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Creative Matter Master of Arts in Liberal Studies (MALS)

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11-1-1997

Modern Drama and Culture: A Dramaturgy of August Strindberg's A Dream Play Stephen Aiello Skidmore College

Follow this and additional works at: http://creativematter.skidmore.edu/mals_stu_schol Part of the Dramatic Literature, Criticism and Theory Commons Recommended Citation Aiello, Stephen, "Modern Drama and Culture: A Dramaturgy of August Strindberg's A Dream Play" (1997). Master of Arts in Liberal Studies (MALS). Paper 8.

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M od ern Dram a and Culture : A D ramaturgy of August Stri ndberg 's A Dream Play by Step h en A i e l lo

Final Project S u bm itted i n Part i al Fu lfil l m ent of the R eq u i rem ents for the Deg ree of M aster of Arts i n Li beral Studies

S k i d m ore Co l l eg e August 1 997

Advi sors : Victor L. Cah n, Daniel Bal m uth

Aiello 1

Table of Co ntents

I.

A N ew Con sciousness Em erges

11.

The R evolt of the N ew Consciousn ess

Il l . Nyanatu ral i sm in Strind berg 's A Dream Play

IV.

Concl u sion : Strind berg as The Poet

V. A Dream Play

in Perform ance : Prod uction Notes

Aiel lo 2 Photography Credits

Figure # 1 : M eyer, M ichael . Strindberg: A Biography. New York, N Y: R andom House, Inc. , ! 985. Figures #2 & 3 : Tornqvist, Eg i l . "Stag i ng A Dream Play." Strindberg's Dramaturgy. Goran Stockenstro m , ed. M i n n eapolis, M N : The U n i versity of M i n n esota Press, 1 988. Fig ure #4: Styan , J . L. . Modern Drama in Theory and Practice, volume 3. N ew York, N Y : P ress Syndicate of the U n iversity of Cam bridge, 1 993. Figu res #5 t h roug h#1 2 : Tornqvist, Eg i l . "Staging A Dream Play." Strindberg's Dramaturgy.

Goran Stockenstro m , ed . M i n n eapolis, M N : The U n iversity of

M i n n esota P ress, 1 988.

Aiello 3

Abstract

The prim ary o bjective of this paper is to show a con nection between a revolution i n thought, a " n ew consciousness , " of young i ntel l ectuals at the turn of the n i n eteenth century and the ideas of their forefath ers that preceded them. The p h rase, "new con sciou sness , " to which this paper frequently refers, is som ewhat of a m isnomer in that the d evelopm ent of these revo l utionary ideas was i ntim ately rel ated to the philosoph ical , scientific, political and aesthetic trad ition s from which the g eneration of 1 900 sou g ht to separate them selves. I n their eag erness to find an identity, what those of that era chose to define as " n ew" was actually the result of a creative synthesis formed fro m the d i al ectic of what they as a generation i n h erited and what they i m agined . I n dramatic l iterature, no better exam ple of such a synthesis exists than Aug ust Stri ndberg 's, A Dream Play, which so i n novatively and powerf u l l y merges naturalism , the l iterary form of the material and scientific con sciousness of the n i n eteenth century and expressioni sm , the form of the subjective and i rrational mod ern m i nd of the twentieth century.

Aiello 4

Indra's Voice. Where art thou, Daughter? Daughter. Here, Father, here! Indra's Voice. Thou hast strayed, my child. Take heed, thou sinkest. How cam'st thou here?

Daughter. Borne on a cloud, I followed the lightening's blazing trail from the ethereal heights. But the cloud sank, and is still falling. Tell me, great Father Indra, to what region am I come? The air's so dense, so hard to breathe. . .

( Prologue to August

Stri n d berg 's A Dream Play (197, 198). 1

I . A New Consciousn ess Em erg es

T h e constriction in h er breath ing that I nd ra's daughter experiences from the atmosphere of earth while o n her quest to learn the true n ature of "th e Creator's c h i ldren" (198) in August Strind berg's A Dream Play echoes sim i l ar fee l i ng s of strang u l ation that Stri nd berg and the other i ntel l ectuals of the pre-World War I generation expressed i n reg ards to what they con sidered as a m iasma of stagn ant and desiccated n i n eteenth century thought. Historian Robert Woh l describes the attitude of ' All textual references are to the following edition: Strindberg, August. A Dream Play. translated by Elizabeth Sprigge. New York, NY: Doubleday, 1955.

Aiello 5 these yo u n g i ntel lectuals toward s the world they i n herited from their forefathers as one of com plaint for h aving " the m i sfortu n e to be born i nto a dyi ng world" ( 1 9). What em erg ed from their despair was the floweri ng of a n ew con sciousness, rooted i n abstract thought. This n ew con sciousn ess was one i n which d ream s, such a s t h e o n e descri bed b y Stri ndberg in A Dream Play, were a more val id mode o f inqu iry than all the sci entific certainties of the n i neteenth century. As one h i storian expresses the transformation,"the rational i st and 'm echani stic' expl anation of the world that h ad dominated European thought from the sixteenth century onward now g ave way to an 'organic' explanation . . . " (Stern hell 23). However, t h i s n ew consciousness did not si m ply d escend from heaven to earth, as Ind ra's d aug hter does i n the Pro logue to A Dream Play,

instead its genesis was cau sed by t h e m aterial conditions present i n the

n i n eteenth century. As Walter Benjam i n more specifically explains i n The Work o f Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

, "d uring long periods of h i story, the mode of

human sense perception ch anges with h u m an ity's entire mode of existence. The manner i n which it is accompl i sh ed is d eterm i n ed not o n l y by nature but by historical circumstances as well"(222). These historical circu mstances that Benjam i n refers to were d etermined by the hegemony of bou rg eois capital ism that man ifests itself in the industrialization and u rbanization of Euro pe and i m periali sm throughout the world in the n i n eteenth century. The id eology of the bo u rgeois econom ic revo lution was so "internal ized" by most m iddle-class Europeans that its "pervasive set of assu m ptions," accordi ng to historian R obert Paxton , were accepted by most m iddle-class Europeans as "self­ evident" (30). The first of these assu m ptions that was considered as "th e n atural order of thin gs" was the rig ht to i nd ividual economic freedom, a concept u pon w h ich the bourgeois econom ics of the eighteenth and n in eteenth centuries was based . This concept , form al ly labeled "li beral ism , '' expressed a bel ief that prog ress was most

Aiello 6 efficacious when accom plished through the actions of ind ividuals rather than through authoritarian form s of governm ent control . T h e economic determ inism of l i beral "laissez-faire" capital i sm placed its faith in the h ands of those who possessed an "enl ightened self-interest" ( Paxton 32) to act in accordance with the needs of society as well as to their own. However, l i beral po l itici ans sought to ach i eve another goal in add ition to their stated obj ective of ind ivid ual freedo m , a freedom that clearly was more narrowly defined as econom ic than anyth ing else. Their desire was to secure a stabl e and orderly society that would better foster econo m ic growth . S uch a socially tractable world wou ld be attainable not only t h rough offering g reater econom ic opportunity, in a sense, a larger piece of the bourg eois economic pie to more of the m iddle-class; but also from more oppo rtunities fo r social advancem ent through social pol ic ies, such as universal ed ucation wh ich wou ld d iffuse any class antagonism s and potential social d iso rder. A second ideolog ical assu m ption that dom inated the establ ish ed consciousness in the nineteenth centu ry and contributed to this sense of an ordered and stable world was the concept of "reason. " Perceived as a "fixed , innate h u m an qual ity" ( Paxton 3 1 ) , reason, expressed in more modern term s as positivism , perm eated intellectu al thought to the point that all other p h i loso p h i es, includ ing form al rel ig ion, that were considered m etaphysical or su perstitious were cal led i nto q u estion. Reason pro pounded a scientific view of the world that was based in the ind ivid ual perception of m aterial phenom ena ; united with l i berali sm it reinforced the val ue of util itariani sm and structu red thinking . Reactions to bourgeois l i beralism at fi rst cam e from the pol itical l eft and the right in the form of m ass pol itics. The most d i rect attack was from the social i st movem ent which championed a working class consciousness and a workers' united revolt against the

Aiello 7 selfish individual i sm of l i beralism and capital ism . S i m il arly, o pposition to the hegemony of the m iddle-class cam e from con servative parties and trad itional rel igious organizations that cam e "out of the chateaux and pu l pits and i nto the streets" ( Paxton 34) , joi n i ng peasants, the lower m i dd l e-class, aristocrats, and the rel igious faithful i nto a m ass movem ent. So intense was the revolt that conservative g rou ps, such as the Action francaise

, voiced reactionary feeli ngs against bou rg eo i s capital i sm w h i l e

m ixi ng proto-fascist nationalist ic a n d anti-Sem itic views with cal l s for d i rect actio n . From a d i al ectic created b y the o pposition o f l i beral , reason ed ord er a n d mass movement pol itical ideologies, a rebel lion of a d ifferent sort d awned : the revolt of the new con sciousness. Suffering from what they perceived as spi ritual , i ntel lectual , and aesthetic al ienation , turn of the centu ry scientists, artists, and phi losophers turned i nward i nto the well-spri ng of their own creative and i ntu itive m i nds w h i l e escapi ng the stultifying order of reason and what they perceived as corru pted M an ichean pol itical ideologies of the l eft and right. This new consciousn ess, d efined by what it sought i n t h e ethereal areas o f t h e m i n d , was t h e trenchant respon se o f the g en eration o f 1 900 to what it considered was choking them in the i ntel lectual atmosphere of the n i n eteenth century. H . Stuart H u g h es i n Consciousness and Society: The Reorientation of European Social Thought 1890-1930

details the terms of this phi losophical

generation g ap. Fi rst and foremost, these youn g i ntellectuals sought to d i stance themselves from what they con sidered to be the conservative, stai d , and i ntellectually suffocating m iddle-class society. As Hughes explains, the attraction to the philosophy of Fredrich N i etzsche was a form of escape for this generation "away from the smugness, the p h i l istinism of the upper m iddle-class . . . that exuded a sense of heaviness, of material excess, of confinem ent" (40) . Seco ndly, the val i dity of either of the materially based pol itical ideo logies, capitalist or soc ialist, was rejected. Accord i n g

