"The World on Stage"

Here are some notes on the "The World on Stage" reading.

-"All that is on stage is a sign"
-becomes a self contained illusion outside of social praxis
-creates a bridge between the stage and its fictional analogue of the world
-the power of this sign (image) is not exhausted either by its illusion or its referential character.
-signs and images are more than their iconic identity
-theater is really a language whose words consist an unusual degree of things that are what they are.
-signs may represent images, but they are still real images outside of the scene.
-persuit of the "essence" of things disregards their other functions in real life
-"the sensation that things as thy are perceived and not as they are known" - Shklovsky
- art makes objects unfamiliar
-the image is unique and unreproducible
-root difference between image and sign
-"the material of the sign is totally indifferent to the object it signifies... but the relationship between the material of the physical image and it's object is altogether different; the two resemble each other" -Sartre
-reading a scene present almost no phenomenal distraction
-more real than on stage, mind can create images
-the eye is window to the waiting consciousness
-vs the theater production which is a condensation into "real form"
-some things refuse to be signs or images
-the viewer gets worn down, no more initial amazement
-clocks will always be a disturbance onstage, we are perturbed that theater time is being measured by a real clock
-somethings are too interesting in real life to be used on stage (running water, fire, ect)
-"double vision" of the audience to overlook casting ( ex: child troupes)
-the medium becomes the message
- animals on stage give the effect of bisociation ( natural animal behavior and culturally programed human behavior)
-the actor putting objects on stage neutralizes the objects "Objectivity"
-same way animals in a zoo lose their objectivity, " this is the kind of animal you would see here"
-something on stage can rouse the awareness of something external
- art is a certain perspective on substance
-props(furniture) and their placement can force the actors to move and act differently
-the actor allows us to recognize the human "from the inside"
-are it nature.


--Allie S.