‘In my own room,’ I said, ‘at night.’
‘Good,’ said he. ‘If I were to be carried into those surroundings, it would be absolutely necessary for me first to make an approach to the house; to climb the outer steps; to ring the bell; to go through, in short, a whole series of acts leading up to my being in my room.
‘Do you see a door-knob to grasp? Do you feel it turn? Does the door swing open? Now what is in front of you?’
‘Straight before me is a closet, a bureau.’
‘What do you see on the left?’
‘My sofa, and a table.’
‘Try walking up and down; living in the room. What are you thinking about?’
‘I have found a letter, remember that it is not answered, and am embarrassed.’
‘Evidently you are in your room,’ the Director declared. ‘Now what are you going to do?’
‘It depends on what time it is,’ said I.
‘That’, said he in a tone of approval, ‘is a sensible remark. Let us agree that it is eleven o’clock at night.’
‘The very best time,’ said I, ‘when everybody in the house is likely to be asleep.’
‘Just why’, he asked, ‘do you particularly want this quiet?’
‘To convince myself that I am a tragic actor.’
‘It is too bad you wish to use your time to such poor purpose; how do you plan to convince yourself?’
‘I shall play, just for myself, some tragic role.’
‘What role? Othello?’
‘Oh, no!’ I exclaimed. ‘I can’t play Othello in my own room. Every corner there has associations, and would only lead me to copy what I did before.’
‘Then, what are you going to play?’ the Director demanded.
I did not answer, because I had not decided, so he asked: ‘What are you doing now?’
‘I am looking around the room. Perhaps some object, some accidental thing, will suggest a creative theme.’
‘Well,’ he prodded, ‘have you thought of anything yet?’
I began to think aloud. ‘Back in my closet’, I said, ‘there is a dark corner. One hook there is just right for a person to hang himself on. If I wanted to hang myself, how should I go about it?’
‘Yes?’ urged the Director.
‘Of course, first of all, I should need to find some rope, or belt, a strap . . .’
‘Now what are you doing?’
‘I am going over my drawers, shelves, closets, to find a strap.’
‘Do you see anything?’
‘Yes, I have the strap. But unfortunately the hook is too near the floor; my feet would touch.’
‘That is inconvenient,’ the Director agreed. ‘Look around for another hook.’
‘There is not another hook that would hold me.’
‘Then possibly you had better remain alive, and busy yourself with something more interesting, and less exciting.’
‘My imagination has dried up,’ said I.
‘There is nothing surprising in that,’ said he. ‘Your plot was not logical. It would be most difficult to arrive at a logical conclusion to commit suicide because you were considering a change in your acting. It was only reasonable that your imagination should balk at being asked to work from a doubtful premise to a stupid conclusion.
‘Nevertheless this exercise was a demonstration of a new way of using your imagination, in a place where everything was familiar to you. But what will you do when you are called upon to imagine an unfamiliar life?’
‘Suppose you take a journey around the world. You must not think it out “somehow”, or “in general”, or “approximately”, because all those terms do not belong in art. You must do it with all the details proper to such a large undertaking. Always remain in close contact with logic and coherence. This will help you to hold unsubstantial and slippery dreams close to steady solid facts.
‘Now I want to explain to you how you can use the exercises we have been doing in various combinations. You can say to yourself: “I will be a simple spectator, and watch what my imagination paints for me, while I take no part in this imaginary life.”
‘Or if you decide to join in the activities of this imaginary life you will mentally picture your associates, and yourself with them, and again you will be a passive spectator.
‘In the end you will tire of being an observer, and wish to act. Then as an active participant in this imaginary life you will no longer see yourself, but only what surrounds you, and to this you will respond inwardly, because you are a real part of it.’
4
Today the Director opened his remarks by telling us what we must always do when the author, the director, and the others who are working on a production, leave out things we need to know.
We must have, first of all, an unbroken series of supposed circumstances in the midst of which our exercise is played. Secondly we must have a solid line of inner visions bound up with those circumstances, so that they will be illustrated for us. During every moment we are on the stage, during every moment of the development of the action of the play, we must be aware either of the external circumstances which surround us (the whole material setting of the production), or of an inner chain of circumstances which we ourselves have imagined in order to illustrate our parts.
Out of these moments will be formed an unbroken series of images, something like a moving picture. As long as we are acting creatively, this film will unroll and be thrown on the screen of our inner vision, making vivid the circumstances among which we are moving. Moreover, these inner images create a corresponding mood, and arouse emotions, while holding us within the limits of the play.
‘As to those inner images,’ the Director asked, ‘is it correct to say that we feel them to be inside of us? We possess the faculty to see things which are not there by making a mental picture of them. Take this chandelier. It exists outside of me. I look at it, and have the sensation that I am putting out, towards it, what you might call visual feelers. Now I close my eyes and see that chandelier again on the screen of my inner vision.
