Copyright by Richard James Gray II 2006

The Dissertation Committee for Richard James Gray II Certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation:

FRENCH RADIO DRAMA FROM THE INTERWAR TO THE POSTWAR PERIOD (1922-1973)

Committee: Seth Wolitz, Supervisor Mary J. Baker Jean-Pierre Cauvin Alexandra Wettlaufer Michael Kackman

FRENCH RADIO DRAMA FROM THE INTERWAR TO THE POSTWAR PERIOD (1922-1973)

by Richard James Gray II, B.A.; M.A.

Dissertation
Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

The University of Texas at Austin May 2006

Dedication

To those whom I have lost. May you continue to live in my memory: Grandma and Grandpa Gray, Great Grandma Green, Grandma and Grandpa Knabusch.

Acknowledgements

I would like to extend my most heartfelt thanks to the members of my committee whose input was instrumental in the writing of this dissertation. I am especially indebted to Dr. Seth Wolitz, who encouraged me to choose a fresh, challenging subject of research, and who motivated me to reach the end. Without his support and his continued assurance, I may have never realized this study. I would also like to express my gratitude to the members of my family who have supported me in this endeavor. I would like to thank my parents, who have provided constant encouragement throughout my life and who gave to me the gift of a university education. To my sister, without whom I never would have been known as Chauntels little brother. Also, to my mother-in-law and father-in-law, who have helped my family in immeasurable ways. Finally, I will never find the words to express the thankfulness that I feel toward my wife, Andrea, and to my daughters, Genevive, Madeleine and Catherine. I have always appreciated your patience and understanding. You have been my true source of inspiration. Together we went on a journey that at times seemed never-ending. This journey is now over. I am proud of where our travels have taken us, but I will always strive to remember our families humble roots.

French Radio Drama from the Interwar to the Post-War Period (19221973)
Publication No._____________

Richard James Gray II, Ph.D. The University of Texas at Austin, 2006

Supervisor: Seth Wolitz Radio drama, as a whole, is one of the most underappreciated popular literary forms of the past nine decades. With the advent of the radio, literary expression in the form of radio drama soon found another medium through which it might both entertain, educate, and propagandize. In France, in particular, the uses of radio drama continued to develop in conjunction with the evolution of radio in the periods before, during, and after World War II. This dissertation serves to provide a better understanding of the role of radio drama within French society from 1922-1973. It serves to highlight the emergence of French radio drama and to underscore its uniqueness. It seeks to interpret the intention and the progression of the medium beginning with the pre-World War II period and ending with the radio dramas of the mid-1970s. In addition, this study will show how theater profited from the arrival of radio. It seeks to define the literary history of radio drama during this period. Finally, this work aims to demonstrate how French radio drama of the Interwar to the Postwar period reflected the social and political realities of

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an ever-changing France. Radio itself became a place of political and cultural opposition. But radio also became an instrument through which the listener could communicate aurally with his environment. This new means of communication served foreign policy, propaganda, cultural and religious objectives that no one could have imagined. The Introduction will situate the advent of radio drama within its proper context and offer an overview of Western radio drama during the period under investigation. Chapter One serves to outline the medium and genre that one calls radio drama, a form of popular literature. It will present in detail the aesthetics of the radio drama and the various typologies that existed throughout the period before, during, and after the German Occupation. In my dissertation, I will make use of both representative radio dramas as well as exemplary ones in order to illustrate the dual capabilities of the genre. Chapter Two serves to highlight French radio dramas that emerged before German Occupation. It will examine representative dramas in detail by looking at radio drama as entertainment, propaganda and a reflection of the contemporary reality. The purpose of Chapter Three is to show the form and function of representative radio dramas that appeared during the period of German occupation. Chapter Four serves to analyze the evolution of French radio drama during the Postwar period. The chapter will examine the new frontiers of radio drama that were beginning to be explored after Liberation. The Conclusion presents an accounting of the results of this dissertation as well as presentation of new perspectives on the future of French radio drama in the Information Age.

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Table of Contents

Introduction..............................................................................................................1 Chapter One: From Radio Emerges Radio Drama ...............................................18 Chapter Two: French Radio Drama of the Interwar Period..................................48 Chapter Three: French Radio Drama of the World-War II Period .....................101 Chapter Four: French Radio Drama of the Post-War Period...............................160 Conclusion ...........................................................................................................217 Appendix 1...........................................................................................................226 Appendix 2...........................................................................................................230 Appendix 3...........................................................................................................232 Appendix 4...........................................................................................................234 Appendix 5...........................................................................................................235 Appendix 6...........................................................................................................236 Bibliography ........................................................................................................237 Vita ..................................................................................................................249

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Introduction Radio drama appealed to some of the key dramatists of the twentieth century: Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard, Arthur Miller, Samuel Beckett, Bertolt Brecht, and Peter Handke. Beginning in the 1920s, the playwrights of the period trained in traditional forms of theater discovered that radio drama offered a new creative medium. During the last century, a vast repertoire of thousands of radio dramas has only recently been discovered. I will show how radio drama became an important genre within French popular literature and culture. Radio drama owes its very existence to the introduction of radio technology. The advent of radio in the 1920s revolutionized mass communications as a whole. It provided another means to disseminate news, music, and inevitably, literature. Countries in Europe and North America, in particular, no longer relied exclusively upon the written press for news and information. To hear both classical and popular music, citizens were no longer obliged to attend concerts and operas. As a result of the coming of radio, listeners heard literary works read and performed for the first time in their own homes. In 1938, the critic Marc Berger remarked that theater on television would never be anything more than une russite du thtre et du cinma. This criticism did not apply to radio drama, for he declared that radio drama bas sur la perception auditive et la suggestion est bel et bien un huitime art (13). Berger made this statement in allusion to the film medium, which the French had quickly labeled the seventh art.
1

For more on Marc Bergers evaluation of radio drama, see the journal Marianne (August 17, 1938): 13.

Some scholars of French literature perceive radio drama as a well that never filled with water. Researchers that explore the field seldom venture further back in time than the appearance of the radio dramas of Samuel Beckett of the 1950s and 1960s. Academics recognize Antonin Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, principally because the controversial subject matter caused such a stir in 1948. Modern scholarship in French radio drama leaves a gap of more than twenty-five years from the birth of French radio drama to Artauds controversial work. With the exception of the German Hrspiel, which enjoys a long tradition and has been studied extensively since its appearance in the early 1920s, few academics outside of England and Germany have explored radio drama. The few substantial book-length works on French radio drama that exist are dated and limited thematically by their authors. Among these works is Thtre radiophonique: mode nouveau dexpression artistique (1926), published by the playwrights Pierre Cusy and Gabriel Germinet. Thtre radiophonique combines contemporary scripts, including the well-known radio drama Marmoto, several essays on radio drama, and newspaper articles commenting on the performance of the radio dramas contained within the work. Another existing study on French radio drama is Jacques Baudous Radio mystre: le thtre radiophonique policier, fantastique et de science-fiction (1997), which focuses upon French crime dramas, fantasy dramas, and science fiction produced in the form of radio dramas from the 1930s the 1980s. Baudous work, which offers commentary on several of the radio dramas represented in the collection and a list of
2

