“Parisians Hiss New Ballet”

The Sacrifice of Modern Art on Art’s Altar [1]

Rachel Katherine Duncan

Senior Seminar in Religion

Professor David Weddle

March 14^th, 2002

It is surprising the places we find modern examples of sacrifice. From the particular to the general, society is wrought with the scapegoat mechanism outlined by Rene Girard. To research Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring is to embark on a journey of human observation, moving concentrically outward from the premiere event, to its treatment today. Art has a power to conceal and reveal. In this case, it did both. The goal of Modern art was truly realized on May 29^th, 1913, because the audience was completely integrated in the art itself. In this case, the art was a sacrifice, and the audience behaved as the sacrifier.

The performing arts are always a draw for those who can afford the tickets. And it is usually at the screening, or the opening night when the cream of society graces the lobby. This phenomena did not start in Hollywood or New York City, “first nights have perhaps never been more dazzling social events than they were in Paris between 1900 and 1914.” [2] The Theatre Champs-Elysees itself was an example of new architecture and construction, and was “distinctly provocative.” [3] When the curtain rose the evening of May 29^th, 1913 at the Theatre Champ-Elysees in Paris, the crowd was expecting something worthy of their presences; they got much more. When they entered the theatre to be entertained by Le Sacre du Printemps (or The Rite of Spring), they were unaware they would be the aggressors in a modern sacrifice.

The opening was one in a series of Ballets Russes commissioned and produced by Serge Diaghilev, a native Russian who made his name in the Paris art circle. Diaghilev himself was not an artist, but he had a talent for putting artists together who complemented each other. He represented (if not conceived) a movement of Russian artistic collaborations drawing from folkloric traditions, specifically Slavic, and presented ballets along with cutting edge music. [4] This artistic collaborative project began in the 1890s, and drew from artists of all types (including Alexandre Benios and Leon Bakst) [5] , and only the best performers. The Ballet Russes had been quite popular and enthusiastically supported by Parisians [6] . The latest Diaghilev- Stravinsky collaboration was no exception. Petrushka  ballet was a Slavic folktale put to dance and to the young Stravinsky’s cutting edge score. 

The artistic director and anthropologist for The Rite was Nicholai Roerich. Roerich was well respected in the artistic community as a man who had an excellent eye for design and expressing it through Russian folklore. It was Diaghilev’s idea to put Roerich in touch with Stravinsky to create the next Ballet Russes. This was a brilliant duo -- both parties inspired each other. Upon seeing Roerich’s sketches for the costumes, Stravinsky wrote, “Everything indicates that the work is going to ‘come out’ uncommonly well!” [7]

The young dancer, Vaslav Nijinski, principle dancer of the Ballets Russes, was chosen to choreograph Le Sacre. His selection was met with some controversy, as was the dance.

Despite the excitement for the performance by both the public and the collaborators, no one expected the crowd’s reaction, or that this ballet would be the defining point in the careers of Igor Stravinsky, Nicholai Roerich, Vaslav Nijinski, and to some extent Serge Diaghilev. [8]

            Ballets are not simply dances, they tell a story without using spoken or written word. This is the libretto for The Rite of Spring:

In Act One, The Kiss of the Earth, members of a pagan Slavic tribe congregate near a sacred hill and play springtime games, “The Joy of Spring”. A 300-year-old woman, the progenitress of the tribe, foretells the rites to come, and the tribe performs a series of games and ritual dances to induce and to celebrate the return of spring. Two villages play these games, which turn from playful to war-like. This first part reaches its climax when “The Old Wise Men” enter the stage and an elderly sage consecrates the earth with a kiss.

In Act Two, “The Great Sacrifice”, the maidens of the tribe begin a mystical labyrinthine circle dance on the sacred hill, and Fate, or Yarilo (depicted as a winged-horse configuration), chooses one of them for the sacrifice. The ancestors of the tribe, clad in bearskins (an allusion to the ancient Slavic belief that the bear was man’s ancestor) and elk skins, surround her as she, possessed, dances herself to death in order to save the earth.” [9]

With the anticipation for this opening, and the pressure on all of the artists, “There can be no doubt that a scandale of some sort was both intended and expected.” [10] However, no one expected the reaction that dominated the theatre that night: violence. After the first few measures of the introduction were played, people laughed out loud. The booing and laughing escalated along with the music and along with the isolated fist fights among the audience members.

The audience was somewhat divided between the aristocrats who expressed their distaste for the show and the thespian community who defended the work. “In short, a ready-made cheering section was present, along with a well-rehearsed potential opposition.” [11]

One audience member and art critic described the last scene of the production. He observed “Mlle. Piltz [The Chosen One] executing her strange dance of religious hysteria on a stage dimmed by the blazing light in the auditorium, seemingly to the accompaniment of the disjointed ravings of a mob of angry men and women.” [12]

Another audience member from the artistic community described the scene: “Nothing that has ever been written about the battle of Le Sacre du Printemps has given the faint idea of what actually took place. The theater seemed to be shaken by an earthquake. It shuddered. People shouted insults… drowning out the music… the ballet was astoundingly beautiful.” [13]

So great was the protest, the rioting continued through intermission between those who remained for the second act. The immediate reports and reviews described a great failure, and a scandal of a performance. [14]

