Le Cœur à gaz

"Le Cœur à gaz" (French for "The Gas Heart" or "The Gas-Operated Heart") was a 1920 French-language play by Romanian-born author Tristan Tzara. It was written as a series of non sequiturs and a parody of classical theater, and although short enough to be a one act play, it is arbitrarily split into three acts. A part-musical theater performance featuring ballet numbers, "Le Cœur à gaz" was first staged in Paris, France as part of the 1923 show "Le Cœur à barbe" ("The Bearded Heart"), and connected to an art manifesto of the same name as the latter. The characteristic costumes used in the original staging were designed by Sonia Delaunay.

The play's first staging coincided with a major split in the avant-garde movement. Known for being one of the founders of the anti-art and anti-establishment trend known as Dadaism, Tzara was then involved in a conflict which split the movement, and in 1924 led his rivals to establish Surrealism. Opposing his Dada principles to the dissident wing of Dada, represented by André Breton and Francis Picabia, he rallied around him a group of modernist intellectuals, who endorsed his art manifesto, also titled "Le Cœur à barbe". The conflict between Tzara and Breton culminated in a riot, which took place during the premiere of "Le Cœur à gaz".

Text and staging requirements

ubversive intent

In "Le Cœur à gaz", Tzara's appears to have aimed at overturning theatrical tradition, in particular the three-act play,Peter Nichols, "Anti-Oedipus? Dada and the Surrealist Theater", in "New Theatre Quarterly", Vol. VII, Nr. 28 (November 1991), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1992, p.338, ISBN 0-521-40664-1] which resulted in the text having once been called "the greatest three-act hoax of the century".Jennifer Dunning, "From Jerusalem, an Introduction to the Absurd", in "The New York Times", March 6 2001] American literary historian David Graver, who compares "Le Cœur à gaz" with "Le Serin muet", a play by Tzara's friend Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes, notes of the two texts that, together, they "pulverize the elements of conventional theater they use so finely that few gestures or remarks cohere in any recognizable order. These manifestations of dada at its most extreme reduce theatrical spectacle to a kind of white sound, the significance of which depends almost exclusively upon the cultural context in which it is presented."David Graver, "The Aesthetics of Disturbance: Anti-art in Avant-garde Drama", University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1995, p.168. ISBN 0-472-10507-8] The play is occasionally seen as an early representative of Absurd Theater.

Tristan Tzara himself offered insight into the satirical and subversive intent of "Le Cœur à gaz", writing: "I beg my interpreters to treat this play as they would a masterpiece like "Macbeth", but to treat the author, who's no genius, without any respect [...] "Claude Schumacher, "Naturalism and Symbolism in European Theatre, 1850-1918", Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1996, p.105. ISBN 0-521-23014-4]

Dialogs

The play takes the form of an absurd dialog between characters named after human body parts: Mouth, Ear, Eye, Nose, Neck, and Eyebrow. The entire exchange of lines concentrates on using and misusing metaphors, proverbs and idioms, all of which refer to the body parts in question, but not to the characters, and make the protagonists look obsessed.Brater, p.25] D. J. R. Bruckner, "Comedy and Cruelty Make up an Evening of Five Short Plays", October 3 1997, in "The New York Times Theater Reviews 1997-1998", Routledge, London, p.125. ISBN 0-8153-3341-2] In one such example of a non sequitur, Ear says: "The eye tells the mouth: open your mouth for the comedy of the eye." It is probable that Mouth is courted by Eye, a matter which, according to theater critic Peter Nichols, may help one understand why some of the exchanges in the background turn from nonsensical to "a more lyrical expression of desire." This, Nichols proposes, may also explain the title of the play, a probable allusion to "the power of love as a kind of life-force".

