The Modern French Theater

In her second article for The Woman's Voice, Mrs. Najla Aqrawi discusses "the modern French theater" — the distillation of a full year's study of this very subject at the Sorbonne — and her inquiry shows precision and scholarly thoroughness.

Of the three pillars of the modern French theater that the writer identifies, she will acquaint us today with "classicism" and "Christianity"; as for "atheist existentialism," the appointed time to speak of it is the next issue, and in it there is much that is curious and entertaining about this modern philosophical tendency.

It is very difficult to encompass in a single article all the elements that branch out from the modern French theater. If we are driven to summarize, we would say that the pillars of the modern French theater are three:

Classicism — Christianity — and atheist existentialism. And if we add to these fundamental angles what is performed of the heritage of the foreign theater, we have before us a comprehensive preliminary outline of the theatrical activity we can observe in Paris today.

There is no doubt that the Comédie Française is the center of the classical play, for it is the heir of Molière and his troupe. Its founding goes back to the year 1665, the day Louis XIV titled Molière's troupe "the King's Troupe"; and in 1680 the troupe of the Hôtel de Bourgogne joined it, and thus the present Comédie Française was formed. It preserves the classical style of acting, in keeping with the style of the classical piece and its rhymed verse. Fine delivery, care for clear enunciation, the control of gesture and facial expression within a fixed frame, simplicity of décor, and the unity of scenes are among the classical characteristics that the Comédie preserves with all precision and fidelity. It is very easy for a foreigner with some acquaintance with French literature to understand every word an actor of the Comédie utters, for it is delivered with clarity and deliberation. If we wish to see Tartuffe or Le Cid or Phèdre as they were performed in the seventeenth century, we have only to go to the Comédie, and its classical atmosphere will carry us back to that distant past — to that glorious period in the history of literature in France.

In the halls of the Comédie and in its library are relics which those who administer it guard with watchful eyes and proud hearts. There is the chair onto which Molière fell in a faint on the night of February 17, 1673, while performing Le Malade imaginaire, and from which he was carried home, taking leave of his stage forever. There is his watch, which the director of the Comédie showed us with all pride and care; there is the original manuscript of Hernani by Victor Hugo; there is the statue of Voltaire with his famous mocking smile; and rows of celebrated statues and oil portraits of the army of authors, actors, and actresses whose memory has been immortalized in the history of dramatic literature...

Since its founding the Comédie has shared in the literary and national life of the nation. Its playhouse spoke the decisive word in the famous battle of Hernani — the battle in which the ardent Romantic youth, in defense of Hugo and his theory, clashed with the conservative classical party. Its activity continued unbroken until the last World War came, when some of its members took part in the Resistance movement during the German occupation and made of the lower floor of the Salle Richelieu an active nucleus against the foreign occupation, exposing themselves to the danger of prison, torture, and death.

It is therefore closely bound to the life of the nation, and a radiating center of French culture, preserving

the precious classical heritage and sending its delegations to every part of the civilized world to acquaint it with the masterpieces of the living French theater.

If we leave the Comédie and its classical atmosphere, searching out what is happening in the world of the modern theater, we find that the religious spirit is still an abundant spring from which a group not to be underestimated among the champions of theatrical thought draw their water. We may say that in France today there is a Catholic literature and a Catholic theater, whose leaders are Paul Claudel, François Mauriac, Gabriel Marcel, and Bernanos, followed by a considerable company of brilliant critics and thinking university professors.

We cannot but pause a little at Paul Claudel to say a word about him, for he stands in the front rank, commanding by his mighty personality, by his ardent faith — the spring of his abundant inspiration — and by the purity of his art and the clarity of his message.

Claudel grew up at the end of the nineteenth century in the secular atmosphere of France — that atmosphere over which Taine and Renan presided with their monistic secular spirit. Young Claudel was an atheist like most of his educated young comrades of that time. He tells his own story: he once went to the church of Notre-Dame to watch the religious rites and listen to the chanted prayers, and there befell him what sometimes befalls atheists — grace suddenly descended into his heart, and the Lord spoke to him and entrusted him with a message to carry to the world. Claudel left the church a believer, and the road opened clearly before him toward his final goal, namely, to harness his pen to spread the message of the Church. He read Rimbaud, the symbolist poet of genius, and through him his faith was awakened "humanly"; he studied at the hands of Mallarmé, the father and philosopher of symbolism, and from him he took a lesson in the purity and clarity of art; he studied Thomas Aquinas, who worked upon him a "generative" effect; and the spring of his faith burst forth upon a world of his beauty — poetry and glad tidings in a violent, purifying tragedy whose key is God...

As for the plays that overflowed from this spiritual vitality, the most important are "The Tidings Brought to Mary," "The Satin Slipper," "The Hostage," "The Exchange," and "Christopher Columbus"; and his message in all of them is the unity of the world in Christ — this world for which heaven split open and opened its gates ever since a ladder was set up joining it to heaven.

Perhaps "The Tidings Brought to Mary" (L'Annonce faite à Marie) is among the most splendid things that Claudel's genius has bestowed on the world of the theater. He composed it in 1912, and since that time it has been performed on the various stages of Paris. Its events take place in the Middle Ages, in a peasant family living in a simple atmosphere of warm, sincere faith, made up of a father, a mother, and two daughters. The father hears the call of his Lord to go to the Holy Places, and the elder daughter, Violaine, answers the call of her Lord as well: she comforts a young man sick with leprosy and in pain, and presses on his face a kiss of pure love and compassion; the contagion steals into her, and she is accused of sin. Her betrothed and her family cast her off, and she withdraws to a cave far from the world, spending her hours in prayer and devotion. One day her sister comes to her crying for help, sobbing — her little girl has died, and she is on the live coals of a grief that will not be consoled. It was Christmas Eve, and the bells were ringing in the villages and the surrounding districts. The virgin Violaine takes the child's cold body in her sick hands and sits pleading and supplicating while her sister reads the prayers of the feast — and behold, the child stirs trembling in her hands: life has returned to her. She gives her back to her mother, and the color of her eyes has changed and become blue, like the color of Violaine's eyes. The two sisters bow down rejoicing: "Unto us this day a child is born... Hallelujah. Glory to Thee, O God."

When Claudel was asked, with astonishment, about his belief in miracles, he would answer that his own Christian life began with a miracle, the day the Lord spoke to him in the church of Notre-Dame. And why not?

He expresses this feeling in verse freed from rhyme, in which every word has its magic and its weight — and how could it be otherwise, when he is a pupil of symbolism at the hands of its greatest master, Mallarmé. If we look attentively at his plays, we find in them certain fundamental common elements, which may be summed up as follows:

Man is the creature of God. Woman is the tree of good and evil. Suffering is the purifier of souls. Woman belongs to God before she belongs to man. Deprivation is the key of salvation. Humility and acceptance are the road to sanctity.

(In the next issue: "The Existentialist Theater")