Stravinsky wrote that he had never been so angry in his life as on that night. From backstage, Nijinsky was yelling instructions to the dancers who were jarred by the yelling, and was compelled to run in to the audience himself, but Stravinsky held him back. Stravinsky described how he felt that opening night, “…I was unprepared for the explosion… I left the hall in a rage… I have never again been that angry.” [15]

Roerich himself described and analyzed the scene. He wrote, “I remember how during the first performance the audience whistled and roared so that nothing could even be heard. Who knows, perhaps at that very moment they were inwardly exultant and expressing this feeling like the most primitive of peoples. But I must say, this wild primitivism had nothing in common with the refined primitiveness of our ancestors, for whom rhythm, the sacred symbol, and refinement of gesture were great and sacred concepts.” [16]

It is from Roerich’s observation of the crowd’s behavior that signals an analysis of the modern reaction to sacrifice. With the help of the scholarship of Hubert &Mauss, and Rene Girard, I will investigate the motivations and implications of the riot that historic evening. The results may be as surprising and profound as the violence in the theatre, 90 years ago.

The key to understanding The Rite of Spring is to understand in what ways it was the inaugural event of modern art. The philosophy of modern art is that art never has value in and of itself. Because objectivity is impossible for humans, one piece of art never retains one certain meaning because it is always observed through the veils of time and place. Modern art utilizes this interaction though various harnessing tools, by making the observers active participants. In this way, the Rite may be considered the most successful piece of modern art because it roped people into participation in profound ways.

Art reveals and conceals. Girard argues that sacrifice functions congruently. It is extremely pertinent that a sacrifice was presented as an art form at that moment in history. The union of art and religion in this instance has been largely ignored.

Music historians tend to label The Rite as a masterpiece of modern music, particularly due to the complex rhythms it introduced to the music world. “The percussive violence and barbaric tone colours of The Rite of Spring did, however conceal a new kind of rhythmic sensibility…” [17] Stravinsky’s distinctive style had already been appreciated in The Firebird, and other composers were concentrating on breaking the standards of art music at the time.

However, the discordant harmonies of The Rite of Spring were not anything new in 1913. [18]   Despite the fact that many members of the audience that night might not have heard rhythms and chords as unusual as in The Rite, it is preposterous to think that the aural experience on its own would provoke a riot.

“More surprising [than the violent reaction at the premiere] was the fact that a year later, when played symphonically without ballet or scenery under M. Pierre Monteux’s sympathetic direction [who also conducted the original production], it was received with an enthusiasm at least equal to the aversion with which the music had previously been heard.” [19]

Nor can we conclude that the visual aspects were autonomous in provoking the violent reaction. While there might have been mixed sentiments for Russian culture by the Parisian audience, remember that the Ballets Russes had been running consecutively popular seasons for at least ten years prior to The Rite. The productions were characteristically blatant in the portrayal of Russian culture. 

Many dance historians consider The Rite the progenitor of modern dance. The dance movements broke conventions of physical vocabulary, and did not appear to be a ballet the way those in the audience were accustomed to watching.  It would be reasonable to expect negative reviews in Friday’s paper, and decreased attendance in the second act. However, it is unreasonable to conclude that there is one easy explanation for the particular expressions of violence in the audience that evening.

The Rite held only eight performances that season. [20] Never again would it be performed with the same choreography, set design and costuming. Another ballet production with the same musical score was produced in Paris seven years later with new choreography. By then, the music had gained notoriety, but the original dance movements had been dismissed.  The new choreography was a more traditional form of ballet. Never again was there the vehement response as at the premiere. [21] “The memoirs of the memorists and even the accounts of the critics are immersed in the scandale rather than the music and the ballet, in the event rather than the art.” [22]

The historians abandon the explanation where the social scientist ought to retrieve it. I hold that the source of the vehement reaction of the opening night can only be found when examining the entire sensory experience. This includes the auditory, visual, subliminal, and symbolic elements of the piece and their intersection with the time and place of France and 1913. We must always treat The Rite in respect to all expressive elements because it was conceived and executed with the collaborators working interdependently.

There must be something in both the subject matter and the time of its release. Who is to be thanked for choosing such a brilliant topic? There are serious discrepancies about who should be given credit for the initial idea. Stravinsky claimed to have dreamed the image of a pagan ritual where a girl dances herself to death. He later told Diaghilev the idea, and was directed to Roerich as an anthropologic and visual arts resource. The Roerich followers, on the other hand, claim that the two had been paired prior to a libretto. In this version, Roerich presents Stravinsky with two options, one for a great chess game to be played on stage, the other for a great sacrifice of a young girl. Stravinsky obviously chose the latter. [23]

Regardless of the origin of the idea, the fact that it materialized when it did is of ultimate importance. The discrepancy demonstrates the monumental nature of this ballet. “The subject of this ballet seems to me distinctly too vast for musical illustration, or if not so, it is at all events beyond the easy comprehension of any audience, even of trained musicians.” [24] This comment by an acquaintance of Stravinsky shows an attempt to explain the curious reactions to the performances. To say that the sacrifice topic is simply too complicated dismisses the cultural significance of the audience’s relationship to sacrifice.

