| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
08 May 1921, Dornach |
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| Perhaps the nature of this eurythmic art is best understood by looking at what this eurythmic art seeks to achieve as a form of movement, in contrast to what our spoken language has gradually become. |
| Those who have a sense for such things can certainly feel and sense the gestural quality that underlies language, even if that language is not accompanied by gestures. We can say that our language has become an audible gesture, and we can clearly feel the remnants of the old gestures in what we hear. |
| At the Waldorf School in Stuttgart, which was founded by Emil Molt and is now under my direction, we have introduced eurythmy as a kind of soul-filled gymnastics, one after another, as a compulsory subject alongside other gymnastics. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
08 May 1921, Dornach |
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The first part of the performance took place in the domed room of the Goetheanum, the second, more light-hearted part in the “provisional hall” of the carpentry workshop.
Dear attendees! The eurythmy art, of which we want to present a sample to you here today, is not to be confused with related art forms that make use of the human being itself and [work with all kinds of artistic means of expression –] such as sign languages, mimic arts and the like. It is least confused with any form of dance art, although it is a kind of spatial movement art, whereby movements are performed by the human being themselves, by their limbs, especially the hands and arms, which allow the soul to be revealed best; but also through movements of groups of people in space, in the positional relationship of groups of people in space and the like This eurythmic art attempts to arrive at a completely different way of shaping human movement than a mere art of gesture or mimic art. And it is precisely through this that it will be able to move away from all that is inauthentic in these related artistic attempts and arrive at an artistic form of expression. For it may be said that what is usually attempted through the human being and his movement forms is, when considered in relation to the original culture, something that is actually, fundamentally, originally and essentially human. In older epochs, one always had an accompanying gesture for that which was to work as a kind of song or, better said, as a kind of recitative in the human being as an artistic form. The older languages even had a single word for this accompanying gesture and for that which came about through the sound, through the tone, a single word that indiscriminately designated both. In the course of human development, what was expressed as belonging together was then split, as it were, by the sound gesture, gesture-sounds: into speech without gestures or singing without gestures and into everything that has passed over into mime, into pantomime, into gestures. Eurythmy wants nothing to do with the latter, in that it really wants to be a kind of visible speech, drawn out of the human organization according to the same laws as speech and song are drawn out of this human organization. Perhaps the nature of this eurythmic art is best understood by looking at what this eurythmic art seeks to achieve as a form of movement, in contrast to what our spoken language has gradually become. Of course, we accompany our speech with gestures and facial expressions, especially when we are full of enthusiasm or liveliness. But basically our speech is actually nothing more than a kind of invisible gesture, in that the outwardly visible gesture has gradually receded and what the person has experienced in this visible gesture has receded into the particular nuance, into the interpenetration with feeling and so on, which he gives to speech. In earlier times, the fact that the older, more monotonous, more consonantal language was based on and supported by the gesture, gave the gesture its special nuance. We have, as it were, taken this back into the sound in the course of human development. Those who have a sense for such things can certainly feel and sense the gestural quality that underlies language, even if that language is not accompanied by gestures. We can say that our language has become an audible gesture, and we can clearly feel the remnants of the old gestures in what we hear. If we now move [back to the gesture] today - without turning the art of eurythmy into a mimic, a gestural expression, as sometimes happens - then we have the gesture, which is a further development of the natural gesture that a person uses when they speak particularly vividly or when they want to put something special into their language. But what kind of gesture is that? But what kind of gesture is this? We will not be able to use a gesture [in the usual sense] in eurythmy, because this is added retrospectively to what has gradually split off in our language. The human being of prehistoric times had a living sense of the interior of the sound itself. He developed a feeling, a sense, in the a, in the i, in the f, in the r, in the s; he had thus brought his humanity into connection with the sounds. That was also what was expressed in the primal gestures, what the human being experienced in the sound. But the sound is developed through language – and that is the case, insofar as language belongs more and more to civilized cultures. But the gesture has gradually lost its connection with the development of sound through the development of language. Language itself has developed from a revelation of the sound, of the tone, in which one has one's inner joy, one's inner experience, into that which now lives more abstractly, more logically in the context of sounds, in the context of words, of sentences. In this way, language has discarded the original sound that it had, in which its true artistic quality lay, and has become meaningful. And so if we were to try today to accompany language in eurythmic art with gestures and facial expressions, we would have gestures of meaning that are actually connected to what a person experiences inwardly in thought, in feeling, in will, but that are no longer connected to what a person can experience in sound. Eurythmy, on the other hand, goes back to the inner essence of the sound and the tone itself. And it seeks the gesture that comes naturally when one feels and experiences the inner essence of the sound and the tone, so that eurythmy, in contrast to meaningful gestures, consists of gestures of sound. A visible language, a visible singing, is thus created. Therefore, what is attained in this way through sensual and supersensory observation can certainly be regarded as an independent artistic accompaniment and revelation of what, for example, a poem presents to us. In shaping language in today's civilization, the poet goes back to the actual artistic element of language in phonetic speech itself and its formation through rhythm, meter, rhyme, and so on. Schiller, for example, always had a kind of rhythmic melody alive in his soul before he grasped the literal meaning of the poem in its fullness. And so the poet must either go back to the musicality of language or to the plastic and pictorial, as was more the case with Goethe. But he must, I would say, go back one layer further in the shaping of language, so that the artistic may enter into language beyond the merely meaningful. But in poetry it still remains hidden. I would like to say that in people there is the temptation to place too much value on the meaningful, the thought-like. And the analogous, the conceptual, is actually death, the paralysis of every truly artistic activity. What is artistic is basically language – which is composed of the conceptual element and the will element in the human being. What is artistic in language is only to the extent that it comes not from the human head, but from the full human being, from the will nature of the human being. In [eurythmy], the possibility is created of making this visible eurythmic language an expression of the fully human, of the will, by going back to the experience of the sound, to the gestural experience of the sound and the tone. In this way, the whole human being reveals himself, so to speak, not just a single organ or organ system in language, but the whole human being reveals himself as a whole human being. If we accompany our eurythmic performance with recitation or declamation, these performances of appropriate poetry, which are to be revealed through eurythmy, then the declamation and recitation must also be different from the way we are accustomed to today. We need only remember that people who have really lived in art, like Goethe, placed such great value on form and on the shaping of language that Goethe himself rehearsed his iambs with his actors very dramatically, like a conductor, using a baton. So he placed the greatest value on the treatment of language. Today, it is considered particularly praiseworthy when, when reading, when there is a recitative form, the sense of verse, rhyme and meter is completely suppressed. This is inartistic. And in an age that will be more artistic than ours, it will be recognized as unartistic to place the greatest value on the prosaic and the literal. This could not be done if one accompanies the [poems] with eurythmy. One has to go back to the actual artistry, to the artistic design of the poem, to the rhyme, rhythm, and beat, to the inner, melodious and pictorial element. Just as one can now accompany the poem with eurythmy, one can also do so with music. Since eurythmy is a truly visible language, it can be sung through in the same way as through the human speech organs. And you will also be able to see rehearsals where the eurythmy accompanies the music, as this eurythmy is a possible art in itself. Apart from the other thing, which I do not want to mention today, it can be seen from this that in certain cases one must resort to this eurythmy, I would like to say as a matter of course, if one wants to do full justice to the dramatic. For example, in Goethe's “Faust” there are scenes where the drama arises from the mere realistic representation of the phenomena. One need only recall the moment in Faust when the drama rises to depict something of the supersensible world that plays into the human soul. For example, if one considers the Arielle scene at the beginning of the second part of Faust, which represents something that does not take place in the real, outer, sensory world, but plays into the human soul from a spiritual reality human soul. If you want to depict that, you cannot get by with the usual realistic stage settings. But the moment you move on to what the eurythmic art gives not in terms of meaning but in terms of sound, when you introduce a special language that is not the language of ordinary contemporary life, you move beyond the very ordinary drama into the drama that can also be presented supersensibly. And so you will be able to see in a scene from one of my “mystery dramas” that is being performed today that what is intended is thoroughly supersensible, but intended dramatically and not symbolically, as can be represented by the art of eurythmy alone. In this case, it is about the development of a human being, about the kind of development that does not, I would say, proceed in the usual way in which human life develops in everyday life, but rather one that brings about real transformations in the human being, where he really becomes a different person inwardly, in his soul, where he experiences something in his soul that can be compared to the great transitional points in outer growth. If you want to depict something like this, which is absolutely real but does not take place before the outer senses – as here, where John is standing before us, undergoing an inner soul development – then you have to do so pictorially, not symbolically, but pictorially, to make accessible to the sensual and supersensible gaze what is passing through the human soul. And this is precisely what is to be shown in this scene, as we present it: that what takes place in the human being, but takes place in him in such a way that he has a purely spiritual world around him – as otherwise through the eye and ear a sensual world – that this is represented through the outer form by the three soul forces, as it is expressed through Mary, the ruler of these three soul forces . However, this cannot be realistically portrayed on stage if one wants to reveal it in a meaningful way. Instead, one must resort to eurythmy. You will also see how eurythmy can work on its own. For in recent times we have moved towards creating forms that, so to speak, indicate the mood from the mere visible language of eurythmy, which is then continued and developed in a corresponding musical [performance] or in an artistic poem. Even the fading away of a mood can be captured in such a silent form. In addition, eurythmy also has a hygienic-therapeutic side, which, however, basically draws what is expressed in this eurythmy from the inner laws of the human organism itself. Thus, the movements, which on the one hand are an artistic revelation, can also be shaped in such a way that they have a healing effect on certain pathological formations in the human organism. I just wanted to mention that. The third thing that eurythmy offers is the didactic-pedagogical side. At the Waldorf School in Stuttgart, which was founded by Emil Molt and is now under my direction, we have introduced eurythmy as a kind of soul-filled gymnastics, one after another, as a compulsory subject alongside other gymnastics. And it has already been shown how children, from as early as compulsory school age, find their way into these movements with great ease, movements that are thoroughly rooted in the human organism. Ordinary gymnastics – in the future, people will judge these things more impartially – are based solely on the physiological laws of the human organism. But what appears here as inspired gymnastics is based on the whole human being, on the human being as body, soul and spirit. Every movement is inspired. The child takes this for granted as it performs these movements. This is why these movements have such a life-giving and developmental effect on the child. It is an important educational tool in many other respects as well, for it contains a special power of the will. Above all, this eurythmy exercise fosters the initiative of the will and, in children, even a sense of truthfulness. In ordinary speech we can say things that become hardened into lies. But we cannot lie in these speech sounds, for when the whole human being is expressing himself, he cannot lie or indulge in empty phrases. What is given in this way means a development towards truthfulness for the child. These are only isolated aspects. Much could be said about this theme. If we consider that the human being uses himself as an instrument, but in such a way that the forces at work within him are brought out, and the form itself is transformed into movement, then we can say that this eurythmy really does embody an ideal. Then, before each performance, I must again ask for your forbearance. We are our own harshest critics, we know that we are at the beginning of our art form; it must develop further, but it has the potential to develop. These possibilities for development can be convincing when one considers what is gained by man using himself as a tool, as an instrument for his artistic formation, not just any external instrument, but himself. When Goethe says: When man is placed at the summit of nature, he sees himself again as a whole nature, which in turn has to produce a summit. To this end, he improves himself by permeating himself with all perfections and virtues, invoking choice, order, harmony and meaning, and finally rising to the production of the work of art. One must add that he rises most significantly to the production of the work of art when he seeks choice, order, harmony and meaning from this own organization and transforms it into movement, into living sculpture. So that one can indeed entertain the hope that eurythmy, which is now at the beginning of its development, will continue to perfect itself more and more, so that one day it will be able to stand alongside the other fully-fledged art forms as a fully-fledged art form in its own right. The first part of the performance will take place here in the building; the second part in the carpentry workshop. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
15 May 1921, Dornach |
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| Through the vicissitudes of his life, John comes into contact with various personalities who, while he is undergoing his own spiritual development, are also undergoing theirs. And then it can be shown in dramatic images how the various supersensible powers intervene in the development of those people who are truly undergoing an inner, spiritual development. |
| This gives rise to prejudices in those who have hitherto been involved in such an undertaking merely out of, I might say, abstract practice – like the office manager in the first picture of Hilarius Gottgetreu's practical enterprise. |
| However, when you see something like this, you soon realize how not only the so-called practical, physical world presents its prejudices against that which wants to exert its influence from the spiritual, which it wants to penetrate spiritually, but also how sometimes those who now strive for the spiritual heights, who want to undergo a certain spiritual development and also undergo it, how these can also absolutely can also completely fail at the right moment. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
