Table Of ContentAutomata and Mimesis on the Stage of Theatre History
Automata and Mimesis
on the Stage of Theatre
History
Kara Reilly
Palgrave
macmillan
© Kara Reilly 2011
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2011 978-0-230-23202-0
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work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2011 by
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ISBN 978-1-349-31243-6 ISBN 978-0-230-34754-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9780230347540
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Reilly, Kara.
Automata and mimesis on the stage of theatre history / Kara Reilly.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Drama—History and criticism. 2. Theater—History. 3. Robots in
literature. 4. Mimesis in literature. 5. Motion in literature. I. Title.
PN1650.R63R36 2011
809.2’9356—dc23 2011021387
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11
To Sarah Bryant-Bertail, who first introduced me to the
concept of mimesis as more than mere representation or
imitation. Sarah always gave of her time as a supervisor
and modelled how to be both a mentor and an intellectual.
Without Sarah’s generosity and encouragement, this project
would never have existed.
Contents
List of Illustrations viii
Acknowledgements x
Introduction 1
Mimesis (art versus nature) 5
Onto-epistemic mimesis 6
Remediation 9
Trans-historical study 10
Chapter overview 12
1 Iconoclasm and Automata 16
The Rood of Grace 19
Iconoclasm and moving statues 23
Court masques, cabinets of curiosity and automata 28
Moving statues (re)membered in the early
professional theatre 33
2 Descartes’s Mimetic Faculty 48
3 From Aristocrats to Autocrats: The Elite as Automata 73
4 Olympia’s Legacy 111
Olympia in theatrical adaptations of Hoffmann’s
‘The Sandman’ 120
Other Olympias: Coppélia and La Poupée 136
From the individual star to the mass-produced
chorus girl 144
5 From Automata to Automation: The Birth of the
Robot in R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) 148
Epilogue 177
Notes 182
Bibliography 203
Index 214
vii
List of Illustrations
1 The Automaton Turk from Karl Gottlieb Windisch’s
pamphlet Inanimate Reason (used with the generous
permission of the British Library) 3
2 Thomas Bushnell’s Enstone Marvels from Robert Plot’s
A Natural History of Oxfordshire (1676) (used with the
generous permission of the Huntington Library) 46
3 Strasbourg Cathedral Astronomical Clock (from the
author’s own collection) 52
4 Strasbourg Cathedral Astronomical Clock, detail of
Death and Jesus automata (from the author’s
own collection) 54
5 Cecelia, The Organ Player, in the grottoes at the Royal
Gardens at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, as depicted by Salomon
de Caus in Les Raisons de Forces Mouvantes (1615) (used
with the generous permission of the Bibliothèque national
de France) 58
6 Orpheus in the grottoes at the Royal Gardens at
Saint-Germain-en-Laye, as depicted by Salomon de Caus in
Les Raisons de Forces Mouvantes (1615) (used with
the generous permission of the Bibliothèque national
de France) 60
7 The hydraulic system used to power Venus driving a
dolphin in the grottoes at the Royal Gardens at
Saint-Germain-en-Laye, as depicted by Salomon
de Caus in Les Raisons de Forces Mouvantes (1615)
(used with the generous permission of the Huntington
Library) 64
8 Mechanical theatre at Schloss Hellbrunn (used with the
generous permission of Schlossverwaltung Hellbrunn) 74
9 Detail of Jewish moneylender at Schloss Hellbrunn (from
the author’s own collection) 77
viii
List of Illustrations ix
10 D etail of street performers at Schloss Hellbrunn (from the
author’s own collection) 78
11 D etail of carpenters building a theatre at Schloss
Hellbrunn (from the author’s own collection) 79
12 V aucanson’s flautist, duck, and drummer, frontispiece to
Jacques de Vaucanson’s Le Mécanisme du flûteur automate
(1738) (used with the generous permission of the British
Library) 82
13 T he Jaquet-droz Writer, Charles, carefully writes ‘The
Jaquet-droz automata of Neuchatel’ (from the author’s
own collection) 88
14 T he Jaquet-droz Musician, Marianne, plays her organ
(from the author’s own collection) 90
15 T he author, the Jaquet-droz collection and its caretaker
(from the author’s own collection) 92
16 T he Marie Antoinette Tympanon Player
(reproduced with the generous permission of the
Musée des Arts et Metiers) 95
17 C lose up of the Tympanon Player (reproduced with the
generous permission of the Musée des Arts et Metiers) 96
18 O lympia (Moira Shearer) is introduced to the puppet
audience by Spalanzani (Leonide Massine) in Powell
and Pressburger’s film The Tales of Hoffmann (1951)
(reproduced with the generous permission of the British
Film Institute) 130
19 A nna Held in La Poupée (1897) (image reproduced
courtesy of Culver Pictures, New York) 140
20 T he Robots confront Alquist (Louis Calvert) in the 1922
New York Theatre Guild production of R.U.R. (image
reproduced courtesy of Culver Pictures, New York) 153
Acknowledgements
This book represents several years of reading, research, and thinking.