Stravinsky clearly did all composing through the inspiration of the visualization of the pagan setting. “What I was trying to convey,” said Stravinsky “was the surge of spring, the magnificent upsurge of nature reborn.” To give all the credit to the music goes against the intent and vision of the composer, who said, “I have written a work that is architectonic, not anecdotal.” [25] It was an entire construction of something that needed to be built. This spiritual dynamic is the most mysterious to the creative process. “I had only my ear to help me; I heard and I wrote what I heard. I am the vessel through which Le Sacre passed.” [26]

In reference to the Rite of Spring, as Wise observed, Stravinsky “writes whatever he feels to be of the essence of his subject, -- leaving to his interpreters the task of conveying his meaning to the hearers.” [27]   We know that Stravinsky composed this particular score with the direct visual inspiration of the sacrifice. This is why I find scholarship on the music as an autonomous entity disrespectful of the very conditions for its creation. Every tone color Stravinsky painted in the music mingles with the visual elements, and vice versa, to create an intense experience to say the least. The music might take responsibility for some of the describing that cannot be done visually. The penultimate sound is a distinctive but short flute melody in crescendo, and ends in one final choral dark chord. This solo flute could be seen as the soul or spirit escaping the body, moving upwards, as the music suggests, to the sun god. The following single pounding chord is the collapse of the body back to the earth.

The music enforces this visual experience of the death of the Chosen One. The piece starts with a bassoon solo, the melody of which reoccurs only a few times after the introduction. There is a distinct juxtaposition of the bassoon solo and the pounding, chromatic, multi instrumental chording that characterizes most of the score. During the Dance of the Chosen One, we hear a chorus of voices in polyrhythmic unison, and never in the final dance do we hear that solo voice again.

Only one modern article addressed the fascinating element of group response and interaction with the ballet, and how that event epitomized the modern art experience. The author uses the explanation to enforce the philosophy of modern art introduced by the breakdown of the fourth wall. He explains how “the ballet stands clearly at the forefront of modern cultural achievement.” [28] Eksteins’s article is useful for my research in how he explains that art can never be autonomous. There is ever a static meaning inherent in the work itself.  “Without an audience, without conflict, the art of modernism would not exist.” [29]

It could be that at the night of the performance, the only one to really understand this larger meaning was Diaghilev. He saw art “above all as experience, beyond morality, beyond pedagogy, and beyond rationalist notions of cause and effect.” [30]

Slavic Sources

Hubert and Mauss describe sacrifice as a genuine means of mediation between people and the divine (insert footnote if this is first reference). The ritual may take place on special occasions, or regularly. Since time and the gods were created by sacrifice, time and the gods must be maintained similarly. In the case of the original version of The Rite of Spring, a dramatic representation of Slavic people participating in a ritual sacrifice in order to ensure the arrival of spring was acted out through dance and music.

Slavs were exogamous clans who held very tightly to their tradition. “Ancient Slavic civilization was one of the most conservative known on earth.” [31]   Their religious actions were based on the belief in various spirits and gods inhabiting all realms of activity. Some gods were anthropomorphic, and needed to be appeased through offerings, sometimes in the form of sacrifice. [32]

While the design of The Rite was based traditional in origin, the audience was not privy to the details on Slavic mythology, (there was no narrator or program notes). So the performance was truly an abstraction of a tradition.  It was not clear if the sacrifice was agrarian, expiatory or communion in nature. Because the piece is symbolic rather than narrative, the audience is left to use their imagination. While the details are not apparent, the ritual was not complete fiction. Nicolai Roerich used Slavic tradition to create the scenery, costumes, and to advise Nijinsky on the choreography.

Slavic patterns could be seen in the steps of the dancers, the shapes of their bodies, the embroidery on their costumes, to the Slavic melodies embedded in the music. [33] “Le Sacre du printemps was inspired by looking at archeological documents… in which characters were contorted, the knees turned in, the arms twisted back.” [34] While the ballet was not attempting to precisely replicate a Slavic ritual, all facets of the piece were inspired rather than based on archaic models.

The “basic postures and movements of the dancers throughout the ballet appear to owe much to the carved wooden idols that figures so prominently in Roerich’s paintings of early Russia. With feet turned inward, elbows clutched tight to the body, and palms held flat, in defiance of the cardinal rules of classical ballet, the dancers indeed bore a physical resemblance to these pagan idols, and their restricted range of movement in this position lent their bodies an angular, wooden quality.” [35]

Roerich’s expertise in Slavic tradition, mingled with Stravinsky’s own interest in the tradition of his native Russia, influenced the melodic phrases in the music. While the score itself was radically innovative, contained within it are folk sources. This trend in “primitivism” in music became a trend in modern music throughout the century. In a Paper by Richard Taruskin, professor of musicology at Columbia University, entitled “Russian Folk Melodies in the Rite of Spring,” he

“demonstrates how certain parts of Stravinsky’s score can be identified with music from Slavic rituals. Specific melodies in the sections called ‘Spring Rounds,’ ‘Dance of the Earth,’ and ‘Ritual Action of the Ancestors’ are recognizable as ancient chants, some of which were performed with movement. Dance chants of this sort had the purpose of collective conjuring, ‘to facilitate,’ for example, ‘the quick awakening of nature.’” [36]

            According to Roerich’s notes, Yarilo is ancient spirit of light and creativity for the ancient Slavs. [37] I was unable to find any reference to the god, Yarilo in any documentation of Slavic Mythology and practice. This is probably due to the diversity in language and practice within the tradition referred as “Slavic.” There has already been critique on the authenticity of the Slavic sources, “there is no clear precedent in Slavic mythology for the sacrifice of the maiden.” [38]   One theory is that Roerich drew from Mexican tradition, where human sacrifice is well documented. [39]

