Possession: 100 Years of ‘The Dybbuk’ Hashtag (topic) #performing arts #language & literature Nagłówek super artykułu Title on page in header Possession: 100 Years of ‘The Dybbuk’ Image or video dybuk_30_.jpg Podpis dla multimediów Szymon An-ski (fourth from left) with the Vilna Troupe, circa 1919, photo: from the archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York Header text color rgb(255, 255, 255) Enable audio for video Off Negative header audio button Wyłączony Negative side audio button Wyłączony Zawartość (treść strony Super Artykułu) Columns style left column static Left column Blood & spirit When an animal has bled its last drop of blood, you can be sure that its soul has left its body. Right column ‘Dybbuk’ by Maurycy (Ephraim Moses) Lilien, illustration from the Book of Job, photo: Wikimedia Commons The souls of the dead do return to the world, but not as spirits within bodies. There are souls that transmigrate through several bodies, trying to purify themselves. The sinful souls come back as animals, as birds, as fish, or even plants. Signature Trans. AD Text size standard fonts size Tekst So says the hero of S. An-ski’s drama, the mysterious visitor Messenger who portends the future. In this world, therefore, we are not dealing with the miraculous formation of new souls, but with the eternal return of a non-embodied divine particle of existence. But sometimes, this transmigration takes a dissonant, ghastly form. Souls that cannot find solace and wander restlessly take over an already ‘occupied’ body. They enter a living person as a dybbuk – ‘to purify themselves’, says the Messenger. Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column Portrait of S. An-ski, from the title page of the book ‘The Destruction of Galicia’ by S. An-ski, 1928, photo: National Library / Polona Right column ‘Reisefieber’ The obsession with possession probably came to An-ski around the year 1911. Columns style right column static Left column This dream turned out to be costly not only in a metaphorical sense; hence, An-ski intensively sought a sponsor. Right column S. An-ski conducting a survey amongst the inhabitants of a shtetl, 1912, photograph: Wikimedia Commons Fullscreen gallery items Text The researcher’s fears were not unfounded. During An-ski’s expedition from 1911 to 1914, he and his companions – including the musicologist and composer Joel Engel and the photographer and cartoonist Solomon Judowin – were sometimes met with openness and a willingness to cooperate from the shtetl inhabitants. Other times, the inhabitants would suddenly change their minds towards the newcomers, acting with understandable reserve. The difficulties were also quite mundane... The writer and poet Chaim Nachman Bialik (the later author of the Hebrew translation of The Dybbuk) reportedly resigned from joining the expedition after news of mud being flung at those wandering through the shtetls. Podpis obrazka Photo of Solomon Yudovin taken during an ethnographic expedition led by S. An-ski, 1912-1914, photo Wikimedia Commons Text position right bottom Text However, the hostile topography did not discourage the participants of the expedition, who developed more and more effective ‘research methods’ over time. One of these was, amongst others, bribery – minor bribery. An-ski, Engel, and Judowin offered Jewish children five kopecks for each sung song, but soon, the young inhabitants of the shtetl discovered an opportunity for business, and they started inventing non-existent songs just to get a little bit of money. Podpis obrazka Olyka, a Volyn shtetl, photograph by Solomon Yudovin taken during the ethnographic expedition led by S. An-ski, 1912-1914, photograph: Wikimedia Commons Text position left top Text Importantly, An-ski’s expedition was one of the first ethnographic undertakings during which the phonograph, constructed by Thomas Alva Edison, was used. The device, with its characteristic metal tube, aroused curiosity but also anxiety in the surveyed population. The rabbis believed that the phonograph stripped melodies of their religious power. Others were skeptical of the technology. To prove to the locals that Edison’s patent was really capable of recording sound, one of the participants of the expedition sang while laughing in the middle of the melody. The recording presented in this way acted as unbeatable proof. Podpis obrazka Synagogue in Iziaslav, photograph by Solomon Yudovin, a photographer and artist who accompa-nied An-ski on the ethnographic expedition, 1912-1914, photo: Wikimedia Commons Text position right middle Tekst The expedition covered more than 70 towns (although the plan