15 May 1921, Dornach |
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The performance on 15 May 1921 (Whitsunday) took place entirely in the domed auditorium of the Goetheanum. Only the first part of the performance on 16 May was shown there; for the second part after the break, the performance was moved to the carpentry hall. Program for the performance in Dornach, May 15, 1921
Dear ladies and gentlemen. The presentation that is about to take place will consist of recitation, eurythmy and music. It has been organized in such a way that the second scene from my fourth mystery drama, from 'The Awakening of the Soul', can be presented today in the following way: Firstly, Dr. Steiner will recite the first part of this second scene. Perhaps I may therefore be permitted to say a few words about these “mystery dramas” for the reason that only one scene is to be presented here and perhaps a few words are necessary to place this scene in the context in which it is presented. For these “mystery dramas” are in fact a presentation of the soul processes within, not in a symbolic or allegorical way, but in such a way that the soul — insofar as it is as real for the human being and his development as the sense world around him — is presented in a thoroughly idealistic way, if I may use the paradoxical expression: idealistic-realistic. The four “mystery plays” depict the inner psychological development of a series of people who are socially and psychologically connected to one another. In a sense, the fate, the psychological and spiritual fate of the personality named Johannes, is the central focus that runs through all four “mystery plays”. Johannes is a painter, but one who, in his artistic striving, aims for a spiritualization of the artistic, for such a spiritualization that can then bring a supersensible reality to manifestation in a thoroughly realistic way, even in the painterly. Through the vicissitudes of his life, John comes into contact with various personalities who, while he is undergoing his own spiritual development, are also undergoing theirs. And then it can be shown in dramatic images how the various supersensible powers intervene in the development of those people who are truly undergoing an inner, spiritual development. We see how, in particular, Maria is placed alongside Johannes Thomasius as a personality who, while Johannes himself is still at the starting point, one might say at the beginning of his development, has already attained a certain maturity of development; so that a kind of spiritual confrontation takes place between the still undeveloped Johannes Thomasius and the more mature personality of Maria. Then other personalities join the circle. Above all, the antagonism of fate that arises between the two personalities - Professor Capesius and Dr. Strader - is portrayed. Strader is a personality who, by nature, is actually quite suited to direct practical life, who has only been brought up by parents and educational prejudices into a different life path, but at the same time a personality who cannot be within practical action without this practical action being illuminated by a spiritualized worldview. And at the same time, he is a personality who does not want, on the one hand, to have practical work, like the sober, realistic life to which one pays tribute, and, on the other hand, devotion to the spiritual world in an abstract, mystical form, but rather, in Strader, a personality should be portrayed who, from the point of view of humanity, from reality, wants to weave the spiritual and the practical into one another . In Capesius, we see a personality who is more immersed in the scientific life and who also finds some satisfaction in this scientific life, but only in the general scientific life as such, not in the particular scientific field of the present in which he is immersed. Therefore, Capesius feels particularly drawn to the revelations that can come to him from fairy tales, from the presentation of myths, in fact from all that which, in an imaginative, folk-like way, finds its way into the secrets of existence. What such people can experience in terms of mutual spiritual interaction is now presented in the first three “mystery dramas” to the point where personalities can connect a specific idea with what it means to be part of the spiritual life. Because, dear attendees, this must be a spiritual experience, a spiritual event. Something that can only be expressed approximately in abstract formulas, something that is called “standing within the spiritual world”, which can be characterized in such a way that for the one who stands within the spiritual world, this spiritual world is really like the outer sensory world, so real that he must speak not only of some abstract spiritual beings, but of concrete spiritual entities that are not symbols and allegories, but that interact with human nature — which itself is spiritual and soul-like on one side — just like the beings of the external sense world. And it is intentional, according to the scenic images that already characterize this standing within the spiritual world with the decisive personalities of the “mystery dramas”, it is intentional the transition into practical life afterwards, after the drama that I have named the “Threshold of the Spiritual World” [The Guardian of the Threshold], after that the drama is set, [whose events] present themselves as a further development, [ the drama] which the personalities on whom it depends are now to place in practical life. We should be able to use the course of these dramatic events to draw attention to how a spiritual world should not be approached as a Sunday pleasure, as something that runs alongside life, but how it should be approached as a spiritual reality that is directly connected to the outer, very real everyday life. The spiritual world should not be sought as a cloud-cuckoo-land, but as something that can be approached through each of the individual powers of the material life, to have a spiritual effect. The first scene of this mystery drama, “The Awakening of the Soul”, therefore shows how one of the personalities of the four dramas, Hilarius Gottgetreu, comes to organize his very practical, namely industrial, enterprises in such a way that he includes Johannes Thomasius and Dr. Strader in this practical enterprise, so that they can actually bring about the realization of what that is, what connects abstract technology, in which it has been brought to a certain perfection in recent times, with that which, at the same time as the actions of technology, promotes everything that places man in this community in such a way that everyone can find their human existence in this community. If this is to be realized, then the machine must begin to think differently than it has been thought in the past, especially in modern life; then the spirit must indeed be invoked and called upon to explain in a fully human way that which has so far only been explained in abstract mechanics, so that it can be carried directly into practical life - for the good and further development of humanity - that which is looked down from the spiritual world. Thus, spiritual personalities with a certain development are to be placed in practical life, and practical life is to be placed in the service of spiritual activity. This gives rise to prejudices in those who have hitherto been involved in such an undertaking merely out of, I might say, abstract practice – like the office manager in the first picture of Hilarius Gottgetreu's practical enterprise. And we see the whole opposition with which so-called practice is confronted with that which alone can bring salvation to humanity: in a spiritual conception of life that is convincing to humanity. What we are now attempting to a certain extent in practice, albeit in the very first, elementary stages, is fully contained in these “mystery dramas”. And when in 1913 the fourth drama, 'The Awakening of the Soul', was performed, initially it could only be brought to the world - which actually only means the world, namely the world of the stage - but which is thoroughly conceived in a thoroughly real sense, albeit in the sense of a spiritual-physical reality. However, when you see something like this, you soon realize how not only the so-called practical, physical world presents its prejudices against that which wants to exert its influence from the spiritual, which it wants to penetrate spiritually, but also how sometimes those who now strive for the spiritual heights, who want to undergo a certain spiritual development and also undergo it, how these can also absolutely can also completely fail at the right moment. And this failure from the other side is artistically attempted to be demonstrated in the second picture, which we now want to present. In the first picture, which is not to be presented here, the resistance of external practice against the spiritual is shown, so to speak. In this second picture, the resistance of spiritual people is to be shown, so to speak. First of all, there is John himself, who, in the course of many events in his life, has gone through a lot, and who has risen to a certain view of the spiritual world, so that he could already be guided through the event of crossing over into the spiritual world. But then he suddenly feels uncanny] about this whole spiritual world into which he has come: He is confronted with the spiritual world, he feels like he has no footing in this spiritual world. But he wants to resort to direct nature and, above all, to what emerges in him as his own childhood memories. This inner tragedy, which actually grows ever greater the more a person advances in the spiritual world, this inner tragedy of a person developing in this way, is to be depicted in this picture. One would like to say: Through such a spiritual development, a person, when he has reached a certain age, becomes more alien to his earlier epochs of life than otherwise. He looks at his earlier epochs of life as if, one might say, childhood, the first childhood, were standing there as an independent person, as another person, and then youth, one might say, as another person. One becomes stranger through such a spiritual development. And one must again find one's way back in a more intense way than otherwise occurs. We see Johannes Thomasius depicted as his childhood appears before him, as he wants to go back to that childhood because he cannot yet grasp what he is looking at, because he has not yet learned [to shine a light into] the spiritual world. Just at the moment when he had been called to be useful in the world, one might say, he becomes a burden to himself. You see him standing there in all his tragedy, first facing Maria, as he is to be led back to what he once was. But we also see how another personality connected with him, Capesius, has taken a certain step forward in his development, has gone through it, and cannot find his way back into reality, how he wants to remain in abstract spiritual worlds, in those that cannot penetrate reality. He, who has only been educated by science, I would say - not by practice like Strader - can more easily be tempted to stay inside the abstract spiritual world. We therefore see him, so to speak, temporarily falling away in the course of this picture. And all this is meant to represent nothing other than the way in which the power appears – I need only remind you of Johannes Thomasius – not in a mystical and mysterious way, when I use the term 'Ahrimanic' for this power, when one sees how the Ahrimanic reaches into this life, wanting only to chain him to the outer, spiritless practice, to all that that only ties people to the physical and mechanical. This Ahriman does not appear in this [picture]. But on the other hand, one sees that which now wants to lead the human being beyond himself, so to speak, which works in the human being so that he wants to mystically or, in the bad sense, theosophically rise above himself by half a human length. You are well aware, ladies and gentlemen, of this kind of theosophy, which consists in those concerned always saying: I have the higher human being in me, I have the higher self in me. And then they feel as if they had grown beyond themselves by half a person and could grow beyond all other people. This is bad mysticism, this is bad theosophy, this is what wants to dissuade man from standing firmly on a secure ground of practical-physical reality, but which must be permeated by the spirit. These forces, which want to alienate man from himself into an abstract spiritual world – I refer again to Thomasius – should be called Luciferic forces. They appear here; but the whole thing is not meant symbolically, but quite dynamically as forces present in the world, such as electricity and magnetism, which cannot be seen, but which are nevertheless present forces. We see how, through everything that is at work, Johannes Thomasius is led not to see his youth in delusion and dream and to long for it, but to see it in front of him, real. The struggle of his Scelenkräfte - Philia, Astrid, Luna and the other Philia - is presented to you. The spirit of Johannes' youth is presented to you. It is Johannes himself, but something that has become alien to him, which is juxtaposed with the older Johannes Thomasius as a perceivable personality – so to speak, the young Johannes Thomasius with the older Johannes Thomasius. The soul forces work together so that Johannes Thomasius, at the age at which he can recognize himself, no longer dreams himself back to his youth in delusion, but can prepare himself in this way to really intervene in practical life, as it should be in the real, right relationship between the spiritual world and the physical world. The first part will be recited. The second part – where the gnomes and sylphs appear and the soul forces and where the drama itself demands a kind of eurythmy, as noted in the drama – the recitation will then transition into a stage presentation through eurythmy, through that eurythmic art that is based on a visible language that is brought forth from the human organization just as lawfully as human phonetic language or singing. But precisely that which is to be presented supernaturally, which plays into the supernatural, cannot actually be presented with ordinary stage realism. We have made the attempt with the scenes in which Goethe, for example, transfers his “Faust” drama into the supernatural: we have used our eurythmy, this visible language, to help us. And you can see how everything that Goethe weaves into a higher world of reality can, precisely because of that, find its way into the language of the stage. What appears here as visible speech is intended to enable the inner movement tendencies of the human larynx and speech organs to be studied as they are employed in speech or song. Then what is observed there as the inner lawfulness of speech is transferred to the whole human being or to groups of people, so that, as it were, the human being or groups of people appear on the stage like a visible larynx, like a speech organ. Eurythmy is not mere gesturing or mimicry, nor is it ordinary dance, but eurythmy seeks to represent something quite different at its root. When we accompany our speech with gestures today, these are arbitrary gestures. It is interesting that in the early days of human development there was a single word for the gesture that was still connected to the sound. Our gestures today are gestures of meaning that arise from what we actually want to express and have already gone through in our thoughts. What occurs in our eurythmy is what is experienced in the tone and sound. What is experienced when a person experiences the individual sound in their soul is already abstract in outer speech. But in eurythmy we must lead back more and more from the gesture of meaning to the gesture of the sound. And that is the point: how speech in sound and song itself can evoke something that is again a real language, not just an accompaniment. In this way we can go back to the elementary form, to the artistic feeling of expression. This, however, also leads to a different relationship to the other arts, namely declamation and recitation. This is an experiment. And one could, by accompanying the eurythmy - not in the sense of wanting to particularly emphasize the content of the prose and let everything that is rhythm, meter, rhyme and so on, verse foot and so on, recede in the declamation, thus suppressing the actual artistic element, [one could] not accompany the eurythmy with this art of recitation at all. Therefore, we fall back on what, for example, Goethe, the true artist, still felt very much when he himself rehearsed the drama with his actors, what he had to rehearse with the baton, thus seeing the main thing in the treatment of language, in the formation of the linguistic-phonetic-tonal basis of the actual literal content. For that is the truly artistic, whereas it is an unartistic approach to focus particularly on the content and to want to emphasize only what is often considered the greatest in the art of recitation and declamation today. We then apply this art of recitation and declamation, if recitation and declamation is used at all, by always going back to the artistically shaped, which actually only makes use of the literal content in order to express something much deeper than can be expressed by the abstract literal content, thought-filled content. In this sense, the first part of the picture should be recited; then the transition will be made immediately to the eurythmic presentation of the second part of the second picture of my mystery drama “The Awakening of the Soul”. There will be no break. The entire performance will take place in this space without a break. The presentation of this mystery play will then be followed by other types of eurythmy performances, and there will also be a musical interlude. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