Alan Beck discusses theories for the failure of scholars outside of England to embrace the study of radio drama in Playing by Ear: New Ways of Teaching and Research Radio Drama. Studies in Theatre and Performance (2000). <http://www.ukc.ac.uk/sdfva/stp/index.html>.

broadcast dates, directors, and actors, offers primarily a catalogue of radio scripts and offers little insight into the evolution of French radio drama. Although radio stations within France continue to broadcast a small selection of radio dramas, scholars within France fail to appreciate the impact of the genre.3 The lack of reliable academic evaluation and an underdeveloped theoretical base provide the primary reasons why radio drama has received little scholarly attention. A lack of exploration of the field explains why Orson Welles labeled radio drama an abandoned mine. Oversight on the part of scholars has left me in the unique position to explore this abandoned mine and to fill the gap overlooked by modern scholarship. I shall analyze the radio milieu in detail, including the notion of the audience and its expectations of radio drama. By contrasting the radio drama with the stage drama, I shall underline the similarities and differences that exist between these two types of performances by examining the sthetics of radio drama (role of actors, direction) and how the theatrical space is represented in the radio medium. By observing the evolution of the French radio drama before, during, and after World War II, I hope to define the role that censorship plays during this period and how dramas change under censorship. Through an analysis of the radio medium, through an exploration of various radio dramas written and produced from 1922-1973, and through an examination of the cultural response to this developing genre, I seek to provide an analysis of the importance of radio drama in France from the Interwar to the Postwar period, and perspectives as to why few scholars have embraced the genre.

Radio France (France Inter, France Culture) continues to broadcast a small quantity of radio dramas. <http://www.radiofrance.fr/rf/speaker/programme.php>.

Defining the Radio Drama Radio dramas are theatrical presentations intended for the aural medium, using voices, music and sound effects. Unlike stage dramas during which the audience interprets a characters state of mind through his or her gestures and facial expressions, in the radio drama, the audience interprets a characters thoughts through monologue and dialogue. Absent from the radio drama are the physical stage, the curtain, scenery, and props. Meaning in radio drama is achieved through the manipulation of the soundscape, as silence and sound effects replace the visual elements present in the stage drama. Radio dramas may include stage dramas that have been modified to the radio format. To turn a piece of prose or verse writing into a radio drama involves an adaptation. The radio drama must be transformed to conform to the characteristics of the sound medium. This transformation will be explored in detail in Chapter One. The study of radio drama also involves the understanding that radio drama is not an analogous experience to that of stage drama. Bill Ash, former assistant head of the Script Unit at BBC Radio, contends that radio is not a collective experienceit is unique and individual, whereas in a visual medium, everything that can be seen is a shared experience. By its very nature, radio drama is an entirely different experience than that of stage drama. Spectators of a live stage drama see the same physical stage, the same characters and prescribed scenery. Radio drama relies upon the ability of each listener to construct the drama as it is
4

Cited in Elissa Guralnicks Radio Drama: The Stage of the Mind. Virginia Quarterly Review. 61 (1995): 93.

unfolding before his ears within his own imagination. Radio drama relies upon the capacity of its audience to recognize that radio drama is a hybrid genre. Radio drama is a highly interdisciplinary field, combining elements that are central to theater, radio broadcasting, mass communications, psychology, sociology, anthropology, and literature. The contemporary scholar may study radio drama through many diverse entry points including semiology, phenomenology, cultural studies, feminism, Marxist criticism, media studies, epistemology of radio, narratology, psychoanalysis, and reception theory, all the while referring to the genre under various headings.5 Scholars and practitioners refer to the genre by the terms radio drama, radio theater, audio drama, and audio theater. The first two strike more deeply at the historical aspect of the genre. Practitioners employ the latter two in the digital age of the genre. The term radio restricts its application exclusively to dramas produced and broadcast for that particular medium. The term audio suggests anything aural or acoustic. Dramas broadcast via the Internet are audio dramas, but not necessarily radio dramas. I will employ the term radio drama throughout this dissertation when referring to the radio works examined here within. This term permits the inclusion of texts that do not fit within the rigid parameters of traditional theatrical works.
6

Alan Beck and Tim Crook have approached the study of radio drama from many of the above-mentioned angles. See Becks Playing by Ear: New Ways of Teaching and Research Radio Drama. Studies in Theatre and Performance (2000). <http://www.ukc.ac.uk/sdfva/stp/index.html>. 6 Radio drama remains the most common label for the genre. Contemporary British scholars and radio drama producers, including John Drakakis, Peter Lewis, Alan Beck, and Tim Crook, prefer this term. Val Gielgud, radio drama producer at the BBC from 1929 to 1963 and author of approximately forty radio plays, preferred the term radio theater. Tony Polermo, radio dramatist and composer working in Los

Radio Drama: History of Function and Form Radio drama is the product of five continents. It is the fruit of littraires and dramaturges of both developed and developing lands who have worked to fashion and to forge works that reflect the cultural identity and political climates of nations. Radio dramas draw from existing literary and poetic texts. The earliest radio dramatists are indebted to novelists, poets, and playwrights of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries whose works were first adapted for the radio. One of the greatest ironies of radio drama is that extremely talented and well-respected writers who have chosen to specialize in this field remain unknown by the vast majority of the academic world. Therefore, it is no great mystery that many writers in the 1920s and 1930s who could have become radio dramatists avoided this popular medium and chose instead to focus their energies on writing stage dramas. Radio rapidly established itself as a medium for storytelling during the first period of the radio experiment in the early 1920s, which for the purposes of this study, corresponds to the development of radio technology from 1873 to 1938. Among the earliest radio plays that were written expressly for this new medium included Through the Steppes of Winter (1924) in England, Marmoto (1924) in France, Zauberei auf dem Sender (1924) in Germany, and The Smith Family (1925) in the United States. Some of the most well-known writers and filmmakers throughout the world participated in the rapid expansion of the genre during the 1930s and 1940s. Italian director Federico Fellini, famous for his film 8 (1963), experimented in radio drama in
Angeles, utilizes the terms audio drama and audio theater. The latter two terms are more appropriate for digitally-based dramas, broadcast over the internet. 7 In Chapter 4 of Radio Drama: Theory and Practice London: Routledge, 1999, Tim Crook divides radio
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the 1940s before blazing a trail in cinema. Archibald MacLeish, Norman Corwin, and Arthur Miller, three renowned American dramatists, wrote radio dramas of outstanding literary quality that remain some of the most studied to this day. Radio drama consists of five principal categories: 1. Adaptations: Radio dramas function as an opportunity to adapt novels, short stories, poems, and stage dramas. This has been prevalent throughout Western European countries. England, France, Germany and Italy, in particular, possess extensive archives of scripts and recordings confirming radio drama's commitment to produce their country's leading writers and playwrights as well as to adapt the worlds greatest literary works into the local language. 2. Serials: Radio drama regularly appears in the form of long running series (serials) that permit the radio dramatist and the listener to delve into the society, mores, and political views of a particular group of people over an extended period of time. The popular serial has been important throughout the history of radio drama in England, France, and most notably, in the United States. Examples from the United States include Lone Ranger (1933-1955), The Shadow (1936-1954), and Gunsmoke (1952-1961). Following their runs in radio, many popular radio serials enjoyed long runs in the television medium as well. 3. Patriotic drama: Radio drama functions to illustrate the cultural identity of a nation. Radio dramas with a heavy nationalistic overtone are ubiquitous in Western literature. An example of this type is the Canadian series Nazi Eyes on Canada (1942). This radio

drama into six ages. I divide French radio drama into three periods: 1922-1938, 1939-1945, 1946-1973.