In addition to this motif, the play features a series of seemingly metaphysical observations, which characters make about themselves or about unspecified third parties. For example, Mouth states: "Everyone does not know me. I am alone here in my wardrobe and the mirror is blank when I look at myself." [Brater, p.25-26] One such exchange, in which Ear compares herself to a "prize horse", results in an actual metamorphosis later in the text, through which she becomes a horse named "Clytemnestra" (after the femme fatale character in Greek myths). Another line reads: "The void drinks the void: air was born with blue eyes, that's why it endlessly swallows aspirin."

upporting elements

A series of dance routines, described by British theater historian Claude Schumacher as "bewildering ballets", accompanies the dialogs. In its third act, "Le Cœur à gaz" also features a dance performed by a man fallen from a funnel, which, American critic Enoch Brater argues, shares characteristics with Alfred Jarry's "ubuesque" situations.Brater, p.26] For both the third act and the play itself, Tzara's original text culminates in doodles, which are either various spellings of the same letters or drawings of hearts pierced by arrows. According to Brater: "Here the dramatic genre seems to have broken down completely."

The play was originally shown with cardboard costumes designed by artist Sonia Delaunay. According to Peter Nichols, they were an integral part of the performance, "a visual clue to [the characters'] one-dimensionality." Critic Michael Corvin also notes that the position of characters as specified by Tzara, alternating between an extreme height above the audience or episodes of collapsing on the stage, is a clue to how the protagonists relate to one another, and in particular to the tribulations of their love affairs.

1923 riot

The collaboration between André Breton and Tzara, begun during the late 1910s, degenerated into conflict after 1921. Breton, who objected to Tzara's style of performance art and the Dada excursion to Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre, was also reportedly upset by the Romanian's refusal to take seriously the movement's informal prosecution of reactionary author Maurice Barrès. [Richter, p.183-185] A third position, oscillating between Tzara and Breton, was held by Francis Picabia, who expected Dada to continue on the path of nihilism. [Richter, p.184-186, 188-190]

The first clash between the three factions took place in March 1922, when Breton convened the Congress for the Determination and Defense of the Modern Spirit, which rallied major figures associated with the modernist and avant-garde movements. Attended by Tzara only as a means to ridicule it, the conference was used by Breton as a platform for attacking his Romanian colleague. [Richter, p.186-188] In reaction to this, Tzara issued the art manifesto "Le Cœur à barbe", which was also signed by, among others, Marcel Duchamp, Jean Cocteau, Paul Éluard, Man Ray, Theo van Doesburg, Hans Arp, Vicente Huidobro, Ossip Zadkine, Erik Satie, Jean Metzinger, Paul Dermée, Serge Charchoune, Benjamin Péret, Marcel Herrand, Clément Pansaers, Raymond Radiguet, Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Cécile Sauvage, Léopold Survage, Marcelle Meyer, Emmanuel Fay, Ilia Zdanevich, Simon Mondzain, and Roch Grey. [Richter, p.188]

Tzara celebrated the formation of this new group with a Dada show, also titled "Le Cœur à barbe", hosted by Paris's Théâtre Michel (July 6 1923). According to music historian Steven Moore Whiting, the Romanian writer "cast his net too widely. The programme was a volatile hodge-podge of ex-Dada, pre-Dada and anti-Dada", while the audience, art critic Michel Sanouillet argued, comprised "gawkers and snobs [...] as well as artists and those in the know, who were attracted by the prospect of watching wolves devour each other."Steven Moore Whiting, "Satie the Bohemian: From Cabaret to Concert Hall", Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999, p.519. ISBN 0198164580] Tzara's play was one of the attractions, but the event also featured music by Georges Auric, Darius Milhaud and Igor Stravinsky,Richter, p.190] films by Man Ray, Charles Sheeler and Hans Richter, as well as another play by Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes ("Mouchez-vous", "Blow Your Noses"). There were also readings from the writings of Herrand, Zdanevich, Cocteau and Philippe Soupault, as well as exhibits of design works by Sonia Delaunay and Doesburg. Whiting notes that controversy erupted when Soupault and Éluard found their writings "being read in the same events as those of Cocteau", and that no explanation was provided for presenting works by Auric, "in view of his alliance with Breton." He also recounts that Satie unsuccessfully sought to make Tzara reconsider the choice for musical numbers weeks before the premiere.