was to visit nearly three hundred!), and as a result, more than 2,000 recordings of folk tales, over one and a half thousand songs, a thousand melodies, hundreds of photos, and nearly a thousand objects were collected. An extremely detailed questionnaire constructed by An-ski with the help of the students of Saint Petersburg University aided him in conducting his survey, which was originally supposed to contain as many as ten thousand questions (!). In the part of the survey published in 1914, you will mainly find questions regarding death, the soul, and reincarnation: Text size standard fonts size Do you know any real stories about reincarnation? Is it true that a sinner’s soul can enter a stone? Do you know of any case of a soul that could not find solace and entered the body of a living person as a dybbuk? What does a dybbuk usually say and shout? Signature Trans. AD Text size standard fonts size Columns style right column static Left column A sob in the night The last, third part of the expedition was quickly interrupted by the outbreak of the Great War. In October of 1914, An-ski finished the first manuscript of The Dybbuk. Right column ‘Old Man’ by Solomon Yudovin, woodcut, photographer and artist accompanying An-ski on his ethnographic expedition, 1926, photo: Wikimedia Commons Fullscreen gallery items Text The phonograph, a source of fascination and anxiety for the shtetl inhabitants. Podpis obrazka Ethnographic expedition by S. An-ski, 1912, photo: from the archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York Text position left top Text An-ski asked his interlocutors thousands of detailed questions. Podpis obrazka Ethnographic expedition by S. An-ski, 1912, photo: from the archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York Text position right top Text Children from the shtetl sometimes fabricated ethnographic material in order to earn a small amount of money. Podpis obrazka Ethnographic expedition by S. An-ski, 1912, photo: from the archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York Text position left top Tekst The fate of the borderlands S. An-ski spoke of himself as a man living ‘between two worlds’. He was born in 1863 to an Orthodox Jewish family as Shloyme Zanvl Rappoport; he started going by his pseudonym at the age of 28 and used it during the second half of his life. He was born in Chashniki of today’s Belarus, but he grew up in Viciebsk, later known as ‘the city of Chagall’. The painter, who is more than two decades younger, was brought up in a poor family, just like Rappoport, on one of the poorer streets in Viciebsk. He immortalised the city of his youth in many characteristic paintings. Text size standard fonts size Columns style both columns static Left column Between what worlds was An-ski functioning? As a publicist and writer, he used two languages and usually wrote his texts in the two versions concurrently. Right column Fragment of a letter from An-ski to Chaim Zhitlowsky, 1913, photo: from the archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York Fullscreen gallery items Text An-ski was both ‘a modern Jewish intellect and a radical Russian intellect, [...] he led the life of a revolutionist and an emigrant’, as Eugenia Prokop-Janiec wrote. This, however, is what he had to say about himself: A writer has a difficult fate, but a Jewish writer has an especially difficult fate. His soul is torn; he lives on two streets with three languages. It is a misfortune to live on this sort of ‘border’, and that is what I have experienced. [...] Bearing an eternal longing for Jewishness, I threw myself in all directions and left to work for another people. [...] I spent many years on that ‘border’, on the boundary between the two. Trans. AD Podpis obrazka ‘The Blue House’ by Marc Chagall, 1917, from a series of paintings depicting the landscapes of Viciebsk, photo: Wikimedia Commons Text position left middle Text Wandering Soul – this is the title of An-ski’s biography written by Gabriella Safran, an American scholar of Slavic, Jewish and literary studies. Safran claims that An-ski’s ambiguous, ‘border’ existence found its reflection in the figure of Khonen, a yeshiva pupil – a meticulous student of Kabbalah. Podpis obrazka ‘Panorama of Viciebsk’ by Marc Chagall, 1914, photograph: Wikimedia Commons Text position right bottom Columns style right column static Left column In The Dybbuk, Khonen, the son of Nisan, is the fiancée of Leah, the daughter of Sender. Right column Lithograph from the series ‘Shtetl, My Destroyed Home: A Remembrance’ by Issachar Ber Ryback, 1922, photograph: Public Domain Review Columns style left column