In 1938 a collection of Antonin Artaud’s (1896–1948) essays was published in French under the title Le Théâtre et son Double. Its equivalent in English, The Theater and Its Double, was first translated by M.C Richards and published in 1958.1 One of the essays titled ‘The Alchemical Theater’ is an exposition of Artaud’s ideas for a new and future theatre founded on alchemical principles. Artaud was not specific with what he meant by alchemy, although he did share imaginations as to how alchemical theatre could be performed. His manifesto is radical and challenges preconceived ideas of theatre. It is itself a great alchemical experiment in its attempt to re-forge “… the chain between what is and what is not, between the virtuality of the possible and what already exists in materialized nature.”2 This work The Alchemical Actor sets out to amplify Artaud’s imaginations with a view to exploring how they might be worked with by alchemical actors towards the great work of new and future theatre.
To make a start it is useful to take a look at what constitutes alchemy and what might be extracted from alchemy to build an imagination for an alchemical theatre. Traditionally alchemy was performed in laboratories and was known as being arcane and magical and that the alchemist’s prime motive was to turn lead into gold. As we shall discover however, this was only a superficial apprehension since there were much deeper ‘philosophical’ forces at work. Artaud referred to this latter process as “mental or philosophical alchemy” that replicated work of chemical alchemy in a psychological and spiritual way, and that through its practice, would lift theatre into an “essential drama.” He poetically contends: “The theatrical operation of making gold, by the immensity of the conflicts it provokes, by the prodigious number of forces it throws one against the other and rouses, by this appeal to a sort of essential re-distillation brimming with consequences and surcharged with spirituality, ultimately evokes in the spirit an absolute and abstract purity, beyond which there can be nothing, and which can be conceived as a unique sound, defining note, caught on the wing, on the organic part of an indescribable vibration.”3 Throughout The Theater and Its Double Artaud makes suggestions that the actor serve as a vessel where such transmutations can take place within the larger theatre
The essential work of alchemy however it is performed, is to transform gross earthly matter into more refined substance. To the alchemist, unrefined substance was seen as primal and chaotic and so the work of the alchemist was to bring balance to these substances. This makes the practice of alchemy an art since it is about the alchemist’s participation in the creative and magical process of transmutation. Anyone of us can be working alchemically if we consciously commit to creative acts of transformation, although there are various ways of going about it, and degrees of engagement. Contemporary writer on alchemy Brian Cotnoir points out that where old classical chemical alchemy, and new contemporary psychological alchemy meet, is through this process of transmutation, stressing that transmutation is a key concept that both forms share: “The central concept in alchemy is transmutation: the fundamental change of one thing into another, from a grosser, impure state to a more refined, balanced, and pure state. This is to be understood on multiple levels – physically, spiritually, and symbolically.”4 For the classical chemical alchemists, their practice was to transform one metallic substance into another in search of a magical elixir or tincture that would perfect imperfect metals into gold, both in real terms, and as a metaphor for higher refined states of consciousness. Pursuing a not dissimilar point of view to Artaud, contemporary writer on “chemical theatre,” Charles Nicoll tells us that through the practice of mental, philosophical and spiritual alchemy, the chemical process of alchemy has become a metaphor for seeking the exaltation of the spirit in the body, with view to transforming the earth.5
What is paramount to the practice of alchemy, is grappling with the mysteries of consciousness.6 Overall this is what constitutes the Great Work and is attained by awakening a centre in the human psyche or soul different from
In the alchemical tradition, the highest goal a human being can aspire to is the fertilization, gestation, and birth of a higher person within the soul of the lower human personality. This second birth is known esoterically