16 May 1921, Dornach |
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| What is presented here is not intended to be some kind of mimic or pantomime performance, or even something dance-like, as we understand these things today. Rather, it is about exploring, through sensual and supersensory observation – if I may use this Goethean expression – which movement tendencies underlie our speech organs when phonetic language is produced or when singing is produced . In this case, however, it is more a matter of movement tendencies that, I would say, are still disappearing as they arise and then transform into that which, as a movement of the air, underlies the tone, the sound. These movements, which only half arise, but which as such lie quite clearly, I would say in the will of the human being, in the unconscious will of the human being, are carefully studied and are now transferred according to the principle of Goethe's metamorphic view of the whole human being, namely to that part of the human being that can most directly reveal the soul's inner being: to the human arms and hands, which are then supported, admittedly, by movements of the rest of the human organism. |
| It is that which presupposes that the human being not only has an understanding of the meaningful that is expressed through his language, but also has an understanding of the phonetic, of the sound itself. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
16 May 1921, Dornach |
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Dear attendees! We will be giving you a eurythmy performance here today, and I will take the liberty of saying a few words in advance about the nature of our eurythmic art. This art is based above all on a real, visible language. You will see gestures, movements, performed by individuals, groups of people and so on here on stage. What is presented here is not intended to be some kind of mimic or pantomime performance, or even something dance-like, as we understand these things today. Rather, it is about exploring, through sensual and supersensory observation – if I may use this Goethean expression – which movement tendencies underlie our speech organs when phonetic language is produced or when singing is produced . In this case, however, it is more a matter of movement tendencies that, I would say, are still disappearing as they arise and then transform into that which, as a movement of the air, underlies the tone, the sound. These movements, which only half arise, but which as such lie quite clearly, I would say in the will of the human being, in the unconscious will of the human being, are carefully studied and are now transferred according to the principle of Goethe's metamorphic view of the whole human being, namely to that part of the human being that can most directly reveal the soul's inner being: to the human arms and hands, which are then supported, admittedly, by movements of the rest of the human organism. When I say, according to the principle of Goethe's metamorphic view, it means that, as Goethe saw in the individual leaf of the idea a whole plant and in turn in the whole plant a more intricately designed leaf, so in the processes that take place in an organ system, one can see something like an expression of the whole human being. This is indeed the case when a person makes use of the activities of his speech organs. What we otherwise feel as the content of our full humanity is expressed, so to speak, through this one organ system. And so, like Goethe, we can look at the whole plant as a more complicated leaf, and in a sense we can make the whole human being an organ of expression for his soul and spirit. And then something like a visible language emerges, which is the basis of our eurythmy. It is therefore important to bear in mind that the movements that are performed are not random gestures that would be added at random to one or other expression of the soul, but that everything that is done in terms of the smallest and small movements here is subject to strict inner laws, just as the formation of language itself is. Anyone who has an appreciation of the eurythmic quality of the way language is treated by the true poet, something of what one might call the pictorial, painterly or musical representation of language, will also have to approve of an extension of the artistic formal language into this eurythmic quality, for artistic reasons, I think. For anyone who is interested in art at all is also interested in expanding artistic means. What the poet actually wants is based on something that, I would say, is one layer deeper than what we reveal through language in ordinary prosaic expression. When we reveal ourselves in ordinary prosaic expression through the literal, then basically it is the thought that is embodied in our language. And it is quite certain that all thought kills what is actually artistic. The actual artistry of poetry makes use only of thought, of the literal content. But what is truly artistic about poetry is the special formation of language, the relationship between one sound and another, between high and low tones, and so on and so forth. It is that which presupposes that the human being not only has an understanding of the meaningful that is expressed through his language, but also has an understanding of the phonetic, of the sound itself. For what appears here as eurythmy is not the same gesture that we use to accompany our speech today. The gestures we use to accompany our speech do, to a large extent, come from the unconscious, but they are connected to the meaning of what we are saying. And the details of the eurythmic movements performed here are essentially connected to the sounds and tones themselves. So we can say that when we see one or other of these movements performed, it is the reaction of the human soul, not to the meaning expressed by some sequence of sounds, but to the sequence of sounds themselves, which produces sympathetic, antipathetic, joyful, sorrowful impressions and so on, albeit in a finely nuanced way. Nuances of the soul and its inner movement, which are brought about by the sound itself, are to come to light through eurythmy. Therefore, precisely that which is actually volitional, that is, emotional, in the artistic can come to light through this eurythmy, that is, that which has already stripped away the thought, the inartistic. And those who can immerse themselves in this way of looking at eurythmy will probably find that the very thing the poet struggles with in order to express it in language can be expressed particularly well in the visible language of eurythmy. These are a few words that point to the essence of eurythmy in an artistic sense. This eurythmy has another side, a hygienic-therapeutic side. The gestures and movements that are made here initially appear to us as something like a visible pronunciation of what is recited here in the poetry, or are intended to be a visible song, a musical element. This eurhythmics is therefore presented as musical and recitative, accompanied. But at the same time, these movements are such that they follow from the inner laws of the organism itself. Anyone with an appreciation of the human form will know that the outer limbs, as you know, extend into the most intimate structures of all the organs. When the human form is at rest, it is in a constant state of transition into movement. We cannot, my dear attendees, look at a head, for example, which is intended to be at rest [gap in shorthand], or at each finger, which is intended to grasp, in its resting form [gap in shorthand], or at how it looks in motion, how it must appear at rest. In this way, however, it is possible to extract, as it were, the forms of movement from what man is as an organized being, which are thoroughly healthy forms of movement of the human being. And in this way it is possible to extract certain forms of movement from healthy people, but also from sick people (this is only hinted at), which can also be applied to the medical field (this is only hinted at). The third [area of eurythmy is] didactic and pedagogical. We introduced [eurythmy as a subject] in the Waldorf School, founded by [Emil Molt], from the very beginning. It represents a kind of soulful gymnastics. And it must be said that one day we will think about these things more impartially and without prejudice than is already possible for people today. One day we will see that our present-day gymnastics are actually only taken from the laws of the human body, so that children derive great joy and devotion from this soulful gymnastics from the very beginning. They feel that they are entering into a life of movement that has been drawn from the nature of the human being itself. It can be said that it is quite possible to perceive in children that the soul forces can also be cultivated in this way through eurythmy, namely the initiative of the will, which is not really expressed through ordinary gymnastics. I would say that a certain efficiency and a certain courage come from ordinary gymnastics. But it is the inner initiative that comes from the soul, and this is what can be cultivated in children through eurythmy. And so this eurythmy has three sides. But what is artistic for us here is [illegible word]. And this artistic element is indeed only just beginning today. I must therefore ask again and again to be lenient with what [gap in shorthand]. We ourselves are the strictest critics of what we have dared to begin with this eurythmy. But one must consider that eurythmy uses that [illegible word] as its means of expression, its tool, which summarizes all the secrets of the world, which is a real microcosm: it uses the human organization itself. Goethe says that man arrives at art by taking order, harmony, measure and meaning from the whole of the rest of the world and expressing them in his production. When man borrows order, harmony, measure and meaning from the world through mystical vision and expresses them through his own intention, thus making himself, as it were, a work of art, then the artistic must come to expression in the best way. Therefore, one may also believe that, despite the fact that eurythmy is only just beginning today, it will have developmental possibilities in itself, so that one day, when it has been further developed, it will be able to present itself in a fully valid way as a younger art alongside the older, fully valid arts. We will, honored attendees, have the first part of our presentation here in this room today. Then there will be an intermission after the performance of The Chemical Wedding. And for the following part, that is, for what comes after the intermission, I ask the honored audience to please go to the rehearsal hall. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
12 Jun 1921, Cannstatt |
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| There we have the form as the sculptor reproduces it in a static way. One cannot understand a human hand without understanding one's own finger formation in such a way that it can move, without understanding the connection between the movement in the human being and the human form. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
12 Jun 1921, Cannstatt |
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The following words are from Karl Schubert, who only took down fragments of Rudolf Steiner's address in shorthand. A visible language is expressed through the movements of the human body in space. These are not random gestures or facial expressions, but rather this visible language is truly brought out according to the same laws by which the soul and spirit of the human being reveal themselves in musical song or in spoken language. The aim is to explore, through sensory and supersensory observation, which movement tendencies are stimulated – not actual movements, as movement tendencies are transformed into sound vibrations. These are transferred to the movements of the whole person or whole groups of people. This is based on Goethe's view. This Goethean view leads to seeing the whole plant in the individual organ, both super-sensibly and sensually. There is a whole plant in each individual leaf. What is seen in the forms can be applied to human activity. In the larynx and its neighboring organs, movement tendencies are generated during singing, in a closed human organ system. If one gets to know these movement tendencies and transfers these movements to the limbs of the whole human being, then one gets the whole human being on stage as a speech organ, and one can express the same thing that one can bring to light through singing or through poetry through the whole human being. In this way, one achieves an essential foundation for something artistic. In our language, the content of thought appears as a particularly intrusive element. The thought pushes the artistic back. In language, will and thought meet. The thought comes from the head. It is an incomplete means of expression. Human will comes from the whole person, and so what comes from the will is what is effective and powerful in language when language is to be artistically shaped through poetry. Those who have an organ for rejoicing when the field of art is expanded will welcome such an attempt as an attempt to expand the artistic. But the fact that these movements come about as I have described them does not make them tendentious. They arise from the whole inner lawfulness of the human organism. This inner lawfulness is something wonderful when one gets to know it. Consider the wonderful formation of the human hand. There we have the form as the sculptor reproduces it in a static way. One cannot understand a human hand without understanding one's own finger formation in such a way that it can move, without understanding the connection between the movement in the human being and the human form. The one who sees the eurythmic should have before him in direct contemplation that which can arise in the human organism in a completely lawful way in terms of movement. You can present a poem in such a way that you see how the whole human being comes into activity, into movement. Nietzsche knew what he said: He meant that what the human being wishes to reveal from the fully human can only be expressed in visible speech, whereas what is expressed in phonetic speech and song does not come from the fully human. Those who demand that the human being add pantomime to his movements would demand something grimacing. We will hear something poetic. This declamation must become something different if it is to accompany what is being presented through eurythmy. We have indeed strayed far from what Schiller had in his soul when, before writing down the literal words of a poem, he wrote down an indeterminate melody. Goethe had more of a poetic-pictorial quality in his soul. It is not the prosaic that is at the root of it; we have to go back to the shaping of the sound, to where the linguistic expression becomes an image in the sounding. If you bring the eurythmic into the language in this way, then the declamation is able to accompany the eurythmic. Goethe therefore rehearsed the iambs with a baton. The poetic lies in the rhythmic, not in the literal. Therapeutic-medical: Movements can be derived that have a healing and hygienic effect. The educational-didactic, which has proven itself in Waldorf schools. It can be clearly seen how the child, by immersing themselves in soulful gymnastics, feels that every single movement comes from the laws of the human being. The human being itself is taken as a means of expression. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
03 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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| And everything dance-like, mime-like and so on must be overcome in this eurythmic art. What underlies it is a real, visible language. Every single expression is not taken from the momentary meaning of this or that word, which eurythmy accompanies, or this or that musical motif; rather, one is dealing with a real language that is drawn from the human organism as elementarily as the sound language, as the phonetic language itself. |
| And just as little as one can say in the depths of one's being, when confronted with language, that one wants to bring it to some kind of understanding in the first immediate impression, [but] one simply grasps it in terms of feeling, just as little can one say of eurythmy: this gesture does not fit with this or that that is at its basis. |
| And when music is accompanied by eurythmy, it can be understood as singing in visible motion, and nothing else. That, ladies and gentlemen, is the artistic side of eurythmy. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
03 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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The first part of the performance took place in the Goetheanum building, the second part in the carpentry workshop.