“Given Roerich’s commitment to archaeological authenticity and the encouragement he gave to both Stravinsky and Nijinsky to use their Slavic heritage, it is curious that he rewrote mythology for the climax of Sacre. I wonder if the decision enabled him to resolve the desire to use an archaic subject with what he considered an appropriate way to end a ballet. Death of a young woman, or apotheosis of her spirit, is, after all, the crux of Romantic ballet.” [40]

I argue that the crux of the issue is on actually sacrifice. Not just the death of the woman, but the conditions under which she dies. The fact that a woman died in another Stravinsky-Roerich ballet, Petrushka, and did not cause controversy enforces the point that it was the topic sacrifice that distinguished the The Rite.

Because of his deep respect for the tradition, it is unlikely that Roerich fabricated the god, Yarilo. Hubert and Mauss point out that the nature of the victim has some sort of affinity with the god for which it is being sacrilized. [41] This leads me to assume this god has some relationship to dance and to young women. The fact that a sacrifice takes place for a deity of light and creativity logically leads to the choice for an energetic woman to play the role of the victim. The woman herself could be a symbol for creation of life.

In my research, the only Slavic reference to sacrifice was in the myth of the rusalka (or rusalki, plural). Rusalka was a “lake-dwelling soul of a child who dies unbaptized or of a virgin who was drowned (whether accidentally or purposely).” In some areas, rusalki are “beautiful charming girls… singing sweet, bewitching songs to the passersby,” whereas in other areas, rusalki are “ugly, unkept… and always ready to ambush humans.” [42]

It is relatively unimportant to this paper whether or not the folkloric resources were genuine for The Rite. Ultimately, there was a sacrifice performed on that emotional Thursday, which caused expected reaction from any crowd witness to human sacrifice.

Sacrifice is either an invitation or expulsion of a sacred spirit, whether pure or impure, resulting in a transformation in the victim, and in all involved and observing. The victim is drawn from the mundane, but through the ritual action is put in a liminal place between the worlds of mundane and divine. The victim, “by the fact of consecration, was filled with a sacred force that excluded it from the profane world.” [43] It reaches the climax of divination and remains there for only a moment before releasing all energy, where the spirit exits and the body descends to the mundane world; the two never to be united again [44] .

This special energy is perfectly described in dance, where the energy is obvious, but the source of that energy is not. It is also obvious when the energy is released because the body collapses. The Dance of the Chosen One depicts the crucial transformation of the victim. She no longer moves like a human, but like bird. Nijinsky’s sister, who worked with her brother to choreograph the solo, commented that “the movements give the image of a prehistoric bird whose wings try to raise the body, which is clumsy and not yet ready to fly.”

Various accounts “bear witness to the magic function of the movements, the incessant movements of the springtime songs, whose purpose was to facilitate the quick awakening of nature – the growth of grass, the opening up of the rivers, the flight of birds, and so on… These descriptions make clear the connection between the performance of the spring invocations and some form of action” [italics original]. [45]

Hodson notices that “the leaps of the young men who wear the firewheel costumes adumbrate those of the Chosen Maiden in her awkward effort to join Yarilo in the sky,” [46] With movements resembling a bird struggling desperately to lift its body in flight – whether trying to escape her fate or striving toward it is left ambiguous – she held the audience spellbound until, with a final shudder, she expired – Yarilo’s victim or, as Roerich and others interpret it, his bride.” [47]

She continues that “A circle, like the sun, is potent in and of itself because of its correspondence to that source of energy. So the continuity of design from a shaman’s rattle to the steps of his dance is a form of incremental repetition which multiplies the impact of the rite.” [48]

Other ceremonies surrounding Maslenitsa (EXPLAIN) involve the symbolic death of a child through a doll that is carried to a field and torn apart. Food was believed to spill from her body, and her remains were scattered. [49] This tradition seems to follow Hubert and Mauss’s explanation of agrarian sacrifice.

Silence in ritual is essential, and it marks the absolute, primordial beginning that the ritual itself is aiming to recreate. Therefore, in order to consider the Rite of Spring a true sacrifice, there must be an period of silence. Although the music is continuous, one of the main features of the composition is the dramatic and abrupt change in volume, rhythmic and instrumentation throughout the score.

However, the music does not give any length of silence. But the silence can be found elsewhere on that evening: in the audience. It is quite significant that the audience abandoned their fighting at the moments when the maiden is chosen, and during her final dance. This is another area where The Rite was only a complete experience with the audience’s reaction. The audience added to the silence required for effectiveness of the ritual.

“While the maidens wove their mystic circle dance at the beginning of the second act, the audience quieted down, as if temporarily mesmerized by the haunting lyricism of the music and the exquisitely intricate pattern of the dance against the ominous nocturnal setting. But once the bearskin-clad ancestors appeared and began their ritual stamping around the Chosen Maiden, the public exploded again. The shouting and booing gradually subsided, however as the Chosen Maiden launched into her sacrificial dance.” [50]

THE PROBLEM WITH SUICIDE

Hubert and Mauss outline several of killing methods, from quite efficient, to prolonged. Either extreme might “lighten the responsibility of the sacrificer;” however, sacrifice is never torture, and never a gift. [51] Blood must be spilled.