as the birth of the Spirit Embryo. The first birth is into a body of flesh … Alchemists, however, know of another birth, one that is, as Jung said, a work against nature (opus contra naturam). In the second birth a Spirit Embryo is fertilized and then brought to term by the conscious work of the student. This Spirit Embryo is called the “I Being” by Rudolf Steiner, the “True Self” by Carl Jung, and “the parent who would never lie to us” by the Kahunas of Hawaii.9
Klocek reveals that the birth of the Higher-Self necessitates a conscious undertaking and can facilitate “… the study of how to dialogue with the beings that stand behind nature as archetypes of substances found in the manifest world.”10 Profound stuff to consider and not for the faint-hearted! It seems from what he, and others that I will also mention in this work infer, that to practice alchemy, is to pursue the secret of creation that includes penetrating the secret of our inner nature. This was done by extracting and refining meaning and substance out of the gross earthly substance mentioned earlier that the alchemists called ‘prima materia’, first matter, or original chaos, also referred to as the womb of creation. Alchemy was known as “a work against nature” due to what was seen as the need for human intervention to progress and redeem nature. For the chemical alchemist, this entailed working with chemicals in their laboratories. For the philosophical or mental alchemist, this means awakening his or her soul, through practicing appropriate exercises and techniques to bring about the second birth, where stripped of falsehood, we are initiated into the experience of our Higher-I and sovereign Self. By undertaking the work, the alchemist has the opportunity to become fully conversant with the essence of archetypes that can nurture self-emergence. Archetypes known as unique patterns that are not fixed but capable of evolving, have a positive and negative face and are varied in their manifestation. They are the very forms that structure human existence which is why they are so important to us. Plato and other philosophers of his time saw archetypes as divine ideas that can manifest in individual awareness and behavior. Take for instance the archetypal image of a mother or father from which various types of mothers or fathers are enacted. According to the alchemists, the potential power of conscious awareness is limitless due to there being countless archetypes that are constantly in the throes of change, and so the whole world is seen as a place of archetypal transformations. The alchemists trained their consciousness to become aware
What makes the alchemist’s work unique is not just intellectual knowing, but the pursuit of psychic and spiritual ‘knowing’. To become conscious in this way necessitates being committed to exercising differentiation between earthly and spiritual elements. This is done by deep questioning and reflecting upon objects, ideas and experiences, as we contemplatively witness our own actions and reactions. The alchemist must be open-minded to receiving knowledge about the mysteries of life, death and destiny. It is anticipated that the work leads to a realization of the eternal Self with the consequence the alchemist sees and acts in new and enlightened ways.
When we exercise alchemical consciousness, we shift from perceiving the world in a purely material way by seeing only one-sided perspectives such that life is life and death is death. Instead, alchemists creatively train their perception to see through and beyond material cognition perceiving life and death as alternative states of consciousness evolving in an eternal cycle. This seeing means observing trees and plants growing and transforming from a seed, to leaf, to bud, so that everything is beheld in metamorphic change. Alchemists learn to identify with the essence of these metamorphosing worlds and its objects – the composition of stones and how they are transformed as they are slowly added to, or are eroded by the elements, sea shells metamorphosing in spiral forms; creatures emerging from eggs, while others grow inside the womb of their mothers. Alchemists seek to participate in the mystery of creation, to fathom the part minerals, plants and animals play in evolution, and how human beings develop and grow from being conceived by parents, to being born of their mothers, crawling to standing upright, exercising the gift of speech, and how we make our way in the world. Looking up into the skies, alchemists are inspired by the shifting dance of the planets and stars at night, the sun and moon rising and setting at particular positions in the sky, depending on the movement of the earth.
