Reviewed by:

• The Use of Asian Theatre for Modern Western Theatre: The Displaced Mirror by Min Tian
• John K. Gillespie

With this well researched book, Min Tian adds to the continuing discussion of theatre manifesting other-culture aspects. Such efforts have been termed fusion, cross-cultural, intercultural, transcultural, transnational, and Eurasian, among others. Tian eschews them all, pronouncing the idea of intercultural theatre as rejected for what he calls "'new' interculturalisms" (p. 1) that nonetheless remain, he declares, "theoretically Eurocentric … and the historical divide remains between the East and the West" (p. 1). He maintains that Asian theatre's appeal, though "shared by the founding fathers of modern Western theatre" (p. 2)—he includes Aurélien-Marie Lugné-Poe, Adolphe Appia and Gordon Craig, William Butler Yeats, Jacques Copeau and Suzanne Bing, Charles Dullin, Antonin Artaud, Vsevelod Meyerhold, Sergei Eisenstein, and Bertolt Brecht—ultimately became what he calls "displacements," uprooted from the original Asian context and tossed into their thoroughly Western, ethnocentric concepts. Tian's notion, borrowed from Freud's "Entstellung" ("distortion") and filtered through Jacques Derrida, is key: "The … productive and destructive displacement of a performance text makes impossible the dialectical reassemblage of the totality … into … any particular saturated theory or model" (p. 7). It's a provocative approach and bears consideration.

Within that frame, Tian probably reaches his objective. He discusses how and why each of the Western figures discovered Asian theatre, citing their overt disaffection with the era's torpid naturalism, the affinity they perceived between symbolism, and certain Asian performance aspects, the various Asian troupes then performing in Europe, and the appearance of milestone translations—for example, Noël Peri's Cinq nô; drames lyriques japonais and Arthur Waley's The Nō Plays of Japan, both in 1921. Tian sleuths through breathtakingly abundant essays, letters, notes, meetings, confirming what the Europeans knew, saw, or heard, plus the related exchanges among them. That information alone makes for compelling reading.

Concluding every chapter, whatever the European figure borrows, Tian reiterates that it constituted not influence but displacement, distortion—cf. his title's "displaced mirror"—unmoored from its tradition. For example, he writes that Yeats's nō plays, though popular in Japan, "must be put in their proper historical place as a displacement of the Japanese model" (p. 91). And Tian's chapter on [End Page 334] Meyerhold, carries the tagline, "Welding the Unweldable," concluding that Meyerhold's approach, "necessitates the refraction, and thereby the displacement, of the original essence of those popular traditions out of their historical-social as well as their aesthetic contexts" (p. 204).

Tian deems the process his selected Europeans followed as displacing something from its rightful context and claims, in an oddly self-fulfilling prophecy, that the aspect in question would have happened anyway, even without Asian contact! For example, he opines that Artaud, had he never "witnessed the performance of the Balinese dancers, would have seen the same 'effigy' or 'double' of his Artaudian Occidental self in any other non-Western primitive tradition" (p. 263) and concludes that "in the hyphenation of differences and traditions, there is no escaping the law of displacement" (p. 271). Is this "Tian's law," I wonder? Furthermore, his tone throughout regards displacement as not merely caused by Western ethnocentrism; it is also inauthentic, even unethical. I read Tian's book with great interest, though at some point it struck me that his assessment carried limitations; there was nowhere to go with it. I mean, what of the most asked questions about a play: What do you think? Good drama? Effective performance? There's very little insight in that regard, beyond his displacement notion, or even about theatre in general.

Therefore, I would like to offer several rejoinders to Tian's fundamental point. For example, in a concrete sense, any truth about Asian aspects adapted to Western performances could be as likely about inauthentic Asian theatre as about displacement. Several such troupes were performing in Europe in the early 20th century. To cite one, Kawakami Otojirō, a shinpa performer, and by nature...

