On Chinese Acting
Author(s): Bertolt Brecht and Eric Bentley
Source: The Tulane Drama Review, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Sep., 1961), pp. 130-136
Published by: The MIT Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1125011
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THE TDR DOCUMENT
SERIES
Edited by Barnard Hewitt
ON CHINESE ACTING
By BERTOLT
BRECHT
In the following paper somethingwill be said about the use of
"alienation" in Chinese acting. The "alienation effect"has been used
in Germanyin plays of a non-Aristotelian
kind, that is, in plays which
are not based on empathy(einfuehlung).I referto various attemptsto
act in such a manner that the spectatoris preventedfromfeelinghis
way into the characters.Acceptanceor rejectionof the characters'words
is thusplaced in the consciousrealm,not, as hitherto,in the spectator's
subconscious.
The attemptto "alienate" the eventsbeing presentedfromthe audience was made in a primitiveway in the theatricaland pictoraldisplays
of old fairs. We also find it in the circus clown's manner of speech
and in the way in which so-called "panoramas"' are painted. The reproduction of the painting The Flight of Charles the Bold Afterthe
Battle of Murten,oftento be foundon German fairgrounds,
was always
inadequately painted. Yet the copyistachieved an alienation effectnot
to be found in the original; and one can scarcelyblame this on his
inadequacy. The fleeinggeneral, his horse, his retinue,and the landscape are quite consciouslypainted to give the impressionof an extraordinaryoccasion,a forbiddingcatastrophe.Despite his inadequacy the
painter admirablyproduces the effectof the unexpected; astonishment
guides his brush. This effectof estrangementis also known to the
Chinese actor,who uses it in a verysubtle manner.
(Everyoneknowsthatthe Chinese theatremakesuse of manysymbols.
A general wears little ribbons on his shoulders,as many, in fact, as
the regimentshe commands.Povertyis indicated by sewing irregular
patches onto silk robes, the patches being also of silk, thoughof a differentcolor. The personagesof a play are characterizedby a particular
kind of make-up,that is, simplyby paint. Certain gestureswith both
hands representthe forcibleopening of a door, and so forth.The stage
staysunchangedthougharticlesof furnitureare broughton during the
play. All thishas been knownfora long timeand can scarcelybe taken
over by us in toto. And one is accustomed to regard an artisticphenomenon in toto-as a whole. However,if you want to studyone particular effectamong many you have to break with this custom.)
In the Chinese theatrethe alienation effectis achieved in the following way. The Chinese performerdoes not act as if, in addition to the
threewalls around him therewere also a fourthwall. He makes it clear
that he knows he is being looked at. Thus, one of the illusions of the
European stage is set aside. The audience forfeitsthe illusion of being
unseen spectatorsat an event which is really taking place. The European stage has worked out an elaborate technique by which the fact
that scenes are so arrangedas to be easily seen by the audience is con130
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BERTOLTBRECHT
131
cealed. The Chineseapproachrendersthistechniquesuperfluous.
As
whichshowthem
openlyas acrobatstheactorscan choosethosepositions
offto bestadvantage.
Anotherexpedient is this: the actor looks at himself.Presenting,let
us say, a cloud, its unsuspectedappearance, its gentle yet strongdefromtime to time he
velopment,its speedyyet gradual transformation;
looks at the spectatoras if to say: Isn't it just like that?But he also looks
at his own arms and legs, guiding them,examining them,in the end,
perhaps praisingthem.If he glances at the flooror measuresthe space
available for his act, he sees nothingin this procedurethat could disturb the illusion. In thisway the performerseparatesmimicry2
(presenting the act of observation)fromgesture3(presentingthe cloud) but the
latter loses nothing thereby,for the attitude of the body reacts back
upon the face,gives to the face, as it were, its own expression.An expressionnow of complete reservation,now of uttertriumph.The performerhas used his face as an emptysheetof paper thatcan be written
on by bodily movement.
The performerwishes to appear alien to the spectator.Alien to the
point of arousing surprise.This he manages by seeing himselfand his
performanceas alien. In thisway the thingshe does on the stagebecome
astonishing.By this crafteverydaythingsare removedfromthe realm
of the self-evident.
