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ANDRÁS VISKY Meanwhile, it turns out that everything that happens under the table is visible to the viewers, so it must be acted out (for example, preparation of the props must be made part of the performance, including the snake, etc.). The forbidden apples are raised into the flies — they will not be managed by the actors; we give up the dwarfs’ props in the Athens scene; the circus-like mechanisms of hands and feet are dropped from the scene (it would be truly impossible to drill their handling in the time available); there are scenes where the absence of masks requires a new mise en scéne, for example, the Athenian scene, etc., etc.: an astounding volume of changes, which Purcarete, paying attention to the production’s language, handles coolly, like someone who can no longer be surprised by anything in theater. MARCH 2, 2020 After yesterday’s dispute about Lucifer’s drive — whence, where, why, how [?] — that I had provoked in the discussions following the full rehearsal, today Purcarete returns to the topic. Yesterday I felt that the actors had lost the production’s path, especially the Lucifers, who propel the scenes. They actually carry the “story,” or human “history,” somewhere, but the problem is that it’s not quite possible to know why. What do they want? Purcarete summarizes where we had ended up yesterday: Lucifer wants to prove to Adam that there is no salvation in history and thus, the life to which God had called him into existence is meaningless. Except that the consequence, I continue, is that Creation itself would collapse, because following the Fall, it is the promise of Salvation that keeps the created order alive: this is what shines at the center of Life, giving it its rhythm and pulse, because “For from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be the glory forever,”** I quote the letter to the Romans in alarm. Therefore Lucifer would derail this because he stands on the ground of pure rationality, whatever it might mean, or rather, on the ground of science, whatever this too might mean, whence, so he thinks, he can dislodge God’s rule. The positivist science-eschatology taken to its limit renders the God story unnecessary because the solution is “coming” soon, and that is a scientific, or what is worse, technological question: there is nothing else we could await. Where the eternal ’Nay’ his foot shall set, The world shall at his treading crumble yet.* 88 Rom 11:36. 59 Madach: Ibid. (trans. J.C.W. Horne), 6. Translator’s note: Horne translation cited here, not the Szirtes, as it hews closer to the original’s literal meaning, especially in Lucifer’s boast that he will topple God’s world. «270 +