Aiello 8 to Hug hes, for t h i s generation, "the task was to penetrate beh ind the fictions of pol itical action . . . "

to reveal who were "the actual wield ers of power and the political

el ite" (65) . "One of the great su rvivors of the period , " whom Hughes does not further identify, clai m s that the consensus among this cad re of young i ntel l ectuals was that " politically things were going down , [wh i le] i ntel l ectu ally they were g o i ng u p agai n" (43 ) . Lastly, t h e great faith their forefathers h ad i n t h e tradition o f reaso n 's "u ltra­ i ntell ectual doctri nes" becam e a defiant philosophy of "rad i cal anti-inte l l ectualism" for their i n h eritors. Their phi losophi cal attack, explai n s H u ghes, was d i rected at " positivism . . . a general term [that] was i nterchangeably with 'm aterial ism ' , 'mechanism , ' a n d 'natu ral ism"' (37) w h i c h tended "to d i scuss h u m an behavior i n term s of analogi es d rawn from natural science" (36) . R obert Woh l describes the reactionary identity that these you n g i ntellectuals adopted in The Generation of 1914 as the e m bodim ent of "a cu lture of anti­ necessity" ( 1 6) . As m uch as the generation of 1 900 wanted to l eave the positivist trad itio n beh i n d , there was sti l l a " painful contrad iction , " as Woh l d escribes it, that this generation had to acknowledge that although "man was free to create h i s own l ife, as the novelist creates fiction . . . [he] was yet slave to the material conditions of h i s existence" ( 1 7) . R aymond Will iams speaks t o t h i s sam e issue for playwrig hts o f the period, for exam ple, the focus of this paper, August Strindberg , who, l i k e all i ntel lectuals of the period , could sense a "dramatic tension . . . between what men felt them selves capabl e of becom ing and a thwart i n g , d irectly present enviro n ment" (335 ) . However, a s i l lusory the idea o f escapi n g i nto a world o f dreams m ay h ave been for those of the era that was evident in "th e i r synthesis of neo-ideal ism and biological determ i n ism , their el itism , their pessi m ism about the future of Western cultu re, [and] their critiq ues of democracy and socialism" (Wo h l 1 8) , there was a unanim ity of sentiment and arg u m ent that it was necessary.

Aiello 9 The answer to prosaic positivism , as many of th ese i ntel l ectuals perceived it, lay i n a more poetic " reorientation of thoug ht" that replaced the "cult of m aterial progress" ( H u g h es 4 1 ) with a "cult of i n stinct and sentim ent [and] an affirm ation of the supremacy of the forces of l ife and the affections"(Stern hell 23) . The search for order was replaced by the freedom of randomness as the accepted mode of thought. Yet as m uch as there was movement forward i nto a " n ew sense for the frag m entary and problematic character of modern l ife" ( H ug h es 43), there was an attraction to the past i n a longi n g for rom antic values and the vitality of the preindustrial "organic" society. These " n ew perceptions" that Walter Benjam i n d i scusses (cited earl i er in this paper) were realized "sin ce it had apparently proved i m possible to arrive at any sure knowledge of h u m an behavior . . .

[and], " if one m u st rely o n flashes of subjective

i ntuition or on t h e creation of conven i ent fictions, then the m i n d h ad i n d eed been freed . . . to specu late, to i m ag i ne, to create" ( H ug hes 66) . Benjam i n , however, contri butes another perspective as to the cause of the new consciousn ess as exemplified i n the d evelopment of new tech nologies i n the arts. One of the most notable successes of n i n eteenth century l i beralism was the d i scovery of advanced technolog ies that had a sign ificant effect on the n ature of art for both artists and its audiences. For Benjam i n , art i n the "age of m echan ical reprod uction . . . represents som eth i ng new" ( 2 1 8) . The abil ity of technology to reproduce copies of art i n mass q u antities h ad the effect of separating artist and art from long held cu ltural trad itions. " By making many reproductions, " explains Benjam i n , "it substitutes a plural ity of copies for a u n iq u e existence" (221 ) . This loss of " u niquen ess" was further exacerbated by reproductions of art being brought home to be appreciated by any " beholder or l i stener in his own particu lar situation" (221 ). What the m echan ical reproduction of art ach ieved , accord ing to Benjam i n , was a m ass aud i ence for art and a con n ection of art to everyday l ife ; what was lost, however, was its "aura" (226) . The

Aiello 1 O aura of art, Benjam i n explains, that orig i n ated with art's i nvolvement i n the rel i g ious rituals of the M iddle ages(224) was m aintain ed in a more secular sen se in the n i neteenth centu ry through concepts such as "creativity and genius, eternal val ue and mystery" ( 2 1 8 ) . The reaction to the "commod ification" of art in the age of m echan ical reprod uction , however, was to separate art if at all possi ble from its ever-increasing social and pol itical popularizatio n . Thus, as Benjam i n points out, m ovem ents such as /'art pour /'art

sought as a goal to d ivorce art, as m uch as possible, from the everyday

world. Thus, the n ecessity for artists, as wel l as for others from diverse epistemologies, was to turn inward to subjectivity, to feelings and i n stincts, to the u nconscious, and as August Strind berg d i d , to d ream s. Thus, the i n itial n eorom antic ( H ughes 35) sti rrings of the revolt of the n ew consciousn ess agai n st a general sense of the loss of "aura" were fi rst visible i n a " new aesthetic i n which personal sensi b i l ities replaced the obj ective aesthetic of representing external n ature" ( Paxton 41 ) . As reason and order g ave way to subjective i nterpretation, "progress insofar as it existed , o n ly too k place i n i nd ivid ual's m inds" (Woh l 1 6) . Such a turn to the subjective was apparent even i n the n eed fo r redefinition of ti me "to free experience from the d eterm i n ism of sequence" ( Wo h l 1 6) . Accord ing to H . Stuart H u ghes, this new aesthetic man ifested itself i n m ultifarious form s: i n the "u nconscious strivi ngs" (34) of Fredrich Nietzsche, as well as i n Henri Bergso n 's m etaphysical I mag ical phi loso ph ical i nq u i ries i nto the relation sh i p between time and h i story ( 34) . Bergson also piqued t h e i nterest o f t h e tu rn o f the century generation "in the role of the "u nconscious" i n his fi rst book Essay on the Immediate Data of Consciousness

i n which h e postulated that "the depths of

consciousness . . . fol lowed a log ic of its own" ( 63) Moreover, H u g h es explains that Bergson " h ad com e to the concl usion that the world of dream s m i g ht offer a clue to thi s secret a n d u nexplai ned real m " (63) .

Aiello 1 1 It was the work of Sigmund Freud that most popularized "a theory of the uncon scious to which the l ife of d ream s offered the key" ( Hug h es 64) . T h e deg ree to which bourgeois soci ety viewed Freud's theories as threaten ing social order can o n ly be seen i n the attack and isolation Freud received from the sci entific com m u n ity d uring his l ifet i m e . R ather than consi dering reason as g u i d i ng d eterm i n ism of h u m an behavior, Freud revealed " how depend ent ratio n al con scious tho u g ht i s o n the u nconscious mental l ife" ( Paxton 40) . S i m i l ar to Berg so n , Freud asserted that through psychoan alysis "the i m po rtance of d ream s as a sou rce of what g u ides o u r behavior" ( Paxton 4 0 ) could b e real ized . From the i nflu e nce o f Bergson , Freud and others, the " psycholog ical process h ad replaced the extern al as the most pressing topic for i nvestigation" (Wo h l 66). Positivism faced an even greater challenge as the scientific com m u n ity took up the cal l of the n ew consciousn ess. As in psychology and the social sci ences, the irrational nature of pheno mena rather than the rational drew the attention of those in the sciences. Even in terms of m ethodology, the m i nd's i rrational and u nconscious respo n ses were felt to be val id modes of i n q u i ry. Paxton explai n s that "the physicist's i ntuition and som et h i ng aki n to aesthetic flair becam e essential to the eleg ant mathematical languag e with wh ich the u n iverse was i nterpreted , a l anguag e i ncom patible with the k i n d o f m aterial certai nty science had o nce seem ed t o em body" (37) . T h u s, if positivism used data t o reveal a rationalistic order i n the u n iverse, scientists of the turn of the century sought irrational ity: N iels Boh r discovered the " rand o m n ess" of su b-ato m i c particles, w h i l e Werner H eisen berg " proposed the theory that atom ic structures were 'indeterm inate"' ( Paxton 36) . Across the i ntellectual spectru m , t h i n kers becam e "obsessed . . . [and] i ntoxicated with the non-log ical , uncivil ized , and i n explicab le" ( H ug hes 35) . T h e turn to i rrational ity, the uncon scious, and subjectivity as sources of