Dear attendees, Allow me to say a few words to introduce the performance, as I always do before these eurythmy performances. This is not done in order to somehow explain the artistic performance; that would be inartistic, the artistic must speak for itself. But in this eurythmy we are dealing with a special formal language that is unfamiliar, and with drawing from artistic sources that we have not yet become accustomed to. And I would like to say a few introductory words about these sources and this formal language. What you see on stage is either an individual moving person — moving in their limbs — or moving groups of people. None of the movements presented here are pantomime or facial expressions. If one still sees something of that kind in the performances, it is because eurythmy is still in the early stages of development. And everything dance-like, mime-like and so on must be overcome in this eurythmic art. What underlies it is a real, visible language. Every single expression is not taken from the momentary meaning of this or that word, which eurythmy accompanies, or this or that musical motif; rather, one is dealing with a real language that is drawn from the human organism as elementarily as the sound language, as the phonetic language itself. It would, of course, be quite impossible to keep asking, 'What does this mean? What does that mean?' about the details of spoken language. This is also not possible with this real, visible language of eurythmy; rather, the forms of eurythmy are based on a real, if I may use Goethe's expression, sensual-supersensory study of spoken language and singing itself. Our larynx and speech organs as a whole are designed as a part of the human organism in such a way that they want to carry out certain movements. I have to put it this way, because it is first and foremost the predispositions for movement that are involved. These predispositions do not come directly out of the larynx and the other speech organs during ordinary speaking and singing, but are transformed into vibrations of the air, and this is what gives us the sound of speech or singing. But if one really studies what is stored in the larynx and its neighboring organs, as I said, through sensory-supersensory observation, then one can transfer what is stored for a single organ complex to the whole human being, entirely according to the principle of Goethe's metamorphosis teaching, which of course then has to be implemented artistically. In particular, the expressive organs of movement, the arms and hands, can be used to convey the same effect as speech. And in this way, with regard to human nature, one arrives at something more artistic than even speech or song can be. For in our words, even in poetically and artistically formed language, we have before us a combination of what takes place through the will of man and through the thoughts of man in connection with each other. But all thought, in essence, is inartistic. If our thinking is to be put into action, if one is to look for meaning, expression and so on in the syntactical or other sense, then, to the same extent that one has to do this, what wants to reveal itself becomes inartistic. The poet is always struggling between what is beauty of sound sequence, sound design, rhythm, beat, and what the whole inner movement of the linguistic is, and what is thought. The conceptual is, so to speak, only something that must necessarily be taken along if the sound is to be heard. But if we go back to the actual element of movement, to the disposition to move in the speech organs, and transfer it to the whole human being, so that the whole human being or groups of people become, as it were, visibly moving larynx and speech organ, then we go back to the element of will. And that emerges from the full human being, the whole human being. It can be seen from this that, firstly, even in a primitive language, a single word is often used for movements that are carried out by the human being and for the sounds that accompany them when they are sung or recited. Primitive man moves when he abandons himself freely to his inner being, in the process of transforming language into art. Hence a word for human artistic movement and for the sung or recited word in primitive language. On the other hand, we can say that everything that is a mental element in poetry recedes behind the purely formal, that is, the actual artistic element; this comes through as a will element, as a movement element – and movement is always a manifestation of the will – this comes through this eurythmic movement entirely. Anyone who is able to study the human organism as a whole or in part will say to themselves: the human organism at rest has a certain shape. So now we see the shape, let us say of a hand. We cannot be satisfied with just looking at the hand at rest. Every finger, every surface on the finger, everything about the finger is such that it wants to move out of the shape into movement. If one discovers the laws, as must be the case for eurythmy, where the entire human form wants to pass over, in a very elementary, natural way, into movements that are inherent in it, then one comes to a pure expression of will, to a spiritualized expression of will, and is then able to detach the poetic, the truly poetic, from the literal and to express through the word and through this form of movement more and more that which underlies the actual artistic aspect of poetry in the real poet, in the real artist. It is therefore important not to believe that one can directly indicate every single gesture in a mimic way in the poem without the accompanying movement. Just as in spoken language itself, the essential, insofar as spoken language is artistically formed, lies in the succession of sounds in the visualization of the sounds, so too here nothing lies in the individual gesture, which is not a gesture at all, but rather, as in music, it lies in the succession of sounds, in the shaping of the sounds - in the movement, the succession of movement, the actual element of the artistic in eurythmy is in the succession of movement. And just as little as one can say in the depths of one's being, when confronted with language, that one wants to bring it to some kind of understanding in the first immediate impression, [but] one simply grasps it in terms of feeling, just as little can one say of eurythmy: this gesture does not fit with this or that that is at its basis. Rather, the aim is to be able to feel the linguistically visible element in eurythmy as such. Eurythmy as such is not yet art. Only then must that which is drawn from the organism in the form of movement be shaped artistically. Recently, we have endeavored to achieve a great deal in this direction, particularly in the shaping of movement. Those of you who have seen eurythmy before will notice how the forms that are usually more silent, with which we introduce or end a poem, express not only the moving people or groups of people, but also the mood, beat and rhythm of the poem. Thus you will see moving people or groups of people on stage; you will hear what is presented in the movement of eurythmy accompanied by recitation or music. However, it must be noted from the outset that the recitation that has to accompany this eurythmy must now return to the truly artistic element of recitation and declamation. This artistic element of declamation has, of course, been much maligned in recent times. I use this expression for the reason that those insults that have occurred certainly did not arise out of mere ignorance, but out of ill will, which is connected with all sorts of things, and in particular arose out of an unartistic sensibility that is so widespread in the present day. We appreciate all too little in the present what it means that a true poet like Schiller did not start with the literal meaning of the most important of his poems, but rather started from an indefinite feeling of a melody and only then, I might say, lined up the literal meaning with this musical element. Goethe started more from a figurative-imaginative point of view. But [on this figurative] - which is also expressed in rhythm, beat and so on - and on the musical, the actual artistic of poetry is based, not on the literal content. Just because something is inartistic in our time, one cannot take that into account, because in the emphasis of the pure prose content, in the recitation or in the declamation, something special is being attempted. I would like to say that the inability to feel artistically about recitation today has led to these smear campaigns being unleashed in recent times, especially against recitation to accompany our eurythmy. And it is precisely this form of recitation that will have to prevail because it goes back to what is already eurythmic, namely also musical and imaginative, in language itself. Just as eurythmy can be accompanied by recitation and declamation, since it is intended to be only a different expression of what is heard, so can eurythmy be accompanied by music. You can sing in these eurythmic movements just as you can reveal yourself through sound. And when music is accompanied by eurythmy, it can be understood as singing in visible motion, and nothing else. That, ladies and gentlemen, is the artistic side of eurythmy. I would just like to mention that eurythmy also contains two other elements. One is a hygienic-therapeutic element, because it can be drawn from the human organism – from that which is already within it, that which occurs in movements. Therefore, these movements can also be transformed into healing movements. A start has already been made on this recently. Now, this side of eurythmy, the hygienic-therapeutic side, will also be further developed. The third element is the pedagogical-didactic element, which has already proven itself in the Waldorf School in Stuttgart, founded by Emil Molt and led by me, where, in addition to gymnastics, this spiritualization of human movement in eurythmy is introduced to children as soon as they enter elementary school and then continued as a compulsory subject through all school grades throughout. It may be said that every movement that a child has to perform is not merely carried out from the physical-physiological, but from the whole human being, who is spirit, soul and body. So that the child feels from the outset: it is making movements into which its soul-spiritual flows. The children feel this as something completely natural. And what is more, the fact that children feel so completely in their element is also based on the fact that this eurythmy is particularly suitable not only for developing the physical structure of the limbs and for evoking physical dexterity in movement, but also for evoking the will initiative that our time and probably also the next generation will so urgently need. What eurythmy offers children is education in the will initiative. I will not go as far as a very famous contemporary physiologist – you would be amazed if I were to mention his name – who, after such introductory words, when he was watching a performance, told me that gymnastics, which are often overestimated today, are not a means of education, but a barbarism. As I said, it was not I who said it, but a famous contemporary physiologist. One could say that this gymnastics, which is based purely on external, physical considerations, this gymnastics that supports the physical, must be complemented by that which is then the spiritualized gymnastics for children, which can be given to the child through eurythmy. The child feels completely at home in its element. These are the three sides of eurythmy. And here in our performances, it is of course the artistic aspect that comes into its own. And here it may perhaps be said again and again that this eurythmy, if further developed, is truly suited to fulfill that which appeared to Goethe as the highest artistic principle, in that he said: He to whom nature begins to reveal her secret longs for her most worthy interpreter, art - not for the abstract physiology of natural laws , but to the revelation in art. Man is that which, in essence, he has in his organism as cosmic laws and cosmic secrets. If we set him in motion in such a way that what is grounded in his essence becomes visible in the movement, then we can say: human nature begins to reveal its essence to him who feels a deep longing to bring out this essential humanity in an artistic way from within the human being. On the other hand, when Goethe says: When man is placed at the summit of nature, he in turn produces a summit within himself, takes harmony, order. and meaning together, in order to finally rise to create the work of art - so one may say: an art that does not make use of external instruments, but of the human organism itself as its instrument, as its tool, an art that brings out from this human organism measure, harmony, meaning and so on, such an art has within itself the germs to become more and more perfect. We are our own harshest critics. I know very well that this eurythmy is only at the beginning of its development. Therefore, I must always apologize to the esteemed audience when such attempts are made. But those who are willing to engage with what is being developed will recognize that if it is properly developed, by us or by others, the eurythmic art will be able to join the other, older, fully-fledged arts. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
10 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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| It is not actual air movements that are transmitted to the human speech and song organism, but the movement tendencies that are, as it were, captured in the process of their formation, but which, precisely as an expression of human will, underlie speaking and singing. And these movement tendencies are transmitted to the whole person according to the principle of Goethe's theory of metamorphosis. |
| It must be said: precisely because of this, one is able to bring out what underlies a poem, for example, the artistic quality of the poem, to a very special degree, even beyond human language. |
| Both these examples show that the poet, the real poet, is not concerned with the prosaic and literal, but with what actually lies behind the words: the rhythm, the beat, the musical theme that underlies the words or the way they are formulated. Or, as is more the case with Goethe, the pictorial element that lies behind it. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
10 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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The first part of the performance took place in the Goetheanum building, the second part in the carpentry workshop. 1. Part (Goetheanumbau) “Symbolum“ by J. W. v. Goethe with music by Leopold van der Pals“Weltenseelengeister” by Rudolf Steiner Saying from the Calendar of the Soul (13) by Rudolf Steiner “Spring” by Rudolf Steiner with music by Leopold van der Pals Saying from the soul calendar (14) by Rudolf Steiner “Heeding“ by J. W. v. Goethe Saying from the soul calendar (14) by Rudolf Steiner “Autumn” by Friedrich Nietzsche “World Soul” by J. W. v. Goethe with music by Max Schuurman Part II (carpentry) Music by Leopold van der Pals Dear guests, dear friends! Allow me to introduce myself with a few words as usual in these eurythmic attempts. Such introductions are not intended to explain the artistic aspect in any way, that would be inartistic; art must speak for itself. But they are done because this eurythmy attempts to reveal itself from artistic sources that are still unfamiliar and in an artistic formal language that is also still unfamiliar. And allow me to say a few words about this source and this formal language. What will appear on stage is the human being in motion, the human being moving in his limbs, namely in his arms and hands, the human being moving in space, and also groups of people moving in space. But none of this should be understood as dance or pantomime; rather, it is a real, visible language that has come about in such a way that, through sensual and supersensory observation – I deliberately use this Goethean expression – the movement tendencies of the larynx and other speech organs when a person sings or speaks have been researched. I say: movement tendencies. For in the actual speech and singing organism these movement tendencies do not come to real expression, but are transferred to air movements, and these convey them to the hearing of the sound and the tone. It is not actual air movements that are transmitted to the human speech and song organism, but the movement tendencies that are, as it were, captured in the process of their formation, but which, precisely as an expression of human will, underlie speaking and singing. And these movement tendencies are transmitted to the whole person according to the principle of Goethe's theory of metamorphosis. So that what you see on the stage as individual people or groups of people is, in a sense, a moving larynx, language made visible. Goethe's theory of metamorphosis is something that, according to the current state of our scientific views, cannot yet be fully appreciated today. In the future, it will certainly be seen in a much more positive light than it is today. In the simplest terms, we can express Goethe's theory of metamorphosis in such a way that, in everything, the individual organ – for example, a leaf in the case of a plant – is the transformation of the other organ. All organs are, in a sense, ideally one, only outwardly shaped differently. And again, the whole plant is only a more intricately shaped leaf. If we apply this theory of metamorphosis, which Goethe, I would like to say, intuitively applied scientifically to the whole plant, if we apply it to the movement tendencies of the human speech and singing organs, then we can say: that which exists in a single, separate organ complex when speaking or singing as movement tendencies, as an expression of the human will, can be transferred to the whole person or even groups of people. However, the sound is only slightly lost as a result. You see the movements, which are then not held in their creation, but are actually performed; you see them in front of you and they reveal themselves as a real visible language. So it is not about pantomime, not about facial expressions, not about dance. It is about the artistic design of a real language. It must be said: precisely because of this, one is able to bring out what underlies a poem, for example, the artistic quality of the poem, to a very special degree, even beyond human language. However, one must really take into account what is artistic in a poem, for example. The literal, the prosaic in a poem is not the artistic. Schiller, before he even approached the literal side of his poetry, first had an indeterminate melody in his soul. Goethe rehearsed his iambic dramas with his actors as a conductor would with a baton. Both these examples show that the poet, the real poet, is not concerned with the prosaic and literal, but with what actually lies behind the words: the rhythm, the beat, the musical theme that underlies the words or the way they are formulated. Or, as is more the case with Goethe, the pictorial element that lies behind it. This can now be brought out by, as it were, translating it through the tool of the human being himself into a moving sculpture. It can be said that when a person moves in the ordinary course of life, his movements are adapted, firstly, to his worldly purposes and, secondly, to what is expressed in the form of facial expressions and pantomime. The fact that a person is in motion also expresses something that a person experiences in his motion when he is simply involved in moving and still life. This is, I would say, the one pole: pure purposeful, appropriate motion. The other pole is language, which is also purely functional and serves human communication or the imparting of knowledge. While through his movements, which primarily serve a useful purpose, man expresses himself outwardly like a member of outer space or at least of necessary life, through language he expresses himself inwardly. The inner self reveals itself. If one wants to shape language poetically, one seeks what should lie behind language. In ordinary spoken language, as well as in scientific language, one aims at what should be expressed through thinking. But thought is something that should never actually play a special role. Because thought as such, as we have it, in ordinary life or in scientific communication, is eminently inartistic. That is why everything that is allegorical or symbolic in art is actually inartistic. The real poet as an artist therefore goes back to the musicality of language or the pictoriality of language in the way he forms language, which is actually already movement behind language. And indirectly, if poetry is to be expressed through language, one must try to have movement, rhythm, and tact in what is heard. What one tries to develop indirectly by bringing movement into speech in the formation of sounds and tones, what one tries to develop indirectly, the musical element, can now come to fruition in the movement of the human being, which one draws from the cosmos. So that the soul of a poem can actually be expressed through the moving human being, as one can also add to the musical, instead of a song, I would like to say song through the movement of the human being. One can express the musical element through this visible language in the movements of eurythmy just as one can express the musical element through song, through tones. In this way one is indeed able to push back the conceptual element in the poetry, which the poet only needs to use in order to, I would say, string together the actual artistic element. And the other element contained in every form of poetry, the will element, which comes from the whole human being, not just from the human head, is more fully revealed through the visible language of eurythmy. Those who have a truly artistic feeling will therefore have no objection to such an expansion of the artistic as it wants to occur in eurythmy, because they will rejoice in every expansion of the artistic. And whoever says, for example, that Goethean poems should not be presented in eurythmy, what would Goethe himself say about that? - would be missing the point entirely. For it is precisely that which is truly significant in poetry that arises from the whole human being, not merely from what can be expressed in words. And it is precisely this fully human aspect that can be expressed through eurythmy. So that much of what, I would say, lies in the deep secrets of poetry can be brought to the surface, can be looked at, precisely through this visible language of eurythmy. And it is on looking, after all, that everything that really constitutes the artistic impression is based. You will therefore see these eurythmic performances accompanied on the one hand by recitation and declamation – the formed speech sounds are, I would say, only another expression of what is to come to the surface in eurythmy in the human soul – or you will also see them accompanied by music. With regard to recitation, it must be said that it is particularly necessary to go back to what is actually hidden in the mystery of poetry. And in the future, accompaniment through recitation and declamation must also enter into and return to a better form of recitation and declamation, and return to conditions that no longer exist in our so unartistic time. Today, people particularly love the pointed, and consider that which brings something to light from the surging depths of the soul to be particularly effective, while the truly artistic is based on form, rhythmic composition, and the treatment of language. And it is basically the present-day form of declamation, which really only wants to emphasize the prosaic, the literal, that has emerged from an unartistic point of view and from an inability to appreciate the truly artistic. This is probably why, when a position has been taken in a non-objective way towards eurythmy in recent times – which cannot even be called negative, because one can see its non-objective way – when a position is taken against it, as here, again, with complete reliance on emphasizing the artistic that lies in the musical, pictorial, imaginative, must be [recited]: First of all, there is the artistic element, which is the main thing here. But there are two other sides to eurythmy: a hygienic and therapeutic side, which is already being developed in training. The movements that are sought in eurythmy arise from the whole organization of the human being in a way that is elementary and natural. So one might say that the movements a person makes when doing eurythmy are movements that the human form, including the inner form, the whole human organization itself, calls for. Therefore, one cannot work directly, as in the art form, which you will see here, but in a metamorphosed, transformed form, one can achieve healing and hygienic effects through these forms. Doctors have already taken up the cause, and this second aspect will therefore also be cultivated. The third aspect of eurythmy, its educational and didactic side, has already been introduced into the Waldorf School in Stuttgart as a compulsory subject alongside gymnastics. Ordinary gymnastics — one day it will be judged more objectively than today. It is based on human physiology and is founded on the idea that the physical body of the human being should be trained in particular. I fully recognize its legitimacy, but I would not go as far as a physiologist who is very famous in the present day, who once told me that I had not gone far enough for him, because he regarded banal gymnastics, ordinary gymnastics, not as a teaching tool but as barbaric; as a physiologist, he saw eurythmy for children as having to stand alongside ordinary gymnastics, not as a teaching tool, but as barbarism. I myself would like to recognize it, so that one can see that [one] will think in a different way about not just physiological gymnastics, which only focuses on the physical body. So gymnastics should not be abolished by us, but alongside this purely external gymnastics there should be an inspired gymnastics that goes not only to the body but to the body, soul and spirit of the human being. And in the lessons, which have been taught in the Waldorf School for two years now, you can see how children from the age of entering primary school until the age of fourteen or fifteen really feel their way into the movements that come from the body, soul and spirit - not just from the body - how they find something else that is fully appropriate to human nature in eurythmy and take part in this feeling with the most heartfelt joy, because they can reveal their whole human being there. With this feeling, this inner joy, the children devote themselves to these exercises, which I would like to call, from a pedagogical-didactic point of view, soulful, spiritualized gymnastics. Now, my dear attendees, this pedagogical-didactic side of eurythmy also has the effect, not only, I would like to say, of strengthening muscles and the like in children, but also of developing willpower as a soul element. Therefore, it is a pedagogical tool first and foremost, in that it strengthens the will, the will initiative in the child, which is so necessary in our age. Thus, eurythmy is a tool that uses the human being as a tool, not external tools, but the tool that lies within the human organization itself. And if Goethe uses the expression: “To whom nature begins to reveal its manifest secret, longs for its most worthy revealer, art” – then one might say: “In the human organism, what is otherwise spread out as secrets of nature, of the world in general, is also united in the cosmos. Therefore, anyone who feels the human organization with all its secrets, with all its laws in a natural way, will also feel the deepest longing for the most worthy interpreter, namely for the artistic interpretation of what is inherent in the human organism itself. Goethe says very beautifully at another point: When man is placed at the summit of nature, he in turn produces a summit within himself, takes order, harmony, measure and meaning together and ultimately rises to the production of the work of art. If we do not use external instruments, but the human being himself with the secrets of this organization, if we bring order, harmony, meaning of the human being himself and thus rise to the perfect, to the creator of the work of art, then we may say that something artistic in the most comprehensive sense must come about as a result. Therefore, this eurythmy - although I always apologize to the esteemed audience because we are only at the beginning of the development of this art and many things still need to be perfected - may say that it works from artistic sources and in an artistic formal language that is so capable of perfection - perhaps still through us, or more likely through others - that this eurythmic art will one day be able to present itself as a youngest, alongside the other fully-fledged art forms. I have only to add that the first part of the performances will take place here in this hall. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
17 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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| But what is held back in the moment of origin, what thus underlies speech and song out of human nature, can be studied and transferred to the whole human being according to the principle of Goethe's metamorphosis. |
| In the whole plant, he sees an individual leaf, a more complicated individual leaf. He then applied the same principle to understanding the forms of other living beings, of man. One day, when certain prejudices of the present so-called scientific method have been overcome, the full scientific fruitfulness of Goethe's theory of metamorphosis will be recognized. |
| As I said, when something like this happens on a large scale, it is no wonder that all sorts of things are said out of a lack of understanding or – as has happened recently – out of truly party-political, dishonest opposition to such specific aspects as the search for a real art of declamation and recitation. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
17 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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The first part of the performance took place in the Goetheanum building, the second part in the carpentry workshop.