dramatic serial urged the Canadian people to unite in order to prevent a potential Nazi invasion. 4. Didactic drama: Radio dramas serve to educate, warn, and improve society by combining information and entertainment. The radio serial The Archers, which has aired on BBC radio since 1951, was developed to inform the listening public of ways to enhance farming efficiency during the period of rationing that began during World War II. Godfrey Baseley, producer of the program, hoped that farmers would listen to the stories and pick up information that would help them provide for a Britain still subject to food rationing. The serial continued with this educational purpose until 1972. This type of drama is referred to as social action drama. Such a dramatic form is particularly useful in educating the listening public on issues that are pertinent within society. 5. Propagandistic drama: Radio drama is used as an instrument of propaganda and war. This occurs when conventional dramas and series are constructed to manipulate listeners ideologically. The Office of Strategic Services, the predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency, used audio drama techniques to simulate the sound of a non-existent Army and Air Force in order to overthrow a left-wing government in Guatemala during World War II. The Nazis created an extensive body of radio dramas designed to promulgate National Socialist ideologies during the 1930s and 1940s.
9 8

The Archers is one of the most successful BBC radio dramas of all time and continues to be produced to this date. The series reached episode number 13,546 as of March 17, 2001. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/archers/info/>. See 7 Things to Know about the Archers, (The Sunday Herald October 30, 2005). 9 For more on National Socialist radio drama, see Gerhard Hays Rundfunk und Hrspiel als Fhrungsmittel des Nationalsozialismus in Horst Denklers Die Deutsche Literatur im Dritten Reich Stuttgart: Aufl, 1976.

United States The United States has always had the largest radio industry in the world. From the 1920s, through the Golden Age of Radio in the 1930s and 1940s, to the coexistence of radio with television beginning in the 1950s, radio drama played an important role in the definition of twentieth century American culture. American radio drama represented an extraordinarily rich popular medium. Various genres and styles emerged, including suspense series, childrens serials, womens dramas, science fiction, and westerns. Full-scale U.S. radio drama production began in 1926 when NBC and CBS started to distribute network programs. Programming included concerts of dance and jazz music as well as radio dramas. Among the first and most popular radio programs was Samn Henry, which dbuted on Chicagos WGN radio on January 12, 1926 and included a newspaper cartoon strip in the Chicago Daily News (Frank Buxton and Bill Owen, The Big Broadcast: 1920-1950 13). NBC Network adopted the program as Amosn Andy in 1928. Amosn Andy told the story of African-Americans who had migrated from the South to make their fortune in Chicago (whites Freeman Fisher Gosden and Charles Correll played the lead roles). African-American actors played supporting AfricanAmerican roles. There is little question that Amosn Andy, which aired on the radio until 1960, is the most popular drama series in the history of American radio. This does not mean that the series did not provoke controversy.10 In fact, the program seriously divided the African-American community.

10

See Bob Greenbergs video entitled Amos n Andy anatomy of a controversy Avery, Burbank (1986).

Numerous celebrated American playwrights, such as Archibald MacLeish, Arthur Miller, and Norman Corwin, became involved in radio drama during the 1930s and 1940s. Many playwrights realized that radio presented yet another forum to display their literary talents. Playwrights adapted many novels, short stories and poems to the radio medium, and this included not only American literary works, but works from other world languages adapted into English as well. In the late 1930s, radio theater groups formed in order to bring these works to the listening public. Mercury Theater on the Air became the most famous American radio theater group of the era. The Mercury Theater on the Air began as a summer series of nine episodes on CBS-affiliated stations in the United States and in Canada on the CBC. Mercury Theater on the Air became the first time that a theater company operated with the single aim of bringing drama to the radio, presenting hour-long dramatizations of classic novels. Orson Welles directed and produced some of the most multitalented and imaginative minds in the history of radio entertainment. During this series of episodes, Orson Welles created the best known show in radio history: the radio adaptation of H.G. Wells The War of the Worlds. The Mercury Theater on the Air broadcast The War of the Worlds on October 30, 1938, the seventeenth show in the series. At its broadcast, the United States experienced a mild mass hysteria, particularly on the East Coast in New York and New Jersey. Numerous listeners believed that a Martian invasion had actually occurred. As result of the panic that followed the October 1938 broadcast, the federal government requested that no similar broadcast could take place without the listeners being expressly notified that the broadcast was in fact entirely fictional (Buxton 158). 10

The public reaction to this broadcast has prompted decades of research into mass hysteria caused by the media and spawned academic interest in the psychology of radio.
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Archibald MacLeish, Norman Corwin and Arthur Miller contributed to the development of American radio drama. MacLeish created The Fall of the City (1937), an allegory on the mounting risk of war in Europe broadcast by the BBC in the 1930s as well as originally produced by CBS with Orson Welles as the narrative voice in 1938. In addition, he authored Air Raid: A Verse for Radio (1938), which played upon the fear of the American public of an inevitable war. Roger Corwin sought to create a modern-day form for radio verse drama, combining it with a recounting of world events as they were unfolding. During World War II, Corwins radio dramas permitted Americans to understand the implications of the war both at home and abroad. His war-time radio dramas include An American in England (1942), the six-part story of Corwins visit to England which reported war-time conditions there from the perspective of the English, This is War! A Collection of Plays about America on the March (1942), a strong anti-German and anti-Japanese piece of propaganda, and On a Note of Triumph (1945), broadcast on Victory in Europe Day, May 8, 1945. This broadcast commemorated the Allied victory in Europe. It also encouraged the American people to think about the post-war reconstruction and to endeavor to prevent the violence of the war from repeating in the future. Although most famous for his Death of a Salesman (1949) and The Crucible (1953), Arthur Miller developed a rather extensive body of radio dramas in the 1940s that
11

For a comprehensive study of the psychology of radio, see Hadley Cantrils Psychology of Radio New York: Arno, 1971. In addition, see his The Invasion from Mars; A Study in the Psychology of Panic. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1947.

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American scholars are only beginning to appreciate.