Aiello 1 2 i nspi ration had even far more effect on the art and artists of the turn of the centu ry who staged an open revolt agai n st the trad itions of the past . The revolutionary goals of artists of the period were to break art's long standing representation of the external world , to abandon a d ependence on acq u i red tech nique ( i n schools often spon sored and approved by the state), and to find artistic inspiration i n "child ish spontaneity . . . [and] prim itivi sm" or anything "outsid e the real ms of reason and learn i ng " ( Paxto n 38) . Artists d evoted t o abstraction and the expression o f emotions, such a s Wassily Kand i nsky, sought "to create an art of pure i nward n ess without any reference to n atu re" ; other artistic rebels such as the Fauves ("wild beasts") in Paris d esired to "sm ash the slickness of over-refined art , " while the Cubists d i storted n ature through the use of a variety of perspectives ( Paxton 37, 38). R evol utionary i rrationalism, in its break with exist i ng thought and defiance of the soci al institutions, espec i ally w ith col leges and un iversities that m ai ntai n ed the positivist I rationalist tradition, was not without n eg ative i m pact as well . As Zeev Stern hell posits in Neither Left nor Right.' Fascist Ideology in France,

the lack of restraint of the revolt of the n ew consciousness

i n som e areas of thoug ht led to o m i nous concl usions. Stern h e l l differentiates between what he considers the necrom antic i rrationalism "that affected o n ly the world of arts and l etters" and i rrational i sm i n the soci al sciences that contributed an ideology that supported the rise of fascism i n Europe (24). This i s not to say that literary n ecromantic i rrationalism d id not h ave a political im pact on the era. As M arxi st l iterary critic, Terry Eag l eton arg ues in Literary Theory, literature i n the eig hteenth and n i neteenth centu ries always possessed an ideology that served eith er as a force to establ i sh and maintai n the pol itical status quo, or to provide a pol itical altern ative in a form of creative i m ag i n ation to transcend it. Eag leton expl ains that l iterature developed i nto an ersatz rel igion in the m id-Victorian era due to the anti-metaphysical nature of the prevai l i ng rational i sm . Wh at was recog n ized

Aiello 1 3 among the bourg eois el ite was that l iterature possessed m any of the same qual ities of social contro l that formal relig ion did in its appeal to the affective n ature of con sciousness : " Li k e al l successful ideolog ies, l iterature, [ l i ke reli g io n] works less by expl icit concepts or form ulated doctri nes than by i m age, sym bol , h abit, ritual , and mythology." Moreover, Eag l eton states that the protean nature of l iterature, from highly i ntellectual and com plex works to simple sentimental sto ries, worked in a si m i l ar fash ion to religion i n its abil ity to u n ite people from all classes as readers. Thus, l iterature as a form of rel igion acted as a pall i ative for soci al tensions and un rest, by " providing the social cement, the affective val ues and basic m ytholog i es by which a socially turbulent class society can be welded together" (20, 2 1 ) . S i m i l arly, for Eag l eto n , literature i n its evocation of "emotion and experience" , was able to serve the bou rg eois society i n a more "secular" and utilitarian fash ion as "the p i l l of m iddle class ideo logy was to be sweetened by the sugar of l iterature" ( 22) . The goal of l iterature, as M atthew Arnold explai n ed it, i n terms that Eag l eton praises for their lack of hypocrisy is "to cu ltivate the m iddle class to u nd erpi n their political and eco no m ic power with a suitably rich and subtle ideo logy" ( 22 ) . Essential t o this ideology, accord i n g to Eagleto n , was a sense of the "wholeness" of society; a feeling of com ity was attain ed through l iterature that " h u m an izes" its readers by focusing on " u n i versal" val ues rather than local ized pol itical o nes and also reinforces the "moral riches of bourgeois civi l i zation . . . and a reverence for the m id d l e class" (23 ) . Furthermore, the readi n g o f l iterature provided a "so l itary and conte m p l ative" form of d i straction that not only red uced any disruptive tend ency to "collective action" but also prod uced a means of escape through the vicarious experience of literature for those whose m undane and ro utine l ives were " i m poverished" of vital experi ence (23 ) . The n ew con sciousn ess i n l iterature of t h e n i neteenth century that traces its roots back to early rom anticism defined the modern concept of l iterature. Eag l eton

Aiello 1 4 claims that ro manticism of that period was a "literary rad ical ism . . . [th at] sign ifies a concept of h u m an creativity w h ich is rad ical ly at odds with the utilitarian ideology of early industrial capitali st Eng land . " In opposition to " prosaic" util itarian ism , romanticism asserted the val u e of the "imagination " and the " im ag i n ative vision" that is evident in the writing of poetry ( 1 6) . Eag l eton clai m s that the "visionary hopes and dynamic energ i es" of the bourgeois revolution expressed in early rom antic literature conflicted with the transform ation of that vital ity i nto "crassly p h i l istine Utilitarianism . . . that as the domi n ant ideo logy of the m id d l e class, tetish izing fact, red ucing h u m an relations to m arket exchanges . . . dismiss[ed[ art as un profitabl e ornam entation ( 1 6) . Thus, tor romantic writers and readers, literature became a n "enclave of creative values . . . [in wh ich] an im age of non-al ienated l abor" survived . R o m anticism was a victory of the "intuitive, transcendental m i nd" over rational i sm and empiricism that were "enslaved to tact" ( 1 7) . According to Eagleton , the l iterary i m ag in ation, in its poetic expression by Blake and S h el l ey, becam e a "pol itical force . . . that sought to transform society in the name of those energies and val ues which art em bodi es" ( 1 7) . As R obert Paxton explain s in regards to the visual artists of the turn of the centu ry period, the subjectivity i n herent in irrationalism not o n ly separated its bel ievers from trad itio n , but also left them "su bject to the lonel i n ess and anxiety of being adrift in a m ean i ng l ess u niverse" (42). This held true for the rom antic writers as well who "deprived of any proper place within social movem ents,which m ight h ave transferred industrial capitali sm into a j u st soci ety . . . [were] d riven back into the solitariness of [their] own creative m i nd [s]"(Eag leton 1 8) .

Daug hter. So be it. I descend. Come with me, Father! I nd ra. No. I cannot breathe their air. Daug hter. Now the cloud sinks. It's growing dense. I suffocate!

Aiello 15 This not air, but smoke and water that I breathe, so heavy that it drags me down and down. And now I clearly feel its reeling! This is surely not the highest world.

I ndra. Neither the highest, truly, nor the lowest. It is called Dust, and whirls with all the rest, And so at times its people, struck with dizziness, live on the borderline of folly and insanity . . . Courage, my child, for this is but a test!

Daug hter, [on her knees as the cloud descends.] I am sinking! (199).

I I . The R evolt of The New Consciousness i n Dramatic N atural ism

If l iterary rom anticism protected the sensib i l ities of the artistic i m ag i nation from the ravages of uti litarianism and positivism by allowing it to escape i nto an subjective "enclave of creative values , " then the n aturali st movem ent explored the fate of consciousness on the o bj ective earthly plane. The basic concepts of n aturalism were drawn from the social and i ntellectual changes of the n i n eteenth century : " m ech anization a n d urban ization, democratic reform , a n d the rise o f the physical sciences" ( Bentley 23) . Used as criteria with which to view critically the relation between i nd ividuals and their enviro n m ent, these concepts were analyzed i n a l iterary work that served as a "clin ical lab" (Zola qtd . in Bentley 6) to exam i n e "scientifically and dispassion ately" the effect of "hered ity and e nviro n m ent" ( Bentley 2 5) on human behavior. For phi losopher and writer, Em ile Zol a, who i s credited with out l i n i ng the goals of n atural ism i n the preface to h is play, Theresa Raquin,

Aiello 1 6 the task of th e playwright was "to reprod uce m an 's environm ent, endow it with h u m an life and show that one prod uced the other, and what [th at] h appened h ad seemed small and insignificant could be i m portant and u rgent"(Styan 8). As British l iterary critic, R aymond Wi l l i ams, explains, "natural ism was also an i n herently critical form ; it showed the world as u n acceptabl e by showing d i rectly what it was l i ke, and how i m possible it was when people tried to change it" (340) . It was Zola's bel ief that by dedicating itself to the drama of ord i n ary people th rough the "experim ental and sci entific spi rit" of natural ism , theater, as an art form , which he bel ieved had been long since rendered i m potent as a force for artistic and social c hange through its dependence on melodrama and sentimental co m edy would find its "salvatio n " ( Bentley 27) . The ultimate goal of naturalism in the theater for Zol a was t o explore t h e truth o f real l ife no matter h o w d ifficult or " pessi m i stic" ( Styan 6) the experience wo uld be for audiences. Of co urse, that truth for each playwright was as varied as the forms of n atural ism itself ; however, pl aywrig hts of the period were not afraid to seek the truth in subject areas long since considered "taboo in m iddle class culture - sex, rel igio n , and eco nom ics .. . all d isplayed freely on the stag e" ( Bentley 27) . Moreover, these natu ral ist writers bel ieved that the truth lay beyond the style of the sim pl e reprod uction of " photog raph ic" real ity that was most co m mo n ly associated with natu ral ism . For Stri ndberg sim ply " sketching a piece of nature in a natural manner" amounted to "fake n atural ism"; "true natural i sm seeks o ut those poi nts of l ife where th e great co nflicts occur" (qtd . i n Wil liams 333). S i m ilarly, for Yeats, n atural ism explored a consciousn ess which did not appear i n " photographs . . . [but] i n a gro u p of figu res, sym bols, i m ag es [that] enable us for a few mom ents i nto a deep of the m i nd" ( Wi l liams 333 ) . R egardl ess of i nterpretatio n , what un ited the n aturali st playwrig hts was a "passion for truth i n strictly h u m an and contem porary terms"(Will iams 334) . Zola's "essential requ i rem ent [was] that theater shou ld not l ie" (Styan 1 0) , and h i s desire to