A young woman, a fisherman'sdaughter, is shown on the stage,
rowinga boat. She stands up and steersthe (non-existent)boat with a
little oar that hardly comes down to her knees. The current runs
faster.Now it is harder for her to keep her balance. Now she is in a
bay and rows more quietly.Well, that'sthe way to row a boat. But this
voyage has an historicquality, as if it had been sung in many songs,
a most unusual voyage,known to everyone.Each of this famous
girl's
movementshas been preservedin pictures. Every bend in the river
was an adventure that one knows about. The bend she is now
approaching is well-known.This feeling in the spectatoris called forth
by the performer'sattitude.It is she who confersfame on the voyage.
(The scene remindsus of the march to Budweis in Piscator's production of The Good Soldier Schweik. Schweik's three day march
under
sun and moon to the front,which,curiouslyenough,he never reaches,
was seen in a completelyhistoricalway, as something
just as worth
thinkingabout as Napoleon's journey to Russia in 1812.)
To look at himselfis for the performeran artfuland artisticact of
self-estrangement.
Any empathyon the spectator'spart is therebyprevented from becoming total, that is, from being a complete
self-surrender.An admirable distance from the events
portrayedis achieved.
This is not to say that the spectatorexperiences
no empathywhatsoever. He feels his way into the actor as into an observer.
In this
manner an observing,watchingattitude is cultivated.
In manywaysthe art of the Chinese actor seems to the westernactor
cold. Not that the Chinese theatrerenounces the
presentationof feelings! The actor presentseventsof considerablepassionateness,but his
deliveryremainsunimpassioned.At momentswhen the presentedcharacter is deeply excited, the performertakes a strand of hair
his lips and bites it. That is prettymuch of a rite; there is between
nothing
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132
The Tulane Drama Review
eruptive about it. Clearly it is a matterof the repetitionof an event
by anotherman, a rendering(artistic,certainly).The performershows
that this man is beside himselfand he indicates the outward signs of
such a state of mind. This is the proper way to express being beside
oneself.(It may be impropertoo, but not for the stage.) Anywaya few
special symptomsare chosen out of many--obviouslywith great deliberation. Anger is naturallydistinguishedfrom fury,hate from dislike, love from sympathy,but the various movementsof feeling are
sparinglypresented.The pervading coolness arises from the fact that
the individual is not so much the center of interestas in western
theatre.True, the cult of the star has gone furtherin Asia than perhaps anywhereelse. The spectator'seyes positivelyhang on the star.
The otherroles give him the cue to the star,place obstaclesin his way,
show him off.Nevertheless,the starplaces himselfat a distancefromthe
role he plays in the manner just described.He guards against making
the audience feel exactly what the characteris feeling. Nobody will
be raped by the individual he presents.This individual is not the
spectator but his neighbor.
The western performerdoes all he can to bring the spectator as
close as possible to the events and the characterbeing presented.To
this end he gets him to feel his way into him, the actor. He spends all
his strengthon transforminghimself as completely as possible into
another type of person,the type being presented.When this complete
transformation
is achieved, his art is prettymuch exhausted. Once he
is the bank clerk,thedoctor,thegeneral,he needs just as littleart as the
bank clerk,the doctor or the general need in real life. The act of comoneselftakes a lot of trouble to accomplish.Stanipletelytransforming
slavski provides a whole list of devices, a whole systemof devices, by
means of which this "creativemood" can be produced afreshat each
performance.Usually the actor does not succeed for long in really feeling like the other person. He soon begins, in his exhaustion,to copy
certain external featuresof his carriage or tone of voice, and thereby
the effecton the audience is appallinglyweakened. Doubtless the reason
is that the creationof the Other Man was an intuitiveact takingplace
in the subconscious.The subconsciousis veryhard to regulate. It has,
so to speak, a bad memory.