It is historically advantageous to remember that we have inherited a rich legacy from the sixteenth century European Renaissance where alchemy thrived along with a resurgence of esoteric practices. Renaissance alchemists practiced forms of natural magic and were able to determine weather patterns and to prophesy from cloud formations. They also observed the four seasons
It is the aspiration of alchemists to live consciously in this world of magical transmutations. If the arts of consciousness are not practiced regularly however, we can forget to see alchemically and fall into the stupor of unconsciousness, vulnerable to nefarious forces and in danger of missing the experience of living in this magnificent natural laboratory we call earth. Our material cognition can become enthralled by what we believe to be static material forms experienced as oppositional extremes, and we can become anxious and vulnerable to fear. The possibility of imbalances is perhaps why alchemists sought to lead seekers to soul awakening by degrees. This was done in experiments with gradual exposure to opposites, towards making unconscious elements conscious, since human experience in psychological terms, can be seen as a resolution of opposites. From an alchemic perspective, opposites are fundamental to human experience and to the practice of alchemy since they offer us the possibility to weigh-things-up, enabling us to contextualize things in their apposite forms through exercising differentiated consciousness. Every day we live experiences of opposites such as life/death; body/soul; day/night, black/white; good/bad; suffering/joy; conscious/unconscious; masculine/feminine; sun and moon. It is easy to see that the body has two arms, legs, eyes, ears, but most often we take symmetry for granted and not see its purpose. Jungian writer Martin Lings captures this distinction when he tells us: “Every separate thing is a unity penetrated by a duality; a single flower comprises a central ‘eye’ and a circumference of petals, by which it symbolizes, on the human plane, the individual as such, that is, the polarity Heart-soul.”12 By not exercising the differentiation of opposites, and focusing on one-sided fixed forms such as suffering rather than embracing joy with suffering, we can miss profound
In the great work of alchemy, alchemists sought to remedy imbalances by bringing form to primal chaos through their chemical experimentations. This enabled them to comprehend these profound natural laws. Their experiments included working co-creatively with the four elements of nature – earth, water, air and fire, known as physical representations of qualities, or archetypes that constitute the chaotic prima materia. These four elements can be attributed to chemical, psychological and spiritual alchemy. To fully understand the inherent properties of these elemental substances, so as to refine them, alchemists recombined the elements in varying ways to establish balance – to bring order into chaos. The work took the form of four main alchemical stages called the nigredo, albedo, citrino and rubedo that are broken down into more particularized stages described later on. What alchemists ultimately sought to produce out of the four stages was a mysterious fifth element called the quintessence, the combined product of the four elements that had perfect chemical balance and was both metallically and metaphorically, like gold. This magical substance, the result of a distillation of chemicals and consciousness, consisted of a life-force or elixir that could render the alchemist ‘immortal’ or twice born. The technique fundamental to chemical, and philosophical alchemy is called in Latin (the language of Renaissance alchemy) solve et coagula meaning separate and then bring back together in its new form. The alchemical philosopher Aristotle (384–322 bce) scientifically contributed a great deal to what we know of alchemy today when he established the scientific understanding of the transmutation of the four elements by categorizing their primary qualities: earth is dry and cold, water is wet and cold, air is wet and hot and fire dry and hot. He contended that each of the elements could be transformed into the other through qualities that they have in common. By removing and altering elemental qualities, alchemists could modify the material form of substances.
When the alchemists worked in their laboratories they not only experimented with earthy substances such as minerals and metals, but sought the secrets of the universe invoking and experimenting with the metallic qualities of the planets. Charting the planets rhythmic influences in nature and how these rhythms affected the human body and psyche became an essential element of their work. Engaging in disciplines such as meditation, contemplation, astronomy and astrology they subscribed to the ancient hermetic alchemical axiom “As above, so below; As below, so above” and to seeing the human being as a “microcosm of the macrocosm” believing that what takes place outwardly in the movement of the planets, has an impact on the soul or psyche and vis-à-vis, making their work not only a chemical but philosophical
Since practicing alchemy is a performance of a symbolic representation of an entire process of cosmic activity, where everything is a holon or an image of the same great pattern that it is both a whole and a part, it is our human perception of the pattern that changes with evolving consciousness. The actor can become privy to such holonic secrets when we practice theatre alchemy. This is what Artaud was advocating: For actors to become keepers of such divine knowledge. Forging a path towards alchemical acting we can practice self-knowing while performing theatre, and by so doing birth an alchemical theatre that is inextricably born out of our consciousness work.
