Does the reason for it lie in the desire to live imaginatively a story
which could not be lived if this story were true? One has all kinds
of courage in imaginary situations. It is pleasant to play with the
notion of fear when there is no real cause for fear. This desire for
'acting' comes perhaps from the urge to get a full grasp of real
life and its problems through an artificial re-creation of life, some-
thing which is really 'filtered' life, or life at one remove. This is
something in which attitudes and behaviour are more clearly out-
lined and lucidity is not blinded by the urgency of decision. It is
therefore a training ground for virtual actions which can be
beneficial in cases of incapacity to act; it is a school of energy, a
place where one recharges one's batteries.

All men are double, that is a well-known fact, and one would
not be surprised to hear that men are multiple: 'there are many
men in one man'. Yet if each of us is a compound of many per-
sonalities, the fact that another self seems to be always present in
us, makes us say that we are double. Our double has its own indi-
vidual life; it is he who at night lives our dreams. Life on the stage
is a dream dreamt when one is awake. There has been in recent
years a good deal of talk about the lie of the theatre. It is frequently
said that the actor when acting deludes himself and lies, and the
spectator does the same and lies when he believes what he sees.
Diderot's famous paradox of the comedian or of the spectator is
supposed to be the result of a connivance between two liars. That
is very possible; but what of it? Dreams also are supposed to be
lies but in fact nobody knows anything about it. Let us content
ourselves with saying that the theatre, like life, is a dream, without
caring too much about the question of lie.

The whole history of the theatre shows us that it has its source
in imitation, which of course is not the lifeless copying of nature,
but the re-creating of life through artificial means. The artist gives
life to a kind of magic object which has more life than any ordinary
object. A picture, a bust, a symphony, ought in fact to belong
to the living world. 'Creation' is for the artist a kind of sexual
action at the end of which he gives life to something. If life is
a symphony of colours it is normal to invent the painter; if it is
a dance of forms then a sculptor must be born; and if it is a pattern
of sounds then it is clear that music exists as well as man. What
appearances will life take in order to justify the invention of an
'imitator'? Painting, sculpture, architecture, music, poetry, are

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