Dear attendees! Allow me to try to say a few words to introduce this performance, as I usually do before these performances. This is not done for the purpose of explaining the performance itself. Artistic work must speak for itself, through direct observation, and any explanation would, of course, be inartistic. However, since we are dealing here with an artistic activity that draws on artistic sources that are still unfamiliar today and also makes use of an unfamiliar artistic formal language, a few introductory words about these sources and this formal language may be said. Our eurythmy is not something that could be categorized as pantomime, mime, dance or the like. Rather, it is about bringing something up into a certain artistic sphere that wants to have an effect as a visible language. You see here, esteemed attendees, on the stage the moving human being, namely the human being who is moved in his arms and in his hands, which are the most expressive limbs when you consider the human being as a whole. You will see movements of the human being in space, movements of groups of people. All this should not be pantomime, not mimicry, nothing that could somehow occur to one as a gesture that is added because one believes that it could have a reference to something that accompanies the presentation in poetry or music, but it is a real, visible language. That which is otherwise revealed in human speech or song through tone or through sound is revealed in eurythmy through the movement of the human being or groups of human beings. Therefore, what appears as eurythmy cannot be derived from some arbitrary act or from a momentary interpretation of the poetic or the musical. Rather, it is based on a real study of which movement tendencies – I do not say movements, but movement tendencies – the larynx and the other speech organs set when phonetic language or singing These movement tendencies are, as it were, held back in their formation, in their status nascens, and pass over into those undulations of the air that then convey the tone or the sound. But what is held back in the moment of origin, what thus underlies speech and song out of human nature, can be studied and transferred to the whole human being according to the principle of Goethe's metamorphosis. This Goethean metamorphosis, which Goethe himself only applied to morphology, to the study of living beings, also allows for artistic expression. In the individual plant leaf, Goethe sees an entire plant, only simpler and more primitive in form. In the whole plant, he sees an individual leaf, a more complicated individual leaf. He then applied the same principle to understanding the forms of other living beings, of man. One day, when certain prejudices of the present so-called scientific method have been overcome, the full scientific fruitfulness of Goethe's theory of metamorphosis will be recognized. But this theory of metamorphosis, because it leads directly to the visual, allows for artistic expression. And so what can be observed through sensual and supersensual observation of movement tendencies in the human speech and song organs can be applied to the whole human being. And in a sense, you will see in the individual human being, in groups of people here on the stage, moving speech organizations themselves, which visibly, according to exactly the same laws by which metamorphosis gives rise to phonetic language and song, which reveal the human essence according to these laws – and even reveal them in such a way that one is closer to the laws of sound, of tone, insofar as these are lawful, in this visible language than in the case of the spoken word. Not only that the spoken word, especially in the case of the present speaking, leads to the conventional or to that which merely wants to be a communication of the thought - the thought itself can never be artistic, the thought kills the artistic - but language is always formed in a certain way according to logic. If the poet wants to go back to the artistic, to some extent wants to seek the artistic in the shaping of language, then he must, as far as possible, disregard what makes language logical, what makes it an expression of thought, as much as possible in the already advanced, developed language, and go back to what can be shaped in the tone itself, to the musical in the form of sound. Schiller always had an indefinite melody in mind before he spoke the words of one of his poems, especially the smaller poems that he conceived in his soul. Goethe rehearsed his iambic dramas with his actors with a baton because he wanted to go back to the pictorial – Schiller to the musical, Goethe to the plastic-pictorial. The poet must place into the sound-formation that which basically lies behind the language, that which the language more or less conceals, and this must be done in an, I would say, invisible eurythmy. But it comes to expression in particular when the musical itself is to reveal itself in song. It is just as possible to sing in this visible language of eurythmy as it is to express a poem in this visible language in terms of its actual artistic content. Anyone who really enjoys the artistic process will therefore welcome with joy every expansion of art through a new formal language, through new artistic sources. And something like eurythmy, which seeks to expand the artistic in a particular area, will not meet with any real resistance from him. But by using the human being himself as a tool in this eurythmy, one also goes back to a more artistic level than one can achieve in spoken language. After all, thought lies in spoken language. But thought is actually always inartistic. The pictorial is more artistic. Such a pictorial quality is in the broadest sense, as it can naturally be, I would say, the audible – and in the musical, that which lies not in the thought but in the human song, in the human tone, that arises from the whole, from the full human being, arises from this will element. In language, the thought element and the will element always flow together. The thought element almost completely recedes in the visible language of eurythmy; and the will element, that is, what comes forth from the whole, full human being, comes into its own. Therefore, one can feel in the eurythmic presentation of a poem, for example, what lies at the heart of the poetry as the actual artistic element. This must also be taken into account when, as is the case here, many poems are accompanied in eurythmy not only by music, which also happens, but also by recitation and declamation, which is then only a different expression, a different revelation of what is being declaimed, recited. But we must realize that we must go back from the present declamation and recitation, which belong to an unartistic age, to real artistic recitation and declamation. Here we are not dealing with what is particularly valued today – with the emphasis of the prosaic, the literal – but with the development of the rhythmic, the metrical, and even the melodious, textual, thematic element that underlies it as the truly artistic. In poetry, the literal can never be the essential, but only that which serves as a kind of ladder – the rhythmic, the musical, the metrical, the melodious, the thematic – to be strung together in the words, which are actually used only to form sounds and tones. This formal artistic element must be worked out in the recitation and declamation that accompany the eurythmy. Recently, attempts have been made to develop this recitation and declamation here in a way that recalls more artistic epochs than the present one. But what needs to be trained here today is often not only dismissed, but also insulted. Of course, we cannot be slowed down in the development of what must come again: a truly artistic recitation and declamation. In declamation and recitation, all that is artistic must arise through formally artistic means, not through the kind of emphasis that people love today and that actually arose only from the inability to find real art in poetry. It is no wonder that a single chapter, I might say, of what must be cultivated here at the Goetheanum and what is cultivated with a purely artistic sense — at least in intention — is distorted and criticized in the world when one sees how otherwise everything that emanates from the Goetheanum in Dornach is worked against with untruth and dishonesty. . Only recently we had an example of this in the form of a report that a so-called sensational brochure about the Goetheanum was being prepared by a quarter from which dozens of lies have been issued in the past. We shall just have to listen expectantly to see whether those people, who have been amply proved that only lies come from that quarter, will now pounce on the new one with wild greed, which of course is also unknown to me. But the side that has only ever lied about the Goetheanum is very well known to me. As I said, when something like this happens on a large scale, it is no wonder that all sorts of things are said out of a lack of understanding or – as has happened recently – out of truly party-political, dishonest opposition to such specific aspects as the search for a real art of declamation and recitation. That, for the moment, ladies and gentlemen, about the artistic aspect of eurythmy, which, however, has two other sides. I can only mention one of them briefly: that is the therapeutic and hygienic side of eurythmy. The movements that one encounters in eurythmy are drawn from the innermost laws of the human organism, just as language and song come from the laws of the speech organs. And it must be said that anyone who is familiar with the form of the speech organs can see in this form what can be communicated to people through singing and what can be communicated through artistically treated language in poetry. But in the same way, the human organism as a whole contains the potential for certain movements that can be derived from it. If these are faithfully derived from the human organism, they can also be transformed into movements that, because they are derived from human nature, have a therapeutic effect. These are different movements, transformed, metamorphosed movements, which appear on the therapeutic-hygienic side, in contrast to the artistic movements of eurythmy, which can be seen here. But basically they are based on the same source. The third element in this eurythmy is the pedagogical-didactic element, which we have been applying for two years now at the Freie Waldorfschule founded by Emil Molt in Stuttgart, which I run and where eurythmy is taught to the youngest and oldest schoolchildren as a compulsory subject alongside ordinary gymnastics - as a form of gymnastics that is inspired and spiritualized. >I have to keep saying: people will one day think more objectively about gymnastics than they do today; but it is not said by me, but I have to keep saying what one of the most famous physiologists of the present day said to me, who once heard what I said about it and who therefore told me afterwards: ordinary gymnastics should not be seen as something that, from a physiological point of view, point of view, but as a form of torture. Now, as I said, he was one of the most famous physiologists – I don't want to repeat what he said about gymnastics. It is reduced to a basis of what can be researched in a physiological way. But what is illuminated, inspired and spiritualized in the child through eurythmy is felt by the child. And this is clearly evident in the Waldorf school as something that really comes from the most elementary core of human nature. The child feels truly at home in its element, because it not only experiences physical movement, but because the child's body, soul and spirit are truly emphasized as a unity. And it is no small thing that something is developed in the child that is now missing and will be increasingly missing in every following generation, something that can never be achieved in ordinary gymnastics: soul initiative, initiative of the will. This can only be judged by someone who sees how the child grows in its soul-bodily development from week to week, from month to month, from year to year. It is the case that the child actually develops its will initiative to a particular degree through this eurythmic gymnastics, whereby it is certainly not a one-sided soul or spiritual training that is meant. Rather, precisely because the whole, full human being is appealed to, the human being is furthered in his development through eurythmy as inspired gymnastics in body, soul and spirit. Here in our presentation, you are now confronted with the artistic. But one may say that when Goethe, with his view of art, took the position: When nature begins to reveal its apparent secrets, as he says, he feels the deepest longing for its most worthy interpreter, art. In particular, if one does not use an external instrument, but uses a human being as an instrument – and all the secrets of the world are contained in the human being, the human being is a microcosm, that is not a phrase, it is a fact - and so we can say in response to this saying of Goethe: When man, as a higher nature, begins to reveal his inner secrets of growth and of creation, he feels a deep longing to create that which can arise out of himself! And when Goethe says elsewhere: When man is placed at the summit of nature, he takes harmony, measure and meaning together, produces a summit within himself and rises to the production of a work of art, then one may also say: When man searches within himself, in his overall organization, for order, harmony, measure and meaning, in order to elevate them to a higher level, then himself, as the most worthy tool, something artistic will certainly arise. What I always want to say at the end of each introduction to our performances – and so also today, dear audience – remains: We ask the esteemed audience to be lenient because what is already eurythmic art today is just only a beginning. We are our own harshest critics. But we also know that, given time, the germ of an idea will develop into something that can stand on its own as a fully-fledged art alongside its older sister art, eurythmy. It is more likely that others will do this than that we will. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
24 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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| The poet attempts to bring into his poetry the artistic element that underlies language in a deeper way by means of an inner eurhythmy of speech, by shaping speech, by means of the musical and phonetic, by means of formally shaped speech, by means of the rhythmic, by means of the musical, thematic element that he lays at the basis of speech and for which the literal content is only a ladder by which the artistic element can ascend. underlying artistic element in language into his poetry. |
| The essential thing is the musical-thematic, which underlies language, or the imaginative-pictorial, which underlies language, the pictorial. Especially in a pictorial language, what otherwise, I would like to say, only lies hidden in man, can be presented to the outward eye in a truly artistic sense. |
| What is being sought here is a real return to the art of declamation and recitation, which cannot be based on emphasizing the prosodic structure, but must be based on the artistic, musical, thematic, rhythmic, and metrical shaping of the language treated by the poet, or on the imaginative and pictorial elements that underlie poetry which a poet like Goethe has based on, to the purely prosaic, in order to express the actual [poetic] of the poem. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
24 Jul 1921, Dornach |
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The first part of the performance took place in the domed room of the Goetheanum, the second part in the provisional hall of the carpentry workshop.