Klocek tells us that the soul is the stage upon which this transmutative cosmic drama can unfold.15 For instance, during the early stage of the alchemical process called the Nigredo, so named for its quality of blackness, the philosophical alchemist would be plunged into an extreme darkness of unknowing. Her task was to find ways out of the darkness into light that would restore psychic balance. Garnering knowledge by balancing this split between opposites, was termed enlightenment, or ‘seeing’ the light. Enlightenment is what Artaud wanted for the actors of his new and future theatre, which is why he envisioned alchemical theatre as a laboratory for this to take place. His theatre was to be a space where the actor could explore the art of consciousness, as an act of rebellion against the hardening forces of materialism, by communing with the divine and conjoining internal opposites in a healthy life-giving and embodied way. Directing us to what the practice of alchemy can offer to the development of future theatre and the future actor, as well as the creative symbiotic process of performing for audiences, Artaud wrote his seminal essay ‘Alchemical Theatre.’16 It is his essay that this work mines for imaginations as to how alchemical theatre can be actuated through the work of alchemical actors.
For alchemists, enlightenment was in part dependent upon an understanding of the symbolic language of chemical operations. Accordingly, their work became a rigorous undertaking involving profound intellectual and spiritual practices.
What most researchers on alchemy agree, that links western and eastern, old classical chemical with new ‘philosophical’ alchemy, is that the mysteries of inner spiritual advancement of the alchemist were a priority.17 With advancement reason and intellectual understanding is surpassed by synchronic higher ways of knowing that took the form of visionary insight. These
Together with his essay ‘Alchemical Theatre,’ other essays in The Theater and Its Double will also serve as indispensable guides to our work forming imaginations of Artaud’s ideas that provide some insight into his doctrine. For instance, an essential key to Artaud’s theatre, is poesis. This is perfectly recounted by alchemical and Jungian psychologist, James Hillman (1926–2011) who captures the essence of chemical and spiritual alchemy when he informs us: “… alchemy a poesis of matter.”20
Poesis, the art of bringing something into being that is new and unique is at the heart of alchemy. We could say poesis is the magical substance we bring to the work that ignites the alchemical process, since it is about the making of images. Philosophically, alchemists adhered to a path of spiritually knowing by direct experience called Gnosis. This ‘philosophical’ approach became the alchemist’s guide to poesis because it embraces mythologies that inspire the soul towards the divine. Many alchemists subscribed to a poetical creation myth whose imagination centred on a high spiritual being in service of the Godhead, instrumental in creating earth known as the divine Sophia, recognized in
The divine Sophia was seen as the feminine face of God with the earth as the great laboratory that serves as the womb and tomb, where human beings through the experience of life and death, come to know themselves as divine beings. Becoming co-creative with Sophia, became the alchemists life-long earthly, and spiritual vocation, noted previously as the Great Work since alchemists felt called to lift the veil on mysteries was to become great and ‘God-like’ in order to fulfill their mighty task. To become co-creative with divine Sophia, the alchemist needed to acknowledge their divinity but also experience descent. Once this descent into primal essence had taken place the alchemist then worked to transmute earth substance in order to return to the heavens (or higher thinking), through their consciousness work. Not only chemists and scientists, but also philosophers and artists, alchemists through their chemical research and studies, came to understand more about the world and the cosmos, so that they could effectively participate in refining it. The result is that across all cultures and religions, alchemy has become a co-creative path to conscious evolution, which is clearly why Artaud wanted to establish alchemical theatre. His theatre was to become a magical space and place, a laboratory where actors could take responsibility for Self-actuating and to bring theatre and life closer together towards birthing new culture.
The question of how alchemy began is elusive since documentation recording its history is difficult to source and read due to its esoteric presentation, and it being recorded in classical languages excluding many readers including
Both Eastern and Western alchemy lend themselves easily to esoteric interpretations based on the idea of inner transformation. The material dimension of alchemy may have been concerned with such matters as immortality of the body or the production of gold, but from the esoteric perspective these can be seen as not separate from the work of inner transformation. Because alchemy was influenced by initiatic streams of thought (arising from Taoism and Tantra in the East, and Hermeticism and Gnosticism in the West) it was eventually understood, by at least some of the alchemists of antiquity, that the practical outer work was not separate from an inner processes of transformation.25
Around this transformational work however, an air of secretiveness developed, particularly with historical Christian alchemy that was performed and experienced by alchemists covertly, because the practice was deemed by the church as heretical. This was because it was seen to support psychological transformation, and as Metzner informs us “… liberation from false concepts and preprogrammed designs.”26 Notably, research points to alchemy being taken extremely seriously by its adherents because of its capability to lead the alchemist away from divine interventionaries such as priests, in favor of the gnosis of independent and individual knowing. With this provocation, its infusion into theatre was certainly deemed a possibility by a ‘free-thinking’ radical Artaud.