What is recorded here represents not so much the completion of
these thoughts, but their arrested form.
I would like to express my gratitude to many friends, colleagues,
and institutions that generously supported my research. A heartfelt
thanks to my colleagues in the Drama Department at the University
of Birmingham without whom this book would not have been pos-
sible, particularly Liz Tomlin and Caroline Radcliffe who both read
complete drafts of the manuscript. My gratitude also to Russell
Jackson, Kate Newey, and John Warrick, who all generously read
book proposals and drafts in various stages. I would also like to
thank Steve Waters, Rose Whyman, Brian Crow, and Adam Ledger
for their support. A special thanks to Paula Kennedy at Palgrave,
who expressed interest in this project and supported me all the way
through the process and to Penny Simmons for her wit and her
eagle eye. Thanks also to Shelley Butler, James Maughn, Olga Kekis,
Jim Davis, Kimberly Jannarone, Victor Holtcamp, Mickey Chemers,
Erik Butler, Mike Sell, Sam Mitschke and Tom Lockwood, who all
provided encouragement, conversation, support, and research help.
I would also like to thank my peer reviewers for their insight and
close reading. A special thank you to the students of my Performing
Objects: Automata, Puppets, and Robots seminars (2007–11) for their
inspiring participation.
Parts of this project have appeared in presentations at the
Performing Presence Conference at the University of Exeter (and
special thanks to Gabriella Giannachi for her encouraging feedback);
the American Society for the Research; The International Federation
for Theatre Research; the Five Senses Conference, and the Performing
Science Conference (both at the University of Birmingham), at
TAPRA; and Exeter College at the Oxford University.
The British Academy generously funded research trips to see
automata in museums and to use archives in Europe and North
America. The Society for Theatre Research kindly gave me research
funds to purchase the copyright for a number of images in the book.
x
Acknowledgements xi
A warm thanks to Ingrid Sonvilla and Karl at the Schloss Hellbrunn
gardens in Salzburg, Austria for their very generous help in research-
ing the garden. Thank you also to Yves Peller, Monique Leresche,
and Caroline Junier at the Musée des Arts et Histoires in Neuchâtel,
Switzerland, for arranging for me to see the Jaquet-droz automata.
Thank you, too, to the librarians at the University of Birmingham,
in the Manuscript Collections at the British Museum, particularly the
wonderfully helpful and efficient J. M. Maldonado; and to the librar-
ians at the Jerome Robbins Collection of the New York Library of
the Performing Arts; and the Victoria and Albert Theatre Collection
Library. The Simpson Center for the Humanities at the University
of Washington gave me a scholarship that helped me to complete
my PhD, and Miriam Bartha and Kathleen Woodward both warmly
encouraged me there.
This book began as a PhD thesis in the School of Drama at the
University of Washington, Seattle, where it was advised by Sarah
Bryant-Bertail. I was also encouraged by members of my commit-
tee, in particular Odai Johnson, Herbert Blau, Simon Werrett, and
Barry Witham. As an undergraduate at Kent State University Marya
Bednerik kindly offered me more time, advice, and encouragement
than I could have possibly deserved. Her generosity remains an inspi-
ration to me. Also at Kent State, Rose Bank taught me theatre history
for the first time, and I remain eternally grateful for her example.
Above all, a special thanks to Mom and Dad, Conor and Sean,
Molly Mead, Connie and Bob, Ygraine and Brian, and Moe. And a
special thank you to Dan, for all his encouragement.
All mistakes are, of course, my own.
Kara Reilly