12

Millers war-time radio dramas

include The Pussycat and the Plumber Who Was a Man (1941), The Battle of the Ovens (1942), Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943), and Bernadine, I Love You (1944). Miller created these dramas for the Columbia Workshop (CBS). American radio drama was instrumental in the development of American television in the 1950s. The listening publics experience with radio and with radio drama serials aided in initiating the listening public to the television programming that Americans were experiencing for the first time with mild trepidation. Television adapted a number of serials to the radio medium. Among the most popular were Ozzie and Harriet, The Ed Sullivan Show, Gunsmoke, and The Guiding Light, which premiered June 30, 1952 on television and January 25, 1937 on CBS radio.
13

Canada The Canadian Golden Age of radio drama occurred from the 1940s to the 1960s. Because of the fact that the Canadian government decided to support public radio early on through the creation of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), radio drama has flourished throughout Canada. The CBCs support for radio drama literature in both English and French has varied both the form and the content and has attracted an energetic and creative culture of radio drama writing. This time of support has

Robert Martins The Theater Essays of Arthur Miller (New York: Viking, 1978), contains an extensive bibliography and an analysis of Arthur Millers radio dramas. 13 See Frank Buxtons and Bill Owens The Big Broadcast: 1920-1950 (New York: Viking, 1972) for more information on American radio dramas (serials) that were later developed into television series such as Lone Ranger and Gunsmoke.

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encouraged all types of writers, from novelists to poets, to become involved in radio drama writing and production. An example of such a writer is Marie-Claire Blais, an important Qubcoise, who authored a large number of radio dramas. Textes radiophoniques (1999) is a collection of her most important radio dramas, which were written from 1971-1974. This collection includes Deux destins, LEnvahisseur, Le Disparu, Un couple, LExile, and Un jardin dans la tempte. In each of her radio dramas, Marie-Claire Blais explores Qubec society and culture through her characters which internalize events that are occurring around them. Blais enjoyed strong support from Radio-Canada and the listening public. One of the most interesting and thought-provoking radio dramas to ever come out of Canada was a radio drama series entitled Nazi Eyes on Canada, a full-cast production featuring renowned radio personalities Helen Hayes, House Jameson, Quentin Reynolds, Vincent Price, and Orson Welles. It aired originally in 1942 on CBC Radio.
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Nazi Eyes

on Canada is said to be based upon field reports written by Colin Ross, a Nazi spy traveling throughout the United States and Canada in the 1930s. The program was preceded a few weeks in advance by an address given by W. L. Mackenzie King, then Prime Minister of Canada, who implored his fellow countrymen to back the war effort against the Nazis for fear that a Nazi victory might eventually jeopardize the freedoms that Canadians enjoyed. It remains Canadas radio dramatic crown jewel.

United Kingdom

The five parts of the radio program were broadcast on CBC Radio on September 20, 1942, and October 4, 11, 18 and 25, 1942. Alan King, dir. Nazi Eyes on Canada Toronto: Scenario Productions, 2000.

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Playwrights such as Tom Stoppard remain among the most prolific of all dramatists who have written for the radio drama medium. Stoppards stage drama Indian Ink (1995) was initially produced as a radio drama entitled In the Native State (1991). Caryl Churchill, Britains premier female stage playwright, had nine of her radio dramas produced by the BBC until 1973 when her stage work caught the eye of the Royal Court Theater. Harold Pinter and Louis MacNeice are other prominent littraires who dabbled in radio drama while focusing the majority of their energy in the creation of stage dramas. Giles Cooper cultivated the art of creating a dramatic contrast between the interior and the exterior sides of his protagonists. He wrote more than sixty scripts for BBC Radio. Production of his drama The Disagreeable Oyster (1957), along with that of Samuel Becketts Tous ceux qui tombent (BBC Third Programme, January 13, 1957), led to the development of sound studios able to create the sounds required to produce authentic-sounding radio dramas.

Germany On October 24, 1924, the first German radio drama, or Hrspiel, went on the air: Zauberei auf dem Sender, written by Hans Flesch. Zauberei auf dem Sender tested the technical possibilities of radio. Germany has maintained a rich tradition of radio drama, but because of the language barrier, its treasure trove of dramas remains virtually inaccessible to many of the worlds listeners. German Hrspiel remains one of the most significant categories of radio drama literature. The quality and volume of literary criticism associated with it is quite extensive.

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Thanks to Everett Frosts and Margaret Herzfeld-Sanders text German Radio Plays, seven of Germanys most important radio dramas are available to the Anglophone world. This work contains English translations of important German radio drama scripts, an introductory essay on the texts, and biographical sketches of the playwrights in question. The collection of radio dramas includes Wolfgang Borcherts The Outsider, Gnter Eichs Dreams, Peter Handkes Radio Play, and Jrgen Beckers Houses.

France The list of well-known French radio dramatists is extensive. Among the most influential during the first period of the development of radio drama were Gabriel Germinet and Pierre Cusy, who worked together to create Frances first well-known radio drama entitled Marmoto. The ground-breaking Marmoto, written in 1924 and broadcast on the radio in 1936, became the cornerstone of French radio drama of the 1920s and 1930s. This dissertation will examine Germinets and Cusys contribution to the field of radio dramatic writing in Chapter Two. In many ways, the 1930s was the Golden Age of French radio drama. The number of outstanding programs broadcast on the radio was staggering, which indicated the desire of the radio community to take full advantage of the potential of radio to captivate new audiences.
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Radio drama programs were extremely varied. They included

French novels adapted to the radio medium (Les Misrables), university-level lectures, adapted French stage dramas, educational dramas, and social and religious dramas by
15

Christopher Todd lists 201 plays cited by Germinet as the eras best radio dramas in his article, Gabriel Germinet and the Livre dor du thtre radiophonique franais (1923-1935), Modern & Contemporary France 10:2 (May 2002): 225-241.

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well-known contemporary dramatists such as Cita and Suzanne Malard. With its ability to reflect the societal conditions of the times, radio drama became an important means of portraying the popular culture of the age. When considered from a historical perspective, the decade of the 1940s is the most important in French radio drama because of restrictions placed on production and broadcasting. Jean-Jacques Bernard, a well-known playwright of the 1930s and 1940s, witnessed the banning of many of his polemical radio and stage dramas during the German Occupation of France. The high level of German governmental control over French radio broadcasting during the early 1940s significantly influenced the quantity and content of radio dramas produced and broadcast during occupation. The Vichy government controlled Radiodiffusion nationale (1940-1944), one of Frances premier radio stations. A second emanation of Radio-Paris (1940-1944) became the voice of the Germans during the Occupation. As a result, the vast majority of radio dramas created and broadcast within France were produced primarily for entertainment purposes. To find radio dramas that explored and criticized the German Occupation and the war that was in progress, one had to listen to broadcasts that originated from outside of France. England, North Africa, Canada and the United States produced radio programs in French as well as in English that addressed the harsh realities of war-torn Europe. A great number of radio dramas, whose publication or broadcast was censored or forbidden during the World War II period, were produced for the first time during the post-World War II period. Therefore, the era of the late 1940s to the mid-1950s featured many radio dramas that reflected upon the experiences of the French during the war.