It is easy to deduce that alchemy appealed to individualistic thinkers and practitioners who were so committed to the work that they were prepared to take risks, even with their own lives, to practice it. For those within the alchemical fraternity the mysteries of alchemy were held sacred. Jungian Edward F. Edinger suggests however, that the secrets of alchemy were relatively safe: “… because it is not communicable to those who have not yet experienced it for themselves.”27 The experiential aspect of alchemy being key to its inherent philosophy and longevity. Nowadays, since Jung’s contribution to contemporary psychological disciplines, psychological alchemy is practiced in a much less restrained way becoming progressively infused into mainstream thinking, through depth psychology and, other soul-awakening disciplines.
Significant creative exchanges across disciplines of the avant-garde contributed to rapidly forming movements, whose various names had ‘ism’ as their suffix, paradoxically, adding a sense of fixity to the foci of these movements. ‘Ism’ movements, to include Expressionism, Surrealism, Dadaism, to name a few, also included different psychological and healing modalities, as well as philosophical and artistic orientations that hall-marked the emergent consciousness of the twentieth century. Christopher Innes points out that an overall theme, at the forefront of avant-garde theatre, but also evident in other modalities, was the interest in creative imagination, pointing to a shift in perspectives away from singular investments in rationalism.29 These were ideas also shared by Jung, Steiner and the Russian actor and theatre director, Michael Chekhov (1891–1955), who was Steiner’s spiritual pupil, in an endeavour to hold back the rapid spread of materialistic thinking.
A later contemporary of Artaud, and nephew of Anton Chekhov the Russian playwright, Michael Chekhov strove to restore magic to theatre through his Technique to counteract what he saw was destructive materialism with its ensuring de-humanization. He believed that actor’s needed to exercise a deeper more profound relationship to life in order to overcome it. As Chekhov notes: “Since the last third of the nineteenth century a materialistic world outlook has been reigning, with ever-increasing power, in the sphere of art as well as in science and everyday life.”30
Cold, analytical, materialistic thinking tends to throttle the urge to imagination. To counteract this deadly intrusion, the actor must systematically undertake the task of feeding his body with other impulses than those which impel him to a merely materialistic way of living and thinking. The actor’s body can be of optimum value to him only when motivated by an unceasing flow of artistic impulses; only then can it be more refined, flexible, expressive and, most vital of all, sensitive and responsive to the subtleties which constitute the creative artist’s inner life. For the actor’s body must be molded and re-created from inside.31
Now that Antonin Artaud is no longer passed off as “gifted but a crank”, he is acknowledged as one of the leading figures of European theatre in the twentieth century. But it is by no means easy to understand how he managed to write so many essays and letters during the periods of lucidity of his sad and tragic life, when he was not wrestling with insanity. His main contribution to the theory of the Avant-garde theatre is to be found in the remarkable series of articles published by the N.R.F. in the thirties and collected in a book translated into many languages: “The Theatre and its Double.” In these fourteen essays written after the collapse of his honeymoon with Surrealism, all the components of a doctrine of the Avant-garde theatre can be traced, and this doctrine could be seen as a sort of time-bomb which was to blow up some thirty years later.32
Divulging his radical thoughts in The Theater and Its Double, modernist themes not-inconsistent with ideas of the twentieth century avant-garde to include his
As Gadoffre points out, Artaud’s psychosis and struggle with insanity, was a relentless and deeply debilitating factor of his life. In a strangely conflicted way, what was Artaud’s Golgotha, where he sacrificed ‘sense’ that played out in psychosis, resurrected in intermittent and extraordinary vision where he imagined the conscious re-uniting of heaven and earth through theatre. Ultimately, his attempt to truly articulate what he, and others in the modernist movement, to include philosopher and existentialist Friedrich Nietzsche, experienced as psychological and spiritual alienation of their time, became his great and notable contribution to twentieth century theatre. As a mentally health-challenged visionary, what he lived in his life, and captured in his writing and theatre, is exceptional, since it endeavors to penetrate and lay bare the often unacknowledged ‘shadow’ business of the human psyche in all its goriness. It is this, he suggests, that can be explored and redeemed through the Double of theatre that he contended could be safely experienced and transformed through the practice of alchemy. And so to embrace the fruits of Artaud’s intermittent genius and explore his directives with their apparent contradictions, is, to align-ourselves with his idea of theatre alchemy and by extension, birth of the alchemical actor.