A riot broke out just as "Le Cœur à gaz" was premiering, and, according to a first-hand witness, poet Georges Hugnet was provoked by Breton, who "hoisted himself on the stage and started to belabor the actors." Also according to Hugnet, the actors could not run away because of their restricting costumes, while their attacker also managed to assault some of the writers present, punching René Crevel and breaking Pierre de Massot's arm with his walking stick. Although they had beforehand shown a measure of solidarity with Tzara, Péret and his fellow writer Éluard are reported to have helped Breton caused more disturbance, breaking several lamps before the Préfecture de Police forces could intervene. Hugnet recounts: "I can still hear the director of Théâtre Michel, tearing his hair at the sights of the rows of seats hanging loose or torn open and the devastated stage, and lamenting 'My lovely little theater!' "

Art historian Michael C. Fitzgerald argues that the violence was sparked by Breton's indignation over Masson having condemned Spanish painter Pablo Picasso in the name of Dada. Reportedly, Masson's speech also included denunciations of André Gide, Duchamp and Picabia, to which, Fitzgerald notes, "no one took offense."Michael C. Fitzgerald, "Making Modernism: Picasso and the Creation of the Market for Twentieth-century Art", University of California Press, Berkeley, 1996, p.146. ISBN 0520206533] Fitzgerald also recounts that, after breaking Masson's arm, Breton returned to his seat, that the audience was subsequently ready to assail him and his group, and that an actual brawl was averted only because "Tristan Tzara alerted the waiting police". According to Whiting the scuffles "continued outside the theatre after the lights were snuffed".

Legacy

Hans Richter, who contributed to the 1923 show, wrote: "Le cœur à barbe" and "Le cœur à gaz" were Dada's swan song. There was no point in continuing because nobody could any longer see any point. [...] All this was linked with the movement's gradual loss of its inner power of conviction. The more it lost this power, the more frequent became the struggles for power within the group, until the hollow shell of Dada finally collapsed." Whiting writes: "The Soirée drove the last nail into the coffin of the movement that Cocteau had all too aptly characterized as 'le Suicide-Club'." Tzara unsuccessfully sought to have Éluard sued, while the theater refused to host any other performances of the same show.

"Le Cœur à gaz" endured as one of the most noted among his writings, as well as among Dada plays in general. "New York Times" chronicler D. J. R. Bruckner argues: "Few Dada plays survive; this one is exquisite [...] ." The text was received with interest by the avant-garde movements of Central and Eastern Europe. In Hungary, it was staged as early as the 1920s by the Expressionist theater company of Ödön Palasovszky (in a Hungarian-language translation by Endre Gáspár). [Júlia Szabó, [http://www.hungarianquarterly.com/no155/131.html "Idea Aeroplanes and Oberdada"] , in "The Hungarian Quarterly", Vol. XL, Nr. 155, Autumn 1999] Notable among the post-World War II productions of the play are the version staged in 1997 by the Threshold Theater Company, shown as part of New York City's "Caught in the Act" festival of European one-acts, and the Israeli modern dance adaptation by Gábor Goda and the Vertigo Dance Company. In 1930, Tzara produced and directed the film "Le Cœur à barbe", which starred some of the original show's main protagonists. [ [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0020775/ "Cœur à barbe, Le"] , at the Internet Movie Database]

While noting that Tzara's play shares a number of motifs with "Not I", a 1972 dramatic monologue by Irish playwright Samuel Beckett, Enoch Brater also argues that the latter is more accomplished and different in tone, and that "Le Cœur à gaz" is one of several "parodies of theatrical conventions rather than significant breakthroughs in the development of a new dramatic form."

Notes

References

*Enoch Brater, "Beyond Minimalism: Beckett's Late Style in the Theater", Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1987. ISBN 0-19-506655-3
*Hans Richter, "Dada. Art and Anti-art", Thames & Hudson, London & New York, 2004. ISBN 0-500-20039-4

External links

* [http://www.english.emory.edu/DRAMA/TzaraGas.html "The Gas Heart"] , translation by Michael Benedikt, at the Emory University [http://www.english.emory.edu/ Department of English]