derful thoughts and emotions are somehow chained inside their
undeveloped bodies. The process of rehearsing and acting is for
them a painful struggle against their own "too too solid flesh," as
Hamlet said. But no need to be dismayed. Every actor, to a greater
or lesser degree, suffers from some of his body's resistance.

Physical exercises are needed to overcome this, but they must
be built on principles different from those used in most dramatic
schools. Gymnastics, fencing, dancing, acrobatics, calisthenics and
wrestling are undoubtedly good and useful for what they are, but
the body of an actor must undergo a special kind of development
in accordance with the particular requirements of his profession.

What are these requirements?

First and foremost is extreme sensitivity of body to the psycho-
logical creative impulses. This cannot be achieved by strictly
physical exercises. The psychology itself must take part in such a
development. The body of an actor must absorb psychological
qualities, must be filled and permeated with them so that they
will convert it gradually into a sensitive membrane, a kind of
receiver and conveyor of the subtlest images, feelings, emotions
and will impulses.

Since the last third of the nineteenth century a materialistic
world outlook has been reigning, with ever-increasing power, in the
sphere of art as well as in science and everyday life. Consequently,
only those things which are tangible, only that which is palpable
and only that which has the outer appearance of life phenomena.
seem valid enough to attract the artist's attention.

Under the influence of materialistic concepts, the contemporary
actor is constantly and out of sheer necessity suborned into the
dangerous practice of eliminating the psychological elements from
his art and overestimating the significance of the physical. Thus,

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