The Origin and Development of Eurythmy 1918–1920

GA 277b — 15 November 1919, Dornach

31. Eurythmy Performance

Dear ladies and gentlemen.

We would like to take the liberty of presenting a sample of our eurythmic art to you today. This eurythmic art is in the early stages of its development and is in great need of further refinement. So we will have to present a kind of experiment to you. Therefore, you will allow me to say a few words in advance.

Of course, the aim of the eurythmic art is not to be understood through any kind of theoretical prediction. Every artistic activity should be grasped directly through the aesthetic impression itself. However, I do not wish to speak these few introductory words in order to provide theoretical discussions about what is to be imagined, but rather to explain to you how an attempt is being made here to create a new art form from certain sources. This new art form should not be confused with all kinds of neighboring arts that seemingly want something similar - such as dance art and the like - but it is an art form that is taken entirely from the Goethean worldview, from the inner possibilities of movement of the human individual himself. If I am to express in a few words what this eurythmic art actually is, I would have to say: it attempts to reveal itself through the whole human being in a toneless language, in the same way as a person would otherwise speak through the larynx and its neighboring organs. The possibility for this is derived from a psychology, from a soul science, which is based entirely on the principle of Goethe's world view. Let us just consider, my dear audience, what human speech actually is. We still do not give sufficient account of this today. And that is why such attempts as the eurythmic art - which reveals a different artistic language from the other art forms - will be more difficult to understand because we are not yet accustomed to understanding.

Human speech is such that human will works together with the whole human organism. However, this human will is, as it were, toned down by what pours in from the other side of the human organization, from the side of the thought organization. In ordinary human speech, human volition, which mobilizes forces that we can describe as muscular and other forces, and everything that otherwise works in thinking, but which is discharged through organic transmission to the larynx and its neighboring organs, really do flow together. That which is the thought form of speech, that which pours out of the thought side into speech, brings us together with our fellow human beings in life, and brings us together with the outside world in general. This is also the element in which the outside world is mirrored.

Now, in this eurythmic art, an attempt is made to bring about such a metamorphosis of language that the sounding of the thought is eliminated and only that is brought out of the possibilities of movement of the human organism, which pulsates from the will into language. In this way, this silent language, which expresses itself through the limbs of the whole human being, this eurythmy, is made an expression of the human being himself in a much more intense sense than ordinary language, into which, because it is also the means of communication for the human being, much that is conventional must flow.

Thus it comes about that we are able to bring to manifestation in eurythmy, through the possibilities of movement given in the human organism, precisely that which is subject to language from the soul of man.

When man speaks, I would like to say that he is always willing to make the same movements that come to manifestation in eurythmy. Particularly when listening to something spoken, the human being would like to make these movements. He suppresses them because the thought element dulls and paralyzes that which lives in the whole human being. In this way, the thought element is completely suppressed. Then it no longer paralyzes that which comes from the will element: the whole human being becomes an expression of the will, which is suppressed in ordinary language. But through this, my dear audience, the bridge is created over to the musical element, which is also a kind of language that expresses the depths of life, and on the other side, but also to poetry.

In poetry, the main thing is not the content of the words, but rather what is actually suppressed in ordinary life when speaking: In poetry, the main thing is rhythm, meter, everything that underlies the spoken word as its form. Hence you will see how, on the one hand, in certain pieces, the eurythmic element - which is a silent language spoken by the whole human being - is accompanied by the musical element, which in this case expresses the same thing as that which is expressed in the movements of the human limbs on stage. On the other hand, you will see that the truly poetic in poetry must be expressed when poems are recited at the same time, which on the one hand work through the word itself, but on the other hand but also through the silent language, the language of the will, which is presented on the stage and says the same thing as is spoken from the mouth in poetry, through the spoken word.

The basis of the art of eurythmy is not an arbitrary movement of the human limbs. Anything that is merely a gesture, merely facial expression, merely pantomime, is avoided. There is an inner lawfulness, as in the melodious element of music itself, for example. It is all based on the sequence of human movements. What the human will does with one sound follows, one might say, a melody of movement, what the other sound does. And so the inner connection is a lawful one. When two groups or individuals perform the same piece in eurythmy, the individual conception is no more at issue than it is for two pianists playing one and the same piece of music, such as a Beethoven sonata. Nothing arbitrary remains in the eurythmic art. Everything is in accordance with inner law.