The Chinese performerknows nothing of these difficulties.He
eschews complete transformation.He confineshimself at the outset
to merelyquoting the character.But with how much art he does thisl
He requires only a minimumof illusion. What he shows is worthseeing even to thosewho are not out of theirsenses. What westernactor,
with the exception of a comedian or so, could do what the Chinese
actor Mei-Lan-Fangdoes--show the elementsof his craftclad in evening
dress in a room with no special lights before an audience of professionals? The scene of Lear's division of his kingdom,let us say, or
Othello and the handkerchief?He'd be like a conjurer at a fairground
showinghis magical tricks,which no one would want to see a second
time. He would merelyshow how one dissembles.The hypnosiswould
pass and there would remain a couple of pounds of badly beaten-up
mimicry,a commodityquickly throwntogetherfor sale in the dark
to customerswho are in a hurry.Naturally,no westernactor would
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BERTOLT
BRECHT
133
arrange such a performance.Isn't art sacrosanct?Isn't theatricalmetamorphosisa mysticalprocess?He lays store by the fact that what he
does is unconscious;it has more value forhim that way. A comparison
with Asiatic acting showshow deeply parsonic our art still is.
Certainlyit getsharderall the time forour actorsto consummatethe
of completetransformation.
Their subconsciousmind's memory
mystery
is gettingweaker all the time. And even when the actor is a genius
it is hard to createtruthout of the adulteratedintuitionof a memberof
a class society.
It is difficultfor the actor to generate certain emotions and moods
in himselfeveryevening and comparativelyeasy to renderthe outward
signs that accompany and denote these emotions.Certainly the transference of these emotions to the spectator,the emotional contagion,
does not take place automatically.The "alienation effect"entersin at
this point, not in the formof emotionlessness,
but in the formof emotions which do not have to be identical with those of the presented
character.The spectatorcan feel joy at the sight of sorrow,disgustat
the sightof anger.We speak of renderingthe outwardsignsof emotions
as a way of effectingalienation. This procedure may, however, fail
to do so. The actor can so render these signs and select these signs
that, on the contrary,emotional contagion follows,because the actor
has, while renderingthe signs,generatedin himselfthe emotionsto be
presented.The actor can easily stirup anger withinhimselfby letting
his voice swell and by holding his breath,also by drawing his throat
musclestogetherso that the blood flowsto his head. In thiscase, alienation is out of the question. On the other hand, alienation does occur
when at a particularpoint and without transitionthe actor
displays a
deadly pale face which he has acquired artificially.(He held his
face in his hands, and in his hands was some white grease paint.) If
the actor exhibitsat the same time an
apparentlyundisturbednature,
his frightat this point in the play (occasioned by a piece of news or
a discovery)will produce the alienation effect.To act in this manner
is more healthyand, it seems to us, more worthyof a
thinkingbeing.
It calls fora considerableknowledgeof men, a considerable
general inand
a
keen
of
what
is
telligence,
grasp
socially
Obviously
.a
creative process is going on here too. And oneimportant.
of a higher sort,since
it belongs to the sphere of consciousness.
Obviously the alienation effectin no way presupposesan unnatural
styleof acting.One must at all costsnot thinkof what is called Stylization. On the contrarythe successof the alienation effectis dependent on
the lightnessand naturalnessof the whole procedure. And
when the
actorcomesto examine the truthof thisperformance-a
necessary
operation,whichgives Stanislavskia lot of trouble-he is not
merelythrown
back on his naturalsensibility.He can alwaysbe corrected
reference
to reality.Does an angryman reallyspeak like that?Does aby
man
guilty
sit like that?He can be corrected,thatis, fromwithout,by other
people.
His style is such that nearly every sentence could be
the
audience. Nearly every gesture is submitted to the judged by
approval of the
audience.
The Chinese actor is in no trance. He can be
interruptedat any
moment. There is no question of his
"coming to." After an inter-
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134
The Tulane Drama Review
ruption he will take up his performanceat the exact place where he
was interrupted.We disturbhim at no mysticmomentof creation. He
had finished"creating"beforehe came on the stage. If scene building
is going on while he is acting,he doesn't mind. Stagehandshand him
whateverhe needs for his work quite openly. During a death scene
played by Mei-Lan-Fang a spectatorsittingnear me let out a startled
cryat one of the actor'sgestures.Several spectatorsin frontof us turned
indignantlyaround and hissed: Shl They conducted themselvesas at
the death of some real girl. Perhaps their behavior was right for a
European production,but it was unspeakablyridiculous in a Chinese
theatre.The alienation effecthad misfired.