However, The Rite depicts a sacrifice via bloodless suicide. While the girl does not completely volunteer, (she is chosen from the group and singled out by fate) and is forced to remain in the ring by the encircling elders, she alone is responsible for her destruction. Hubert and Mauss discuss sacrificial suicide only in relation to some examples of origin myths where a god dies. They found that in agrarian mythology, suicide is a common form of divine sacrifice because it mimics the apparent self-destruction of the earth with the seasons. [52]

“During rusalki week, at the beginning of the summer, the nymphs are supposed to emerge from the water and climb into weeping willow and birch trees until night, when they dance in rings in the moonlight. Any person joining them must dance until he dies. After that week, grass grows thicker where they trod.” [53]

There are sources of self-sacrifice through dance in the Slavic ritual that must have influenced Roerich’s artistic decisions. But one point remains to be stated. While all elements of a true sacrificial ritual were depicted on stage that night, two very important aspects are not included: the victim does not actually die (Marie Pilz continued her career as a dancer!), and so there was no descarilization of the victim.

THE PROBLEM WITH DESCARILIZATION:

Hubert and Mauss emphasize that after the death of the victim, its body must disappear. This can be done using a variety of methods, from burning to consuming the flesh among the people. Despite the method, the result must be the total annihilation of the recognizable features of the body. At the moment of death, the victim exists in a temporary place of divinity. After the sprit exits, the body collapses back to the mundane world. A new victim must be used for each sacrifice.

If the sacrifice was expiatory in nature, the body must disappear in order to eliminate the guilt that was placed upon it. The scapegoat must be symbolically sent from the town, never to return. So much energy and emotion has been aroused throughout the ritual, and was released at the time of death, there must be an exiting ritual to vent all emotions of those still left observing. This venting happens along with the desacrilization of the body. The desacrilization also ensures that the victim’s spirit might not return to the people to seek vengeance. [54]

The result is a of contract between humanity and their god or gods. The benefit of the sacrifice can be observed in the change of state in the sacrifier. In the case of the Slavs, the death through suicide (although this death may only be symbolic), points to a regular, agrarian sacrifice.

Clearly, in the Rite, the girl collapses and supposedly dies at the culminating and apex of the ballet, and hence demonstrates her change of state (dancing to not dancing). However, the curious part of this particular musical drama is that there is no staging of the ritual after the victim dies. I also find it hard to believe that she really could be dead. My guess is that after her collapse, the observers circle in and kill her. But in the production, there is no dance of desacrilization. There is no denouement, or “come-to-realizer” (as Professor James Yaffee calls it). This is where the examination of the audience, the critics, and scholars illuminates how The Rite of Spring in its entirety was a sacrifice.

My aim thus far has been to demonstrate the multi-sensory experience of that opening night, how no one aspect can be removed and examined without dissolving the essence of the piece. Also, the audience was as important a participant in the sacrifice as the dancers and artists were. While several of the essential elements of sacrifice as outlined by Hubert and Mauss can be drawn from the performance, the peculiar choice of ending leaves the sacrifice theorist at a loss.

I hold that the key to the completion of the ritual lies in what the audience did to the event afterwards. Scholarships on the piece as simply a piece of art, and the rechoreographing projects hence have mythologized the collective violence that took place that evening. The process is a perfect example of Girard’s discussion on the role of the persecutor in his book, The  Scapegoat. The event at large fits all descriptions of a sacrifice, as defined by both Hubert and Mauss and Girard. This conclusion demands a pulling back from the Dance of the Chosen One, to the event in its totality, which in itself is the victim.

            Girard’s theory on the mythologizing of collective acts of violence also shed light on the Slavic tradition itself. “Mythology eliminates collective murder but does not reinvent it, because all evidence indicates it was not invented in the first place.” [55]

THE HIDDEN DESACRALIZATION:

            Most of the scholarship of The Rite does not discuss possible reasons behind the riot, or the social psychology of that particular audience. This omission is partly due to the fact that the authors are concerned with the significance of the piece to the art world, rather than the religious significance of the sacrifice. They explain the violence away with the fact that the crowd attended under different pretense, or that the music and choreography was too new for their aesthetic pallets, or that the heat France in May caused hysteria. But the emotional and physically violent reaction of the audience sounds comic without further explanation. Hidden within the violent reaction are the remnants of the sacrificial structure.

Using the insights from Girard’s philosophy, the event warrants investigation. Girard maintains that every culture is rooted in an instance of collective violence. Collective violence comes at a time of crisis, establishing a new order by muting the past order. We can see how Girard’s model holds true for the opening night under discussion in this paper, and how the event itself becomes the victim. The hubristic climate of Europe in 1913 was the result of the disappearance of all notions of order and identity. The public was subconsciously desperate to reclaim their safety.

            Social crisis is characterized as the breakdown of agreed upon hierarchy. In a crisis, the former labels by which people felt confident in their identity and power have been ripped off their lapels. It does not take much imagination to see the crisis in France, 1913. While the Industrial Revolution has been an astounding example of progress, it resulted in the rupture of every social structure that had formerly been unbreakable. We can see this breakdown coming from the sciences, economics, and international affairs.