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This cushion of several years gave the audience and those producing the dramas the necessary distance to make reflection on the war possible. Censorship did not cease after the Liberation. Watchfulness on the part of French broadcasting directors had not waned. The station manager banned Antonin Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, scheduled for broadcast on February 2, 1948, which was recorded over several days from November 22-29, 1947. Because of its format and controversial subject matter, radio producers in France did not broadcast Artauds radio drama until March 6, 1973. I will examine the radio drama of Antonin Artaud in Chapter Four of this dissertation. Also in Chapter Four, I will examine the defining period in French radio drama sthetics (1957-1973). This corresponds to the first broadcast of Samuel Becketts extensive corpus of radio dramas and Antonin Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, which constituted some of the most innovative and original radio dramas that the world had ever laid ears on. Many of the radio dramas of these two geniuses have been featured in subsequent broadcasts and new adaptations to the present day. Most have been recorded onto audio cassette or are available in other electronic formats. The radio dramatic work of Artaud and Beckett redefined the genre. I will now examine the development of radio in France, the characteristics of the genre as a whole and the obstacles that its architects had to overcome to present drama on the radio. I will highlight the intricacies of this form of popular literature as we begin to explore Orson Welles abandoned mine. This examination will provide an understanding of the importance of radio drama as a part of French popular culture.

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CHAPTER ONE FROM RADIO EMERGES RADIO DRAMA

The Development of Radio in France Before 1914, French forces used radio to coordinate troops as well as to link French strongholds throughout the colonial empire. During World War I, radio played a critical role. In naval and aviation missions, soldiers used TSF (tlgraphie sans fil), or voiceless wireless telegraphy, to organize ships and submarines and to align aerial strikes. On land, troops utilized small wireless radio transmitters to communicate. Under the direction of General Ferri, the Eiffel Tower, engineered and constructed by Gustave Alexandre Eiffel as the showpiece of the Paris Worlds Fair of 1889, became an instrument of war and a radio broadcasting antenna. The military employed the tower as a signal beacon to permit ships to track their position. In the 1920s, the French government sought to come to grips with the potential of radio for news dissemination, politics and the ability of radio to reflect Frances cultural composition. In 1928, the government established the first legislation designed to control the use of airwaves within France. This legislation established a limit of thirteen public and thirteen private radio stations administered by the Ministry of the Postes, Tlgraphe, and Tlphone (PTT). Until the 1930s, radio was a tool of the French military and a toy of hobbyists. From 1933, the Ferri Plan, created by the Chamber and Senate and named after Army General Ferri, regulated public radio stations. The outcome was a nation-wide network of radio stations developed to report breaking news and to broadcast entertainment 18

programs. Radio quickly moved from the hobbyists toy to an instrument of mass media listened to by millions of people per day.
16

The flagship station of this nation-wide network was Radio-Paris. To render state-sponsored radio lucrative, the French government levied a radio-use tax in the amount of fifty francs per annum on each privately-owned radio receiver. When Georges Mandel took over the PTT in 1935, he initiated a law to ban commercial advertising on public radio stations. French radio grew throughout the 1930s, with the number of daily listeners increasing from two million at the beginning of the decade to approximately twenty million by 1940 (Madel, Histoire de la radio 193). The first broadcasting stations came into being through the initiative of radio receiver manufacturers. Stations required listeners to sell the radio that they manufactured, and to create a listener base, each station had to develop programming that appealed to listeners. Radio stations increased the number of daily programming hours throughout the 1930s. In 1933, public station Radio-Rennes increased its programming to seventy-five hours per week (Brochand, Histoire gnrale de la radio v1 327). Radio-Cit, a private station that began in 1935 with forty-two hours of programming per week, offered one hundred twenty-six hours of programming in 1936 (Madel, Histoire de la radio 238). In 1937, rural areas in France such as the Massif Central and mountainous regions such as the Alps had less than one

In Histoire de la radio des annes trente: du sans-filiste lauditeur, Paris: Anthropos Economica, 1994, Ccile Madel profiles the transition of radio within France from a hobby of the bricoleur to a mass-media phenomenon.

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radio per twenty people. In contrast, urban centers such as Paris and Lyon had approximately one radio per family.
17

The development of French radio stations was unique. France was the only Western nation to witness the simultaneous development of public and private radio stations.
18

The government and the corporate realm competed for listeners, sought a

means to control production of the radio, and worked to define an audience that guaranteed the success of their stations. While state-sponsored radio stations struggled to compete with wealthier private stations, the latter controlled French radio broadcasting by the dawn of World War II. The radio production community in France requested help from listeners in the development of radio programming in the 1930s. In 1936, Poste-Parisien (1924-1940) began an ambitious campaign to obtain public input. More than ten thousand responses containing scripts and other ideas arrived at the radio station. Following this deluge of listener responses, radio stations throughout France developed services to handle the incoming mail that stations received (Madel, Le Spectacle sonore, histoire des mises en scne radiophoniques 216). There were two important elements in the development of radio in France. The first was the struggle between public and private radio stations before World War II that resulted in a government monopoly over French radio stations in the postwar period. The
Andr-Jean Tudesq and lisabeth Cazenave explain this process in Radiodiffusion et politique: les lections radiophoniques de 1937 en France, Revue dhistoire moderne et contemporaine (Oct.-Dec. 1976): 530. 18 In Histoire de la radio-tlvision (Paris: PUF, 1981) Pierre Albert and Andr-Jean Tudesq attribute the late bloom of radio in France to labsence dun statut cohrent; conflits entre postes dEtat et postes privs, antagonismes au sein des postes dEtat entres les associations grantes et les fonctionnaires des PTT, mfiance ou mme lhostilit de nombreux journaux (33-4). In contrast, the United States had only
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second was the use of radio as an means of socialization. Radio remained the principal form of mass communication until the 1950s, when television took away the reins. Control of broadcasting through government agencies made radio a platform for promoting French nationalism before, during and after World War II. The station and the listener base were mutually dependant. Programming producers had to know the type of programming that listeners desired so that they could modify the programming grid to increase audience size. Campaigns such as that of Poste-Parisien played a central role in the growth of the radio station. The barrage of listener scripts that flooded French radio stations suggested that audiences of the 1930s desired to hear French radio dramas. Radio drama was the cornerstone of programming in France in the 1930s and 1940s, during an era when listeners of all ages turned on the radio. As more individuals purchased radio receivers, station programmers broadcast more radio dramas.

Understanding Radio Drama: From Dramatist to Audience In Le Spectacle sonore, histoire des mises en scne radiophoniques, Ccile Madel underscored the fact that limited access to material from the early period makes it a challenge to identify how the radio production community and the listening public perceived radio drama at its genesis: il est malheureusement impossible de sappuyer sur le texte des missions diffuses puisque celles-ci ont disparu dans leur quasi-totalit (211). Madel proposed a means of analyzing la rpartition de la parole, la dure et le dcoupage des programmes, lintervention des auditeurs, les porte-parole et les rles in
privately-owned radio stations, many of which were created by radio receiver manufacturers.

