Van Der Leeuw on Drama - Kevin Gontkovic

For this post, I’d like to talk about Van Der Leeuw’s view on drama in his book, Sacred and Profane Beauty. Van Der Leeuw speaks of a mask that the actors have to wear when they go on stage. He says, “Through the mask one is transformed into a person in the sense of an actual, essential happening” (84). The actor is transformed into the character that he or she is portraying. They become that person in the story and lose themselves in the process. By doing so, the actor is able to make the story into an actual occurrence. The story is actually able to happen in this world through the actor becoming one with his or her character.

According to Van der Leeuw, “actors are ‘only a symbol of a world outside the usual world’” (Leeuw 84). By putting on the mask that transforms them into another person, the actors are able to become a symbol of the world of the story. By giving themselves up to a higher power they are able to open a pathway to this other world that is outside our own. They let the character from this other world take over their body. The actor is not in control of his or her own body. He or she must let this person from the other world take over his or her body.

Van der Leeuw says, “As long as the mask is consciously worn, the role played, the action of the actor means little as art, and nothing at all in the religious sense” (Leeuw 105). In order for their performance to be religious, the actors must not be conscious of what they are doing. They must give up their body to the character. The character from the other world must have complete control over the actor’s body. Once the mask is put on, the actor must lose his own consciousness and the consciousness of the character must then take over. If the actor is able to do this, then the actor can bring the world of the story to life. I find what Van Der Leeuw says above to be very interesting. I have not acted before but I have seen performances where it really seems like the actor has become so engrossed in character that he or she may have given up their own consciousness.