‘The same process occurs when we are dealing with sounds. We hear imaginary noises with an inner ear, and yet we feel the sources of these sounds, in the majority of cases, to be outside of us.
‘You can test this in various ways such as giving a coherent account of your whole life in terms of images you remember. This may sound difficult, but I think you will find that this work is actually not so complicated.’
‘Why is that?’ asked several students at once.
‘Because, although our feelings and emotional experiences are changeable and incapable of being grasped, what you have seen is much more substantial. Images are much more easily and firmly fixed in our visual memories, and can be recalled at will.’
‘The whole question then,’ said I, ‘is how to create a whole picture?’
‘That question’, said the Director, as he rose to leave, ‘we will discuss next time.’
5
‘Let us make an imaginary moving picture,’ said the Director as he came into class today.
‘I am going to choose a passive theme because it will necessitate more work. At this point, I am not so much interested in the action itself as in the approach to it. That is why I suggest that you, Paul, are living the life of a tree.’
‘Good,’ said Paul with decision. ‘I am an age-old oak! However, even though I have said it, I don’t really believe it.’
‘In that case,’ suggested the Director, ‘why don’t you say to yourself: “I am I; but if I were an old oak, set in certain surrounding conditions, what would I do?” and decide where you are, in a forest, in a meadow, on a mountain top; in whatever place affects you most.’
Paul knit his brows, and finally decided that he was standing in an upland meadow near the Alps. To the left, there is a castle on a height.
‘What do you see near you?’ asked the Director.
‘On myself I see a thick covering of leaves, which rustle.’
; ‘They do indeed,’ agreed the Director. ‘Up there the winds must often be strong.’
‘In my branches,’ continued Paul, ‘I see some birds’ nests.’
The Director then pushed him to describe every detail of his imaginary existence as an oak tree.
When Leo’s turn came he made the most ordinary, uninspired choice. He said he was a cottage in a garden in the Park.
‘What do you see?’ asked the Director.
‘The Park,’ was the answer.
‘But you cannot see the whole Park at once. You must decide on some one definite spot. What is there right in front of you?’
‘A fence.’
‘What kind of a fence?’
Leo was silent, so the Director went on: ‘What is this fence made of?’
‘What material? . . . Cast iron.’
‘Describe it. What is the design?’
Leo drew his finger around on the table for a long time. It was evident that he had not thought out what he had said.
‘I don’t understand. You must describe it more clearly.’
Obviously Leo was making no effort to arouse his own imagination. I wondered of what use such passive thinking could possibly be, so I asked the Director about it.
‘In my method of putting a student’s imagination to work,’ he explained, ‘there are certain points which should be noted. If his imagination is inactive I ask him some simple question. He will have to answer, since he has been addressed. If he responds thoughtlessly, I do not accept his answer. Then, in order to give a more satisfactory answer, he must either rouse his imagination or else approach the subject through his mind, by means of logical reasoning. Work on the imagination is often prepared and directed in this conscious, intellectual manner. The student sees something, either in his memory or in his imagination: certain definite visual images are before him. For a brief moment, he lives in a dream. After that, another question, and the process is repeated. So with a third and fourth, until I have sustained and lengthened that brief moment into something approaching a whole picture. Perhaps, at first, this is not interesting. The valuable part about it is that the illusion has been woven together out of the student’s own inner images. Once this is accomplished, he can repeat it once or twice or many times. The more often he recalls it, the more deeply it will be printed in his memory, and the more deeply he will live into it.
‘However, we sometimes have to deal with sluggish imaginations, which will not respond to even the simplest questions. Then I have only one course open, I not only propound the question, I also suggest the answer. If the student can use that answer he goes on from there. If not, he changes it, and puts something else in its place. In either case he has been obliged to use his own inner vision. In the end something of an illusory existence is created, even if the material is only partially contributed by the student. The result may not be entirely satisfactory, but it does accomplish something.
‘Before this attempt has been made, the student has either had no image in his mind’s eye, or what he had was vague and confused. After the effort he can see something definite and even vivid. The ground has been prepared in which the teacher or the director can sow new seeds. This is the canvas on which the picture will be painted. Moreover, the student has learned the method by which he can take his imagination in hand and ply it with problems which his own mind will suggest. He will form the habit of deliberately wrestling with the passivity and inertia of his imagination, and that is a long step ahead.’
6
Today we continued the same exercises in developing our imaginations.
‘At our last lesson’, said the Director to Paul, ‘you told me who you were, where you were, and what you saw, with your inner eye. Now describe to me what your inner ear hears as an imaginary old oak tree.’
At first Paul could not hear anything.
‘Don’t you hear anything in the meadow around you?’
Then Paul said he could hear the sheep and the cows, the munching of grass, the tinkle of the cow-bells, the gossip of the women resting after their work in the fields.
‘Now tell me when all this is happening in your imagination,’ said the Director with interest.
Paul chose the feudal period.
