A Barbarian in Asia by Henri Michaux

Author:Henri Michaux [Michaux, Henri]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: e9780811220842
Publisher: New Directions
Published: 2015-08-11T16:00:00+00:00

When it comes to speed, they have nothing to learn from anyone. Into their drama, which is more varied than anything of the kind in Europe, they introduce everything—the nine ingredients, comedy, morality, poetry, action, etc. The play goes on without interruption for seven hours, through from two to two hundred and fifty scenes, and heaven knows how many changes of scenery. All this with a style and with gestures that are merely suggested, and at once forgotten. The whole thing is diverting, full of life.

The cinema taught them nothing. They were already much faster. The gags are followed by bursts of laughter in the house, loud, but immediately after gobbled up, swallowed, vanished. Discharges.

There is a power in all this that says: ‘Come on, don’t dawdle, cut it short!’ Someone sings, the same song is taken up at once in another key. Then suddenly the melody is broken off altogether, and then the key is changed again. The actors go out, leaving no atmosphere behind them. The scenes pass rapidly by in the natural chronological order, following each other very closely, and a donkey could understand it. As there is no atmosphere, interruptions are of no consequence. On the stage, a man reduced to extreme poverty begs for charity. A fellow, in jest (they all have a sense of the comic; many of the scenes are extraordinarily droll), a fellow in the orchestra seats throws him an anna (a sou), and immediately the whole house amuses itself throwing annas. This lasted, I am sure, from eight to ten minutes, then began all over again.

Another time I was present at the last performance of a theatrical troupe. They were giving a drama with a tendency to moralize, and its subject was poignant.

Well, right in the middle of the dialogue, the audience got up on the stage (generally children, and several of them at a time) to present flowers and garlands which the actor at once put around his neck, and oranges which he stuffed in his pockets, or as far as possible kept in his hands, and the performance went on.

Extremely embarrassing custom to the European—the feminine roles are played by men dressed as women, a kind of abortion, most of them, with at times a beautiful contralto voice in falsetto.

‘These roles,’ as someone in the audience explained to me, ‘could not be played by women. They are too difficult(!). The young men that you will see have practiced from their earliest years to learn how to be effeminate. And a man who practices goes much farther than a woman.’

Here, indeed, I said to myself, are arguments. But when I saw the actors, I was not too disappointed. They had in fact many feminine reflexes, every instant, even when standing apart, of which a woman is neglectful, if I may say so.

But make-believe cannot have the value of the natural.

I saw afterwards, in Madras, Sundarambal, the great Tamil actress, a marvelous singer, the only beautiful Dravidian woman I ever saw, and one most truly talented.

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