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Janet Williams, M.A. THST. Dr. Daniel Fischlin Canadian Adaptations of Shakespeare Project School of English and Theatre Studies University of Guelph 5 April 2010 Dancing with Shakespeare. This brief essay is meant to accompany the Educational Unit Plan: “Shakespeare and Dance: Translating Text/Narrative to Verbal to Movement/Dance” in order to outline some of the key elements behind dance adaptations of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and some possible research questions to be considered. Dance as a means of adapting Shakespeare evolved out of the opera-ballet of the eighteenth century. Ballet master Jean-Georges Noverre1 (1727-1810) embraced the art form as dramatic, despite it being non-verbal. In the process of replacing words with affect, ballet loses much of the subtlety of the texts it is adapting and its “incapacity for ‘cold reasoning’ has haunted ballet since, giving rise to a reputation for triviality” (Edgecombe 68). This “triviality” being attributed to ballet adaptations of text needs to be challenged and explored, as it subverts the non-verbal to the verbal; mind over body.

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Jean-George Noverre was known as "The Shakespeare of the Ballet." None of his 150 ballets has been handed down to us. His influence on the art gives him the title "The Grandfather of the Ballet" as we know it today. In 1754 he produced his first ballet and in 1760 published his book, "Letters on the Dance." ([email protected] © 1987 - 2010 by Gus Dick Andros and Michael Minn. Google:28 March 2010)

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In any study of balletic versions of Shakespeare’s works, the music must be considered alongside the movements themselves as they do not occur in isolation from each other. The composer Prokofiev alone significantly contributes to the history and development of Romeo and Juliet being danced onstage. Romeo and Juliet is the focus of this curriculum program for three practical reasons; it is commonly studied in any school curriculum, it has a plot that is accessible to young people and, “it is the best suited to ballet, not least because of its unstoppable momentum…A narrative ballet needs this kind of forward motion”2 (75). Music and movement are often separated in scholarly research in order to simplify the interpretation of any inquiry, however, in doing so another mode of communication, often used for adaptation may be getting lost; that the language of “musicmovement” exists separate from either of its components. The Romantic period 3is a time in which the relatively new4 dance form of ballet flourishes as it fits well with the quest for the sublime;5 a dominating philosophic and aesthetic ideal of the time. Its quest for a beauty beyond measure is applied to Shakespeare’s works as well and the reach of the British Empire carried those representations of Shakespeare around the world. They are adapted through “regionalist dialects” (72) across Europe; particularly in 2

For more on Shakespeare and music refer to Recommended Additional Reading List The Romantic Ballet is a period of ballet influenced by the ideas of Romanticism in art and literature which occurred during the early to mid 19th century. The period began in 1827 with the début in Paris of the ballerina Marie Taglioni in the ballet Le Sicilien and climaxed with the premiere of the Pas de Quatre staged by the Ballet Master Jules Perrot in London in 1845. The Romantic Ballet slowly declined after that, with Arthur Saint-Léon's 1870 ballet Coppélia considered to be the final work of the era. (Encyclopedia Britannica online) 3

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The Ballet Comique de la Reine , a court entertainment and now considered to be the first ballet. It was staged in Paris, France, in 1581 for the court of Catherine de' Medici. It was produced and choreographed by Balthasar de Beaujoyeulx and danced by Queen Louise and the women of the court. This ballet was also known for its long length of over five hours and its elaborate and scattered stage design. It had elaborate costumes and centered around the myth of the Greek goddess Circe (12). 5

Sublime: reverend:worthy of adoration or reverence; exalted: of high moral or intellectual value. For the younger grades: “beautiful beyond belief or measure” may be used.

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music, which in turn impacts the balletic translations and affect on stage. These variations also appear in the performers as can be seen when different dancers pair up to present Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet as choreographed by Kenneth MacMillan. Adaptations of Shakespeare face the issues any adaptation might such as the difficulty of defining what exactly one is. Linda Hutcheon suggests that, “defining an adaptation as an extended, deliberate, announced revisitation of a particular work of art does manage to provide some limits,” (170) while Daniel Fischlin and Mark Fortier make the point that, “adaptation is not the right name for the work represented in this anthology, because there is no right name” (2). It appears then, that it remains for each participant in the adaptation process to define what it for themselves6. It could be significant to add to this area of study a consideration of defining the term in relation to dance adaptations specifically. Fidelity is another issue common to adaptation and which resonates in particular with adaptations of Shakespeare due to the depth of connections his works have to British history and culture. For Hutcheon, “an adaptation’s double nature does not mean, however, that proximity or fidelity to the adapted text should be the criterion of judgment or the focus of analysis…’fidelity criticism’…was the critical orthodoxy of adaptation studies, especially when dealing with canonical works…” (7). Fidelity within the context of Shakespeare adaptations is made even more complex by the bard himself who was himself an adapter: “conventionally situated at the epicenter of the English literary tradition and viewed as an ‘original genius,’ Shakespeare’s writing practice was based on borrowing from earlier materials” (Fischlin, Fortier

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For further discussion on the many ways of defining adaptation see Fischlin and Fortier, “General Introduction,” Adaptations of Shakespeare (2000).