Dear Guests! Allow me to begin with a few words, as I usually do before these eurythmy performances. This is not to defend or explain the artistic aspect, which would be, of course, something inartistic, and everything that aspires to be art must speak for itself, through its own impression. But what we are dealing with here in the art of eurythmy draws on artistic sources that have been unfamiliar until now and makes use of an equally unfamiliar artistic formal language. And a few words about these two, about the sources and about the formal language, may well be said so that what we are trying to develop here as eurythmy - which, however, is still more or less in the early stages of its development today - is not confused with something it does not want to be: dance or pantomime, facial expressions or the like. What underlies this presentation, which occurs through the agency of the moving human being or groups of moving human beings, is a truly visible language, and specifically a language that, as such, emerges from the human organization just as regularly and fundamentally as spoken language or song. For it is possible to observe, through sensory-supersensory vision, the movements of the larynx and other speech organs of the human being when speaking or singing. These are not the movements that are performed last and then become air movements through which sound and tone are conveyed, but rather the movement tendencies that are held back at the moment of origin because it is not the movement that is to become visible, but the sound that is to arise. remain latent in the human organism when speaking or singing. The following can be said: in the human organism, there is, on the one hand, an element of imagination and, on the other, an element of will that seeks expression through speaking and also through singing. That which is imaginative struggles to free itself from the human cerebral organization. What is volitional in our speaking and singing comes from the whole nature of the human being, from the full human being. Now everything that is mental, that is, conceptual, is unartistic. Man experiences the conceptual only through his soul when it is, as it were, intellectually assimilated inwardly. Thus something unartistic intrudes into the soul experience when the soul is confronted with the conceptual and has to wrestle with the unartistic element of the thought. This is always the case with the art of poetry. The poet always tries to go back as far as possible from the conceptual element to the volitional element that comes from the whole human being. This volitional element, which comes from the whole human being, is, as it were, what lies in the movement tendencies of the larynx and its neighboring organs and what is, as it were, dulled by the conceptual element. The poet attempts to bring into his poetry the artistic element that underlies language in a deeper way by means of an inner eurhythmy of speech, by shaping speech, by means of the musical and phonetic, by means of formally shaped speech, by means of the rhythmic, by means of the musical, thematic element that he lays at the basis of speech and for which the literal content is only a ladder by which the artistic element can ascend. underlying artistic element in language into his poetry. What lives in the speech organs as, I would say, the hidden, full personality of the human being, can now be brought to revelation through the eurythmically visible language. We proceed here from the principle of Goethe's theory of metamorphosis, which is the view that what is revealed in a single organ system of an organism is the same - only in a simpler way - as what is revealed through the whole organism. The individual plant leaf is, so to speak, in idea, a whole plant, only more simply formed for external sensory perception; and the whole plant is only a more complicated leaf. One can study the nature of the individual leaf in the whole plant. Thus, when this morphology, as conceived by Goethe, is artistically developed, what can be seen in the artistic in the supersensible can be transferred to the organs of movement of the whole human being, to arms and hands - which come into consideration because they are the most expressive parts of the whole human being - or to movements and postures of groups of people. In a truly visible way, one can express the same thing that the poet seeks to achieve by bringing the will element into the language. Then it must be emphasized again and again: the literal content is not the essential thing – that is only the prosaic. The essential thing is the musical-thematic, which underlies language, or the imaginative-pictorial, which underlies language, the pictorial. Especially in a pictorial language, what otherwise, I would like to say, only lies hidden in man, can be presented to the outward eye in a truly artistic sense. Therefore, anyone who has a real feeling for this expansion of artistic possibilities will be able to enjoy eurythmy and not fight it. But it should be emphasized that poetry can be accompanied with this visible language as well as with music and singing. And what is actually poetic, the artistic, can be brought to the fore in a special way. When a poem is recited or declaimed and then performed in eurythmy, as you will see on stage here, we must go back to the actual artistic element of reciting and declaiming, because we live in an unartistic age in which the art of recitation and declamation has also become unartistic And this artistic element does not lie in what impotence seeks today, in the emphasis of the purely prosaic. If one prefers this emphasis on the purely prosaic, one will criticize what is being attempted here, as has indeed happened so often in recent times. However, in the case of the last campaign against the eurythmic art, this criticism has come not from any artistic background but from a rabble-rousing party background. What is being sought here is a real return to the art of declamation and recitation, which cannot be based on emphasizing the prosodic structure, but must be based on the artistic, musical, thematic, rhythmic, and metrical shaping of the language treated by the poet, or on the imaginative and pictorial elements that underlie poetry which a poet like Goethe has based on, to the purely prosaic, in order to express the actual [poetic] of the poem. One can say that the actual essence of poetry never lies in the words and in what is to be conveyed in the words, but in the treatment of the thoughts, in the way the words or thoughts are formed. This can be particularly emphasized by the artistic presentation of eurythmy, but it must also come to the fore in declamation or recitation. Today, in addition to the other performances, we will present the “Prologue in Heaven”, which precedes the dramatic presentation of Goethe's “Faust”, in eurythmy. It may be said on such an occasion that the eurythmic presentation proves particularly useful for the dramatic as well, if this drama - as is the case with Goethe's “Faust” in many places, for example in this “Prologue in Heaven” - distinguishes itself from the naturally outwardly obvious, when it rises to that which can only be given in the soul's view . When the spiritual experience is elevated to the supersensible, the naturalistic and intellectualistic aspects of the art of the stage are no longer sufficient; the presentation demands a different form. For in the same measure in which these elements appear on the stage – the naturalistic and the intellectualistic do indeed belong together – in the same measure it becomes impossible to depict the supersensible. This is particularly evident in scenes such as the 'Prologue in Heaven' or other scenes in Goethe's 'Faust' that play in the supersensible, where there is this peculiar artistic stylization, this lifting of the content, the prosaic content, out of the naturalistic into an element where one can no longer be naturalistic because it has to be seen spiritually. That is what makes it possible to do justice to scenes that make these demands: to go out into the supersensible, so that it can also be grasped by the supersensible of the human soul. Therefore, I may believe that such poetry as “Faust” can only come into its own in eurythmic performance on the stage. I have already said something about the artistic aspect of eurythmy. There are two other sides to this eurythmy: a therapeutic-hygienic one – there is also a form of eurythmy therapy that is now being developed, at least in its initial stages. Because eurythmic movement is an entirely channelled expression of the inner laws of the human organism, the mobility that it engenders in the human being, for example the movement of breathing, can also be used for therapeutic and hygienic purposes through the eurythmic element. I can only hint at this here. A third element is the pedagogical-didactic one. We have introduced eurythmy as a compulsory subject in the Free Waldorf School in Stuttgart, which was founded by Emil Molt and is headed by me. Children from the first year of primary school up to the highest year groups find that, because not only the physical body is set in motion as in ordinary gymnastics, but because every movement of the body is imbued with soul and spiritualized, as this soul-spiritual gymnastics - for that is what eurythmy is in a pedagogical-didactic sense - really puts the whole person in such an inner soul state that he feels in his element as a full human being. The child feels this, and that is why eurythmy is such a significant educational tool in so many different ways. I would just like to mention one thing: it is also an important [means of educating the will initiative], which can never be achieved through ordinary gymnastics, but which is so necessary for our generation and probably also for the following generations in the near future. With regard to the artistic aspect, it may also be said that eurythmy is something that uses the human being as a tool. And if Goethe says on the one hand: “When nature begins to reveal its secrets to someone, they feel a deep longing for its most worthy interpreter, art,” on the other hand, we can say: “When the secrets of the highest naturalness, the secrets of human nature itself, are revealed to someone, they long to raise everything that lies in the human being as possibilities for movement and formation through his or her own organization into the realm of art. On the other hand, when Goethe says: When man has reached the summit of nature, he perceives himself as complete nature, takes in harmony, order, measure and meaning, and finally rises to the production of the work of art, so one may say: This production of the work of art reaches a peak, so to speak, when man does not use external tools, but his own organism as a tool. This human organism is a small world, containing the laws of the universe in a concentrated form. If it seeks harmony, moderation and meaning in its sphere, in order to rise to the sphere of consciousness, something good must follow. Even if one needs to ask the esteemed audience for indulgence, and I do so today, because eurythmy is only just beginning, one still knows what developmental possibilities lie in it and that one day - if not through us, but probably through others - it can be led to stages of development through which it can establish itself as a worthy supreme art alongside the older, fully entitled sister arts by making use of man himself as an artistic tool, by making use of what man can extract from his own organization, from this world in miniature. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
07 Aug 1921, Dornach |
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| And the fact that it can be that is based on the fact that, to use this Goethean expression, it was first carefully observed through sensual-supersensory looking at what actually underlies the movement tendencies in phonetic language, song, in the larynx. In the other speech organs, if I may express myself in this way, movements come to life that are captured in the moment of their creation, in their status nascens, and then transform into those movements that convey sound or tone as air movements. |
| We must only be clear about the fact that in the poetic arts, the actual artistic element is seated much deeper than one is accustomed to seeking in our present unartistic age. On the other hand, we must fully understand how that which is present in the shaping of speech in terms of rhythm, meter, melody, but also in terms of pictorial imagery, is that which the poet actually experiences in his soul. |
| In this, it is important to bear in mind that recitation and declamation, which are supposed to accompany what is being performed in eurythmy, must in turn return to the times when the art of recitation and declamation was understood. Our age has become inartistic in this respect, also with regard to poetry. Today, few people are aware that Goethe himself, for example, did not rehearse his iambic tragedies with his actors based on their prosaic content. |
| 277c. The Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922: Eurythmy Address
07 Aug 1921, Dornach |
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The first part of the performance took place in the domed room of the Goetheanum, the second part in the provisional hall of the carpentry workshop.