static Left column Lithograph from the series ‘Shtetl, My Destroyed Home: A Remembrance’ by Issachar Ber Ryback, 1922, photograph: Public Domain Review Right column An-ski placed a large part of his own inner anxiety into the figure of Khonen, whose geographic and spiritual journeys can be compared to those experienced by his creator. Khonen embodies the paradoxes at the heart of An-ski’s actions. I have neither a wife, nor children, nor house, nor even an apartment, nor belongings, nor any settled habits... the only thing that connects me firmly with to these dimensions is my nation. Signature Trans. AD Text size large fonts size Columns style right column static Left column Death before the premiere An-ski’s next journey was bringing his magical-realism drama to the stage. Right column Poster advertising a ‘”Der Dybuk” recitation reading’ in Biała Podlaska, 1920s, photo: National Library Polona Tekst It was 8th November 1920. On that day, An-ski wrote three more letters in which he was pleased with the founding of the Jewish Historical Ethnographic Society in Warsaw. In one of them he added, ‘I feel much better, but I’m not Samson’. In the evening of that day, An-ski, suffering from complications of diabetes, suddenly died of a heart attack. In his final wishes, he emphasised that he did not want any speeches to be made during his funeral. But the ceremony itself was by no means a silent event – more than 8,000 people said goodbye to An-ski. Amongst them, writers, journalists, artists as well as members of the Vilna Troupe carried a banner with the words ‘Na ścieżce między dwoma światami, ostatnie pożegnanie Sz. An-skiego’ (‘On a path between two worlds, the last farewell to S. An-ski’). The author of The Dybbuk was buried in the Mausoleum of the Three Writers at the Jewish cemetery in Warsaw – together with Isaac Leib Peretz and Jacob Dineson. Text size large fonts size Columns style left column static Left column The building wherein the Elizeum Theatre was located, the site of the premiere of ‘The Dybbuk’, photo: E. Troczewski / Wikimedia Commons Right column Warsaw’s ‘psychosis’ An-ski’s funeral day started a shloshim period, or 30 days of mourning. It ended with the premiere – as so desired by the writer – of his mystical text. Columns style right column static Left column In an essay on the history of The Dybbuk, Roman Pawłowski wrote about how ‘The trams going from the Jewish neighbourhood of Warsaw to the city centre were packed’. Right column Judith Lares and Miriam Orleska in ‘The Dybbuk’, Vilna Troupe premiere at the Elizeum Theatre, 1920, photo: Wikimedia Commons Columns style both columns static Left column The most beautiful actress since Duse appeared upon the stage. [...] One wishes to see this actress in a great role on the European stage, perhaps as Desdemona. Trans. AD Right column Judith Lares and Miriam Orleska in ‘The Dybbuk’, Vilna Troupe premiere at the Elizeum Theatre, 1920, photo: Wikimedia Commons Tekst Vakhtangov & Einstein When Warsaw was experiencing its ‘Dybbuk obsession’, Yevgeny Vakhtangov – one of the principal theatre reformers – was working on another adaptation of the drama at the Habima Theatre studio in Moscow. An-ski’s Vitebsk compatriot, Chagall, who was to be responsible for the visual art of the play, ultimately resigned from the collaboration because of an argument with Vakhtangov about the acting method. During the several years that he was preparing for the production of The Dybbuk, Vakhtangov moved from a deep interest in the psychological realism under Stanislavski to more vivid or expressionistic conventions. Text size standard fonts size Fullscreen gallery items Text His style, which he described as ‘fantasy realism’, perfectly suited The Dybbuk – it was, after all, a play situated ‘between two worlds’... Vakhtangov staged An-ski’s text in Hebrew, even though he himself did not know it. That is why his spectacle had to be expressive and clear enough for the audience – regardless of the language they spoke – to comprehend what was happening on the stage. So everything depended on the appropriate guidance of the actors and actresses. It was then that Vakhtangov’s love for intimate studio work became apparent through the acting group with which he was trying to establish a deep connection. When those invited to his rehearsals admitted that not all the scenes were intelligible to them, Vakhtangov chided the actors, claiming that it was not the fault of Hebrew but of their insufficiently expressive and convincing performances. Podpis obrazka Zespół Habimy w “Dybuku”, Moskwa, 1922, fot. z archiwów YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, Nowy