Such preoccupation with personal problems disgusts me, and disgusts me all the more with nearly the whole contemporary theater which, as human as it is antipoetic, except for three or four plays, seems to me to stink of decadence and pus.33
Artaud’s fears that materialism would become all pervasive, seem to have taken a hold in our time. Its shadow can be easily recognized in today’s society and particularly in theatre and film, through the predominance of realism and focus on ego-centric acting where it is often the personality of the actor who becomes a product, rather than the actor working to become co-creative with divine forces to shape their characters. This has been compounded by influences of didactic intellectualizing that has infiltrated, and incarcerated much contemporary theatre into an existential pragmatism and, resultant disconnection with the divine imagination. Fortunately, the pendulum seems to be swinging the other way and significantly, some film and stage actors, are searching for less ego-centric more ‘divinely’ meaningful ways-of-working.
Artaud’s indications that theatre alchemy should become an embodied art form, is something he struggled to give real form to in his life-time. And so, to flesh-out an imagination of how alchemical theatre might take form, I enlist the philosophical and creative indications of Steiner, particularly indications from his speech and drama course, that I propose is deeply alchemical in structure and content. Having trained in Steiner’s acting technique, I can endorse his indications offer a secure and inspirational pathway for actor’s learning to participate with divine beings. Steiner’s focus for new and future theatre is to restore the metaphysical into acting through the power of the Creative Word. His wife and collaborator Marie Steiner-von Sivers (1867–1948) who was principally involved in the development of speech, acting and, eurythmy or visible and moved speech, comments that in order to participate in Steiner’s speech and drama: “… we must be ready to affirm the cosmic spirituality that lies hidden behind the world of appearances; and … to have real experience of this hidden cosmic substantiality.”34 To affirm cosmic spirituality and eventually to have real experience of it, are intrinsic requirements for practicing alchemy and ultimately, actuating alchemical theatre, as we shall discover. Indications from Chekhov, who developed his imagination-based psycho-physical acting Technique, in part, out of his association with Steiner, will also inform this great work as a significant contribution to what might become an alchemical
To progress our work, it is useful to cast back in historical time. Brian Cotnoir notes how the esteemed alchemist, Paracelsus (1493–1541), portrayed alchemy as a means to carry to its end something that has not yet been completed.36 Gauging from all that Artaud proposes in his book The Theater and Its Double it is we alchemical actors who must significantly contribute to the work of the “second phase of creation” by practicing alchemical theatre to actively redeem materialism and establish a living restoration of truth, beauty, and goodness into our lives. Artaud reminds us that theatre alchemy is gnostic in intent, and it is to be an embodied practice, where a dynamic synthesis of body, soul and spirit can birth a special essence that can be offered to our audiences for their advancement. To engage in this work becomes a sacred act and so I am dedicating this text to becoming alchemical actors, on stage and in life, who like Artaud, have a vision for change, and who courageously commit to participating in the Great Work.
Artaud, Antonin, The Theater and Its Double, transl. Mary Caroline Richards, Grove Press Inc. 1958. Please note the American English spelling of theater in the book. In this work I will observe the British English spelling of theatre unless referring to the book and its contents.
Artaud, Antonin, The Theater and Its Double, p. 27.
Artaud, Antonin, The Theater and Its Double, p. 51–52.
Cotnoir, Brian, The Weiser Concise Guide to Alchemy, ed. James Wasserman, Weiser Books, San Francisco, CA/Newburyport, MA, 2006, p. 11.