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order to better understand how radio producers sought to define and attract their audiences during this time period (211-212). Before the development of analog and digital recording methods, the radio drama experience existed from the moment that the station broadcast the drama live and the dialogue, sound effects and music reached the audience. Extant recordings from the 1930s and 1940s are few, with many of the earliest radio dramas existing only in script form. With the birth of radio, comdiens and comdiennes found a new theatrical production stage. Madame Dussane of the Comdie Franaise, who had yet to become accustomed to the radio, worked to adapt to acting in the radio medium.
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Actors and

actresses arrived at the studio dressed for the stage, not fully grasping the differences between the radio medium and the stage medium. Few remarks from the early period of radio drama hit the mark like George Bernard Shaws assessment of the radio drama communitys misunderstanding of the medium: You want to broadcast plays; and instead of recognising that the invisible play is a new thing, and cannot be done in the old way, you persist in asking handsome actresses - and well-known pictorial producers - to get up ordinary theatrical performances and allow the public to overhear the dialogue. That is absurd 20 (357). Shaw recognized that since there was no visual element of radio drama, to perform it in the same way as a stage drama was a futile pursuit. He understood that radio drama did

For visual references of actors and actresses adapting to the medium, see photographs in Pierre Miquel's Histoire de la radio et de la tlvision Paris: ditions Richelieu, 1972: 31, 59. 20 George Bernard Shaws comment in the article on radio drama entitled G.B.S. Lectures the B.B.C., which appeared in The Radio Times (November 14, 1925), offered an in-depth contemporary perspective of why so many in the 1920s radio drama community have difficulty grasping this new artistic medium.

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not consist of recording the audio track of a stage drama and playing the recording on the radio. It was a new and innovative format that required modifications of performance and reception. Scholars exploring radio drama have failed to attach a static definition to this form of popular literature derived from the oral tradition. In Radio Drama: Towards a Definition of an Undefined Genre, Renate Usmiani explains: Like most modern art forms, radio drama is a concept fraught with paradox; so much so that I must confess to having been tempted more than once to change my terms of reference from an undefined to an undefinable genre; and I certainly do not propose to come up with a clear-cut definition of the term (405). Radio drama, which had its greatest popularity in most countries before the spread of television, depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine the story in his or her mind. A fluid definition of radio drama permits scholars to explore a wide variety of texts that may not conform to traditional notions of theater. An appreciation of the challenges that radio drama must overcome provides a more in-depth understanding of the paradox of which Usmiani wrote. In the 20th century, some academic departments explored radio drama, but this exploration was limited mainly to universities in the United Kingdom, such as the drama departments in Hull, East Anglia and Kent, and the media studies department at Goldsmiths College of the University of London. Creative writing courses existed within the fields of drama, English, and media studies that included a component in radio drama composition but did not include practica (Beck, Playing by Ear 2.1).

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The resources and budget needed to construct and equip a radio drama production studio remains a major obstacle in exploring radio drama within an academic setting in the 21st century. Universities have had general success in acquiring resources to outfit film and television units because of the obvious fact that their graduates enter into a fairly lucrative profession which permits them to give something back to their programs. There are also strict construction requirements of the radio drama studio. The studio must measure up to twenty feet in length in order to give the actors the ability to move toward or away from the microphone to add depth and texture to the sound. It must be soundproof, containing adjustable sound screens such as those one sees in certain music classrooms to absorb certain sounds and to amplify others. The studio has a cutout for a window through which the producer can see the actors, should he choose to direct from the outside. Radio drama is characterized by the fact that it is under-theorized and borrows theories from fellow media disciplines of television and film. Tim Crooks Radio Drama: Theory and Practice (1999) solidified a radio drama vocabulary, borrowed from radio production, which dramatists and scholars could employ to create and to analyze radio drama. With the growth of television and film in the 1950s, critical studies in television and film emerged, but a critical evaluation of radio drama failed to appear. Radio dramas are enigmatic. Producers rarely have a printed script available of a radio drama, though the Bibliothque Nationale de France stores scripts from the 1930s to the present. For many producers, the radio drama text is the product of the broadcast production. The script is merely a guide on how to produce the drama. Whether in

24

television, film, or radio, scholars contest the notion of text.

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Each radio drama contains

elements that guide the actors and producer in the performance. The spontaneity of certain radio genres (talk radio, sports, drama) challenges this notion of text, which brings such radio theorists as Andrew Crisell to offer the following summation of radio: There is no text (Understanding Radio 5). Radio drama writing demands an approach that is significantly different than that used for the stage play, television, or film. In Writing for Radio: How to Create Successful Radio Plays, Features and Short Stories, Shaun MacLoughlin explains what makes radio drama writing different: When you are writing a radio play, remember two things: 1. That you are writing for a single listener. That single listener may hopefully be multiplied by hundreds of thousands, but you should write the play as if it takes place in the privacy of a single persons imagination. 2. Try to think of what can only happen in radio or audio. In that way you will explore the medium at its most imaginative (13). The creation of a radio drama is a complex process, which is one of unspoken complicity between dramatist and listener. Radio is a writers medium.

Radio Drama: Development and Production For financial reasons, neither stage nor television can afford to take chances with literary scripts that have limited appeal. Stage drama cannot play to an empty theater and
Radio dramatists divide themselves into two camps; those who feel that it is important to respect the original drama script and those who exercise their artistic license. Elaine Guralnick discusses the broadcast product versus the printed text and comes out in favor of the latter: Despite the clear danger - that in reading without listening, we may overlook the radio in radio drama - the demands of close reading should protect against the risk (xi-xii). Sight Unseen: Beckett, Pinter, Stoppard and Other Contemporary Dramatists on Radio. Athens, Ohio: Ohio UP, 1996. Alan Beck (University of Kent) disagrees with
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television cannot sell advertising during a drama broadcast. A drama produced on public television can cost as much as thirty times as much as the same drama produced on radio (Guralnick 83). Since radio is a much less expensive media, it can take the risk of broadcasting lesser known drama that may only reach a small public. Radio drama development is a collaborative endeavor on the part of writers, producers, sound effect technicians, and actors. The producer is responsible for all aspects of production, including selecting the script, choosing the actors, and directing the cast. He balances the business aspect and the technical aspect of production. The radio producer directs actors and technicians to use sound to portray the characters and setting so that the audience might visualize the scene (Lewis 14-15). Unlike television, where production unfolds over a week, or film, where production occurs over several months, radio drama production takes place in as little as one day.
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Such a time-restricted endeavor necessitates a team effort among producers, sound technicians and actors, which explains why many producers select the same technicians or actors to create multiple radio dramas. One of the characteristics of radio drama production that distinguishes it from television and film production is that the radio dramatist traditionally works on its production from start to finish (Lewis 16). This permits the radio dramatist to ensure that the finished product resembles what he set out to create.
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Guralnick. He contends that the broadcast is authorial. 22 As a point of reference, Elissa Guralnick indicates that for a 90-minute radio drama, the BBC allows four days maximum for rehearsals and recording. Much less time is allotted for productions of shorter dramas. Radio Drama: The Stage of the Mind. Virginia Quarterly Review. 61 (1995): 82. 23 Radio drama production is largely uniform and follows a form outlined by John Tydeman: 1. the radio corporation (BBC, CBC, France Culture, NPR, etc.) asks the radio drama producer to produce a drama; 2. the producer schedules a meeting with the writer to discuss the drama; 3. working in conjunction with the

