The Origin and Development of Eurythmy 1912–1918
GA 277a — 16 September 1912, Bottmingen
The Dionysian Course I
On September 15, the cycle on the “Gospel of Mark” had begun in Basel, and on September 16, at four o'clock in the afternoon, my mother and I went for the first time to Bottmingen, a rural suburb of Basel, where Rudolf Steiner was staying during those September weeks.
Without referring to any of the tasks specified earlier, Rudolf Steiner began by emphasizing a few general points. For example: “This new art of movement can only be performed by someone who recognizes and lives in the conviction that human beings consist of body, soul, and spirit.” And, recalling the Luciferic and Ahrimanic beings: “A form at rest has an aesthetic effect, and in motion a hygienic effect.” I also remember the following sentence, perhaps adapted to my youth: “A second dance is of course out of the question.” And then, already in the introduction: “You must learn to let the heart rise into the head, not the other way around, to let the head penetrate the heart.”
“And so you learn to feel a as defense and express it through hands bent upward.”
a — defense — upward, bent / hands
When I tried the movement and instinctively formed it from the posture indicated in Munich, Rudolf Steiner seemed satisfied, because he immediately continued talking about the sound e: “Learn to feel an e in every intersection, even if only hinted at, connected with the feeling of wonder.”
e — Crossing
He recalled that at a certain point in the first scene of his second mystery drama, “The Trial of the Soul,” he had instructed Capesius to slowly lower his arms with his hands crossed and remain in this posture almost until the end of the scene. This is the point where Benedictus counters all the struggles for knowledge and despair that had been triggered in Capesius by the words in Benedictus's book of life as the most severe crisis of the soul with the sentence: “I find you in happiness!” “But try to feel all the other possible nuances of amazement in this e, for example, awe, fear, disgust, and so on.” When I plucked up my courage, I said with a laugh, "Yes, of course, Doctor, when the market women in our Rhineland tell each other any news, they always say: ‘Oh no, oh no.’“ As I said this, I made the gesture that I had often observed at the market. With the ‘Oh’ or ”Oh no,“ they lift their mostly rather plump arms from their shoulders, almost in an O shape, and then with the ”No," they let them fall back down, crossed over their bodies. Rudolf Steiner seemed to enjoy my rather dramatic performance and said with a laugh: “There you see, it's amazement.”
ae — legs placed one behind the other
ä: Legs placed one behind the other, anything standing in pairs one behind the other, for example two people.
i — any stretching
i: "Any stretching, wherever you feel it, whether in your arms, in your legs, or, as I already told you in Munich, in your whole body, but also in your gaze, with your nose, your tongue, or just with one finger or, if you can, just with one toe. But it must be the experience of stretching. A very typical example is when you stretch one arm sideways upwards and the other downwards accordingly.“
au — every touch of your own body
au: ”Every touch of your own body. You just have to feel it, then you will also find the most varied movements there.“
o — every curve of the limbs that comes together
o: ”Every curve of the limbs that comes together, connected with the sensation of a loving, affectionate embrace." Here, too, Rudolf Steiner spoke of many possibilities, whether with both arms, only with the forearms, the hands, or only with the fingers. It can even be expressed with one arm, for example between the hip and arm, head and arm, and so on.
u — every upward movement
u: “Every upward movement – expressed seriously by a large arm movement, human – for example in pleasure, jubilation, cheering by jumping or a little jump.” Here my mother asked a question: “But when the little word ‘and’ comes, you can't make an arm movement or a jump every time, can you?” Rudolf Steiner replied almost mischievously: “You can just do this” – and with one hand he made a very small, slight, jerky swing just from the wrist (and, with his arm hanging loosely, moved his hand very quickly and lightly upwards from the wrist).
äu — Jumping up or pressing down with the limbs
äu: "Jumping up or pressing down with the limbs. Just as # is a jump upwards, äs is a jump onto the ground, a re-contact with the earth. Pressing the limbs can also be, for example, pressing the arms into the hips, or pressing one elbow into the hand of the other arm, or pressing the arms back into the shoulder joint; you can even press your eyes."
ei — any movement of the whole body.
ei: “Every movement of the whole body. Have the feeling of ‘how lovely,’ as you experience when you stroke a child. You cannot feel or express this with your body held immobile.”
After Rudolf Steiner had explained and described the individual vowels and some umlauts and diphthongs, he also gave instructions on how to practice. Repeat each sound individually, try to find new movements and do not rest until every movement, even the smallest, is truly experienced and felt in the heart. Only then should one try to string two sounds together, for example i o, then three sounds, i o u, or let one sound merge into the other, forming them almost simultaneously.
“You will see how beautiful it will be, what a differentiated experience it expresses.” Such words were often accompanied by so much expectant joy in his voice that this unforgettable sound could always be a great help when difficulties or even painful lulls arose later in the work.
