The Origin and Development of Eurythmy 1923–1925

GA 277d — 30 December 1923, Dornach

Eurythmy Performance

Largo from the opera “Clearco in Negroponte” by Domenico Gabrielli
“Ruler Earth” by Vladimir Solovyov
“Immanuel” by Vladimir Solovyov
Prelude in F minor by J. S. Bach
Ghost Chorus from “Faust I,” Study Room, by J. W. v. Goethe
“Funeral March” by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy
“Die Sonne schaue” by Rudolf Steiner
Pastoral in G major from the Christmas Oratorio by J. S. Bach
“Zum neuen Jahr” by Vladimir Solovyov
“Das Traumlied des Olaf Åsteson”

My dear friends!

We have already had a series of eurythmy performances here during your stay, and I was able to say a few introductory words about the position of eurythmy within the system of the arts. In particular, I was able to point out that eurythmy actually had to emerge with a certain necessity from a spiritual movement that strictly followed the signs of the times. For every new artistic impulse, every new impetus in the arts in the course of human development has always come when a new spiritual realm has been opened up to human beings, or when something already opened up has approached humanity in a new way.

Of course, it is very easy to raise objections to eurythmy: it wants to be a language, a language that reveals itself through gestures drawn out of the human organism. At first, people do not understand these gestures, but that is not important. What is important is that what appears as such a gesture satisfies the aesthetic sense and that the satisfaction of the aesthetic sense then gives rise to an understanding of poetry in the same way that correctly oriented declamation and recitation give rise to an understanding of poetry.

Contemporary science has a small spark of what actually underlies the whole of eurythmy: We know that the part of the central nervous system, the brain system, that is primarily associated with language is located on the left side of the brain, and we know that the right hemisphere of the brain, the right side, the symmetrical part of the brain, is not actually configured in such a way that we can say in the same sense that there is also a language center on the right side. But the situation is immediately different for so-called left-handed people, people who are born left-handed—for whom the right hand remains relatively inactive, especially when it comes to intelligent tasks such as writing, sewing, or crocheting—for whom the language center is located on the right side.

From this, science has rightly concluded that there is a connection between what lies in the human arm and hand in terms of movement possibilities and movement abilities, and language, that language is, in a sense, the movement of human limbs that is determined by a certain organ system, the meaningful movement of human limbs. The perception of what is happening outside in the world and the expression of this perception through the speech organs is something that shows that it is actually the human limb system from which language is born.

But this is the case in a very comprehensive sense. Only today we do not know much about these mysterious connections. For example, we do not know how certain roundings and hardenings in speech, which are found in consonants, particularly in palatal sounds, are related to the way a person steps with the ball of their foot or with their heel. In language, we can clearly find an expression of the whole range of human gestures through the limbs. And anyone who has a sense for this will be able to see how the way a person walks, how a person grasps, how a person jumps, actually explains how they speak. So today's science has only a very small piece of the puzzle in the connection between the right hand and the left-sided speech center. Speech comes from the whole human being. Therefore, if one follows the physical body of the human being, one sees certain parts, certain areas in motion when he reveals this or that through speech.

But when the human being is observed in terms of his etheric body, then the whole etheric body is in a certain configured movement with any sound, with any verbal utterance. What is expressed linguistically always comes from the whole human being. And therefore, one can also retrace the path from language back into movement. The child goes through the movement possibilities, projects, as it were, what the limbs feel, experiences it in movement outside, projects it onto its speech organs and creates a reflection of these movement abilities in speech. But then, conversely, one can go back from language to the possibilities of movement that correspond to both the individual sounds and the sound combinations, the sound emphases, and so on. One can translate the whole language back into the moving human being and thereby bring out that moving plasticity of which I have already spoken.

As I said, I always wanted to present a few points of view at the beginning of our performances so that — as is actually quite possible — this eurythmy, which emerges so naturally from anthroposophy, can be illuminated from a wide variety of angles.

You will see, my dear friends, especially in something like “Olaf Åsteson,” which will be performed today in the second part after the intermission, how eurythmy arises quite naturally when poetry lifts people up into a higher, spiritual sphere. It is really possible to eurythmize something like “Olaf Åsteson” with a certain naturalness, because the spirituality that lies in the eurythmic movements really connects best with processes in the spiritual world. “Olaf Åsteson” is a wonderful poem from older Norwegian literature, found in the north, in which original, folk art, which is actually always connected with folk vision and folk imagination, comes to revelation. As I said, this “Olaf Åsteson” – eurythmized after the break – will be a performance today that is particularly appropriate for the Christmas season and our Christmas conference.