‘Then, do you, as an aged oak, hear sounds that are particularly characteristic of that time?’
Paul reflected for a moment, and then said that he could hear a wandering minstrel on his way to a festival at the nearby castle.
‘Why do you stand alone in a field?’ the Director asked.
In response Paul gave the following explanation. The whole knoll on which the solitary old oak stands was formerly covered by a thick forest. But the baron of the nearby castle was constantly in danger of attack, and, fearing that this forest could hide the movements of his enemy’s forces, he cut it down. Only this one powerful old oak was allowed to stand. It was to protect a spring, which, rising in its shade, provided the necessary water for the baron’s flocks.
The Director then observed: ‘Generally speaking, this question—for what reason?—is extremely important. It obliges you to clarify the object of your meditations, it suggests the future, and it impels you to action. A tree, of course, cannot have an active goal, nevertheless, it can have some active significance, and can serve some purpose.’
Here Paul intervened and suggested: ‘The oak is the highest point in the neighbourhood. Therefore it serves as a lookout, a protection against attack.’
‘Now’, the Director then said, ‘that your imagination has gradually accumulated a sufficient number of given circumstances, let us compare notes with the beginning of this piece of work. At first all you could think of was that you were an oak standing in a meadow. Your mind’s eye was full of generalities, clouded like a poorly developed negative. Now you can feel the earth under your roots. But you are deprived of the action necessary on the stage. Therefore there is one more step to be taken. You must find some single new circumstance that will move you emotionally and incite you to action.’
Paul tried hard, but could think of nothing.
‘In that case,’ said the Director, ‘let us try to solve the problem indirectly. First of all, tell me what you are most sensitive to in real life. What, more often than anything else, arouses your feelings—your fear or your joy? I am asking this quite apart from the theme of your imaginary life. When you know the inclinations of your own nature it is not difficult to adapt them to imaginary circumstances. Therefore, name some one trait, quality, interest, which is typical of you.’
‘I am very much excited by any kind of fight,’ said Paul after a moment of reflection.
‘In that case a raid by the enemy is what we want. The forces of the hostile neighbouring duke are already swarming up the meadow in which you stand. The fight will start here at any moment now. You will be showered with arrows from the enemy crossbows, and some will be pointed with flaming pitch—steady now, and decide before it is too late, what you would do if this really happened to you.’
But Paul could only storm inside of himself without being able to do anything. Finally he broke out:
‘What can a tree do to save itself when it is rooted in the earth and incapable of moving?’
‘For me your excitement is sufficient,’ said the Director, with evident satisfaction. ‘This particular problem is insoluble, and you are not to blame if the theme has no action in it.’
‘Then why did you give it to him?’ was asked.
‘Just to prove to you that even a passive theme can produce an inner stimulus and challenge to action. This is an example of how all of our exercises for developing the imagination should teach you to prepare the material, the inner images, for your role.’
7
At the beginning of our lesson today the Director made a few remarks about the value of imagination in freshening up and refurbishing something the actor has already prepared and used.
He showed us how to introduce a fresh supposition into our exercise w
ith the madman behind the door which entirely changed its orientation.
‘Adapt yourself to the new condition, listen to what they suggest to you, and—act !’
We played with spirit and real excitement, and were complimented.
The end of the lesson was devoted to summing up what we had accomplished.
‘Every invention of the actor’s imagination must be thoroughly worked out and solidly built on a basis of facts. It must be able to answer all the questions (when, where, why, how) that he asks himself when he is driving his inventive faculties on to make a more and more definite picture of a make-believe existence. Sometimes he will not need to make all this conscious, intellectual effort. His imagination may work intuitively. But you have seen for yourselves that it cannot be counted on. To imagine “in general”, without a well-defined and thoroughly founded theme is a sterile occupation.
‘On the other hand, a conscious, reasoned approach to the imagination often produces a bloodless, counterfeit presentment of life. That will not do for the theatre. Our art demands that an actor’s whole nature be actively involved, that he give himself up, both mind and body, to his part. He must feel the challenge to action physically as well as intellectually because the imagination, which has no substance or body, can reflexively affect our physical nature and make it act. This faculty is of the greatest importance in our emotion-technique.
‘Therefore: Every movement you make on the stage, every word you speak, is the result of the right life of your imagination.
‘If you speak any lines, or do anything, mechanically, without fully realizing who you are, where you came from, why, what you want, where you are going, and what you will do when you get there, you will be acting without imagination. That time, whether it be short or long, will be unreal, and you will be nothing more than a wound-up machine, an automaton.
‘If I ask you a perfectly simple question now, “Is it cold out today?” before you answer, even with a “yes”, or “it’s not cold”, or “I didn’t notice”, you should, in your imagination, go back on to the street and remember how you walked or rode. You should test your sensations by remembering how the people you met were wrapped up, how they turned up their collars, how the snow crunched underfoot, and only then can you answer my question.
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