Aiello 1 7 ground theatrical n aturalism i n the scientific deter m i n ism represented an effort to i ndemn ify that goal . For Zo la, the so ul of natural i sm was a probing of the relationsh i p between h u m an experience a n d environment: "art a n d l iterature shou ld serve t h e inq uirin g m i nd , i n vestigati n g , analyzi n g , a n d repo rting on m an a n d soci ety, seeki n g facts a n d t h e logic behind h u m an l ife" (qtd . i n Styan 1 0) . A s detach ed and objective as the naturali st l iterary work clai m s to b e i n its i n q u i ry into " h u m an l ife, " there is an undeniably passio nate d efense of the ord i n ary person as a victim of society ( Styan 6 ) . R aymond Wi l l iams i n the conclusion of Drama from Ibsen to Brecht

provides an excellent m etaphor for the conflict between the

individual and soci ety explored i n n aturalist d ra m a. Building on the i nsistence of Zol a and other natu ral i st playwrig hts for exact representations of the i nterior settings i n their plays, Wil li am s depicts the basic conflict that a character faces i n a n atu rali st work as one in which a perso n , " a u n iquely representative figure , " (338) is trapped i n a room (visi ble on stage), and left o n l y "to stare from a win dow at wh ere o ne's l ife is being decid ed " (336) . Caught between two worlds, a "world of action , in which an environment is mad e and a world of conscio usness in which a conseq uence is realized" (338), the person "discovers a h u m an ity" that a "relatively leisu re society" is found to be "frustrating or destroying" (335, 337). Wi l l iams expl ains that these room s devised b y t h e n atural ist playwrig hts are not on stage simply to "defi ne t h e people" but rather to "define what they seem to be, what they can not accept they are" (336 ) . Wi l l iam s further states that there exists a subtle i rony i n t h e confl ict between the ind ivid ual and contem porary society represented i n n atural i st drama. In a l i beral era that extol l ed the virtues of ind ividual ism , natural ist d rama expressed the " i nd ivid ual revolt agai n st an orthodox i nd ividualist society" or as Wil l iam s characterizes it, a "bourgeois revo lt against the fo rms of bourgeo i s l ife" (337) . Natural ist dram a's attem pts to rescue con sciousness through a form of l iterary

Aiello 1 8 empiricism concl uded pessi m istical ly for audiences and artists alike. One o n ly has to think of the endings of a representative sam ple of plays of the era, especially those of I bsen and Chekhov to realize the futility experienced by those "trapped i n the rooms. " If naturalism offered no place i n the world for the expression of the n ew consciousn ess in dram atic l iterature, its only recou rse was to turn i nward to su bjectivity and the expressio n of n ecro m antic dreams, fantasies, m yths and vision as sources of inspi ratio n . The walls o f n aturali sm 's "rooms" were artistical ly d i ssolved a s "Stri ndberg , i n a younger generation . . . abandoned the g iven enviro n m ent and m ad e a d ramatic form out of i ntern al strugg l es" (Wi l l iams 338) . Strindberg was one of those rare artists i n whom long h eld cu rrents of co ntent, form , and style merge and reappear as recognizable but i rrevocably altered and revital ized . August Strindberg , who cham pioned what h e d escri bed as "th e modern psycholog ical d rama", transformed theater through a " m ajor new i n novation , a dram atic form m ad e wholly fro m the already iso l ated con sciousness . .. the dram a of a 'si ngle m i n d ' " (Wil liams 338 ) . Th us, drama as an art form , constrai n ed by what Zola descri bed as its "hidebo u nd conventions" ( Styan 8 ) , finally join ed the other arts i n their turn toward subjectivity as a result of finding no solace for their new co nsciousn ess i n the external world . For Stri ndberg and other artists of the period, truth becam e their own truth, an artist's i n ner conception of the world. An external vision of the worl d , ach ieved by "peering t h rough windows" was replaced by "in n er vision and external distortio n " (Wi l l i a m s 339) . Through the plays of Strindberg , the n ew co nsciousn ess that was emerg i n g i n all areas of tho ught aro u nd 1900 finally mad e its appearance o n the stage . Because o f Stri ndberg 's relevance t o a part icular moment i n both h i story and developm ents in the arts, his "early expression i sm" that is so apparent in A Dream Play

should not be considered unusual . Accord ing to R aymond Wil l iams, "it is not then

A i e l lo 1 9 really real ly surprising that two apparently d ifferent forms, serious n atu ral ism and psycholog ical expression ism should h ave com e to exi st i n the sam e d rama . . . " (339). Fortunately, Strind berg 's exact notions of h i s "early expressionism" are d etail ed i n h i s extended preface t o Miss Julie Formally consid ered b y most critics a s Strind berg 's .

defin itive statem ent on n atu ral ism , the preface extends far beyond the l i m its of "pure" Zolaist n atural ism . Stri ndberg 's natu ralism , or "nyanatural ism " ( G i l m an 90) as he descri bed it, is more inclusive of the trends i n i ntellectual thought of the period . "The stage, h e [Strin d berg] remarked d u ri ng this period , was 'reprehensi ble' in its im permeability by the n ew con sciousn ess . . . " ( G i l m an 90) . I n order to create a place for nyanaturalism in the the theater, Strind berg felt it n ecessary in his preface to critique the theatrical status quo : the bourg eois theater, an "outworn form" that exist[ed] as a stag n ant provider of i l l u sory entertain m ent for the m iddle-class aud i ences who possess[ed] a "prim itive capacity for deceivi ng them selves and letting them selves be d eceived " ( 6 1 ) . Accord i ng to Stri nd berg , theater was not keeping pace with the revo l ution in thought apparent i n oth er cou ntries, particularly i n England and Germany, where d rama . . . "is dead " ( 6 1 ) " No new form has been devised for these .

new contents, " explain s Strin d berg . " The new wine has burst the old bottl es" ( 6 1 ) . It was in h i s two "dom estic dramas, " The Father and M i ss Julie, that Strind berg fi rst attem pted to put theory i nto practice i n order to " m odern ize the form to m eet the demands, w h ich m ay, I think, be m ad e o n this art today" (62). Strind berg 's nyan atural ism , however, d id not abandon all the formal pri nciples of n aturalism . I n h i s exhortation to abandon "feel i ngs which beco m e h armfu l and superfluous" in favo r of a more reasoned reaction to h i s plays, Strin d berg asserts natural ism 's em phasis on a scientific perspective of his works ( 62) . For example, feel i ngs of pity aroused d u e to the fate of the Stri nd berg 's hero i n e, M iss J u l i e, m ay provo ke the i nflu ence of "outside forces and powers"(Wi l l iams 334). For Stri nd berg , a

Aiello 20 member in the audience "with a bel ief i n the futu re may actually demand so me suggestion for rem edying the evi l - i n other words som e kind of pol icy" (62). The i m pl ication i s that an "outside force or power" i n the form of political or relig ious ideology n eeds to be present in the play to m o l l ify any negative reactions to the d rama. Any such attem pts to m ake h i s work less "depressi ng" were excoriated by Strindberg . I n more or l ess a Darwinist term s, Stri nd berg responds that i n h i s dom estic dramas the "downfall of one fam ily is the the good fortune of another . . . [and] the alternation of risi n g and fal l i ng is one of l ife's pri nciple charm s" (62) . For Stri ndberg , to expect theater to provide "the lovers of the com monplace" with anyt h i ng resem b l i ng the i l l u sory "joy of l ife"(63) experience was abso lutely u ntenable. I n contrast, the nyanaturalist perspective is to find the joy of l ife i n the " strong and cruel struggles" i n which Strind berg finds, as he suggests t o others i n the preface, a "pleasure i n learn ing" (63 ) . I n Stri ndberg 's nyanatural ism , as a n expressio n of t h e n ew consciousn ess, i s a n i n h erent belief i n the vali d ity of subj ective i nterpretatio n . The subj ective perspective is what Stri nd berg recom mends as the proper mode of i n q u i ry with which to approach an analysis of Miss Julie. Stri n d berg i n sists th ere is no one, sim ple i nterpretation of the play and that each po int of view i s equally valid : " I see M iss J u l ie's trag ic fate to be the result of many circumstances" (63 ) . The theme of Miss Julie, acco rd ing to the playwrig ht, i s " neither excl usively physiological or psycholog ical . I h ave not put the blame wholly o n the mother, nor on her physical condition at the time, nor o n immoral ity. I have not even preached a moral sermon " (64) . Stri nd berg 's most d i rect critique of the theater of the era, his "critical n atu ralism" (Wi l l iams 81), is d i rected toward the bourgeois positivism's representation of fixed ideas and certai nties that h ave been tran slated i nto ossified theatrical conventions. Such rigid conventions of form , character and plot i n the theater served to reinforce a

Aiello 2 1 sense i n aud i ences of the stab i l ity and order of bou rg eois society d u ri ng the n i n eteenth centu ry(Eag l eto n , Marxism 64) . Strind berg cites the developm e nt of the concept of ch aracter i n this regard . He explains that the origi nal m ean i ng of the term "character" was closer to a " domi nating trait of the sou l . . . often confused with tem peram ent" (64) . The objectification of character i nto character types was the responsibi l ity of bourgeois society: Later it [character] becam e the m iddle-class term for the 'auto m ato n , ' one whose nature h ad beco me fixed or who h ad adapted h i m self to a partic u l ar role i n l ife. I n fact, a person who had ceased to g row was call ed a character, while one conti n ui n g to d evelop - the skillful n avigator of l ife's river sai l i ng not with the sheets set fast, but veeri n g before the wind to luff agai n - was cal l ed ch aracterless, i n a derogatory sense, of cou rse, because he was so hard to catch , classify and keep track of. This m iddle­ class conception of i m m o b i l ity of the sou l was transferred to the stage where the middle-class always ruled . A ch aracter cam e to signify a m an fixed or fin ish ed . . . (64). For Strindberg , any such "summ ary judg ments" of character by authors "should be chal lenged by the N aturalists who know the richn ess of the soul" (65) . Stri nd berg d escribes h i s own characters as "characterless, " ( 64) who , with an almost a post­ modern i st sensi b i l ity, represent a pastiche of "virtues and vices" from the " past and present stages of civil izati o n , bits from books and n ewspapers, scraps of h u m an ity, rags and tatters of fine clothing . . . " (65) . Strind berg's "characterless" characters who resist classification express the world of the new con sciousn ess that surrounds the playwrig ht. These ch aracters perso n ify a culture transform ing itself from the stasis of a materi alist determ i n i sm of the world to the dom i n ion of the irration al unconscious . The un pred ictabi lity of Strind berg 's characters expresses a tension that stem s from the