Nicoll, Charles, The Chemical Theatre, Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd, London, 1980.
“A state of consciousness maybe defined as the subjective space or field within which the different contents of consciousness, such as thoughts, feelings, images, perceptions, sensations, intuitions, memories, and so forth, function in patterned relationships. Furthermore, a state of consciousness always implies a definite division of the stream of time between two transition points”.
Samuels, Andrew; Shorter, Bani and Plaut, Fred, A Critical Dictionary of Jungian Analysis, Routledge, London and New York, 1986. They note: “The archetype is a psychosomatic concept, linking body and psyche, instinct and image … Jung’s concept of the archetype is in the tradition of Platonic Ideas which are present in the minds of the gods and serve as the models of all entities in the human realm.” p. 26–27.
Jung, Carl Gustav, Psychology and Alchemy, transl. R.F.C Hull, cw 12, Bollingen Series xx, Princeton UP, 1993, p. 41.
Klocek, Dennis, The Seer’s Handbook: A Guide to Higher Perception, Steiner Books, Great Barrington, MA, 2005, p. 9.
Klocek, Dennis, The Seer’s Handbook, p. 74.
Nicoll, Charles, The Chemical Theatre, p. 26.
Lings, Martin, Symbol and Archetype: A Study of the Meaning of Existence, Fons Vitae, Louisville, 2006, p. 21.
There is a rendition of the ancient hermetic alchemical maxim at the end of this work.
Metzner, Ralph, Alchemical Musings, Green Earth Foundation and Regent Press, Oakland, 2020, p. 118.
Klocek, Dennis, The Seer’s Handbook, p. 10.
Artaud, Antonin, The Theater and Its Double, p. 48.
Brian, Cotnoir The Weiser Concise Guide to Alchemy, p. 13. Cotnoir’s work provides an excellent rendition of the ‘chemical’ work of alchemy.
Steiner, Rudolf, The Stages of Higher Knowledge, Anthroposophic Press, Spring Valley, New York, 1967.
Klocek, Dennis, The Seer’s Handbook, p. 10–11.
Hillman, James, Alchemical Psychology, Spring Publications, Putnam, Conn, p. 313.
Harpur, Patrick, The Philosophers’ Secret Fire: A History of the Imagination, Penguin Books, London and New York, 2002, p. 205.
Harpur discusses alchemist Jacob Boehme’s metaphysical writings and describes Sophia as the divine imagination.
Goddard, David, The Tower of Alchemy: An Advanced Guide to the Great Work, Weiser Books, Boston, MA and York Beach, ME, 1999.
Goddard, David, The Tower of Alchemy, p. 4.
Mistlberger, P.T, The Inner Light: Self-Realization via The Western Esoteric Tradition, Axis Mundi Books, Winchester and Washington, 2014, p. 35–36.
Metzner, Ralph, Maps of Consciousness, Collier Macmillan, London and New York, 1971, p. 83.
Edinger, Edward, F, Anatomy of the Psyche: Alchemical Symbolism in Psychotherapy, Open Court, Chicago and La Salle, Illinois, 1994, p. 8.
Artaud, Antonin, The Theater and Its Double, p. 109.
Innes, Christopher, Avant Garde Theatre 1892–1992, Routledge, London and New York, p. 4.
Chekhov, Michael, To The Actor: On the Technique of Acting, Routledge, London and New York, 2002 p. 2. I am working with three editions of Chekhov’s Book that I will differentiate by citing dates of publication.
Chekhov, Michael, To The Actor, 2002, p. 3.
Gadoffre, G.F.A, Antonin Artaud and the Avant-Garde Theatre, lecture given in John Rylands Library Manchester, UK, on Wednesday 14 October 1970. Bulletin of the John Rylands Library. 1971; 53(2):329–336.
Artaud, Antonin, The Theater and Its Double, p. 42.
Steiner, Rudolf, Speech and Drama, Anthroposophical Publishing Company, London, 1960, p. 8–9.
For a list of Dawn Langman’s books please see bibliography.
Cotnoir, Brian, Weisner Concise Guide, p. 15.