The turn of the century marks a significant development into what we now take for granted. The scientific discoveries in Europe at the turn of the century instituted a change of thought in all matter and the self. In 1905, Einstein’s theory of relativity showed a new way of calculating time and space. The discovery of the model atom in 1910 revealed a mini solar system. The discovery of bacteria led to medical advancements that then led to a significant increase in life span and the study of epidemiology. Technology was not confined to the laboratories. Advances in media communications and weaponry were entering into everyday life. It is reasonable to assume that these changes were both exciting and frightful.

The advancements of the natural sciences were mirrored in the Social sciences. The development of the schools of Anthropology and Psychology, featuring Pavlov, Freud and Jung, supported the notion that humanity is able to crack all the mysteries of the world. These developments represent the sentiment that all of existence can be controlled through calculations. Darwin presented some very new views on human origins. His work lead to Social Darwinism and the concept of “all against all.” “But how people should think and act in relation to the struggle, especially human struggle, was a question that drew profoundly different answers.” [56] These discoveries encouraged the rage over progress, and put the power over life in humanity’s hands, whereas that power was formerly only held by God.

Coming from a twenty-first century capitalist society, it is sometimes strange to think of a society that does not function similarly. We must remember that the current economic structure is a recent development of the past few hundred years, and that it has contributed to the crisis of undifferentiation. Economic Liberalism or, the “unrestricted pursuit of profit” [57] epitomized an ideal of progress. However, coupled with the Industrial revolution, society was under tremendous stress at the turn of the century.

The move away from mercantilism brought the destabilizing experience of booms and depressions. Because money meant power, and because the free market and the development of factories made both attainable by anyone, autonomous corporations overrode the place of aristocracy. The factories also overrode the system of individual economic power that had been maintained through mercantilism. In this way, work became associated with class, and any status was liable to change, for good or bad. [58] The identity of the worker was threatened of being replaced by the machine.

Napoleon III was a proponent of Industrialization, and thought he was helping all facets of society by encouraging labor unions and the rebuilding of Paris in the 1850s. By 1900, France had bargaining associations, or worker’s unions. As industrialization “brought an end to the traditional way of life, the factory carried the Western peoples from a world in which they were surrounded and dominated by nature to one of their own making [i.e. the city].” [59] Urbanization required a complete change of lifestyle, and damaged people’s connection to nature.

The free market set the stage for the class struggle of haves and have-nots that is an ongoing struggle today. It is especially apparent in the demographics of the audience on the premiere of The Rite of Spring. “Despite their fascination with spectacle, however, the haute bourgeoisie, in particular, looked to the theatre to reaffirm their values, beliefs, and moral code.” [60] While the rivaling artists in the crowd were looking for recognition and acceptance of their art. In Girard’s terms, mimetic rivalry for power and money has distinguished this past century because of the righteousness of the underdog. Both factions in the audience were under threat, and thus were righteous in their attempts to gain power.

Girard discusses the possibility of internal or external crisis. Both forms can be seen in the France of 1913. The economic and general class structure was crumbing, and France as a country was under the looming threat of powerful neighbors. We must keep in mind that Germany declared war on France August 3^rd, 1914: fourteen months after the premiere of The Rite. An informal alliance (or “entente”) was forming between Britain, France, and Russia by 1894. While the alliance was intended to enforce a notion of safety, the “European states did not find safety from war in either arms or alliances.” [61]

The age of New Imperialism is distinguished as the years between 1871 and 1914 when European countries were extending their international and colonial interests. Civilizing missions and the notion of manifest destiny and patriotism naturally would create international conflict. The desire for power and money was universal, and universally attainable in a theoretical sense. Hence, it is not difficult to imagine that there was looming international anarchy. [62]

“In 1914 Europe stood at its peak of power and arrogance… Europeans claimed to look after the problem of “back-ward” peoples, but they proved unable to solve their own. Europe was about to explode in a frightful conflagration, leading to the collapse, soon after, of their colonial empires.” [63]

During this time, nationalism took on a desperate character, and the reversion to the scapegoat mechanism was particularly apparent in regards to religion. The rift between seculars and Catholics has taken root in the French Revolution. An argument was already underway over whom was more patriotic. Nationalism "divided the French more than it united them, even in circumstances of their struggle for survival during the Great War.” [64]

The scapegoat is typically accused of social disruption, cannibalism, and unnatural sexual relations. It usually bears the marks of being weak in any way and/or being a foreigner. While France is usually regarded as a country with a strong Catholic establishment, the Christian system has been under attack for some time. Through the beginnings of the Great War, the Catholic Church bore one mark of the victim, and was scapegoated in a fashion with which Girard would not be surprised. It was an example of crisis exactly as he describes, “Crowds commonly turn on those who originally held exceptional power over them… This is the holy revolt of the oppressed.” [65]

One rumere infam that took the form of an accusation was that the French Catholic system was unpatriotic because its loyalty was for a foreign head, the Pope. [66] The 1905 separation of church and state had nourished the anticlerical movement, and rumors such as these. [67] The French Catholics tried to unify the public around the faith, but the attempts were futile. The Church was not keeping up with the times, and we must remember that it represented the impersonal Christian tradition in its pre-Vatican II form.

