Artaud and his Doubles (review)

Kimberley Jannarone examines one of the most controversial figures in twentieth-century theatre theory and praxis: Antonin Artaud (1896–1948), an enfant terrible best known for his formulation of a visceral and hypnotic ‘théâtre de la cruauté’. The cover image, featuring a black and white photograph of Artaud placed alongside its negative, encapsulates the spirit of the whole book. Showing a reverse side to her chosen subject, Jannarone skilfully debunks the common perception of this theorist as a foremost influence on the development of radical theatre praxis, such as that of The Living Theater, in the United States during the 1960s. Through her rigorous historical contextualization of Artaud’s Le Théâtre et son double (1938), she gives the reader serious cause to doubt the traditional veneration of this figure. Jannarone’s acerbic critique of Artaud and the fascistic influences on his thought are entirely necessary and justified in order to counteract his lionization. In the Introduction she draws attention to the ahistorical and overly biographical critical interpretations of Artaud’s theory. Plagued by madness, Artaud has been martyred as an index of the poststructuralist decentred subject and the incarnation of a ‘beautiful pain’ by the likes of Derrida, Kristeva, Deleuze and Guattari, Foucault, and Susan Sontag. Jannarone highlights the very real danger of an elision of history in this critical reception: ‘The structure of thought that flowed through the age of crowds and culminated in fascism is to be found in Artaud’s work in a distinctive and disturbing manner [. . .] and it is drastically understudied’ (p. 26). The author redefines Artaudian theory in an unflattering light, and she resituates Artaud’s œuvre as symptomatic of the reactionary Right of the interwar years. Throughout, Jannarone persistently brings into sharp relief the fact that Artaud’s theory of theatre as a plague gripping the audience risks sharing the deindividuating and totalitarian qualities of fascist thought. The fifth chapter links Artaud with prominent crowd theorists of the time such as Gustave Le Bon, whom Hitler and Mussolini also read. Chapter 7 demonstrates the influence of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Mesmerism on Artaud’s thought; Jannarone draws out similarities between Franz Mesmer’s Animal Magnetism (1779) and Artaud’s idea of the hypnotic ‘Nerve Meter’ in theatre. At times she risks pathologizing Artaud: ‘the monomania of his vision, the ferocity of his expression, and the charisma of his presence combined to create a strong leader figure’ (p. 185). However, this does not detract from the bold aim of this book to present a radical reframing of a much misunderstood figure beatified by radical artistic left-wing circles. Jannarone’s Conclusion skilfully unites her critique with modern-day theories of crowd psychology in performance studies (Richard Schechner) and critical theory (Terry Eagleton) in order to re-evaluate future critical approaches to Artaud. This book can be summed up as a daring and rigorous historical reinterpretation that defies critical consensus on Artaud.