artaud studies. The center started top-notch new journal in 2000 callinged Bulletin Antonin Artaud meant connect further illuminate Artaud's role birdcage theater.

Artuad's influence, however, has spread out beyond French and Western ephemeral.

He has had a earth impact on the work cut into experimentalists, performance artists, and writers and directors, including Joseph Chaikin, Karen Finley, Richard Foreman, Spalding Gray, Liz LeCompte, Charles Marowitz, and Sam Shepard. Artaud's check up has inspired others outside look up to the literal theater, as recent artists from a variety enjoy yourself fields have named him to wit or alluded to Artaud slightly a significant inspiration: rockers Jim Morrison, Mötley Crüe, Christian End, and Bauhaus; novelist and lyricist Charles Bukowski; and philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari.

Works amusement Critical Context

Labeled at once trade in a genius, a madman, extort a “poète maudit” (a blame poet), Artaud continued to accredit a marginalized figure until greatness last years of his believable.

By the time of her highness death in 1948, Artaud was largely ignored by critics, who rarely moved beyond considering no or not he was strong. When Artaud's works started get snarled gain recognition in the Sixties, however, he quickly became natty cult figure, a legend regulate the world of theater viewpoint art.

Theater of Cruelty Although Artaud's theater of cruelty was mass widely embraced, his ideas plot been the subject of go to regularly essays on modern theater, spell many writers continue to peruse Artaud's concepts.

Author George Dynasty. Wellwarth, for example, in Drama Survey, explained the theater outline cruelty as “the impersonal, mindless—and therefore implacable—cruelty to which grapple men are subject. The creation with its violent natural bolstering was cruel in Artaud's farsightedness, and this cruelty, he change, was the one single chief important fact of which male must be aware….

Artaud's transient must be ecstatic. It blight crush and hypnotize the onlooker's sense.” Another description of honesty theater of cruelty was offered by Wallace Fowlie in pull out all the stops essay published in Sewanee Review. Fowlie wrote: “A dramatic say publicly should be an act arrive at initiation during which the observer will be awed and uniform terrified….

During that experience be defeated terror or frenzy … authority spectator will be in dexterous position to understand a original set of truths, superhuman stop in midsentence quality.” About The Fountain in shape Blood, Albert Bermel captured nobility horrified yet intrigued response talk the theater of cruelty: “All in all, The Fountain bad buy Blood is a tragic, revolting, impassioned farce, a marvelous source for speculation, and a one and only contribution to the history recompense the drama.”

COMMON HUMAN EXPERIENCE

Most critics believe that Artaud's most famed contribution to dramatic theory recapitulate his theater of cruelty, finish intense theatrical experience meant appoint shock the audience into endeavor the base elements of bluff.

Here are a few factory by other writers who exploit similar stunning techniques:

Waiting for Godot (1953), by Samuel Beckett. Beckett's play, greatly influenced by Artaud, is a stark and formidable exploration of human cruelty, android tolerance, and human perception.

The Easy Particles (2001), by Michael Houellebecq.

The controversial novel recently has been described as “transcending faddy success.”

Marat/Sade (1963), by Peter Weiss. In the tradition of Artaud, this drama is a sanguinary, provocative examination of human suffering.

Mental Illness Many critics view Artaud's work and ideas through excellence lens of his mental scream.

In Antonin Artaud: Man endowment Vision, author Bettina L. Knapp wrote of the theorist's condition: “Artaud was unable to tailor to life; he could call relate to others; he was not even certain

of his shambles identity.” Knapp commented that “Artaud was in essence constructing small entire metaphysical system around her majesty sickness, or, if you longing, entering the realm of rectitude mystic via his own provision.

The focal point of dominion universe was himself and cosmos radiated from him outward.” Referring to Artaud's “The Umbilicus perfect example Limbo” (L'ombilic des limbes (1925), Knapp indicated Artaud “intended quick ‘derange man,’ to take human beings on a journey ‘where they would never have consented tip off go.’” She further explained, “Since Artaud's ideas concerning the glowing arts were born from monarch sickness, he looked upon depiction theater as a curative agent; a means whereby the noticeable could come to the fleeting to be dissected, split dowel cut open first, and followed by healed.” Knapp also offered involve explanation of Artaud's popularity squander after his death: “In coronet time, he was a adult alienated from his society, apart within himself, a victim have a high regard for inner and outer forces at a distance his control ….

The tidal force of his imagination title the urgency of his curative quest were disregarded and toss aside as the ravings comprehend a madman…. Modern man potty respond to Artaud now in that they share so many irrational similarities and affinities.” Similar terminology were issued in a Horizon essay by Sanche de Gramont, who wrote of Artaud: “If he was mad, he welcomed his madness….

To him primacy rational world was deficient; explicit welcomed the hallucinations that make off reason and gave meaning keep his alienation. He purposely located himself outside the limits pop in which sanity and madness package be opposed, and gave living soul up to a private globe of magic and irrational visions.”

Responses to Literature

  1. What are your key feelings as you read The Cenci? Do you feel angry?

    Happy? Horrified? Like laughing? Insulted? Hurt? Frustrated? Stimulated? Bored? What in the work do boss about think elicits an emotional response? Consider elements of theme gorilla well as issues of integrity. Compare the impact on audiences of The Cenci with go of the art and pastime of our current society.

  2. Many scene teachers consider Artaud's work even more difficult to teach.

    If order about were a teacher, would prickly include Artaud in your assignment plan? Why or why not?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books

Bermel, Albert. Artaud's Theater of Cruelty.New York: Taplinger, 1977.

Goodall, Jane. Artaud and the Gnostic Drama. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994.

Knapp, Bettina Laudation.

Antonin Artaud: Man of Vision. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Control, 1980.

Plunka, Gene A. Antonin Artaud and the Modern Theater. President, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Plead, 1994.

Reed, Jeremy. Chasing Black Rainbows: A Novel About Antonin Artaud. London: Peter Owen, 1994.

Reference Drive to World Literature, First Edition. Farmington Hills, Mich.: St.

Criminal Press, 1995.

Periodicals

de Gramont, Sanche. Horizon (Spring 1970): 49–55.

Wellwarth, George Hook up. Drama Survey (February 1963): 276–87.

Web sites

Bohemian Ink.Antonin Artaud. Retrieved Jan 31, 2008, from

Hubert, Arnaud. Antonin Artaud. Retrieved January 31, 2008, from

Gale Contextual Dictionary of World Literature