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The radio dramatist employs established radio production techniques and terminology in manipulating sound and music. The smooth movement from one sound to the next is called the segue. This technique is particularly useful between musical elements during which one musical component fades out while the other fades in (Hilliard 29).24 In a radio dramatic performance, it is more appropriately referred to as a cross-fade. The cross-fade is the dissolving of one sound into another. When two of more sounds combine and are broadcast at the same time, this is called blending. This may involve dialogue and music, dialogue and sound effects, sound effects and music, or a combination of all three. Cutting or switching is the abrupt ending of one sound and the immediate appearance of another. The last radio production technique that is important in radio dramatic creation is the fade in and fade out. A relatively simple operation of increasing or decreasing the volume, this technique is frequently employed to fade the music under dialogue, as well as to begin or to end the program. By applying these techniques to manipulate the soundscape, the radio drama producer gives texture to the radio drama. Some radio drama producers choose to stand among the actors and sound technicians. Actor-producers such as Orson Welles stood in front of a podium reading his lines. Radio drama producers frequently work in a sound-proofed control room and direct the actors through a glass window, echoing techniques employed in film direction

writer, the drama is made into a form that can be produced on radio; 4. the producer selects actors who conduct an initial reading and run-through; 5. the producer receives comments from the team of actors, which he then communicates to the script writer; 6. sound technicians meet in the studio to begin to record, mix, and edit the radio drama (Lewis 19). 24 This radio production vocabulary comes from Robert Hilliards text entitled Writing for Television and Radio (New York: Hastings House, 1967). It is the base radio drama production terminology of the postWorld War II period.

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of the early half of the 20th century. As B.B.C. director Jeremy Mortimer underscored, radio drama production is similar to film production: Radio plays are too often packed with words, as if the writer is desperate to fit in as much information as possible to compensate for not having pictures.... But one of the sounds you need in radio drama is silence. Radio is very much like film in its perspective and depth of focus - you can zoom in to things and then leave it quiet (Karpf, The Guardian, 1994). Mortimers assessment involves a manipulation or mise en scne of the soundscape in which the producer places the sound in the foreground or the background, depending upon the desired effect. He alters the soundscape by changing the distance of the microphone from the speaker or by increasing or decreasing the volume. This cinematic directing style gives texture to the radio drama and creates a sensation in the listener that it is she or he who is producing the sound pictures and tracking glances to their targets (Beck, Playing by Ear 1.1). This cinematic technique became one of the most effective and prolific manipulations of the soundscape in radio drama, which continued to be employed throughout the 20th century.

Radio Drama - A Study in Mechanics Radio is an imaginative and innovative medium capable of combining speech, sound effects and music. The popular form of drama makes applicable reader-oriented

theories such as the one presented by the French semiotician Michael Riffaterre. Riffaterre developed his theory in Semiotics of Poetry (1978), in which he argued that competent readers go beyond the surface meaning. The radio drama listener must also move beyond the superficial to incite the power of the imagination. It the listeners

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response that determines understanding. Radio drama allows the listener to participate in the creative process. Some critics consider radio drama a poor facsimile of stage theater and question its legitimacy.
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For this reason, I continue to refer to the genre as radio drama, rather

than radio theater, in order to create as much distance as necessary between traditional stage theater and the radio dramas that I will analyze in this dissertation. We must not think in traditional theatrical terms: stage, actors movement, the curtain opening and closing at the beginning and the ending of a scene do not apply to radio drama. The radio dramatist understands that radio drama is an intrusive literary genre, as the creation invades the privacy of the listeners home. He begins to work on an empty canvas, upon which he adds sounds that allow him to convey the time period and characters, and that allow the listener to visualize the setting. The radio dramatist has the freedom to develop dramas that would be difficult to create on stage or where the cost would be prohibitive in a visual medium, such as fantasy realms or explorations into the subconscious. Radio drama is characterized by its economy.
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Because of the importance of

maintaining a constant listener interest, radio drama is typically shorter in length than stage drama. The radio dramatist competes with domestic activities and interruptions
On the validity of radio drama as literature, see Harold McCartys article entitled Radio Drama not Legitimate? (Players Magazine 10:5) 8. 26 Economy, in this context, refers to the efficiency of radio dramatic language and the production costs involved in relation to those of other media (television, film). Martin Esslin, Head of Radio Drama at the BBC from 1963-1977, explains the economy of radio drama: A full-length stage play can be adequately produced on radio in three to four days or work in the studio...and reaches on its first performance, say a Saturday night and its repeat performance on the following Monday afternoon, an audience between one and a half to two million people - the equivalent of between 1500 and 2000 sold-out performances in a theatre holding a thousand people - a run of more than five years! (6) The Mind as a Stage, Theatre
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such as a telephone ringing, children arguing, or a knock at the door. Should the drama fail to captivate listeners within the first several minutes, they will change the station or turn off the radio entirely (Corwin 132). The audience is not captive, but free to move around within its own private milieu. In principle, the drama begins at the moment that the dramatist piques the listeners interest and ends at the moment that he loses the listeners interest. The opening sequence is the most important element of the radio drama. During this moment, the radio dramatist uses dialogue, sound effects, or music to captivate the listener. Donald McWhinnie, author of The Art of Radio, explains the importance of this component: The radio writer cannot afford waste. He has not to make concessions in order to allow his audience to settle in their seats and unwrap their chocolates, he is expected to intrigue them from the moment that he begins to speak. His sense of drama or poetry or music must operate immediately. It is easy enough to conceive a shock opening in the work of suspense or terror, but every radio script must begin by creating some kind of anticipation, by posing some sort of question. The writer must at least imply some inner tension, which is ultimately to be resolved, if he wishes to involve the listener. It may be through situation, character, atmosphere, or shock tactics, although stunt openings for the sake of it are liable to fall flat; whatever the method, the initial tension must come from the heart of the programme and the first sounds we hear should seem pre-ordained and inevitable - an impression which should subsequently be confirmed and consolidated. (113-114) The opening sequence sets the tone of the drama. Excluding experimental radio dramas discussed in the last chapter of this dissertation, the radio dramatist chooses his style and maintains it throughout. He may develop the story chronologically or begin at the height of the action. He lays the foundation for character development, gives
Quarterly 1:3 (1971): 5-11. Also see Ashs The Way to Write Radio Drama (London: Elm Tree, 1985) 11.

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background information, paints the scene, then focuses his attention on the development of plot. The plot constantly advances the narrative, leading toward its climax, when all the various pieces of the story come together, presenting the obstacles that the protagonist must overcome.
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Character development is an integral component of radio drama composition. Keith Richards, supervisor of the Radio Drama and Features section of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, maintains that the radio dramatists must limit the number of characters to no more than five (22).28 If there are too many characters, the dramatist cannot effectively describe each character to the extent that the character will remain in the mind of the listener throughout the performance. To reduce the risk that the listener will forget characters, the dramatist repeats the characters names, and at the time of performance, the producer uses actors with distinguished voices. The radio dramatists task to create credible characters through the use of sound alone is daunting. He does not have the luxury of writing several pages to describe characters and setting, which forced him to rely upon character stereotypes to stimulate the listeners preconceived notions. An understanding of narration in radio drama development is key to crafting dramas that tell a story and maintain the audiences attention throughout the performance.