On that very first afternoon, Rudolf Steiner spoke last of three consonants — he had emphatically stressed: “One must sensitively experience the vowels in their movement tendencies: stretching, grasping, bending, crossing, striving.” In all this activity, the soul lives and expresses itself in ever-changing ways: “The whole soul is represented in its emotional life in the vowels.” This purely soul-based, weaving, living process was then contrasted with three specific consonants, namely the three consonants “b,” “s,” and “z,” which grasp a piece of the outside world, where we “have something in our hands” and now direct all our attention, all our experience, all our adaptability toward this “something,” this object. I will touch, hold, relate to, or even move or shape this piece of the outside world differently if it is a veil, a staff, a shield, a bud, or a flower. “Imagine how spiritual it can be when the boy in ‘Heidenröslein’ holds a stick in his hand and performs all his s-movements with the stick,” said Rudolf Steiner when, about six months later, he showed us a few more of the only stick exercises he had given us during these first lessons, some of which clearly had such an s-character.
After a brief silence, he suddenly picked up a very large pencil, a carpenter's pencil, held it casually, loosely, as if by chance, and said: “This is v. Learn to feel v as something you hold in your hand or even just touch.”
v — to have something in your hand
Then he picked up the pencil again, and now he moved his hand so that the tip of the pencil pointed to his chest, almost touching it, and said: “Learn to feel b as something in your hand that has an effect back on your body.”
b — to have something in your hand that has an effect on the body
In these first lessons, Rudolf Steiner often brought books or pictures with him to illustrate his points. A few days later, when he wanted to show me certain head positions, he showed me a picture of a Corybant dance in Albert Czerwinski's Brevier der Tanzkunst (Breviary of Dance Art), an illustration of two Greek warriors [see p. 73] facing each other with shields and swords. “See, by the way they hold their shields in a b-gesture, they show that each one is referring the other's aggressiveness to himself. They would not need to cover or protect themselves if they did not feel attacked. Then they would only hold their shields in a v-gesture, letting them hang calmly in a v-movement, just holding them in their hands.”
And as a third movement, he pointed forward with the pencil in an energetic stretch, using the pencil as an extension of his finger. (Again, he took the staff and raised it in an incredibly energetic, I would say radiant, movement.) “And there you have an s, when you feel your arm and this stick as one. s always means moving and shaping together with an object.”
s always means moving or shaping together with an object
The archetype of the s is the person leaning on a thyrsus stick. And now consider how different your s movements must be, depending on the object, that is, the piece of the external world that you hold in your hand and whose character you must move or shape yourself according to. This is how you learn to feel an s."
That was the content of this first afternoon lesson. Rudolf Steiner presented the entire field of vowels, showing how the soul expresses itself in these vowels: the soul seized with wonder at the unfamiliar, the soul that remains upright, the soul that experiences itself in the purest self-awareness, the soul that bows down in loving admiration, the soul that turns from coldness and abandonment to something higher and greater. The soul expresses its very essence, living and weaving in its own spiritual realm. And he contrasts this with these three consonants. The difference really could not be clearer or more striking! He simply gives us a piece of the “outside world,” and all that came before is erased; our entire attention, our entire experience is directed toward this outside world. We must adapt to its nature, its character; we must surrender ourselves to a completely different event, imitating, replicating, recreating what is out there in the outside world. We must develop emotional warmth and truthfulness when we vocalize. We must become skillful, witty, and imaginative when we consonate.
After a pause filled with reflection and reverberation of what had been heard and given, already standing up, my mother asked a question: “What should one do with children who get dizzy very easily, or rather, what should one let them do?” The doctor then asked for his notes on me to be brought to him again and drew the horizontal lemniscate, first slowly and then faster and faster, as the child should run after its nose.
And for children and people who were too strongly and one-sidedly sanguine, he advised them to suddenly switch from a fast run to a tight, upright standstill. That alone was the instruction, which could then be developed in various ways, and indeed was.
Rudolf Steiner's preparatory notes for this lesson
Vowels always express something inner A — Defense. (Fear that defends itself)
E — Crossing — Reverence, fear, disgust —
Ä — Legs placed one behind the other — Hands
I — Every stretch — [suggesting experiencing within oneself]
Au - Any touch of one's own body —
O - Any joining together of the limbs - hesitant embracing - [admiration]
U - Any upward turn - [both hands || expressing] [amazement]
Äu- Jumping up or braceing the limbs —
Ei - Every movement of the whole body
Eu — With hands close to the heart or meaning the other, pointing to him —a — Defense
e — Crossed
i — Straight out
o — Rounding
u — Hands raised
ü — Back of hands together
ä — Arms crossed over chest
ö — Light jump
ei — Inclined movement
ai
äu — Right arm on hip
au