Aiello 22 knowledge that w h at was once certain i s no longer pred ictable. As Strindberg explains, he fash ioned his characters as such " because they are modern characters l iving i n a period of transition more feverishly hysterical than its pred ecessor, I have drawn m y figures vacil lating, d isi nteg rated , a blend of old and n ew"(65) In add ition to his stated o pposition to theater's partici pation in creating an i l l u sory view of the world outside the theater, Strind berg i s eq ually adamantine i n h i s desire t o rid theater o f t h e artifice present i n its past co nventions, most specifical ly t h e concept o f the "well-made play." For Stri ndberg , t h e " modern psychological d rama" represents an inqu iry i nto the hypostasis of l ife and seeks to fu lfil l the needs of the modern m ind that is "no longer satisfied with seeing thi ngs happen . . . [but] m ust know how it h appens" (69) . In an effort to better explore "the psycholog ical process", Stri nd berg l i m its his n u m ber of m inor c haracters and focu ses the d rama on the relationsh i p between j ust a few, since this is "what i nterests people most today" (69 ) . Trad ition al developm ent o f plot is abandoned b y Strindberg , which h e feels d isrupts the flow of the play as well as the concentration of the aud ience, in favor of his experi mental one-act form. Stri ndberg also i ntroduces other " art forms" i nto naturalist theater: the mono log ue, m i m e and dance - to disorder not o n ly the audience's preconceived expectations for d ram a, but also to allow for more of an "org an ic" con n ection between the actors and scri pt through im provised movem ent and d i alog u e ( 70 ) . Furthermore, Strindberg e m p h atically o pposes a n y theatrical artifice i n acting, such as the contrived d ialog ue, exh i bited i n "well-made" plays, for its "sym metrical , m athematical construction" that often consists of characters asking "stu pid questions i n order t o el icit a sm art rep ly" (68, 69) . Agai n , Stri nd berg 's insistence o n fluidity o f speech patterns b y letting his ch aracters speak a s "i rreg ularly . . . a s they do i n real life" (69) exposes the ossified speech patterns of popular theater as i l l u sory. Naturalism

Aiello 23 i n acting technique i n the form of less "playing with the audience" i n favor of more "playi ng to the audience" is another goal of Strind berg's dram aturgy; for Strind berg , not h i ng would pl ease h i m more than to " see an acto r's back t h roug hout a critical scene" (72) . S i m i larly, he stridently exhorts the rejection of theatrical d evices l ike excessive make-up and footl ig hts that distort the actor's natural i m age i nto somethi ng created for a more styl ized , "theatrical" periorm ance(72) . As for scenic desig n , Strindberg favors the "asym metry" and "economy" of form exh i bited i n the works of im pressionist pai nters that "strengthens the i l l usio n " ( 7 1 ) . Attem pts to ach i eve stage reali sm are futi le, accordi n g to Strin d berg , because of the i n h erent problem s with the construction of stage wal ls and doors that shake and move u pon contact (71 ). It is i nteresti ng to n ote than when i l l u sion is used to d eceive or si m ply to entertain i n the theater, Stri ndberg o pposes its use ; however, when i l l usion serves the n ew consciousness by "arousing the i m ag i n ation " ( 7 1 ) he is very m uch its propo n ent. What the revolution i n tho ught and practice that Strindberg 's preface represents is a blueprint from which Strindberg hoped "a n ew dramatic art m i g ht arise " ( 73) .

Daug hter. Continuing the Poet's bitter words. "And then the journey's course begins, over thistles, thorns and stones. If it should touch a beaten track, comes at once the cry: 'Keep off!' Pluck a flower. straight you'll find the bloom you picked to be another's. If cornfields lie across your path and you must pursue your way, trampling on another's crops,

Aiello 24 others then will trample yours that your loss may equal theirs. Every pleasure you enjoy brings to all your fellows sorrow, yet your sorrow gives no gladness. So sorrow, sorrow upon sorrow on your way until you 're dead and then, alas, give others bread.

I l l . Nyanatural ism i n Strindberg 's A Dream Play

It is one of those rare "cu ltu ral coi ncidences" that w h i l e S i g m un d Freud was writ i n g The Interpretation of Dreams, Strind berg was experim enting with the d ream as content and form for several of h is plays( G i l m an 1 1 0) . I n A Dream Play, the form of the dream itself is Stri nd berg 's attem pt to release the artistic i m ag i n ation from the restrai nts of bourgeo i s order and reason reflected in the convention s of popular theater. As Strind berg explai ns i n the two-parag raph Author' s Note fo r A Dream Play, the d ream has its own "logical form " i n which "anything can happen; everyt h i ng is possible" ( 1 93) . T h i s form is delim ited o n ly by the d ream er's u nconscio us and the Freud i an su pereg o ; the dreamer freely associates between the products of the imag ination and fee l i ngs of consci ence co ntrived by the "social" self. As Stri nd berg explai n s i n the Author's Note, sleep, the transm itter of dream s, can act as either a "li berato r" or "to rturer, " and more often than not, produces " more pain than pleasu re"( 1 93) for the dreamer. The i nterrelated n ess of the d ream elem ents in A Dream Play orig inates from a "si ng l e co n sciousness (th at] holds sway" ( 1 93 ) ; however, with i n the context of the

Aiello 25 dream , the freedom of form that Wil liams describes as an " early expressionism " merges with the n aturalistic content of the dream itself in a manifestation of Strind berg's "nyan aturalism . " The subj ective form of the d ream , evidenced by its "external distortion " ( Williams 339) , defies any traditional sense of the theatrical unities of time and place (Gil m an 1 08 ) . The fluidity of the form and the rando m ness of associations are uninterrupted by the theatrical contrivances of acts and scenes. One setting "dissolves" into the n ext or sim ply "blacks out, " while other locales "vanish" or "disappear. " Settings and props also transmorgrify : the "Growing Castle" is transformed into the Officer's room , which in turn changes into his parents' living room . The lime tree that g rows outside the clover-leaf door in the opera's corridor becomes a coat and hat stand in the Lawyer's office and later a candelabra in the c h u rch. The dream imagination expresses itself in a aesthetic variety of fantastical elements often em blazoned in bri l liant co lors: a giant ch rysanth em u m , boats sh aped like dragons, and a ghost ship . Similarly, characters in the subjectivity of the d ream world "split, double, and m u ltiply; they evaporate, crystal lize , scatter, and converg e" ( 1 93) . The theater crowd that waits for the clover-leaf door to open becomes the the crowd of clients waiting fo r service at the Lawyer's office. The Officer himself appears throug hout the d ream , not o n ly in the context of his life but also in the context of the lives of the Lawyer and Po et as wel l . All these elem ents col l ectively express one consciousness freed by the form of the dream to explore, imagine and create. However, Strind berg 's n atu ralist perspective, the "internal reality" of A Dream Play,

explores more earthly concerns, specifical ly the n u m erous contradictio ns of

living in the modern worl d . Trapped within these many contradictions, h u m an kind is seen as alienated from whatever is necessary to find spiritual fu lfil l ment. This alienation is exem plified by the separation of the universe into two wo rlds: the world of spiritual lig ht (new consciousness) , represented by the Hindu god , I nd ra and his

Aiello 26 Daug hter; and the world of m aterial d arkn ess (bourgeois soci ety) experienced by those on eart h . I n her journey to eart h , the Daug hter will attem pt to merg e these worlds. H er spiritual quest is to prove to her skeptical father that h u m an s are simply "victims of soci ety" (Zola qtd . i n Styan 6) whose " l am entatio n s and com plaint are justitied " ( 1 98) . The Daug hter's journey is in one sense a "test , " ( 1 99 ) as her father descri bes it, (in almost Zol aist "laboratory" sense) in which the Daug hter, a pure, rarefied exam ple of consciousn ess, u n su l l ied by any of the " i ntections"(228) of the material world will attem pt to em pathize with those who "live o n the border l i n e of folly and i nsanity" ( 1 99) . As the Daug hter leaves one setting o n earth and enters another, altern ating i n persona from the goddess, I ndra's Daug hter, to her h u m an form , Agnes, she learns from the men who accom pany her on h er journey the n ature of l ife on earth. Her fi rst d esire i s to tree the Officer, whom she finds i m priso n ed i n a " G rowing Castle. " The Officer, a person ification of a "trapped con sciousn ess, " exem plifies the h u man need for i l l usion as a remedy tor the alienation of the h u m an spirit. The Officer's priso n is h is room i n t h e G rowing Castle, a metaphor fo r modern civilization. This castle I fortress has separated itself from the n atural world by rising above the "forest of g iant hollyhocks in bloo m " that exist beyond its wal ls, and the prim itive m ud comprised of "straw" and "stable m uck" that surrounds the foundation of the castle ( 1 99) . The ideals of c ivil ized society are bran d i sh ed with i n the cast l e : the g i lded roof sign ifyi ng its materi al ism , and a fecund flower bud "that crowns its su m m i t" ( 1 99) sym bolizing the elevation of l i bidinal en ergy from its prim itive state to that of civi l ized love. S i m i l arly, the Officer is d ivorced from his own tru e nature.The Officer's priso n , however, is far more t han j u st the castle, but rather h i s dependence on i l lusions. Upo n m eeting the Officer, I ndra's Daug hter offers to free h i m from his room ( 200) . For the Officer, who bel ieves he "has been waiting for this" ( 200) , the real ity of freedom is a th reatening

Aiello 27 prospect : Daug hter. The castle is strong-it h as seven wal l - but it shall be done. Do you want to be be set free-or not? Officer. To tell yo u the truth, I don 't know. Either way l ''will suffer. Every joy has to be paid twice over with sorrow. It's wretch ed h ere, but I 'd have to endure three times the agony for the joys of freedom ( 200) . The Officer's self- i m prisonment is that of social m an who, i m prisoned i n the castle of civil ized society with its rules and restrictions to h i s freedom , learns to accept the i l lusion of secu rity the castle provides rather than face the prospect of a free self u n bounded by society's walls. The Officer's room d i ssolves i nto his parents' l iving room , reveal i ng another source of the Officer's i l l u sory self-im priso n m ent. Set agai n st h i s M other's disclosure that she m ust face the real ity of her death, the Officer h as concluded that l ife i s unfair sim ply because he was fal sely accused of taking som e money as a child. The Officer is unable to free his con sciousn ess from the confl icting feel ings of revenge and g u i lt over the i ncident, which he descri bes as "that piece of injustice [that] gave a twi st to my whole l ife" ( 202) . Only the M oth er, guided by her closeness to death , is able to see through the i l l usion of such a singu lar judgment of l ife . She attributes the Officer's conclusion that l ife is never fair to the workings of "small m inds," urg ing her son to cease " harping" on it . . . spo i l i ng the best of you r l ife" over the incident, and "to never quarrel with God" (202, 203 ) . " A h , t h i s l ife ! " exclaims t h e Mother to t h e Daug hter, w h o has observed the i ncident. To which I ndra's Daug hter responds, " H u m an beings are to be p itied" (203 ) . What t h e Daug hter proffers the Officer a s a n alternative t o the false con sciousness of i l l usions is h er absolute bel i ef that love can solve the problems of m a n k i nd : " Yes, l ife is hard , " explai ns the Daug hter. " But love conquers everyt h i n g . Co m e and see"(203 ) .