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9). The investigation of fidelity within ballet adaptations of Shakespeare may shed some crucial light on the perceived “triviality” of ballet; is that how it loses its “fidelity” to the original? Directly related to fidelity is also the term “haunting.” It is an important consideration when studying adaptation of any kind and has definitive application to adaptations of Shakespeare, due to his own use of adaptations. Jacques Derrida, in Specters of Marx7 (1994) speaks of the ghost in Hamlet as central to the play because “everything begins in the imminence of a reapparition, but a reapparition of the specter as apparition for the first time in the play” (4), the implication being that the play is haunted not just by a ghost, but by the appearance of the ghost, revealing the multiple layers of meaning possible within the original. When extended to adaptations of the original of Hamlet, this theory presents the possibility for a layered haunting where the playwright haunts the adapted performance, as do all the adaptations he made in his original work. The implication for ballet adaptations of Romeo and Juliet is that they are haunted by not only previous productions, but previous use of the music, the movements, the choreographer and the performers themselves, as well as all other adaptations of Romeo and Juliet on stage, screen, galleries and books. The complexity of adaptation described in this paper demonstrates that this is a rich area for further study and for both creative and theoretical approaches. The Education Unit connected to this resource is to explore only one arena; the what and how of the creative process of translating written/spoken text into dance/movement. This element of translation crosses the arts with the theory of language and meaning, an area established by Ferdinand de 7

For more on Derrida’s view of haunting in comparison with others see Recommended Additional Reading List following the Works Cited.

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Saussure. His work can help advanced students dive deeper into the implications of the meaning of words versus movements. Saussure founded the study of semiotics which involves the study of what he referred to as “signs,” which simply put is a term for that which stands for something else, which can include words, gestures, sounds, images, movements and objects. The study of semiotics has expanded and “*c+ontemporary semioticians study signs not in isolation, but as part of a semiotic “sign systems (such as medium or genre). They study how meanings are made and how reality is represented” (Chandler 2). Signs can also be found in music and there are signs specific to ballet that seasoned audience members will know and appreciate. This essay with the Educational Unit Plan: “Shakespeare and Dance: Translating Text/Narrative to Verbal to Movement/Dance” outlines some of key elements behind the making of a dance adaptation of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet which include: music and movement as one entity, the Romantic period and the “sublime,” defining adaptation, fidelity to the original, Derrida’s theory of “haunting” and Saussure’s theory of semiotics. Some possible research questions have been presented, the central one being a challenge to the idea of ballet adaptations of Shakespeare, and other texts, as a loss of the subtlety of the written or spoken word and ballet’s reputation for “triviality.” These ideas will hopefully provide teachers with a more sophisticated sense of the field of adaptation, specifically Shakespeare into dance, giving the information required to deliver a worthy and engaging program to students.

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Works Cited Andros, Gus Dick, and Michael Minn. “Jean Georges Noverre.” [email protected] © 1987 - 2010 Google: 28 March 2010. Web. Chandler, Daniel. The Basics: Semiotics. 2nd Ed. New York: Routledge, 2007. Googlebooks. 6 April 2010. Web. Derrida, Jacques. Specters of Marx. London: Routledge. 1994. Googlebooks. 02 April 2010. Web. Edgecombe, Rodney Stenning. “Trans-formal Translation: Plays into Ballets, with Special Reference to Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet.” The Yearbook of English Studies. 36: 1, 2006. Translation. 65-78. JSTOR. 20 February 2010. Web. Fischlin, Daniel and Mark Fortier, eds. Adaptations of Shakespeare: A Critical Anthology of plays from the seventeenth century to the present. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. 2000. Print. Hutcheon, Linda. A Theory of Adaptation. New York: Routledge. 2006. Print. "Western dance." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 02 Apr. 2010. Web. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/849211/Western-dance.

Dancing with Shakespeare

Williams, Janet L.

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Dancing with Shakespeare

Williams, Janet L.

Janet Williams, MA THST. Dr. Daniel Fischlin Canadian ...

Apr 5, 2010 - Dr. Daniel Fischlin. Canadian .... when studying adaptation of any kind and has definitive application to adaptations of. Shakespeare, due to his ...

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