Jork Text position right middle Tekst Vakhtangov, like An-ski, died of an illness in the year of his Dybbuk’s premiere – but he did manage to prepare the play so that it could be presented. He passed away from tuberculosis five months later, on 29th May 1922. Like the Vilna Troupe before, Habima’s troupe went on a whirlwind tour in the 1920s, and the fans of their interpretation of The Dybbuk included, among others, Albert Einstein. The performance itself would remain in Habima’s repertoire until the mid-1960s, meaning that it was performed for nearly four decades. Hanna Rovina as Leah in 'The Dybbuk', premiere at the Habima Theatre, 1922, photo: Wikimedia Commons Text size standard fonts size Columns style both columns static Left column Affiche advertising the screening of the film ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Michał Waszyński, 1939, photograph: National Library Polona Right column A prince & bankruptcy In the second half of the 1930s, the Feniks Film Studio in Warsaw was almost closed due to bankruptcy, bearing debts of almost 300,000 zł. Fullscreen gallery items Text And so, in Waszyński’s expressionist film (sometimes even reminiscent of horror), we are able to see scenes that are only mentioned in the drama. Already at the beginning, we see the scene of the vow between Nisan and Sender, and a little later – successful negotiations on Leah’s arranged marriage. The film, in which Kazimierz Dolny ‘acts’ as Myropil, was also stripped of the mystical monologues present in the drama, which would slow down the action and distance Dybbuk from the melodramatic intentions of its creators. Podpis obrazka Portrait of Michał Waszyński (Mosze Waks), 1933, photograph: audiovis.nac.gov.pl (NAC) Text position left top Columns style left column static Left column Lili Liliana as Leah in ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Michał Waszyński, 1937, photo: from the ar-chives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York Right column Waszyński himself – just like An-ski – died suddenly. Tekst Wajda behind the veil The post-war journey of The Dybbuk is marked by three premieres at the Jewish Theatre in Warsaw. The first of them (1957) was directed by Abraham Morewski – an actor who plays the role of a Mirepoler Rebbe in both the premiere performance of the Vilna Troupe and in the film hit by Waszyński. However, the most important post-war attempt to deal with this Yiddish masterpiece was Andrzej Wajda’s play, staged in 1988 at the Stary Theatre in Kraków. In collaboration with Ernest Bryll, who compared The Dybbuk to Mickiewicz’s Forefathers’ Eve, Wajda created a spectacle that was part of the discussion at that time about the memory as well as the moral accountability of Poles in the context of the Holocaust. A year earlier, the magazine Tygodnik Powszechny (The Universal Weekly) published a famous essay by Jan Błoński entitled ‘The Poor Poles Look at the Ghetto’, which ends with a representative sentence: Polish soil was desecrated, and we still remain bound by the duty of purification. On this graveyard, this duty amounts to one thing only: the duty to see our past truthfully. Trans. AD Text size standard fonts size Fullscreen gallery items Text The cemetery played a significant role in Wajda’s play, which featured set design by Krystyna Zachwatowicz. In the prologue, the Messenger (played by Jerzy Trela) strolled amid the matzevot, recreating the necropolis of Kazimierz in Kraków. The stage and the audience were separated by a translucent veil – as if the director wanted to symbolically separate the world being depicted from the contemporary one ‘outside the theatre’. It seemed that he wanted to show a reality that no longer existed and so could only be watched like a film. Podpis obrazka Costume designs for ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Andrzej Wajda, 1988, photograph: Andrzej Wajda Archive Text position left bottom Tekst A burnt theatre & a boxcar heading towards death Krysia, as proof that I am already a bit prepared for THE DYBBUK, our new job for the Stary Theatre in Kraków, I recommend you this notebook… Andrzej. 