Aiello 28 However, as the Dau g hter appears i n a corridor outsid e the stage door of the opera house, she witnesses love as a force that alienates and h arms rather than one that un ites and h eals. I nstead of l i berating h u m ans by "conq uering everyth i n g , " love traps them in its i l l usions.The real ity of love's disappoi ntm ents is echoed throug hout the corridor scene. For the Doorkeeper, who sits with her shawl of suffering over her head , crocheting her l ife away, love h as separated her past self from the present. "She was the pri m a balleri na," the Bi llsticker explains, " but when he went away, it seem s he took h er dancing with h i m . . . so she never got any parts" ( 204) . . Wh i l e the Doorkeeper futilely conti nues to crochet a star-patterned coverlet in the hope h er lover will return , the Singer, who the Doorkeeper notes was not "engag ed " for the n ext season by the opera, cries i nto her h and kerchief as she faces the real ity h er d ream i s over(205 ) . The sad irony of the Bi llsticker, who waits fifty years to possess his beloved "fishnet and green box" only to realize that the fishnet was " n ot q u ite what I h ad in m i nd"( 209) is reflected in the Officer's patient waiti ng at the stage door for h is ideal wom an, h i s fiance, M iss Victoria, a singer with the opera. As the season s pass for the Officer, and he gets o lder and o lder, eventually to becom e young again and restart the cycle, he rests assured in h is fantasy that Victoria h asn 't left the opera yet without him " because she loves me"(21 1 ) . For the Officer and the oth ers waiting i n the o pera corridor, the i l l u sion of love i s a way of escaping l ife's i n evitabl e disappo i ntm ents : " noth i n g ever is as one i m ag i ned it - because one's m i n d goes fu rther than the act, goes beyond the object"( 209) . Thus, without such i l lusions, mankind is left with o n ly the u nforgiving real ization of who they are, as opposed to who they wish to be. As the Quarantine M aster explains to the Officer when h e visits Fo ulstrand, there is self-protection i n h id i ng beh ind i l l u sions: " I s o often wish I could forg et - especial l y myself. That 's w h y I go i n for m asquerades, fancy dress, and th eatricals" (225) . As the vo ice of ill usion i n A Dream Play, the Officer presents d ream s and

Aiello 29 fantasies as a mode of escape from the cond itions suffered by h u m ankind for whom I ndra's Daug hter feels that life is pitiable. After receiving his Doctor's degree from the Chancel lor and the fo ur Deans of the Faculties - Phi losophy, Theology, M edicine and Law, the Officer trusts that he now has control over his own l ife : "All paths are o pen to me. I h ave set foot on Parnassu s, the laurels are won . I m mortality, fam e are all m ine" ( 222) . His futu re plans are far more pedestrian , however. The Officer desires to take a teaching position, where he ostensibly will find security teaching boys "the sam e lessons I learnt all through my m an hood . . . u ntil I g et a pension and h ave nothing to do but wait for m eals and newspapers, until in the end I 'm carried out to the crem ato rium and burnt to ashes" (229). He proposes to the Daug hter to accom pany him on a trip to Fairhaven, "where it is sum m er, and the sun is sh i n i n g . Youth is there, chi ldren and flowers, singing and d anci n g , feasting and merrym aking"(222 ) . What they find when the Officer and the D aug hter appear i n their n ew desti nation is that the path to the parad isical Fairh aven ( il l usio n ) , with its " beautifu l wooded shore . . . [and] l ittl e ltalianesq u e vi llas, pavil ions, kiosks, and m arble statues" (223) is accessed o n ly by gain ing entrance through its apparent o pposite ( real ity) : the sulfury inferno, Fou lstrand , wh ere the sick and g l uttonous rich dwell along with those "who have so me m i sery to hide"(224) , and young lovers and their roses wi lt in the noxious atmosphere. As the Officer and the Daug hter flee Foulstrand for Fairhaven, they l earn that the " peace and happin ess" they h ad expected to find there really do not exist. At the dance at the Assem bly R oom , the Daug hter notices a girl, Edith , who " buries her face in h er hands" because she realizes her ugli n ess kept her "sitting there for three hours without a dance. " "What cruel pleasure, " o bserves the Daughter(230) . They encou nter the Blind M an who is " the most envied m an in the place, " fo r he is the "owner of hu ndreds of Ital ian vi llas . . . bays and creeks and shores and wood s" (235) . For all h i s wealth, the Blind M an loses what he loves the most, his

Aiello 30 son , who d rowns while on a voyage. Apprehensive that Fai rhaven i s a c h i m era, the Daug hter beseeches the Officer : " I sn 't there one h appy person in this parad ise?" (235) . T h e Officer suggests t h e apparently bl issful Newlywed Couple. For t h e Newlyweds, however, happin ess is threaten i n g . They are adam ant in their d esire "to d i e together, now at once" since they "fear h appiness, the d eceiver . . .

(who] i n the m idst of

happi ness g rows a seed of u n h appiness" (235) . For the Officer, Fairhaven also is a d estroyer of his dream s . I n a flash back to his experie nces as a boy i n school , the Officer real izes his d ream of a l ife i n education is "dreadf u l , real ly d readful" ( 232) . Wh ile under the stern g aze and b adgering of the Schoo l m aster, the Young Officer, confidence shaken , attem pts to apply sim pl e logic to answer a pro blem i n arith metic. The School m aster uses the opport u n ity to berate the Young Officer contin ually for being i m m ature, an o p i n ion wh ich the Young Officer beg i n s to i nternalize. The Yo ung Officer and the boys join in revolt again st their teacher and d efy the Schoolm aster to explain the concept of "ti m e , " wh ich he can not do. Backed i nto a phi losoph ical corner by his students, the School m aster m ust adm it that the Officer's explanation is "quite correct accord ing to the laws of logic, although it i s absurd" ( 234) . "Then logic is absurd , " concl udes the Officer(234), who " m atures" in realizing that for the Schoo lm aster and others l i ke h i m , their absu rd world which is " back to front" (234) is the tru ly i l l usory one. Strindberg ' s sym bol of i l l usion for all i n A Dream Play i s the clover-leaf door wh ich sits in the corridor of the opera house . The excitement exh ibited by all the characters at the opera house who gather as soon as they l earn that "the door is going to be opened " ( 2 1 1 ) represents their desire to u ncover a secret and g reater meaning to l ife. Wh i l e they await the door's open i n g , the Officer stresses its sign ificance, for "a m o m ent such as this does not recur i n a l ifetime" ( 2 1 1 ). Wh en the secret of the door is about to be revealed , a po l icem an i ntervenes, and " i n the n ame of the law, " ( 2 1 2)

Aiello 3 1 forbids the open ing of the door. I n doi ng so , h e em bodies society's wish to keep the characters "with i n the castle" by mai ntai n i ng the i l l usion of hope. Fi nal ly, before her assent to h eaven, the Daughter su m m ons al l to too see "the answer to the riddle of the universe [th at] is locked up in there" (250) . The bel i ef that there is any m ean i ng to l ife in the world of A Dream Play is exposed as self-delud i ng when all that is visible behind the clover-leaf door to the g athered ch aracters i s noth ingness. The hopelessness of i l l usions as a means of escap i n g reality that the Daughter experiences with the Officer reflects a si m ilar despai r that she real izes in h er relati o n sh i p to the Lawyer. T h e Lawyer, i n h i s practice as the mediator of h u m an antagon isms, el ides the i l l usions of l ife for reality. Portrayed by the the Daughter as Ch rist-l i ke (she puts a crown of thorns on h i s head ) , the Lawyer exh ibits the suffering he has "absorbed from others . . . the vices, swi nd l es, slanders, l i bel . . . o n his chalk­ white, fu rrowed and purple-shadowed" face that " m i rrors all the cri m e and vice with which through h i s profession he has been i nvolved " (2 1 2). In his offer to burn the shawl of suffering that the Daug hter i n herited from the Doorkeeper, as well as in h is advocacy for those who "scrape along so mehow by the skin of their teeth u ntil they d i e" ( 2 1 3 ) , the Lawyer represents the idealist who u n selfishly and hero ical ly acts on the behalf of others. It i s the Lawyer, who recogn izes the al ienation of the m aterial body of h umankind, their actual l iving con d itions and their spiritual consciousness that makes it "a m isery to be h u m an " (2 1 3) . As he explains to the Daughter, Lawyer: And what people l ive on is a mystery to me. They m arry with an i nco me of two thousand crowns when they need four. They borrow, to be sure, they all borrow . . . [but] who has to pay in the end? Tell me that ! Daughter: He who feeds the birds. Lawyer: Wel l , if he who feeds the bird s would come down to earth and see the plight of the unfortunate c h i ldren of m e n , perhaps He would have