审核人：

• 亚洲戏剧在现代西方戏剧中的运用：田敏的《错位的镜子》
• 约翰·K·吉莱斯皮

通过这本研究得很好的书，田敏补充了对戏剧表现其他文化方面的持续讨论。这些努力被称为融合、跨文化、跨文化、跨文化、跨国和欧亚等。田避开了所有这些，宣布跨文化戏剧的想法被他所谓的“'新'跨文化主义”（第 1 页）所拒绝，尽管如此，但他宣称，“理论上以欧洲为中心……并且东西方之间的历史鸿沟仍然存在”（第 1 页）。他坚持认为亚洲戏剧的吸引力虽然“为现代西方戏剧的创始人所共有”（第 2 页）——他包括 Aurélien-Marie Lugné-Poe、Adolphe Appia 和 Gordon Craig、William Butler Yeats、Jacques Copeau 和 Suzanne Bing，查尔斯·杜林、安东宁·阿尔托、弗谢维罗德·梅耶霍尔德、谢尔盖·爱森斯坦和贝托尔特·布莱希特——最终成为他所谓的“流离失所”，从最初的亚洲语境中连根拔起，并投入到他们完全西方的、以种族为中心的概念中。 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 田的概念，借用弗洛伊德的“Entstellung ”（“扭曲”）并通过雅克德里达过滤，是关键：“……表演文本的生产性和破坏性置换使得不可能将整体辩证地重新组合……进入……任何特定的饱和理论或模型”（第7页） . 这是一种挑衅性的做法，值得考虑。

在那个框架内，天可能达到了他的目的。他讨论了每个西方人物是如何以及为什么发现亚洲戏剧的，列举了他们对那个时代麻木不仁的自然主义的明显不满，他们认为象征主义和某些亚洲表演方面之间的亲和力，当时在欧洲表演的各种亚洲剧团，以及里程碑翻译——例如，Noël Peri 的Cinq nô；戏剧 lyriques japonais和 Arthur Waley 的The No Plays of Japan，都是 1921 年。田通过惊人丰富的散文、信件、笔记、会议进行调查，证实欧洲人所知道、看到或听到的，以及他们之间的相关交流。仅凭这些信息就可以令人信服地阅读。

结束每一章，无论欧洲人借用什么，田重申它构成的不是影响而是位移，扭曲 - 参见。他的头衔是“移位的镜子”——脱离了它的传统。例如，他写道，叶芝的无戏虽然在日本很受欢迎，但“必须作为日本模式的替代品放置在其适当的历史位置”（第 91 页）。田在[End Page 334]梅耶霍尔德的章节中，带有标语“焊接不可焊接的”，得出的结论是梅耶霍尔德的方法“需要折射，从而将那些流行传统的原始本质从它们的历史-社会以及他们的审美背景”（第 204 页）。

田认为他选择的欧洲人所遵循的过程取代了其合法背景中的某些东西，并以一种奇怪的自我实现预言的方式声称，即使没有亚洲人的接触，所讨论的方面无论如何也会发生！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ” ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！ ！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！〉！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！』！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！例如，他认为阿尔托，如果他从未“亲眼目睹巴厘岛舞者的表演，就会在任何其他非西方原始传统中看到他的阿尔托西方自我的相同‘肖像’或‘双重’”（第 263 页） ) 并得出结论：“在差异和传统的连字符中，无法逃避置换法则”（第 271 页）。我想知道这是“天律”吗？此外，他的语气始终认为流离失所不仅仅是由西方民族中心主义造成的；这也是不真实的，甚至是不道德的。我读天' 对这本书非常感兴趣，尽管在某些时候让我觉得他的评估有局限性；无处可去。我的意思是，关于一部剧问得最多的问题是什么：你怎么看？好剧？有效的表现？在这方面，除了他的置换概念之外，甚至关于戏剧的总体见解都很少。

因此，我想对田的基本观点提出几点反驳。例如，从具体意义上讲，任何适用于西方表演的亚洲方面的真相都可能与不真实的亚洲戏剧有关，也可能与流离失所有关。20 世纪初，有几个这样的剧团在欧洲演出。举个例子，川上乙次郎，一位神巴表演者，天生......