Resonances of the Tragic

This study is dedicated to the notion of the tragic in European dance theatre, the evocation of which takes place in a field of tension constituted by staging techniques as well as by conceptions, procedures and moments of interruption, of suspension, of disturbance and of an indeterminability effected by ec-static corporeality. It is possible to recognise in the event-generating structure and function of the tragic formal principles and an aesthetics of effect coupled to new constellations of the fictional and the choric, absence and presence. From the perspective of dance studies, the tragic emerges from the representation by means of the moving and moved body of a gruesome monstrosity at the limits of what is imaginable; but how exactly does the mise-en-scène of the ambivalent, ambiguous and paradoxical through figures and figurations of pathos function to make the tragic appear? Two exemplary productions from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, respectively Jean-Georges Noverres Agamemnon vengé (1771) and Luigi Manzottis Excelsior (1881) will form the central corpus for the elaboration of resonances of the tragic between event and affect en detail. A concluding discussion will seek to illuminate implications for our understanding of more recent performances. The study is conceived as a contribution to the inter-disciplinary (discursive) presence of the qualities of the tragic and of pathos, emphasising their hitherto neglected kinetic and kinaesthetic significance. In Noverres Agamemnon vengé a reform ballet from the second half of the eighteenth century tragedy forms the base for the staging of the tragic. The dance-theatrical event is (still) produced through the concept of a tragic essence and the recognition of its artistic and philosophical foundations. Nevertheless, the simultaneity in the second half of the eighteenth century of an emphasis on pathos on the one hand, and of a shift of the narrative dynamic into the characters interior on the other, already indicate a withdrawal into affect. Yet, the representation of pathos still plays a crucial role in the dynamisation of movement the requirement of expressing strong feelings (sadness, hatred, rage, anger) upsets the body, and the traditional body image. It is now primarily the inner body that is activated, more specifically the musculature, the nerves and breath. We can also observe an increasing attentiveness towards energy regulation. At the same time, the chorus as a staging element of particular impact, always present in Attic tragedy, is replaced by (partly choric) group formations. These are made use of on the dance-theatrical stage but are not continuously present. The choric principle becomes manifest in the transferral of the singular gesture onto the group, staged as a compound of ornamental individual figures. In the period of Manzottis Excelsior (1881), classical tragedy is no longer an immediate reference point for the large-scale dance-theatrical event. The de-essentialisation and un-substantialisation of the tragic is a far-reaching phenomenon of the nineteenth century. With regard to nineteenth-century dance theatre, it is possible to develop a conception of the ruinous tragic. The subversion and substitution of its original function, that is, the evocation of a great theatrical event, goes hand in hand with a loss of stable value and of its claims on eternity a process parallel to the discourse on ruins and the auratisation of destroyed artefacts from antiquity in European culture of the time. In Excelsior, these two aspects become manifest in the de-paradoxisation of the tragic (Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht) and the representation of a new contemporary form of mythology. In Excelsior, the representation of extreme passions which cannot be fixed sensually, as well as the embodiment of extreme violence, cruelty and of the abysmal as qualities temporarily suspending any canonical rules of composition, appear as highly regulated. In the nineteenth century, pathos as a small occurrence within a great and reflectively breaking tragic event becomes externalised in the spectacular. Paradoxically, in Excelsior the quality capable of generating an event shows itself mainly in dance group formations. While the rhythmicisation of a multitude of bodies does evoke an apparent link to the tragic, a basic element of the tragic is missing: the elaborate representation of fatal suffering. The pathos of form (Karl-Heinz Bohrer) is victorious over a monstrous content that would threaten its form, that is, the absence of any possibility of reconciliation and the representation/embodiment of absolute horror. In recent decades, central aspects of the two models from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries have re- emerged: the vision of staging the tragic as a great dance-theatrical event, such as in Pina Bauschs Orpheus and Eurydice (1975), and the withdrawal of the tragic into affect, such as in Meg Stuarts and Philipp Gehmachers Maybe Forever (2007). Bauschs proximity to the tragic is produced beyond the immediately visible gesture of adaptation by means of the ambivalence of an energetic body language refusing any escape from suffering and pain. The production engages playfully and in a contemporary manner with the tension between individual and choric group. In the small form of Philipp Gehmacher/Meg Stuarts Maybe forever, it is possible to find an echo of the tragic in the segmentation of the body: unsettling the notion of a subjects unity and rational self-organisation.