Aiello 3 2 som e com passio n ( 2 1 3 ) . T h e observation o f t h e Daughter that " it is a m ad world " ( 2 1 6) upo n realizing that t h e Lawyer was "discred ited" before t h e fo ur Deans o f t h e Faculties a n d den i ed h i s "lau rels" because he "defended t h e poo r, said a good word fo r the sinner, eased the burden of the g u i lty, [and] obtai n ed a repri eve for the condem n ed" ( 2 1 5) d escri bes the contrad ictory world of A Dream Play. As both the Daug hter and the Lawyer concl ude, a world i n which the " Law [serves] all but its servants" and "Justice" i s reserved for the "just unj u st" ( 2 1 6) is the inverted copy of the natural one. Within the new setting of a M editerranean resort, the Lawyer attem pts to explain to the Daug hter the ineq u itable m aterial conditions and rancorous attitudes i n society that have created such an i nversion of the world . " M en have an i n stinctive d read of another man 's good fo rtu n e , " explains the Lawyer. "They feel it's u nj u st that that fate sho u ld favor any one man, so they try to restore order by rol l ing bou lders across his path" (238 ) . I n juxtaposition t o the vil las, casi no and orchard s o f the resort, descri bed by the Daug hter as "parad i se, " is a " h uge h eap of coal and two wheel barrows, " the "hell" of the coal h eavers who work there. The l ives of the coal h eavers exem plify the alienated worker who is trapped wit h i n the conf i n es of "th e system " (242). For these coal heavers, who con sider their labor as "the foundation of society, " ( 24 1 ) the system appears as an obj ectified power over which they have no contro l . Within this society, as the Lawyer expl ains, " noth i n g is free ; everything is owned" (240), wh ich applies to the coal heavers them selves. U n able to enjoy for fear of arrest the barest of luxuries, a simple swim i n the sea to escape the heat , or fruit of a tree, the coal h eavers find themselves chained to their labor by m e re fact that they "were born of poor and pretty bad parents" ( 240) . The o n ly criterion that u n ites all the classes, observes the Lawyer, is the w i l l to "sin"(237) agai nst the system : Daug hter : Do you mean that everyone at som e time or other deserves

Aiello 3 3 i m pri so n m ent? Lawyer : Yes. Daug hter: Even you ? Lawyer : Yes. ( 240) The separation o f t h i s system from its hum an ity is visi ble i n its rejection o f those, l i ke the Lawyer, who try to reform it by "all the rig hteous, all the respectable" (241 ). For such reformers, accord ing to the Lawyer, th ere are o n ly two alternatives: being sent to priso n by the powerfu l , or bei ng driven to the m adhouse " by their own despair when they see the hopelessness of the struggle" (241 ). As the Lawyer further explains, for those that do not revolt, however, there is another kind of i m priso n m ent: the system becomes i n ternal ized in the form of a cod ified set of expectations and behaviors. Life, as the Lawyer d escri bes it, is reduced si m ply to "duties," ( 237) a m an ifestation of the real ity principle2 for which all i nd ivid u al pursuit of pleasure I happiness i s subord i n ated t o the needs o f t h e real ity o f work : Daughter: What are they [duties] ? Lawyer : Everything you abo m i n ate. Everything you l east want to do and m ust. They are to abstain and renounce, to go without, to l eave beh i n d . They are everything that is d isagreeable, repulsive, painfu l . Daughter: Are there n o pleasant duties? Lawyer: They beco m e pleasant when they are done (237) . Efforts to rebel against the system resu lt are futile. What one enjoys, according to the Lawyer, when the d uties are done, is co nsidered sinful and is policed psycholog ical ly by the su perego. "The n ext day" , states the Lawyer,

"

I h ave a bad conscience and go

through the torm ents of hell" (237) . For the Lawyer, "the worst thing of al l " ( 237) is the cycl ical n ature of existence (the Officer's endless pursuit of Victoria) , which mai ntai n s 2

from Sigmund Freud's concept o f the reality and pleasure principles in Civilization and its Discontents.

Aiello 34 itself through endless "repetitions [and] reiteratio n s" ( 237) . I n the natural setting of the grotto , the Daug hter proposes to the Lawyer that they "joi n their destin i es" i n marriag e and " put it to the test" to see if their love, as the Daughter believes, can transcend the corrosive i nfl uence of the world . The Lawyer, although w i l l i n g , is more skeptical ; however, the Daug hter firmly bel i eves that even though the Lawyer's " antipathies m ay be [her] . . . sym pathies, " such conflicts can be " bal anced " (2 1 7). The Daug hter expresses the apotheosis of m arriag e : Lawyer : S u pposi ng w e tire? Daug hter : C h i l d ren will com e , bri ng i n g ever new i nterests. Lawyer: You ? You will take me poor, ugly, d espised , discredited ? Daug hter : Yes . . . (21 7 ) . A s the g rotto d issolves i nto a room adj o i n i ng t h e Lawyer's office, a n d the Daug hter I goddess becom es, Agnes, the eart h ly wife of the Lawyer, the spi ritual sense of what a m arri age can be that the Daughter and the Lawyer d i scuss in the grotto contrasts with the " u n n atural" real ity of their marriage. The maid's " pasting" all the cracks around the wi ndows so as to keep fresh air out of the home is a m etaphor for the absence of any natural l ife-giving forces in this marriage. T h e m arriag e between the Lawyer a n d Ag n es i s d o m i n ated b y t h e i r material a n d eco n o m ic l iving conditions which corrupt the "conscio usness" of the relationship itself. The idealist Lawyer is transformed i nto the h u sband as economic head of his household who val ues Ag nes for h er abil ity to stop their child's scream ing because it "frightens away customers" (21 8 ) . S i m i larly, the m aids pasting of the cracks in the walls, even though it creates a suffocating atmosphere for Ag nes, is valuable since it prevents the warmth from escapi ng. The con d itions of poverty u nder which the Lawyer and Agnes live crush her spirit under their weig ht l i ke a " poor l ittl e flower, without l i g ht, without air" (2 1 9). The

Aiello 3 5 harm onic balance o f their antin o m i c poi nts of vi ew toward m arriag e , " anti pathy and sym pathy" erodes i nto a d i sson ant polarity, "one's pleasu re is the oth er's pai n" as their " l ife together [becom es] torm ent" (220) . What the real ity of their m arriage reveals is that love alon e can 't transcend the m ateri al conditions that form consciousness. Usi ng one of Agnes' hairpins as a m etaphor, the Lawyer describes marriage as the u n ion of parallel l i nes, the two prongs of the hai rpi n . The m arriage, therefore, is the synthesis of that d ialectic formed by the i nd ivid u al partners; however, when vit i ated by the external world, as the Lawyer d escri bes, the h airpin m ay be bent i nto a straig ht l i n e , resulting i n a loss o f i n d ivid uality, o r broken i n two , effecti n g the polarization o f both h u sband and wife. Where the Daughter's experiences of the contrad ictions of h u m an experience finally l ead h er is to the embod im ent of the artistic i m ag in ation in the Poet. It is through art that the Poet and Daug hter real ize the artistic i m ag in ation as a m eta - real ity that tran scends the need for i l l usion and the real ity of m aterial co nditio n s : Lawyer: Of these t h i n g s [the Daug hter's experiences] I o nce m ad e poetry. Daughter: You know then what poetry is? Lawyer: I know what d reams are. What is poetry? Daughter: Not reality, but more than reality. Not dreams, but waking dream s. Lawyer: Yet the c h ildren of men believe that poets m erely play - i nvent and fabricate. Daughter: It is j ust as wel l , my friend, or else the world wou ld be l aid waste from l ack of endeavor (245 ) . The ro le o f t h e artistic i m ag i nation within t h e world is exempl ified i n the Poet's " petition from mankind to the ruler of the u n iverse, drawn up by a d ream er" ( 246 ) , an endeavor which is facil itated by h i s relationsh i p to I ndra's Daughter. The petition , at fi rst, appeals

Aiel lo 3 6 to God for a n explanation of h u m ankind's conflicts with their own n atu re : "Why with ang uish are you born ?" " Why are we born l i ke an i m als?" ( 246 ) . The Poet then questions man 's social exi stence: Pluck a flower, straig ht you ' l l find the bloom you picked to be another's. If cornfi elds lie across your path and you m u st pursue you r way, tram p l i ng on another's cro ps, others will then tram ple yours that you r loss m ay eq ual theirs(247) . However, the h i story of man , explains the Poet, reveals man 's lack of d esire to be free from these conflicts. Christ, as the m ed i ator of man's sufferin g , was crucified by "all righteous men . . . because H e wished to set men free"(248, 249). The hegemony of the "rig hteous" that makes h u mankind fear its freedom is expressed i n the trial of the Daug hter by the Deans of the Fou r Faculties. These fou r "Deans" : M edicine, Theo logy, Law, a n d Phi losophy, w h o su pposedly represent the order and reason of i ntellectual t hought, expose i n their fight for m utual exclusivity the chaos that bel ies the assurances of trad itional ideologies. For their contrad ictions, the Daughter accuses them "of sow ing the seeds of doubt and d i ssension in the m i nds of the young"(253) : Phi losophy: The truth is never dangerous. M edicine: What is truth? Law : Whatever can be proved by two witn esses. Theology : Anyth ing can be proved by two witnesses if you are a pettifogger. P h i losopher: Truth is wisd o m , and wisdom and k nowled g e are phil oso phy itself. P h i losophy is the science of sci ences, the knowledge of knowledge. All other sci ences are its servants. M ed i c i n e : The o n l y science is n atural sci ence. Ph ilosophy is not sci ence.