One historian writes, “The church never wavered in its commitment to the union sacre. Yet there was another set of responses to papal policy which suggest that… there remained deep rifts in French national life which not even the notion of ‘sacred union’ could bridge.” [68] One extreme manifestation of the scapegoat mechanism of the Catholic Church was the rumor that the Catholic network, headed by the Pope, had orchestrated the Great War. [69]

The religious climate in May of 1913 points to another contributing factor for the visceral response of the audience. The depiction of a pagan ritual performed by Caucasians could have been particularly threatening to the religious identity of the crowd, which was already shaken due to Anticlericism. Paganism is usually associated with the other, the dark, the weak, and the dominated. Perhaps the images on stage brought to light the rejection of Catholicism in France.

But the audience and reviewers followed suit in their role as the aggressors. They had to make the entire production “the other” by associating it with the foreigner: the Russians. This was not such a stretch since the pagan themes were obviously Slavic. But the scathing review in the New York Times [70] is curious because of the previous acceptance of the Ballets Russes, which was also created and produced by Russians.

The audience at the premiere under examination represented two minority groups in French culture, both from the margins and extremes. The remaining aristocracy, while they constituted the majority of the audience was actually a minority in the free labor economy. They were old money whose very status was under constant threat of the new money. The other minority was the avante guard – the artist group in which Picasso and Gertrude Stein might have felt at home. In the theatre that night, many of these “bohemians” were Stravinsky and Nijinsky fans. This group felt entitled to societal recognition, and was finding its own ways of undermining the classical notions of aesthetics and lifestyle.

The fighting broke out partly because the artists were demanding that the aristocracy respect the ballet.  The aristocracy refused to give respect because the art was another example of a new order brewing just underfoot. Again, Girard’s insights are pertinent to the situation: “Difference that exist outside the system is terrifying because it reveals the truth of the system, its relativity, its fragility, and its mortality.” [71]

The Modern Art movement has its very origins in the margins of society.

“…much of the psychological and spiritual momentum for this break came from the peripheries, geographical, social, generational, and sexual. The emphasis on youth, sensuality, homosexuality, the unconscious, the primitive, and the socially deprived, originated in large part not from Paris but from the borders of traditional hegemony. The modern movement was full of exiles…” [72]

Modern art continues to push the envelope because it is rooted from outside that envelope. In this way, the art world always bears the marks of the scapegoat. This stereotype makes for easy dismissal of this expression of trueness of humanity.

I assume that the negative reviews generated from the rivaling group’s experience. It is clear that using the stereotype of the foreigner was an easy and logical way to mythologize the violence at the theater that night. Girard notices that “…rather than blame themselves, people inevitable blame either society as a whole, which costs them nothing, or other people who seem particularly harmful for easily identifiable reasons.” [73]

In the case of Stravinsky, Nijinsky, Roerich and Diaghilev, they had foreigner written all over them. They represented an entity that was feared and criticized regularly, Russia. At the time, Russia was a place of brewing anarchism and terrorism, represented by Mikhail Bakunin in particular. [74] In Russia, “some revolutionaries resorted to terrorism, and no public official was safe from assassination.” [75]

In later reviews, we notice more language that fits into Girard’s analysis of the stereotypes of the scapegoat. The attempts in the New York Times article to blame the Russians for their inherent bad taste scapegoats the responsibility of the audience’s hostile reaction. But the audience and reviewers followed suit in their role as the aggressors. The author’s use of blaming the foreigner for the failure of the premiere night is an excellent example of the scapegoat mechanism and thereby removing responsibility for the crowd violence. “Terrified as they are by their own victim, they see themselves as completely passive, purely reactive, totally controlled by this scapegoat at the very moment when they rush to his attack.” [76]

The treatment of the situation by the critics is a perfect situation of displaced responsibility. The Russians did not force the fists to fly, and a violent reaction in a theater is not common. But no one would take responsibility for the rivalry, even though everyone was responsible.

By blaming the barbaric and stupid Russians for forcing Parisians to sit through bad art, or by blaming the papacy for orchestrating the Great War, the general public continued with the tradition of layering myths on top of genuine collective violence. Myths all have the same mixture of the credible and incredible elements, they all conceal the illusion that the victim is guilty, thus all persecution is the same.

The aristocrats and the bohemians could not unite around one object of sacrifice because they had conflicting moral frameworks. The two minorities came from opposite backgrounds. The conflict is irreconcilable and so it resulted in violence. No one could experience the satisfaction of unity because they could not have the “all-against-one” experience. As Girard says, as “a community moves away from its violent origins, the sense of ritual weakens and moral dualism is reinforced.” [77] Due to the disintegration of authority structures in Europe of 1913, the audience was desperate for control. They all laid claim to the knowledge of where society ought to be headed.

The artists sought safety through mining society’s primitive roots. The theme of primitive inspiration in all forms of modern art can be seen as a desperate attempt to regain order in a society that seems so removed from its organized past. Millicent Hodson noticed that the “use of primitive models was a critique of contemporary culture for progressive artists prior to World War I, and the example of Gauguin, Picasso and others [i.e. Kandinsky] stimulated the Russians to mine the rich ore of their mythological past…” [78] She continues that “Self-abnegation, absorption in a ritual responsibility – these qualities of archaic religion are fossilized in objects like the masks and idols, which, for the generation after Gauguin, exemplified what was missing from modern life.” [79] The movement away from the wilderness into the cities only enhanced the scandal of the primitive.