It is not altogethereasy to regard the alienation effectof Chinese
acting as something that can be shaken loose from the Chinese
theatre and exported. The Chinese theatreseems to us uncommonly
precious,its presentationof human passions merelyschematic,its conception of societyrigid and false. At firstsight nothing in this great
art seems useful in a realisticand revolutionarytheatre.The motives
and aims of the alienation effectare alien and suspect.
In the firstplace it is difficult,
when watching the Chinese act, to
rid ourselvesof the feeling of strangenessthat they arouse in us because we are Europeans. One must be able to imagine they achieve
the alienation effectalso in their Chinese spectators.But, and this is
more difficult,
we must not allow ourselvesto be disturbedat the fact
that the Chinese performercreates an impression of mysteryfor a
quite differentpurpose from any that we can envisage. If one has
learned to thinkdialecticallyone can findit possible that a technique
which is taken fromthe realm of magic can be used to combat magic
with. The Chinese performermay intend to use the alienation effect
to make the eventson stage mysterious,
incomprehensible,and uncontrollable to the audience. And yet this effectcan be used to make
the events mundane, comprehensible,and controllable.
The attitudeof the scientist,who at firstviews the object of his investigationwith astonishment,
may resemblethe attitudeof a magician.
Yet these apparentlyidentical attitudeshave a preciselyopposite function.Whoeverfindsthe formula2 X 2 = 4 obvious is no mathematician;
neitheris the man who doesn'tknowwhat the formulameans. The man
who viewed a lamp swinging on a rope with astonishmentat first
and found it not obvious but very remarkable that the lamp swung
thus and not otherwise-such a man approached the understandingof
the phenomenon and, with this, the masteryof the phenomenon. It
won't do to exclaim that this attitude is appropriate to science alone
and not to art. Why shouldn't art try(by its own means, of course)
to contributeto the great social task of masteringlife?
A technical featurelike the alienation effectin Chinese acting can
be studied with profitonly by those who need such a featurefor particular social purposes. As charm, novelty, finesse,and formalistic
frivolityit could never become significant.
Moreover,in the experimentsof the new German theatre,the alienation effectwas developed quite independently.The influenceof Asiatic
acting was nil.
In the German epic theatrethe alienation effectwas employed not
only through the actors but also through the music (choruses and
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BERTOLT
BRECHT
135
solos) and the decor (placards, film,etc.). The aim was the historification of the eventspresented.Under thishead the followingis meant.
The bourgeois theatre (this is everythingthat we think of when
we speak of theatre in general) siftsout fromits materials the timeless element. The presentationof the human being stops with the socalled Eternally Human. By a certain ordering of the plot or fable,
general situationsare created in which Man-the man of all periods
and everycolor--can expresshimself.Events on stage are all one long
cue, the cue for the Eternal Answer, the inevitable, usual, natural,
human answer.Here is an example. The black man loves in the same
way as the whiteman. But only when the plot extortsthe same reaction
fromhim as the white man gives (the formula presumablyworks in
reversetoo) is the resultcalled Art. The peculiar and distinctelements
may have a place in the cue; the answer is the same for both; and in
the answer there is nothingpeculiar and distinct.
Such a philosophymay acknowledgethe existenceof historybut it is
an unhistoricalphilosophy. Certain circumstancesmay be changed;
milieus are transformed;but man does not change. Historyis valid for
the milieu; but not for man. The milieu is so essentially
unimportant,
is understoodjust as the occasion for things.A variable quantity,
and
essentiallyinhuman, it really exists without man. It confrontshim
as a closed unity. And he is foreverunchanged, a fixed quantity. To
regardman as a variable which,moreover,controlsthe milieu, to conceive of the liquidation of the milieu in relationshipsbetween menthese notions spring froma new mode of thought,historical
thought.