Aiello 3 7 It i s mere em pty speculation (253 ) . The Chancellor, a s representative o f t h e state, h as no opi n ions o n such a debate. The Chancellor is " m erely appoi nted" to mai ntai n the ideo log ical status quo by preventing the four Deans fro m "breaking each other's arm s and l eg s i n the Senate. " "Opinions," he explains, "I take good care not to h ave any. I had a few once, but they were soon explod ed" ( 252) . The cond emnation of the Daug hter by the ideologies of the wo rld for challeng i n g their authority sym bol izes the alienation of the Daug hter fro m h u man k i nd for whom she feels nothing but pity : "to be mortal is not easy"( 257) . As the perso n ification of a spiritual con sciou sness, the Daughter attem pts to free her consciousness from the "m ud" of earth and to flee with the Poet " i nto the wi ldern ess" (256). H er last confl ict i s with the i nternal restraint, the " pangs of conscience" im posed on h er by the Lawyer, representing the voice of soci ety, the "righteous, " for n eg l ecti ng her "d uty" to their child. But as the Poet rem i nd s her, for the Daughter, as for the artistic i m ag i n ation, there is a "vocation . . . the h ig hest duty of al l "(256). As she shakes "the dust from her feet, the earth, this clay"(259) i n reaching for h eaven, the Daug hter un ites with her h u m an com panio ns as they free themselves from the objects that signify their bonds to the world and the alienation of their spirit : the Doo rkeeper burns her shawl ; the Officer h i s roses for Victo ria; Edith , h er ug l in ess ; the Lawyer, the report of the proceed ings of the H i g h Court ; and the Poet, A Book of M artyrs, for whom " sufferi ng [was] rede m ption and d eath deliverance" (259 , 260) . As she enters the Castle, it burns reveal ing civil ization as "a wall of h u m an faces, questioning, mourn i n g , despai ring"(261 ) . R eleased from the restrai nts of the Castle, the forces of l ife reassert themselves ; l i bidinal, l ife-prod ucing energy bursts forth as the flower-bud bloo m s i nto a giant ch rysanthem u m .

Aiello 3 8

Daug hter. The parting time has come; the end draws near. Farewell, you child of man, dreamer, poet, who knows best the way to live. Above the earth you hover, plunging at times to graze the dust, but not to be submerged.

I V. Conclusio n : Strind berg as The Poet

The final word s of the D aug hter to the Poet as she e nters the burn i ng Castle echoes the voice of Strind berg in regard to the relationsh i p between the new consciousness and the society from which it sought to separate itself at the turn of the n i n eteenth century. Altho ugh many critics, i nclud ing one of Stri ndberg ' s biog raphers, Elizabeth Sprigg e, bel ieve that Strind berg represented h i m self in each of the main male characters of A Dream Play, as wel l as a" fem al e" self i n the D aug hter, clearly the Poet is the central perso n ification of h i s artistic i m ag i n ation , or as S prigge d escribes it, "the earthly self that was closest to the heavens" (201 ) . For Stri nd berg , the poet as dream er fulfi l l ed several of his personal and artistic n eeds: the dream afforded h i s artistic self the " best way t o l ive. " H i s dreams were h i s "wings" that allowed Stri nd berg 's i m ag i n ation to "hover above the earth" that g rounded his l iterary i m ag i nation with conventional th eater's and even n aturalism 's fetters. M o reover, the dream as form , manifest in h i s A Dream Play , also enabled Stri nd berg to show the world as he believed it existed i n 1 90 1 . It propounds the human experie nce as a frag m entary "confl ict of opposites" resulting i n the alienation of man's m aterial l ife from his consciousn ess, his spiritual self from his earthly existence.

Aiello 3 9 A Dream Play

represents a world that was so u n real , un pred ictable a n d transitory to

Strind berg and others during that era that they felt it could o n ly be understood cl early as " a m i rage, a reflectio n , a d ream i m age" (257 ) . Thus, through the su bj ective freedom real ized in d ream s, the u nconscious, irrational ity, and the artistic i m ag i n atio n , the new con sciou sness broke free of its earthly bounds allowing Stri ndberg and the rebel l ious young i ntel lectuals of the g en eration of 1 900 to soar above the positivi sm , materi alistic val ues, and fai l ed pol itical ideolog ies of their forefathers, albeit briefly, before the horrors of m ass d estruction i n the Great War caused them to tum ble to earth once aga i n .

V . A Dream Play i n

Perform ance : Production Notes

Fig u re #1 ( n ext page) is of Max Rein hardt's sem inal prod uction of A Dream Play,

perform ed i n 1 92 1 i n Stockho l m , Swed e n . R e i n h ardt's stag ing of the play i s

considered one o f t h e most i n novative for its i nterpretation o f t h e dream effect. Because of the structure of the play, with its m any fantastical settings that merge and dissolve i nto each other, A Dream Play was consid ered " u n stageable" and was not produced until five years after it was fi rst published in 1 902 (Styan 28) . A lthough it has been prod uced a m u ltitude of t i m es si nce its fi rst production i n 1 907, fou r productions represent sig n ificant i nterpretations of the stag i n g of Strind berg 's A Dream Play. Strind berg was d i rectly i n volved with the i n itial production , which was performed at his own I ntimate Theatre. The play, which ran for over three hours i n performance, was critically well received after its first performance, but "taxing" for audi ences because of its length and complexity. The play "closed" after j u st twelve perform ances ( M eyer 482) . The second production, pictu red in figure#1 , was performed at the Royal Dram atic Theatre i n Stockholm and was far more successfully received , as were the

Aiello 40 su bseq uent five productio ns of Olaf Molander in 1 935 thro u g h 1 955. In 1 970 film d irector, I n g m ar Berg man, creatively adapted and redesigned A Dream Play for a very successful prod uction perfo rm ed on Swedish television.

Fig u re #1 represents the goal of all of these productions to present on stage the atmosphere and mood of the dream which is so explicitly woven i nto the text and i m agery of Strin dberg 's play. Of the three modern productions, there was unan i m ity in their use of the almost total absence of color i n favor of black, wh ite and g ray as the most appro priate "color scheme" to express properly the fee l i ng of a d ream . Color was considered far more representatio n al of " real ity" than the u n real strangeness of the

Aiello 4 1 black and wh ite schema. Molander, however, d id m ake use of "occasion al to uches of g lowi ng colors" in order to stress the sign ificance of certai n pro perties in the dream ( Holm 252) . The dream effect was sought i n other techn ical areas as wel l . I n h i s production of the play, R e i n h ardt used a variety of atmospheric "dream " sou n d effects; however, he i nsisted that his actors wear th ick felt pads on their shoes to e l i m i n ate any n atural sounds that may occur from their movement (Tornqvist 257) . Bui l d i ng on the d ream effect of reappeari ng props ( e . g . the Officer's closet and the clover-leaf door) that Stri ndberg i nd icated i n his stage d i rections, Molander used the sam e props from scene to scene to add to the estrangem ent of the d ream . As Eg i l Tornqvist notes i n Staging 'A Dream Play ',

" a l l the objects g radually becam e fam i liar - they were

recogn ized as som et h i ng that h ad been seen before , som ething k n own and, for that very reaso n , pecul iar- looking i n thei r n ew su rrou ndin gs" ( 252).

Figure#2 (n ext page) is a rendering of the Prologue, the Daughter's descent from heaven to earth, done by Carl Grabow for the 1 907 Castegren productio n . How to stage the Prolog ue, wh ich Stri nd berg added to the origin al text of the play five years after it was written to "stress the metaphysical d i m ension" (Tornqvist 258) of the play, was cau se for concern for all who produced the play. The i m m ed i ate question was whether it should be included at al l . D i rectors and prod ucers handled the Prologue i n very different ways. Castegre n , i n the 1 907 prod uction i ncl uded the Prologue but sh ifted the em phasis away from the Daughter to the audience as the dream er of the action by su rrounding the apron of the stage with " red poppi es, the sym bol of sleep" (To rnqvist 258) . Mo lander and R e i n h ardt si m i larly i ncluded the Prologue; however, R e i n h ardt used the spotlight to h i g h l ig ht the Daughter i n "crucial moments" of the play, such as the Prologue, where the "goddess" aspect of her character needed

Aiel lo 42 to be emphasized ( Holm 25) . Th us, when bathed i n l i g ht, the Daughter was seen as "sent from the God s" ; when i n norm al stage l i g hting, she was more easily perceived as Agn es ( Ho l m 25) . The G rabow sketch in figure#2, which depicts t h e l an d scape of the Prologue, uses l i g ht and darkness to em phasize h eaven and eart h . The Daug hter em erges from the aura of l ight and descends into w h at are cou l d be assum ed as either thunder clouds or rock fo rmations on earth (Tornqvist 260). Molander, who em phasized a "dream y landscape of the Su rrealists" over l ig hting effects for the Prologue, obviated the staging problem of the Daughter's descent to earth by sim ply chan g i n g the D aug hter's d i alogue to a voice-over sim i lar to I n d ra's (Tornqvist 264).

Aiello 43

F i g u re#3

Fig ure#3 is a scene from the 1 970 production i n which I ng m ar Berg m an relocated the Prologue to just before the opera corridor scene. The Poet i s on stage with Ag nes while I n d ra and h i s Daug hter appear o n an el evated stage beh i n d them . . Berg m an presented the Prologue as "theatrical i llusion" with I nd ra and the D aughter assu m i n g the roles as perform ers rather than Gods.Their presentation of the Prologue

Aiello 44 received applause d u ring the play. Berg m an 's i nterpretation of the P rologue shifts the e m p h asis from the metaphysical side of the A Dream Play to the artistic, which i s em bod ied by the Poet. Moreover, Berg m an 's adaptation extends the phi losophical d i m en sions of the play to include even more of the synthesis of art, phi loso phy and spirituality that is consistent with the "new consciousness" of the era in which the play was written.

Figu re#4.

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