A mentira-verdade do ator: o ofício do ator na Lettre à d Alembert sur les spectacles, de Jean-Jacques Rousseau

• Ano de defesa: 2011
• Autor(a) principal: Pires, Helderson Mariani
• Orientador(a): Pissarra, Maria Constança Peres
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Tipo de acesso: Acesso aberto
• Idioma: por
• Instituição de defesa: Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo
• Programa de Pós-Graduação: Programa de Estudos Pós-Graduados em Filosofia
• Departamento: Filosofia
• País: BR
• Palavras-chave em Português: Ator; Teatro; Iluminismo; Philosophe; Rousseau
• Palavras-chave em Inglês: Actor; Theatre; Enlightment
• Área do conhecimento CNPq: CNPQ::CIENCIAS HUMANAS::FILOSOFIA
• Link de acesso: https://tede2.pucsp.br/handle/handle/11584

In French Enlightenment, theatre was one of the main subjects discussed among its thinkers they used to be called philosophes, who fiercely expressed their ideas about the theatrical performance phenomenon and its possible pedagogical effectiveness, as well as about its social and political implications in 18th Century France. Jean-Jacques Rousseau playwright, musician, poet, novelist, that is: a philosophe found, on his view about theatre, the metaphor of the human laceration, that occurred in the passage of man's state of nature for that of life in society. The conflict between being and seeming, as well as the duel between amour de soi, which is present in the natural being, and amour propre, which artificializes the social being, is a fundamental matter for the understanding of the Genevan philosophe. Though this subject runs trough all his work, it is in the Lettre à d Alembert sur les spectacles that Rousseau devotes himself exclusively to perform his criticism about spectacles. Besides that, the text also brings a definition of the talent and the craft of the comedien, which is also suitable to the acteur, that is, the acting artist as a whole, be they a singer at Ópera Royal de Paris or a tragedian at Comédie Française. Thus, this research opted for the term actor, once it has the advantage of updating both the terms comédien and acteur of the French context at that time. Published in 1758, the Lettre constituted the response to d Alembert who, in his entry Genève, da Encyclopédie, defended theatre and its actors, then seen as socially inferior and devoid of political and religious rights. For that reason, the philosopher proposed the formation of a theatre company in Genève, in order to help educate the taste of Genevan citizens, an idea which would be strongly and radically rejected by Rousseau. The Lettre directly addresses the relation among the spectacles, the actor s performance and the corruption of the man in the society, and the aforementioned conflict between being and seeming is once again present. Such opposition is focused on the scope of the Parisian spectacles, designed as signs of a society which was accustomed to appearances and trivia that made the man more and more artificial, and therefore alienated from their essence and the virtues which are necessary for the constitution of a worthy citizen. 7 The work also offers a synthetic definition of the talent of the comedian and their art of imitating, that is, of adopting a character which is different from the one they have. Thus, the actor's craft is the simulation, the clear expression of the conflict between being and seeming, once it lives in their ability to deceive, to seduce the audience, seeming to be what they are not, offering themselves as a show in exchange for money. Rousseau therefore criticizes the luxurious habits and morals of the actor, mainly because it makes use of those artifices to corrupt the youth. To the author of the Lettre, the interpreter, because of their ability to switch characters in scenic play, becomes a metaphor for the paradoxical condition of man, which distanced themselves from nature and created the spectacle of culture. Rousseau's passion for theatre did not stop him from criticizing it so ruthlessly, as he saw in it not only a specific type of artistic representation, but also the representation of the condition of the human laceration. It was necessary, therefore, a new theater, with new actors capable and true in their craft of lying. That is the critic of representation that ran through the Lettre à d'Alembert and that made theater an essential paradigm of its author's thinking. It is worth noticing, yet, that the actor's craft may gain scenic efficiency from the criticism processed by Rousseau in that work. The parties that he throws to replace the French spectacles have as their main feature the figure of the citizen - actor and spectator of himself. The character - the one that the actor represents, often as a mere projection of themselves - must earn truth so that the theater earns strength. This new actor, with their ability to conceal through their scenic truth, is related to the philosophe and the artist who was Rousseau. That because he obsessively sought, in the practice of his thought, its coherence, making his life the stage for his aroused imagination