Creativity in the Theatre: A Psychoanalytic Study by Philip Weissman (review)

1967 BOOK REVIEWS 459 the text.' He undertook to make it dear 'that the playwright composes with a certain style of acting and production' in mind. According to Artaud's defini· tion, Life is 'that fragile fluctuating centre which forms never reach,' and he believed that 'to break through language in order to touch life is to create or re-create the theater.' For him, the theater was to fulfill .the function 'for which the poetry of language had failed him,' and for him the only hope of attaining that 'fragile, fluctuating centre' he called Life was through the theater. It was his conviction that the theater must be a metaphysical theater, concerned with 'the nature of reality and the meaning of existence, not with questions of char. acter and morality.' For him the theater, in Mr. Chambers' words, 'is a place of metaphysical surprise and fear, just as it is for Ionesco.' It was Artaud's belief that 'the theatre must make itself the equal of life' and that the fundamental purpose of the theater 'is to create myths, to express life in its immense, universal aspect, and from that life to extract images in which we find pleasure in discovering ourselves.' After presenting other evidence that leaves no doubt of Artaud's influence on the contemporary French theater Mr. Chambers concludes his discourse by assuring us that, even though Artaud cannot .be regarded as the father of the contemporary French theater, he is undoubtedly 'one of the figures who, by his experience and attitudes, best helps one to understand where that drama has come from, and where it is going.' The final lecture, delivered by Mr. Davison, is a nicely organized presentation and discussion of certain aspects of contemporary legitimate drama which, the speaker successfully maintains, have a dose relationship to popular, or illegitimate drama. His two-fold purpose, as he phrases it, is 'to describe the relation· ship between contemporary drama and popular dramatic forms (and the problems arising therefrom); and to demonstrate this relationship by presenting readings from a number of plays.' And, with the aid of an able assistant, this is exactly what Mr. Davison proceeds to do. Devoting most of his time to a consideration of the music-hall monologue and the cross-talk act, he proceeds to demonstrate that there is a definite relationship between legitimate and popular drama, and shows that the nature of this relationship is much more meaningful than many students of the theater realize. It was indeed a pleasure to read and study all five of these papers; each of them was very considerately planned and would be very easy to listen to. And the planning of the volume also deserves a word of commendation, for the order in which the lectures were printed could hardly have been improved upon. It would be genuinely pleasing to learn that other of the splendid lectures in the Kathleen Robinson series will soon be made available in volumes such as this one. GuJ!S FLOYD Bowling Green State University CREATIVITY IN THE THEATRE: A PSYCHOANALYTIC STUDY, by Philip Weissman, New York & London: Basic Books, Inc., 1965, 275 pp. Price $1.95. This book is an attempt to examine various aspects of theatrical art in psychoanalytic terms. Dr. Weissman divides his book into five parts with the following titles: "The Psychological Equipment and Development of the Artist in the Modem Theatre," "The Actor's Psychobiography: Some Predeterminants of Creative Success and Failure," "The Dramatist's Psychobiography and His Plays," "The Created Characters and Their Psychoanalytic Value," and H A Psych~analytic View of the Crises in Creativity in the Modem Theatre." Lest the potential MODERN DRAMA February reader be put off by these titles, let me state at once that the rest of the book is not written in this sort of claptrap jargon. Dr. Weissman quotes some colleagues of his who have the socio-scientific writer's usual tendency to butcher the language, but he is himself a commendably clear writer. The most rewarding sections of the book are in Parts 2 Be 3. In the former Dr. Weissman presents a fascinating and brilliantly provocative study of John Wilkes Booth's assassination...