The aristocrats might also have sought refuge in reclaiming their own past and authority because they no longer had authority. Mixed in the audience might have been refuge in the notions of progress and technological advancement. These notions naturally conflict with each other, and I am sure there were even more notions of the key to unity in France at the time (i.e. Christianity). The western world is still wrought with mimetic rivalry over power and money.

            What ensued after the premiere of The Rite was an act of figurative violence by the critics on the piece of art itself and on the foreigners who were supposedly to blame. Because the curtain fell before a staged desacrilizing could take place, the audience had to decide if it was successful. It drew them into the sacrifice and left them to complete the ritual. They mythologized the event by focusing on the rioting and the elements of the artistic performance. They erased the face of the victim, but never buried the body of the art. Today, reactions to The Rite are only complimentary, even glorifying. References to the crowd violence are anecdotal in nature – treated as a funny fact about this masterpiece of Modernism. This language is a way mythologizing not only the rivalry at the Theatre Champs-Elysees, but covers up the chaos of the time.

There have been several ballet productions to the music for The Rite since its premiere, and countless symphonic performances. To neglect the original visual elements does a disservice to the Modern art. Furthermore, the descarilization proves that ritual sacrifice is an automatic and unconscious human response to crisis.

It was no accident that The Rite was conceived and executed when and where it was, the implications of which society might not be ready to swallow. Since that opening night, scholars have been desacralizing both the piece of art, and the event in total. In this way, the audience was more involved in the sacrifice than Marie Piltz (the dancer who played the Chosen One). The sacrificial victim was actually the performance itself in its premiere. The dancer did not literally die, but the mob has literally desacrilized the body of the victim.

The goal of Modern art is to create an experience where the line between artist and audience disintegrates. The Rite is a monument of Modernism not only because of the chromatic chording in the music or the contorted positions of the dancers. It is true Modernism because it demanded the participation of audience in sacrifice, and the crowd behaved exactly as is was supposed to. Recreations to The Rite since that opening night may be interesting and beautiful, but will never function the way it did as an opening. It no longer functions as a sacrifice because the “body” of it has already been desacrilized. The epiploic sac was raised to a divinized place on May 29^th, 1913, and that communion can never reoccur.

Bibliography:

Articles:

“Biography of Nicholas Roerich” http://www.roerich.org/NicholasRoerich.html

[Accessed March 5 2002].

“Stravinsky, Igor (Fyodorovich)” Encyclopedia Britannica Online.

http://search.eb.com/y ol/topic?eu=71750&sctn=2&pm=1 [Accessed 27 February 2002].

Wise, Stanley. “Impressions of Igor Stravinsky.” Musical Quarterly, (April 1916): 249-

56.

“The Dionysian Spirit Which Vitalizes the Music of Igor Stravinsky.” Current Opinion.

(August 1914): 108-9.

Ramey, Phillip. “Stravinsky: Le Sacre du Pirntemps.” Liner Notes. Le Sacre du

Printemps. By Igor Stravinsky. Columbia Records/ CBS, 1972.

“Ballets Russes De Serge Diaghilev.” International Encyclopedia of Dance. 1998: 316

-320.

“Nijinsky, Vaslav.” International Encyclopedia of Dance. 1998: 644-5.

“The Aural Tradition”, Jeremy Eichler             http://www.thenewrepublic.com/112700/eichler112700.html [Accessed March 5

 2002].

Eksteins, Modris, “The First Performance of “Le Sacre du Printemps’”, Canadian Journal of History/Annales canadiennes d’histoire, 18:2 (1983: August).

“Parisians Hiss New Ballet” New York Times, June 8, 1913, III 5:1.

“rusalka” Encyclopedia Britannica Online.            http://search.eb.com.bol/topic?thes_id=335966 [Accessed March 7 2002].

“Slavic religion” Encyclopedia Britannica Online.            http://search.eb.com.bol/topic?eu=119809&sctn=2 [Accessed March 7 2002].

“Slavic Religion” The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. [Accessed March 7 2002].

Books:

Decter, Jacqueline. Nicholas Roerich. Rochester: Park Street Press, 1989.

Girard, Rene. The Scapegoat, Baltimore: John’s Hopkins, 1986.

Greer, Thomas H. and Gavin Lewis. A Brief History of the Western World: Sixth            Edition. Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace Jovanavich College, 1992.

Hill, Peter Stravinsky: The Rite of Spring, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge:            2000.

Hodson, Millicent. “Nijinsky’s Choreographic Method: Visual Sources from Roerich for       Le Sacre du printemps.” Dance Research Journal. (Winter 1986-87): 7-15.

Hodson, Millicent. “Searching for Nijinski’s Sacre.” Moving History/ Dancing Cultures.            Ed. Ann Dils and Ann Cooper Albright. Middletown: Wesleyan, 2001.

Hubbs, Joanna. Mother Russia. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988.

Hubert, Henri and Marcel Mauss. Sacrifice: Its Nature and Functions. University

of Chicago, 1964.

VIDEO RECORDING:

Pina Bausch, The Rite of Spring, (1991?)

AUDIO RECORDING

Stravinsky, Igor. “Le Sacre du Printemps” Rec. 2/1975. Stravinsky  cond. Claudio            Abbado. London Symphony Orchestra. Deutche Grammophon, 1982.