18 June 1987 Konstancin. — Andrzej Wajda, trans. AD Wajda added this dedication to his first notebook used to work on An-ski’s drama. The meticulous black-and-red notes are primarily casting suggestions, spatial designs and detailed staging ideas. The notebook allows us to follow the evolution of Wajda’s thoughts in the context of the Kraków Dybbuk. On one of the pages we read: ‘DYBBUK in a burnt theatre’, but the note is confronted with another notation: ‘I abandoned this idea quickly! It is static and banal’. Text size standard fonts size Fullscreen gallery items Text Another idea appears after a few pages: Instead of an iron curtain, we can use a large boxcar door that has a barred window, which slides open into freedom. So the entire play takes place in the wagon (inside!). It’s better than on a theatre stage. This journey with the play ‘The Dybbuk’ is like the one Jews make with their treasures, taking them with them not knowing where they are going – somewhere towards death. This is a good idea. This is what I will do. Trans. AD Podpis obrazka From Andrzej Wajda’s notebook, created while he was working on ‘The Dybbuk’, 1987-1988, photograph: Andrzej Wajda Archive Text position left bottom Text But this idea was also abandoned – years later, Wajda would describe it as being ‘too bold’. Neither would he implement this concept a few months later in Tel Aviv, where he directed The Dybbuk for Habima. Podpis obrazka Staging plan for ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Andrzej Wajda, 1988, photograph: Andrzej Wajda Archive Text position right bottom Text After the American performances of the play. Annette Insdorf, a journalist for The New York Times, wrote: As the play opens, the Stary Theatre stage assumes an almost cinematic depth, reminiscent of Mr. Wajda’s films, from ‘Ashes and Diamonds’ to’Danton’. A cemetery appears in the background, embodying in spatial terms the presence of the past; in the course of the play, it will come to represent the inescapable grip of what one has left behind. Trans. AD Podpis obrazka Staging plan for ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Andrzej Wajda, 1988, photograph: Andrzej Wajda Archive Text position left top Tekst Compassion for a demon ‘The Dybbuk by Hanna Krall was one of the greatest texts I have ever read in my life’, Krzysztof Warlikowski said in a joint interview with the reporter for Gazeta Wyborcza (The Electoral News). Based on the true story of Michael C. Steinlauf – the son of Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust, now a history professor at Gratz College in Philadelphia – Krall’s story is written, which is characteristic of the author, with acute lightness. It depicts the story of Adam S., the protagonist, as he becomes possessed by the spirit of his older brother, who was murdered in the ghetto at the age of two or three. In a conversation with Elżbieta Janicka, Steinlauf said: Text size standard fonts size For a long, long, long time, I thought that I was carrying this child’s dybbuk. Hanna Krall wrote the story based on conversations with me [...], but she changed a lot, at times completely beyond my recognition. Signature Trans. AD Text size large fonts size Columns style right column static Left column One of the elements of his story that Krall decided to keep the same is the meeting of the possessed with a Buddhist monk in order to drive out the older brother’s dybbuk, who – and this is significant to the story – was also Steinlauf’s namesake. Right column Scene from the premiere of ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski, coproduction of TR Warszawa and the Współczesny Theatre in Wrocław, 2003, photo: Stefan Okołowicz / TR Warsza-wa Tekst Away from folkloric representation Warlikowski staged Krall’s story in the second part of his The Dybbuk, which premiered in 2003 at the Współczesny Theatre in Wrocław and Warsaw’s TR Warszawa. The first part is based on a new reading of An-ski’s drama. The transition between them happens in a sort of empty silence, but it is not a subtle passage – it’s rather a raw cut. Scholars see this gap as a space for imagining the Holocaust. The dramaturgy of the gap used by Warlikowski means that what is left unsaid becomes the most essential in his play. The two parts of the play – the Hasidic story of Leah and Khonen taking place in an undefined past, and an adaptation of Krall’s contemporary story – ‘work together’ on an implicit picture. Text size standard fonts size Columns style both columns static Left column Warlikowski takes the ethnographic dimension of An-ski’s drama into parentheses and distances it as a layer of secondary importance for his approach to this text. Warlikowski’s interpretation is created as part of post-memory, i.e. Right column Only in the second generation does something begin to emerge from the guilt. Form and meaning appear. The first generation actually deals with forgetting, while the second one cultivates the memory of the events. Fullscreen gallery items Text This distancing from the cultural context of The Dybbuk is emphasised by the austerity and simplicity of Małgorzata