An example will cut short this historical-philosophical
excursion.
The following is to be presented on the stage. A girl leaves her
familyto take a job in a big city.(Dreiser's American Tragedy,which
was adapted to the stage by Piscator.)For the bourgeoistheatre
the idea
is a prettylimited one. It constitutesonly the
of a story,
beginning
the bit of informationwe must have if we are to understand or be
excited by what follows.The actor's imaginationcan hardly be set in
motion at all by this.In a way the event is general: girlsdo take
jobs.
And in thiscase one can be excitedat the thoughtof what in
particular
will happen to her. The event is also peculiar: this girl leaves
home;
had she stayed, the following would not have occurred. The important thing is what kind of girl she is. What is her character?That
her familylets her go is not a subject for investigation.It is credible.
Motives are "credible."
For our history-making
theatreit is otherwise.It seizes on the special,
the particular, on what needs investigationin this
event.
What? The familylets one of its members leave theeveryday roof?
paternal
To live quite independentlyand earn her
living without assistance?
Can she do it? Will what she has learned in
the
help her to
earn her living?Can familiesnot keep theirchildrenfamily
more?Are they
any
a burden? Is this so in all families?Was it
so? Is this the way
of the world and not to be affected?"Whenalways
the fruitis ripe, it falls
fromthe tree:" does the proverbapply? If children
always and at all
times make themselvesindependent, if this is
something biological,
does it always happen in the same way, for the same
reason, with the
same results?
These are the questions---orsome of them-that the actors have to
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The Tulane Drama Review
136
answer if they want to present the event as a unique historicalone,
if they want to point to it as a custom which provides a key to the
whole social structureof a particular, transitoryperiod. How can
such an event be presentedso that its historicalcharactercomes out?
How can the confusion of our unhappy age be made to stand out
while a mother,amid warningsand moraldemands,packs her daughter's
bag, which is a verysmall bag? So many demands and so little underwear? Warnings for a lifetimeand bread for five hours? How is this
to be put on the stage?When she hands the small bag to her daughter
the mothersays: "Well, I thinkthat'llbe enough." How can the actress
playing the role speak this sentence so that it will be understood as
an historicalexpression?It can only be done if the alienation effect
is broughtoff.The actressmust not make of this sentence an affairof
her own. She musthand it over forcriticism.She mustmake it possible
for the audience to understandthe motivesbehind it. She must make
protestpossible.
In the Artef Players Collective in New York (1935), I saw a stage
version of Samuel Ornitz' Haunch, Paunch and Jowl, which showed
how an east-sideboy rose to be a corruptlawyer. The theatre could
not play the piece. And yet scenes like this were in it. Sittingin the
streetin frontof his house, the younglawyergives legal advice at very
low prices. A young woman comes with the complaint that her leg
had been damaged in a traffic
accident.But the case was bungled. Her
claim for compensation has not yet been handed in. In despair she
points at her leg and shouts: "It's healing already!" Working without
the alienation effect,this theatre could not adequately display the
horrorof a bloody age in this extraordinaryscene. Few people in the
auditorium paid any attention to it. Few of them, even if they read
these lines, would rememberthe woman's cry. The actressspoke it as
somethingobvious. But preciselythe fact that such a complaint seems
obvious to the poor woman the actressshould have reported to the
audience as an outraged messengerreturningfromthe lowest of hells.
In this she would have needed to be helped by a special technique to
underline the historical nature of a given social condition. Only the
alienation effectmakes this possible.
In bringingforwardnew artisticprinciplesand in workingout new
methodsof presentationwe mustproceed fromthe imperativedemands
of an age of transition.It seemspossibleand necessaryto rebuild society.
All eventsin the human realm are being examined. Everythingmust be
seen from the social standpoint. Among other effects,a new theatre
will find the alienation effectnecessaryfor the criticismof societyand
for historicalreportingon changes already accomplished.
Translated by ERIC BENTLEY
NOTES
xA "panorama"is a seriesof picturesused by a ballad singeras an ac-
companimentto his songs.
2Mimik.
3Gestik.
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