Therefore, in the accompanying recitation, it must also be taken into account that, in poetry, the main thing is not the content of the words - which is particularly emphasized today when reciting; in this respect today - but rather it is actually the main thing. It would not be possible to accompany eurythmy with recitation in any other way than by making this the main thing: the underlying rhythm, the beat. Everything that is the formal expression of poetry must also underlie the recitation. Both are still poorly understood today. However, both should be the beginning of a new art form. And in the interaction of poetry, music and eurythmy, something should be created that truly corresponds to what Goethe felt: Art is based on the insight and visualization of the work of art by the human being, in visible and tangible forms to represent what has been seen through. Goethe once said, when he was writing his book about Winckelmann, where he delved particularly deeply into the essence of artistry: “Because man is at the pinnacle of nature, he in turn feels like a whole nature. He takes measure, order, harmony and meaning together to finally rise to the production of the work of art.

Is it not right, dear assembled here, when the human being's own deep conformity to law, which lies in every possible movement of his limbs, is brought forth into a mute language, which is, however, a fully valid form of expression for that which can also be speech? Must we not say that when something so deeply mysterious is drawn from the human instrument – for there is an imprint of the whole world in human nature, a microcosm – must we not say that something eminently artistic must emerge? As I said, there is nothing arbitrary about this eurythmy; it is simply the possibilities for movement that the larynx itself makes when we speak: These are captured in supersensible vision, are transferred to arms and hands and the other limbs of the human body, so that one might say that the human being itself acts like a large larynx, in order to create possibilities for expression that work through the mute movements, but which can be much richer, namely much more inwardly soulful, than what is achieved through conventional phonetic language.

If it is to be justified that something like this is possible, then it must be said that a bridge between poetry and such an art of movement, which is drawn from the human organism itself, is already given by the fact that the true poet does not feel the literal as the actual content of his creation, but rather that which formally underlies the poetry. In the case of Schiller, for example, in the best of his poems it was not the literal content that was first in his soul, but rather he had something musical, something melodious in his soul; only then did he add the literal content.

And Goethe studied Iphigenia with his actors, which is even a dramatic poem, with a baton like a conductor, so as not to emphasize the literal content, but rather what is based on the rhythm, the inner musicality of the matter. This inner musicality, we say, which we can otherwise express in language only partially, should be brought out of the human organism through eurythmy.

But all this, ladies and gentlemen, is really only at the beginning, and it is very necessary that this attempt at a eurythmic art be perfected more and more. To do this, it is of course necessary to find the interest of our contemporaries. If this interest of contemporaries turns to the art of eurythmy, as it has already partly turned to it, then the beginnings that have been made today will be further perfected, either by ourselves or, probably better, by others. And we are convinced that eurythmy will be able to create something that can stand alongside other art forms as a fully fledged art.

We are our own harshest critics when it comes to what we are able to offer today. We are well aware that it is a beginning that will gradually grow, but that it can already be presented because this art form, born out of Goetheanism, is something different, something that can be introduced as something new in our overall spiritual development. Therefore, because it is a beginning, we ask you to take the performance with indulgence. As already mentioned, we are our own harshest critics, but we do believe that what we can give today is worth the interest of our contemporaries.

[Before the break:] Since a wish has been expressed in this regard, we will present a scene from Goethe's “Faust”, part one, the scene that takes place in the study [night], with the Easter scene that follows. We want to present this scene with the help of the eurythmic art.

The many attempts that have been made to bring Goethe's “Faust” to the stage are well known. The difficulties lie in the fact that Goethe not only depicted what takes place for people and around people here on earth, but that in many places Goethe raised the scenes into the spiritual and supersensible. This is where the art of directing, the ordinary art of directing, very often fails. Anyone who has seen a variety of different “Faust” performances, for example the charming production by Adolf Wilbrandt, or Devrient's mystery play, which broke with the customary style and tried to present the matter in a more mysterious way, knows how difficult it is, especially with “Faust”, to bring to the stage that which is the transference of the plot into the supersensible, to bring truly shaped forces onto the stage.

Now, of course, we will present everything that takes place in the ordinary world of the senses on the ordinary stage; but where the situation involves raising the whole situation into the supersensible, we will use eury thmy, which is particularly suitable for dealing with these scenes, as it has already been shown in certain scenes of the second part of “Faust”, the mysterious depths of which cannot otherwise be fully explored.

So I think you will be able to see, if you let this experiment take effect on you – because it can only be an experiment – this scene in the study with the subsequent Easter scene, you will be able to see how, with the help of eurythmy, the supersensible aspects of this first part of “Faust” can easily be revealed in a way that is appropriate to the scene. Note 129, 5.56