Szczęśniak’s set design. The performance carries an atmosphere of a horror, not a melodrama. Love is portrayed as a clinical disorder, a psychotic attack or a neurotic paroxysm. This approach was close to what Steinlauf himself believed about the dybbuk motif: An-ski made the Dybbuk topos sweet. He made a mawkish story out of it. His dybbuk is a romantic lover. There is no such monstrosity and violence in it, which is what makes a dybbuk unique. Because a real dybbuk is terrifying. Trans. AD Podpis obrazka Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski, a coproduction of TR Warszawa and the Współczesny Theatre in Wrocław, premiere 2003, photograph: Stefan Okołowicz / TR Warszawa Text position right top Text Warlikowski’s production was considered a breakthrough in the Polish reading of The Dybbuk. The director read the ‘dramatic legend set in Myropil differently: not through the prism of the mysticism of Judaism, but in broader, more universal categories of Fate, Guilt and Forgiveness. I wanted to see this text stripped of Jewish cepelia’, he said [editor’s note: Cepelia is the Polish folk art association]. At the same time, he remained far from the poetics of magical realism and wonder. His Dybbuk unfolded in an atmosphere of free-flowing fear, a cold and paralysing feeling that something bad is about to happen. Podpis obrazka Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski, a coproduction of TR Warszawa and the Współczesny Theatre in Wrocław, premiere 2003, photograph: Stefan Okołowicz / TR Warszawa Text position left bottom Text After the New York performances of The Dybbuk, Neil Genzlinger wrote: These stories, especially when accompanied by Paweł Mykietyn’s music flooding the Harvey Theater with gothic chords, can be read as an artistically presented horror. Trans. AD Podpis obrazka Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski, a coproduction of TR Warszawa and the Współczesny Theatre in Wrocław, premiere 2003, photograph: Stefan Okołowicz / TR Warszawa Text position right bottom Tekst Millions of souls in Muranów ‘In a moment, I will enter a shabby and disreputable rehearsal room. I’ve been walking to it for a long time, during sleepless nights...’ These are the opening words of The Dybbuk as directed by Maja Kleczewska – a paraphrase of Tadeusz Kantor’s words from I Shall Never Return, the last completed performance by the creator of the Theatre of Death. This reference is obviously not accidental, because, as Katarzyna Osińska writes, Kantor could ‘recognise an archetype of the Theatre of Death’ in The Dybbuk. In a four-page summary of An-ski’s drama preserved in the Cricoteka archive, one can read Kantor’s notes: Text size standard fonts size The dead come – an intervention of the dark world of imagination, in the dark / a blurred line between the VISIBLE and the Invisible (mon idée-fixe). T. Signature Trans. AD Text size large fonts size Columns style right column static Left column Kleczewska’s play was created on the occasion of the 65th Jubilee of the Jewish Theatre in Warsaw. Gołda Tencer invited the director, famous for her expressive style, to ‘delicately give the Theatre a breath of fresh air’. Was it successful? Right column Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Maja Kleczewska, 2015, pictured: Magdalena Koleśnik, photo: Magda Hueckel / The Ester Rachel Kamińska and Ida Kamińska State Jewish Theatre Columns style left column static Left column Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Maja Kleczewska, 2015, pictured: Magdalena Koleśnik, photo: Magda Hueckel / The Ester Rachel Kamińska and Ida Kamińska State Jewish Theatre Right column We can thus imagine millions of wandering souls. Around Muranów. Around the Łódź ghetto, around Auschwitz, around Dachau... Tekst ‘So you want to see a possession?‘ The action of the play takes place in a reconstructed rehearsal room. After the Kantor-inspired introduction, we see a moment of mystical union between Leah and Khonen. It was Leah who clung to her lover, stepping under his tattered, brownish sweater. In the dramaturgical chaos of the play, one can see a mosaic composed of elements of Jewish culture as well as spirituality. We can see shtreimels (fur hats) and the dances of Myropil Hasids. However, this play is not as keen as the others in altogether avoiding ‘cepelia’. Kleczewska wanted to combine the memory of a culture that no longer exists (whose record is also An-ski’s text itself) with the memory of the Holocaust. The languages of Polish, Hebrew and Yiddish merge. The Messenger (Jerzy Walczak, perfect in this role) is at the same time a Muslim, an exhausted camp