Dear attendees, Allow me to introduce today's presentation with a few words, as I usually do for these eurythmy attempts. This is not done to explain the presentation itself – art must speak for itself in the immediate experience, and the explanation of art would itself be inartistic. However, in the case of these eurythmy attempts, we are dealing with an artistic activity that draws on previously unfamiliar artistic sources and that also makes use of an equally unfamiliar artistic formal language. And perhaps something can be said about these two, about this artistic source and about this artistic language of forms - all the more so because what is presented here can easily be confused with all kinds of neighboring arts, with the art of dance, with pantomime and facial expressions and the like, with which it should not be confused. What you will see here on the stage, so to speak, is people in motion, groups of people in motion. And what is expressed in these human movements is a real, visible speaking. It is not the result of gestures being invented at random to express these or those feelings, these or those nervous processes and the like. It is not like that; rather, it is a real visible language that is drawn out of the human being, out of the human organization, in the same way that language, spoken language itself, is drawn out of this human organization. Visible song, visible speech: that is what eurythmy seeks to be. And the fact that it can be that is based on the fact that, to use this Goethean expression, it was first carefully observed through sensual-supersensory looking at what actually underlies the movement tendencies in phonetic language, song, in the larynx. In the other speech organs, if I may express myself in this way, movements come to life that are captured in the moment of their creation, in their status nascens, and then transform into those movements that convey sound or tone as air movements. So it is not that which becomes real movement, but that which, in the moment of its arising, holds itself in order to become tone or sound, that must be captured by sensory-suprasensory observation. For this is essentially born out of the actual organization, the human organization of tone and sound. Just as language can express what lives within the human being, so this eurythmy, this visible language, can express the laws of both the poetic and musical arts. We must only be clear about the fact that in the poetic arts, the actual artistic element is seated much deeper than one is accustomed to seeking in our present unartistic age. On the other hand, we must fully understand how that which is present in the shaping of speech in terms of rhythm, meter, melody, but also in terms of pictorial imagery, is that which the poet actually experiences in his soul. For in our ordinary language – and singing is only one more artistic [linguistic?] activity that has been developed towards musicality – all that the poet expresses in speech, but that which lives in our language, is actually composed of two elements: a thought element, which, as it were, flows out from the organism of the head into the tone-like of speech, and from a will element that comes from the whole human being. The whole human being has become soulful, and from this soulfulness of the whole human being comes the will element. The more language advances in civilization, the less artistic it actually becomes. You can see it in the languages, if you have an eye for it, how they can become inartistic. Those languages in which the vowels e and i are increasingly preceded by consonants tend towards the inartistic. We must realize that the mental element flowing into speech is inartistic. Thought as such is always inartistic. Thought has a different essential element, a different mission in life, than directly expressing the human inner self in artistic forms, which is why the thought element advances in civilized languages. The element of prose comes to the fore inwardly everywhere and the artistic element recedes. The poet then fights against the prosaic, and he tries to lead language back again, I would say, to a deeper level of experience, where the emotional-volitional can live out more fully in it. But this, what comes from the whole, from the full human being, this will in the expression of soul and spirit, can be brought out particularly through the visible language of eurythmy. Therefore, in poetry in particular, what is basically only hidden in the treatment of language, in the eurythmization of language, but which, when you strip it away, the conceptual, and this element of will in human, lawful movement, is shaped as it is in eurythmy, then you will be able to reveal from the poetic content what is contained in the actual artistic content, just as it is with musical content. You will therefore hear the musical and the poetic at the same time as what is presented here as the eurythmization of the musical or the poetic. In this, it is important to bear in mind that recitation and declamation, which are supposed to accompany what is being performed in eurythmy, must in turn return to the times when the art of recitation and declamation was understood. Our age has become inartistic in this respect, also with regard to poetry. Today, few people are aware that Goethe himself, for example, did not rehearse his iambic tragedies with his actors based on their prosaic content. He did not just rehearse them, but rather, like a musical conductor, he rehearsed his Iphigenia with the actors, wanting to present and reproduce the speech formation. In the future, people will be just as insensitive to this as they are today. Schiller, just before he had the literal meaning of most of his poems in his soul, first had a kind of indeterminate melodiousness within him, a musicality, to which he then, so to speak, strung the words of his most important poems to create this linguistic form, this rhythmicization, this rhythmic treatment of language, to this treatment according to a kind of melodious thematic, to this treatment according to the pictorial, according to the imaginative, which is evident in the particular treatment of the sounds. Some sounds are broadened, others sharpened: in these expressions alone, by taking them literally, it is already expressed that the pictorial element can also come to life in language. This must be expressed in declamation and recitation. That is what is particularly opposed today, but only out of unartistic sentiment, out of pure dilettantism. Even if this kind of declamation and recitation has been fought against in recent times for quite different and dishonest reasons – I do not want to talk about these today – it is precisely out of quite [different declamation and recitation] that it must be shown how language also has within itself that which is then expressed through movements []. And these movements are not arbitrary, but are taken from the whole of the human organism through sensory and supersensory observation, and can be expressed in movement. In our eurythmy performances there is relatively little facial expression. Facial expression can of course only be expressed in a eurythmy performance to the extent that it can be expressed by an individual when speaking. In artistically shaped speech one would treat it in the same way as a forced facial expression when speaking, which would be a grimace, a caricature. And precisely because it has often been emphasized that the facial expression is missing, it shows how little sense one has of this particular linguistic element that lies in eurythmy. One also wants to look for the gestural element in it that can be interpreted from the moment. But just as the speech sound does not come to the soul content arbitrarily, but in a lawful way, so too what is formed in the eurythmic as movement does not come arbitrarily to the soul content. And a thought, a configuration, a sentence configuration, all this has a clear revelation in eurythmic expression, not something arbitrary. And the essential thing is that one does not seek what is actually to be expressed in the individual gestures either, but precisely in the sequence of movements, in the artistic shaping of the person, we have eurythmy. What is still inartistic, what still has to be artistically shaped, just as language itself in poetry: that is what we have to bear in mind. I would also like to mention that today, in addition to the poems presented, we will also see something dramatic, the “Prologue in Heaven”, which precedes the first part of Goethe's “Faust”. There you can see how much the dramatic justifies eurythmy. I have not yet found it for myself, I am still working on it. If one wants to look for a new means of expression for the dramatic at all, as we already have it to a certain extent for the lyrical, for the epic, one only realizes how a truly artistic style comes to expression precisely in the search for a legitimate style. It is at most sought for naturalistic scenes. They must, after all, remain naturalistic scenes. I don't even want to say today how simple and superficial they will appear. But what, like Goethe's “Prologue in Heaven” or other “Faust” scenes, carries the situation from earthly events up into the supermundane, where soul experiences that have a connection with supersensible worlds are to be portrayed, there one notices, especially with Goethe, with the true poet, how that which he cannot reveal, precisely because it descends into the purely naturalistic, ascends into the supersensible, how on the one hand it can only be truly stylistically presented [through eurythmy]. And one can hope that wherever the action in the drama rises to the level of spiritual experience, which goes beyond the purely naturalistic, eurythmic forms will be found everywhere, which in turn do justice to what is basically neglected if one wants to present it with today's merely technical means. I would also like to say that the presentation of Goethe's Faust scenes, such as the “Prologue in Heaven”, which is to be presented to you today, is something that is capable of significant perfection. That is more or less what I would like to say in a few words, just about the artistic side. Another aspect of eurythmy is its pedagogical and didactic side. Here at the Goetheanum, of course, it is mainly the artistic side that is presented to you. As always, I would like to inform the esteemed audience that we are only just beginning with our eurythmy performances; we are our own strictest critics and know that it needs to be further developed. Those of our honored viewers who have seen our performances often will have noticed that we begin and end our eurythmic forms with silent forms before and after our performances. Wherever eurythmy is the only accompaniment, you will actually see how the mood of the poem can be introduced through such silent forms and how the mood can be sealed at the end through silent forms, after the poem has faded away. And how one can express the essential artistic element of the poem through this visible language, even when it is not accompanied by audible sounds, but is introduced or allowed to fade away merely through the visible language of eurythmy. On the whole, it may well be said that when Goethe says: “He to whom nature reveals her manifest secret feels a deep longing for her most worthy interpreter, art, that one strives for this quite objectively with eurythmy. So that this saying of Goethe's can also be interpreted, with some modification, to mean: he to whom human nature and the soul reveal the revealed secret finds in himself a deep longing for that expression of the human form, for that remembering of the human form of the movements that arise from an inner, not an outer, lawfulness and art. Elsewhere, Goethe says very beautifully: “By being placed at the summit of nature, man brings forth a summit within himself and ultimately rises to the production of the work of art.” If we know how the human being is again a true microcosm, in which what lives as the macrocosm, as the great world, is secreted, then what is scattered, I would say, throughout the world of space and the world of time, can be found again in the human being; if we truly feel and experience this world, then we can also say, with regard to what lives in microcosm of the human being, draws order, harmony, measure and meaning from his own essential qualities and forces, and draws measure, harmony and meaning from these qualities and forces and creates a work of art out of them, as in the art of eurythmy, then a real work of art must arise. And so we can have confidence that, if we look at what eurythmy wants, it will continue to develop, probably not through ourselves but through others, but by developing further and further, we can be sure that it will finally arrive at the point where it will be able to add itself as a fully-fledged younger art to the fully-fledged older ones. |
| 278. Eurythmy as Visible Singing: The Experience of Major and Minor
19 Feb 1924, Dornach Translated by Alan P. Stott |
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| This sad fact, that more significance is attached to something still in its infancy than to something more fully developed, is really a proof that at the present time the understanding for eurythmy has not made much headway. It is of the utmost importance that this understanding should be fostered, and therefore I should like today to begin with certain introductory remarks which in the light of such understanding may enable you to work for eurythmy. If we try to develop tone eurythmy out of eurythmy in the more general sense, the opportunity will arise of speaking about this understanding at least in an introductory way. It cannot be denied that on the part of eurythmists themselves, much can be done with a view to increasing a right understanding of eurythmy, for above all what is perceived by the onlooker must be borne in mind. |
| It must be said that in our modern world the understanding for such things is remarkably limited. But without this understanding, absolutely nothing productive can be achieved in so many realms. |
| 278. Eurythmy as Visible Singing: The Experience of Major and Minor
19 Feb 1924, Dornach Translated by Alan P. Stott |
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Speech eurythmy has been developed up to a certain stage, and it may be said that we have achieved something in this domain. Until now tone eurythmy has only been developed in its very first elements, and due to a remarkable fact which has recently come to my notice, I have been led to give this short course of lectures. From various quarters it is strongly apparent that people have frequently found tone eurythmy more pleasing than speech eurythmy and comparatively easy to appreciate, whereas speech eurythmy has seemed much more alien to them. This sad fact, that more significance is attached to something still in its infancy than to something more fully developed, is really a proof that at the present time the understanding for eurythmy has not made much headway. It is of the utmost importance that this understanding should be fostered, and therefore I should like today to begin with certain introductory remarks which in the light of such understanding may enable you to work for eurythmy. If we try to develop tone eurythmy out of eurythmy in the more general sense, the opportunity will arise of speaking about this understanding at least in an introductory way. It cannot be denied that on the part of eurythmists themselves, much can be done with a view to increasing a right understanding of eurythmy, for above all what is perceived by the onlooker must be borne in mind. The onlooker not only perceives the movement or gesture that is presented by the eurythmist, he also perceives what the eurythmist is feeling and inwardly experiencing. This makes it essential that the eurythmist actually experiences something while engaged in eurythmy, and especially that which is to be presented. In speech eurythmy this is the portrayal of the sound, and in tone eurythmy the portrayal of the musical sound. So far [1915–24], with the exception of the forms [Note 1] which have been created for certain pieces of music, this portrayal of musical sound has consisted of nothing but the bare notes, nothing but mere scale [Note 2] If in speech eurythmy we had no more than we have today in tone eurythmy, this roughly would amount to the range of the vowels ah, a, ee, o, oo. Just think how little we would have achieved artistically in speech eurythmy, if until now we had only been able to make use of the vowel sounds, ah, a, e, o, oo! But so far artistically we have actually had no more than this in tone eurythmy. This is why there is something depressing about the kind of judgements about tone eurythmy that reach us, which I have mentioned. And this is also why I believe it to be necessary that now we should at least begin to lay down the foundations of tone eurythmy. It is necessary, above all, that in eurythmy we should get beyond the mere making of gestures and producing of movements, and that in the realm of tone eurythmy, and in speech eurythmy too, the actual sounds should be really felt. You must permit me to make this introduction, for in our speech today, and especially in our writing, we no longer have any conception of what a sound really is. This is because we no longer give the sound a name, but at the most briefly touch it. We say ah. The Greek language was the last to say alpha. Go back to the Hebrew—aleph. The sound as such had a name then; the sound was something real. The further back we go in language, the more essentially real we find the sounds. When we name the first letter in the Greek alphabet, alpha, and trace back the significance of this word alpha (it is a word which really encompasses the sound), we find that even in the German language many words still exist closely related to what lies in the sound alpha or aleph—as, for instance, when we say Alp, Alpen—Alp, the Alps. And this leads us back to Alp-Elf, [the] Alp, [the] elf [but see Appendix 7. Translator's note], to a being in a state of constant activity, of becoming, of coming-into-being, of lively movement. The ah sound has completely lost all this because we no longer say alpha or aleph. If the alpha or aleph is applied to the human being, then we can really experience the sound ah. And how do we experience ah? A snail could neither be an aleph, nor yet an alpha. But a fish could be an alpha, an aleph. Why? Because the fish has a spine, and because the spine is really the starting point for the development of such a being as an aleph. It is from the spine that those forces proceed which embrace an alpha-being. Now try to understand that the spine is the point from which rays forth that which constitutes an alpha or aleph. Then you could roughly experience it by imagining that, as a human being, you could not receive much benefit from your spine [alone], if there were no ribs that go out from it, forming the body. If you then picture the ribs as detached and capable of movement, you get the arms. And then, if you consider it, you arrive at the eurythmic ah.
[IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] Fig. 1 Now you must not think that anyone watching eurythmy sees only this forked angle; if this were so, instead of stretching out your arms you might just as well open out a pair of scissors, or the firetongs! You cannot do this, however, for the onlooker must have a human being before him. And the human being has really to feel the alpha, the aleph, inside. He has to feel that he is opening himself to the world. The world approaches him and he opens himself to it. How do you open yourself to the world? You open yourself to the world most purely when you stand before the world in wonder. All knowledge, said the Greeks, begins with wonder, with amazement. And when you stand before the world in wonder you break out with the sound ah. When you have made the eurythmy movement for ah, you have brought your astral body into that position which is indicated by the angle formed by the stretched arms. But this gesture will not ring true if you have never tried to experience the feeling of this fork-like movement of the arms, as has already been mentioned in earlier instructions. Feeling must be in it. You actually have to feel that the sound ah is an abbreviation in the air, some sort of abstraction as opposed to the living reality which the human being experiences. When, let us say, we encircle something with rounded arms, we encircle it with love. When we open ourselves in the form of an angle, we receive the world in wonder. And this mood of wonder is felt by the astral body (contained as it is within the physical body, within the whole human being). This mood of wonder must be felt in practising, once or even repeatedly, if the ah is to be true. The making of signs is not the essential thing, but the feeling that it cannot be otherwise (corresponding to a specific inner experience) than that the arms assume a forked angle as you stand confronting the world. Let us pass on to the sound a. [Presenting this sound accurately] depends on being able to feel the a—which means holding yourself upright while facing something. In ah we open ourselves to the world in wonder; we let the world approach us. When we experience a we do not simply allow the world to approach us, but we offer some resistance; we confront the world. The world is there and we stand facing it. This is why the movement for a demands that we touch ourselves (crossed hands [in Austrian dialect die Hand can begin at the shoulder; consequently it can mean ‘arm’. Translator's note.]). We touch ourselves. We say, as we experience the a sound: ‘I too am here confronting the world’. And you will learn to understand the a when, in making the gesture, you feel: ‘I too am here confronting the world, and I want to feel that I too am here.’ The bringing of one limb into contact with the other awakens this feeling that I too am here. Now I would have liked things to have developed so that first what we call the letters or sounds would have been given, and then the urge would have inwardly arisen to develop these experiences out of the letters themselves, for then you would get hold of it. And certainly this has frequently happened subconsciously with many people, though it is not always definitely apparent. But the study of eurythmy must proceed from such things as these, too. Let us take o. In making the gesture for o, you form a circle with both arms. You must feel that while experiencing the o-gesture, you cannot experience a. With a you confirm your presence: I too am here confronting the world. With o you go out of yourself, enclosing something within yourself You embrace something. It is important in the a that that which you are addressing stays outside and you are inside, within yourself With o there is a kind of going to sleep while awake, in that you allow your whole being to go for a little walk into the space which you enclose with the o-gesture. But now that other thing you are addressing is also within this space. Thus, when experiencing the o, your feelings are such as these: I approach a tree; I embrace this tree with my arms, but I myself am the tree; [Note 3] I have become a tree-spirit, a tree-soul. There is the tree, and because I myself have become a tree-soul, because I have become one with the tree, I make this gesture. I go out of myself. That which is important for me is enclosed in my arms. This is the feeling of o. The feeling of oo is that of being bound up with something, yet wishing to get away from it; following the movement you make and going somewhere else, leaving yourself and preparing your way. I run along my arms when I make the movement for oo. I am convinced of it, that in oo I stream away, away, away—away in this direction. You see that this is speech. Speech poses questions. ‘How does the human being relate to the things of the world?’ Speech always asks: ‘How does the human being relate to the things of the world? Does the world fill him with wonder? Does he stand upright confronting the world? Does he embrace it? Does he flee before it?’ Speech is the relationship of the human being to the world. Music is the relationship of the human being, as a being of soul and spirit, to him- or herself. When, in the way I have just indicated, you try to enter into what may be experienced in the vowel sound o, let us say, or oo, then you have a distinct going-out of the soul from the body. This is also expressed in the pronunciation. Think of the way in which the sound o is spoken, right forward on the lips and with the lips clearly rounded: o. Oo is spoken with the lips pushed somewhat outwards: oo = away. We have, then, in the gestures made in the air by speech, this going-out-of-ourselves in the sounds o and oo. The musical element presents the exact opposite of speech. When you are going out of yourself in speech, the astral body and ego leave the etheric and physical bodies, even if this only occurs partially and imperceptibly. It really is a falling-asleep while still awake when we utter a or oo, or when we do a or oo in eurythmy. It is a falling asleep when awake. When you are going out of yourself in o or in oo, you really are going with your soul into the element of soul. And when I say that with the sounds o and oo I am going with my astral body out of my physical body, I am speaking in terms of speech. When I say: ‘In what I am now experiencing I am going with my soul into my spiritual being’ (for in spite of the fact that I go out, I am entering into my spiritual being; just as when falling asleep I enter into my spiritual being too, while forsaking my physical body), this is just the opposite [of what happens in speech]. Thus when I say: ‘I am entering into my spiritual being in o or in oo, I am speaking in musical terms. [Note 4] Now when I reflect upon the sound o or oo, I am naturally denying the musical element. But the point in question is: what is the musical experience in this going-out-of-ourselves of o and oo? What is it in music itself that corresponds to the out-going connected with o and oo? The musical experience which is contained in o and in oo is, in the most comprehensive sense, the experience of the major mood. In speaking of the experience of the major mood, it is certainly true that we experience this in the sounds o and oo. I cannot say that we change our interpretation into an experience of speech, but we change the way we live in this experience. Whenever the sounds o or oo are uttered, or when a word is uttered in which either of these two sounds is predominant, then, underlying the speech, we musically experience the major mood. When we reflect upon ah and a, where we may very clearly perceive the experience, underlying the sounds, of the astral body remaining within the physical body (indeed, we are here made particularly aware of the physical body), this produces a different musical experience. Pay attention, then, to this growing awareness of the physical body. When you speak the sound ah, or fashion it in eurythmy, you cause your astral body to sink down as much as it can into your physical body. This entails a feeling of well-being. It is as if you could feel your astral body flowing through your limbs like—I will say ‘sparkling wine’ for the less abstemious people, while for the more abstemious I ought perhaps to say lemonade’! Thus in uttering the sound ah you actually sense something like the flowing of some sparkling fluid through your physical body. What is the kind of feeling that now arises in the physical body? Ah—a feeling of comfort or well-being arises. Let us take the other sound. You stand upright confronting your surroundings and say: ‘I too am here.’ Now it is as if, let's say, you were to shelter from the cold by means of a protecting garment. You increase the intensity of your own existence. This feeling of being aware of something outside yourself and defending yourself against it, this reliance on yourself in the face of some other element, lies in the sound a. In both cases, in ah and in a, the physical body is taken hold of by the astral body. The same thing can be experienced musically, too. Musically this can occur in the experience of the minor mood in the most comprehensive sense. The minor mood is always a retreat into yourself with the soul and spirit part of your being; it is a laying hold of the bodily by the soul and spirit. You will most easily discover what is to be felt in the eurythmic gestures as the differentiation between the major and the minor moods when you draw the experience of the major out of the living experience of the sounds o and oo, and when you draw the experience of the minor, again with feeling, out of the experience of the sounds ah and a—not out of the sounds themselves, but out of the experience. When you enter into these things you will feel how little people today know about the nature of the human being. It must be said that in our modern world the understanding for such things is remarkably limited. But without this understanding, absolutely nothing productive can be achieved in so many realms. Unless such understanding is acquired, we shall never be able to stand with our whole being within the realm of art. Something artistic which has not been permeated with the whole human being is nothing; it is a farce. Something artistic can only endure when the whole human being has poured himself into it. But then we really have to feel the connection between the world and the human being; we must feel how speech brings us into a relationship with the outer world, and music into a relationship with ourselves; how, in consequence, all the movements of speech eurythmy are, as it were, drawn from the human being and transplanted into the outer world, whereas the gestures of music [eurythmy] have to flow back into the human being. Everything which goes out in speech eurythmy has to lead back into the human being in tone eurythmy. [Note 5] Today, as you know, the whole world of thought is chaotically fragmented. There is no living picture of anything. Take a person of what we call a sanguine temperament, one who lives intensely in what is outside himself. A sanguine person pleases us, that is, he makes an agreeable impression upon us, only when he utters the sounds o and oo. We get quite a bitter taste in the mouth when anyone of sanguine temperament speaks the sounds ah and a; it doesn't quite work. But people today do not possess such vivid perceptions, and this is why contemporary people create so little from the depths of their being. Now let us take a person of melancholic temperament. To anyone who has understanding for such things, a melancholic person seems to be an absolute caricature when he speaks the sounds o and oo. It only seems right when he speaks the sounds ah and a. Here we have the going over into the everlasting major mood of the sanguine person and into the everlasting minor mood of the melancholic person. Now let us think of a person who is simply bursting with health, as we say. Such an overwhelmingly healthy person is in the major mood, and for the most part his astral body makes movements which correspond to o and oo. His step is light; that is to say, he lives in a continuous oo. He takes on everything, because it pleases him; he can endure anything. He is continually in the feeling of oo; he is the major mood incarnate. Let us take a sick person. He is continually in a state in which, without the element of wonder, but through the very fact of his illness, he imitates the mood of ah or the mood of a—more especially the latter. A sick person is perpetually in the minor mood. And it is not exactly a metaphor or something of an analogy when we ask: What is fever? Fever is the sound ah transposed into the physical realm, which a eurythmist or someone who speaks the ah produces in the astral realm. The mood of the minor projected into the physical plane produces fever; it is the same process which takes place when you utter the sound ah, but in speaking this process takes place on a higher level—the level of soul and spirit. The sound ah is a fever. Either it is fever or it is tears, but it is always a process which the human being produces in himself. These things lead to a true knowledge of the human being only when they are understood through the feelings. And because the human being is partially healthy and partially ill, the development of that which is superabundantly healthy (which must be inherent in art) and the development of movements imbued with the power of healing are closely interwoven. The latter exists in the case of ill people. This close relationship exists because, in reality, the major and the minor moods are, on a higher plane, the same as health and illness—that is to say, the experience of health and illness. Now we must not think that because the minor mood is [connected with] illness, it is therefore something bad or in some way inferior. Being ill in the soul-world always signifies something quite different from being ill in the physical world. From all this, you will see that the moods of major and minor, when developed eurythmically, may in time bring about therapeutic results. So you see there is actually a bridge between speech eurythmy and music eurythmy. And when in speech eurythmy we experience the vowel sounds rightly, in the way I have described for ah and a on the one hand and for o and oo on the other hand, we really have something that leads us towards the experience of major and minor. But the important fact we could seriously bring home to ourselves is that we tend to push (schieben) the musical element more inwards, whereas the movements of speech eurythmy we have to push away (abschieben). Imagine the following: Take a step forwards with the right foot, trying to feel this step as vividly as you can; do it in such a way that you also express in feeling the involvement of the head: you take a step forward (your head not too far back, but more forward). This is the first gesture. Now we carry out a second gesture. Try to accompany the gesture you have just made with a movement of the right hand, palm outwards, as much as possible in the direction of the foot taking the step. Now you have made a second gesture. Take the first gesture: the stepping. Take the second: the movement. And now try to add a third gesture by making a light movement of the left arm, touching the right arm as if you wanted to push it away (left arm slightly pushing the right). You take a step forwards, following in the same direction with the right arm, and finally pushing the right arm with the left. Here you have a certain gesture in its most extreme form. You have the step and the movement, with what you add with the left arm bringing about a forming gesture—for when you follow on with the left arm, you arrest what you have poured into the movement in the right arm and hold fast the movement. We then have:
Here you are really involved in something threefold, and you are so much within this threefold occurrence that you will actually be able to feel this as a threefold occurrence. In the stepping you are in a position to discover an intimation of the outgoing of your astral body. In the following on of the movement, which you make with the right arm, this outgoing feeling is intensified. And in what I have described as the formation, you can feel how the movement is held fast. Now if you really feel what I have indicated in this gesture, if you put yourselves into it, having no other wish than to enter with your whole being into this step, movement and formation, then you have something that is threefold. And you will easily realize that the step is the foundation of everything; it is the starting point. The movement is felt as the continuation, and must be in harmony with the foundation. And the formation establishes the whole process. You must experience all this yourselves. You can experience it in the most varied ways if you take the notes into consideration; you can make the gesture in the upper, lower or middle zones. If you do it in such a way as to have C below, the E in the middle (thus beginning with the step, leading the movement over into E, and trying to confer the G in the formation) then in this step, movement and formation you have presented the major triad. Fashion the major triad quite naturally and objectively, and put the experience of the major triad into what you yourself present as a human being in the world. Just as in the gestures presenting the sounds of speech you have to feel the inner content of the sound, so here, in step, movement and formation, you have to experience the chord. This is a first element.
Now let us try to step backwards with the left foot, allowing the head to follow [in the same direction]. And now try to follow this with the left arm. You must follow your backward step with the left arm, taking care to hold the palm of the hand inwards. Be really relaxed as you start. Make the backward step together with the movement of the head and arm (hand on the chest) trying to achieve completion by putting the right arm across. Try to hold fast this position. The whole gesture should be done in such a way that it can actually be seen how the left arm is led inwards towards the body, the left hand being brought to the body, and how the right hand is carried over towards the left hand as though to hold it fast [Hand is probably Austrian dialect for ‘arm’. Translator's note].
You have presented the minor triad, and when you keep these gestures in view and have repeatedly tried to keep them in view, you will come to the conclusion that these basic elements of music, the major triad and the minor triad, can be presented in no other way. It is only when you have become convinced that there is absolutely no other way of expressing the matter that you will really have felt it. You may try as you like to find some other way of doing it; it is only when another method pleases you less than the gestures shown here that you can really be said to have realized what dwells in them. Now you see, you have basically expressed in the realm of music what is expressed for the vowel sounds in speech eurythmy. If I ask you to produce an ah in speech eurythmy it is really the same (in speech eurythmy) as when I asked you just now to produce a major, or a minor, triad. It is simply doing vowels. Now there is one thing which I have not yet characterized. I said that we can experience the major mood as such in o and oo, and the minor mood as such (which unlikely as it appears, is really the case) in ah and a, but I have not yet mentioned the fact that there can be something which lies between. Consider the transition. Try to experience the transition from the mood of wonder to the embracing feeling in the sound o, or, vice versa, the transition from the embracing feeling of o to the mood of wonder. Here you go from without inwards; you pass from the ‘going out’ of the astral body to a ‘diving down’ of the astral body. Here you pass from illness to health, from health to illness. This is the ee. Ee is always the neutral feeling of yourself between the experience of going outwards and the experience of being within—both in relation to the physical body. Thus ee stands between ah and a on the one side, and o and oo on the other side. And now try (you can think these things over before tomorrow and apply them for yourselves) to pass over from the experience of minor to the experience of major by simply changing [direction]. You first produce the experience of the minor, then you change it by placing yourself forward. Simply incline the head somewhat forward (in the minor experience it lies in a backward direction), and incline yourself forward, thereby changing the whole movement of the muscles. Instead of the step backwards with the left leg, you would now have to step forwards with the right leg; you simply bring that which you have in front out of the minor into the major; that is to say, you pass out of the major into the minor mood, or out of the minor into the major mood. The experience underlying this transition corresponds to the experience of ee in speech eurythmy. You will already sense the interesting variety of life underlying this transition from the major to the minor mood if you really carry out what I have just indicated. You see, the point is this. When we initially enter into the nuances which lie in the major and the minor moods and the transition between them, we are really entering into what, in the realm of music, corresponds to the vowel sounds. You must take deeply into your soul this first principle, as I have described it. The gestures you have made for the major and the minor moods and the transition from the one to the other are the musical way of doing the vowels. The starting point is taken from the major and the minor moods. The musical realm carries the fundamental moods corresponding to the vowels throughout its entire tonal configuration, through tension, resolution, and so on. [Note 6] And just as we can pass over from the spoken vowel sounds into words, so we may also pass over from the understanding of the elements of music (as, for instance, the simple chordal nature of the major and minor triads) into eurythmic understanding of the musical realm, the inner musical configurations. Tomorrow at this time we shall continue. |