Note: This post originally appeared here in June of 2006.
The other day I spoke about the quality of the word ‘Deadly’ in Peter Brook’s The Empty Space. The Deadly Theatre is seen not as a place but as a way of being. A kind of incomplete work. Or a superficial treatment of the subject matter. The subject of course being nothing less than the spirit of Life itself. While the ‘deadly’ comes up quite a bit in the book, there are two other words that appear with quite some frequency; silent and vital. I would argue that it is only through a vital life affirming silence that the deadly can be resisted. By listening to that necessary silence we can hear the authentic impulse that denies the deadly for one moment longer.
The artistic impulse comes in many forms and from many directions. For me it is a way of delving deeper into my own understanding of the world. The World. Such a multifaceted place. But as one explores “The World” one finds that it is not a singular place, but rather a complex of relationships and dependencies. Child is dependent upon mother like the tide is dependent on the Moon. The Lover needs the Beloved in order to live completely. Each of these relationships is its own world. Contained within it are differing rules of physics and indeed life. The world of ‘blogs’ has its own constellations, galaxies and black holes. Every actor within that system effects the gravitational pull of every other being. Sure some are more massive than others, but it is all part of an interconnected gravitational dance.
In “The World” we often find these many and various worlds colliding with one another. They crash into each other vying for dominance. Which world or Worldview will win out? What perspective shall carry the day? These constantly shifting paradigms of reality create a great chaotic mass of noise. The cacophony becomes such that it is nearly impossible to let our ears rest. Yet there are moments of silence. Brief moments between the crash and thunder where we might for a minute, a second, an instant know the tranquility is noiseless bliss.
The Vital Silence is not so much a literal silence, just as the Deadly Theatre is not a physical institution. The Vital Silence is that moment when all the noise and chaos of daily life becomes, for an instant, background. The perspective shifts and there standing before you, clear as day, is that essential thing you had lost in the mass of movement. The Vital Silence is a return to that core of self that is so dangerous to inhabit. It is the place we build walls and defenses against every day. For to walk around in that place would be to get caught in a hurricane without any skin, every inch of your body crying out in pain.
The Vital Silence is the space after the final bell rings in Arvo Part’s Cantus in Memorium Benjamin Britten. It is that place where we hold still and watch as the colors of the world become a little richer. Finding this place inside of us, learning to see from that perspective, is a difficult enough task on its own. Bringing it forth into the light of day is something entirely other. When he talks of The Immediate Theatre, Brook is getting at that place. The artist must live in that liminal space between objectivity and authenticity. She must be both authentic in her action and objective in her work at the same time. It is a double calling and one where the more intensely one aspect is carried forth, so much more difficult becomes the other.
And in this way it transforms into a dance of the self. Mind and Heart partnering across the dance floor of life creating the authentic [Heart/Mind] of creative action. The music that fills the dance floor is that silence that is so essential to life, so vital, that we almost become blind to it. The beating of our own hearts we do not notice until it gets out of phase with our activity, not strong enough at the beginning of a run or pounding too hard as we take a rest.