prisoner – a figure between the worlds. He says his lines coldly, almost in white, with unseeing eyes, his flesh-coloured tights pulled high to the waist. Text size standard fonts size Simple Gallery Items Podpis obrazka Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Maja Kleczewska, 2015, pictured: Magdalena Koleśnik, photo: Magda Hueckel / The Ester Rachel Kamińska and Ida Kamińska State Jewish Theatre Podpis obrazka Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Maja Kleczewska, 2015, pictured: Magdalena Koleśnik, photo: Magda Hueckel / The Ester Rachel Kamińska and Ida Kamińska State Jewish Theatre Podpis obrazka Scene from ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Maja Kleczewska, 2015, pictured: Magdalena Koleśnik, photo: Magda Hueckel / The Ester Rachel Kamińska and Ida Kamińska State Jewish Theatre Tekst Kleczewska and Chotkowski resigned from emphasising fictional tensions in – nomen est omen – the spirit of the melodrama or horror. This trial situation is observed with curiosity. The whole is led by the charismatic Magdalena Koleśnik, a subtle blonde as if made for the role of Leah – it’s hard to believe that it was her first big role after graduating from drama school. In the sensational exorcism scene, Koleśnik/Leah is ironic; she performs her dybbuk as if somehow mocking expectations. As if she were saying, ‘So you want to see a possession? Here you go’. The creators wanted the audience to recall a Warsaw that no longer existed, as the former centre of Jewish culture, bustling with life. They also wanted to evoke the memory of the Holocaust – a topic posing perhaps some of the greatest challenges for artists looking for an appropriate language or adequate gestures, trying to find themselves in the spectrum between metaphors and brutal literalism. Text size standard fonts size Columns style both columns static Left column Other spirits The theme of a restless spirit entering a living body returns from time to time in Polish theatre and cinema. Right column ‘The Dybbuk’, directed by Anna Smolar, photograph: Monika Stolarska / Polish Theatre in Bydgoszcz Columns style both columns static Left column Still from ‘Demon’, directed by Marcin Wrona, photograph: Marta Gostkiewicz / Kino Świat Right column In the same year, Marcin Wrona’s Demon was released. Tekst Dybbuks wander everywhere – and not only in Polish culture. The theme of a restless soul breaking into someone else’s body was also discussed by Ethan and Joel Coen, amongst others. A Serious Man, their 2009 film, opens with a scene that takes place in an undefined past, most likely in one of the Eastern European shtetls. A couple is arguing over a character the husband met on the way home. When the man gives the name of the encountered man, the wife declares that the man has been dead for three years – and that her spouse must have met a dybbuk, which must be tantamount to a divine curse. It can be said that An-ski’s ‘costliest life dream’ has come true – in one three-act text, he managed to close many motifs of traditional Jewish culture, and to convey the character of Hasidic folklore and beliefs. His Dybbuk is still wandering through successive readings and interpretations, continuously being updated. An-ski, like the ghost he wrote about, will not allow himself to be forgotten. Text size standard fonts size Columns style both columns static Left column Written by Marcelina Obarska, Aug 2020, translated by Agnes Dudek, Nov 2020 Right column The author would like to thank TR Warszawa and the Jewish Theatre in Warsaw for providing recordings of performances, as well as the Manggha Museum for agreeing to the use of Andrzej Wajda’s notebooks. Introduction His soul left his body before he was able to see his life’s most important work on stage. Thus, S. An-ski never saw how the premiere of his play, The Dybbuk (also known as Between Two Worlds), would lead Interwar Warsaw into a ‘psychosis’. Meanwhile, the theme of a stray soul occupying a living body has continued to wander tirelessly to this day. Krall, Warlikowski, Wajda, the Coen brothers – possession connects them all. Not standard color version Off Summary S. An-ski’s soul left his body before he was able to see his life’s most important work on stage. Thus, he never saw how the premiere of his play, The Dybbuk (also known as Between Two Worlds), would lead Interwar Warsaw into a ‘psychosis’. Meanwhile, the theme of a stray soul occupying a living body has continued to wander tirelessly to this day. Krall, Warlikowski, Wajda, the Coen brothers – possession connects them all. Cover Thumbnail size default [360 px] Thumbnail the_vilna_troupe_34.jpg