Dialogue, Narration and Sound in Radio Drama

Olaf Ruhen contends that there are essentially two types of plot: 1. formula plot in which the protagonist finds what he is seeking; 2. plot in which the protagonist fails to reach his goal. The formula plot is the most frequent, as it is the cornerstone of plot development in American television and film. The second plot type is provides a less predictable ending. In Writing (Melbourne: F.W. Cheshire, 1964): 14. 28 Robert Hilliard states: Because too many voices may become confusing to a radio audience, the number
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The first dramas broadcast on radio included adaptations of traditional stage dramas. In order to compensate for a missing visual component, the radio dramatist had to make effective use of dialogue and narration. The dialogue added flesh to each character portrait, providing a description of the emotional state, social status, and the interrelationship of characters in the drama. The dialogue permitted the actor to create a multi-layered portrayal of a characters demeanor. Since the audience did not see the characters on a physical stage, dialogue permitted the listener to envision the age, physical attributes, and social status of the characters. The dramatist developed dialogue through which the listener distinguished the different characters within his mind and provided a focused and limited understanding of the characters.
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The radio dramatist employed a narrator to present the drama, to tell the listener when changes occured in characters or in setting, and to provide descriptive scenic detail. Radio dramatists frequently employed an omniscient narrator operating either at the intradiegetic or extradiagetic level (See Chapter Two). The narrator used his voice to describe the physical scene that the listener would imagine. The narrator was the real presence of the dramatist in the drama. The omniscient narrator, at the extradiegetic narrative level, remained a criticized, though commonly-used narrative technique, for it offered an easy way for the dramatist to narrate difficult descriptions. First-person narration, at the intradiegetic level where s/he is already a character that is not his/her own, remained a more common narrative approach. The narrator contributed information
of roles should be limited. Writing for Television and Radio (New York: Hastings House, 1967): 262. 29 Alan Beck contends that the radio mise en scne most often forces characters into close-up but denies them contact other than verbal proximity....We live in the moment-to-moment semantics and emotions of the characters.... Radio drama dialogue cannot reach down into the pre-verbal, the mental events that happen out of our reach in the head (Playing by Ear: New Ways of Teaching and Research Radio

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that he had obtained through his own experience and did not have a key to the vast storehouse of knowledge that characterized the omniscient narrator. First-person narration allowed the listener to share the inner thoughts of characters. Among the most interesting forms of first-person narration was the reporter or the commentator. The reporter functioned as a character who often moved from the extradiegetic to the intradiegetic level. He was an eyewitness to the events occurring in the drama or a buffer between the characters in the drama and the audience. In Chapter Two of this dissertation, I will examine the use of the reporter by the mother and daughter writing team, Cita and Suzanne Malard, in the radio drama Le Dieu vivant. The Malards employed the reporter as the main character who guided the development of the drama and related the principal themes to the audience. From an intradiegetic level, the Malards reporter became homodiegetic, appearing as a character in the story told by himself. The radio dramatist used live and recorded sound effects to increase the dramatic tension. At the genesis of radio, sound effect technicians created all sound effects live in the studio, which greatly restricted the range of sounds at their disposal. Such live sounds included footsteps, other characters voices, or doors closing. Recorded sound effects consisted of background sounds such as crowd noise, a howling wind, or the pitter-patter of rain. The dramatists altered the soundscape in concert with the context of the radio drama. The manipulation of the soundscape became more common as radio technology improved in the 1950s and 1960s, which allowed the dramatist to create a sound
Drama. Studies in Theatre and Performance (2000). <http://www.ukc.ac.uk/sdfva/stp/index.html>. 1.3

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configuration that stimulated the audiences mind. Among the most interesting manipulations of sound within French radio drama are those occurring in the radio dramas of Antonin Artaud and Samuel Beckett. In Chapter Four of this dissertation, I will examine Artauds controversial Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu and Becketts main body of radio drama. Through their use of soundscaping, Artauds and Becketts exemplary radio dramatic works pushed French radio drama to a new sthetic level. Music was a component of radio drama that the dramatist had always used with considerable caution. One may have found a lone piano playing in the background or a full orchestra. The radio dramatist employed music for several purposes: as a transition between scenes or between acts, as a integral component of the story (Becketts Words and Music), to fade in or fade out (as in television or film), or as an emotive addition to the dialogue. Evocative music produced an emotional effect within the audience and complements the dialogue. Music contributed significantly to a radio drama, as it was attractive to the ear. It was an essential component of television and film production. Radio drama production had to borrow from these two media, which had enjoyed much success since their geneses. Blending music with coherent dialogue, narration, and the use of live or recorded sound effects allowed the dramatist to create a unique experience for the radio drama audience. In the 21st century, it is no longer necessary for a producer to enlist an entire orchestra, for use of computer-generated orchestral music, recordings of previous orchestral performances, or digitally-mixed sound bands proliferate.

The Radio Drama Experience 34

In The Art of Radio, Donald McWhinnie argues that the radio performance of a stage play can rarely be a completely satisfying artistic experience. It is to some extent a substitute for the real thing, and the more precisely the play in question has been calculated for performance in the theatre the greater the loss is likely to be (153-4). McWhinnie oversimplifies the matter. It is possible to adapt any written work for radio. The radio dramatists task it to transmit the essence of the original work into the new medium, not to simply reproduce the work on the radio. He is a bricoleur, making the new creation his own. As a bricoleur, he thinks of the text as if creating it for the first time, breathing new life into it, and transforming it to suit a new purpose. A successful bricolage, writes Keith Richards, functions equally as well as a drama written exclusively for radio and a good radio adaptation does not even resemble the stage or television script from which it was adapted (122). The adaptation must differ from the original to such a degree that comparison to the original is unwarranted. Typically, the audience that attends stage drama is socially, culturally, and economically homogeneous. Historically, the dramatist knows his audience and portrays specific social types with the confidence that these types of people are not present in the audience (Ash 14-15). With the advent of radio as a means to broadcast drama to a national and international audience, dramatists had to reevaluate the types of subject matter that they brought to radio. Producers broadcast from the classic dramatic repertoire, but such broadcasts necessitated explanation of the historical and social context in which their creators authored them.

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The challenges that the dramatist had to overcome when bringing drama to radio were numerous. The biggest obstacle to overcome was the audiences traditional stage drama disposition. The radio drama audience of the Interwar period was characterized by its heterogeneity, its inexperience in theater, and a lack of knowledge of how to listen to radio. In traditional theater, there is a real, mutual relationship between the audience and the actors on the stage. The reaction of the audience exerts a double influence - on the performance itself and on its reception (Understanding Radio 145). The spectators influence the actors performances and also one another through laughter or any other audible reaction. In live theater, the individual is part of a mass audience and he surrenders his individual reaction to that of the audience as a whole. Radio dramatist Cecil A. Lewis explained the difficult task that the dramatist undertook when moving from stage to radio: The task of the wireless play-writer differs from that of the stage author because, although in broadcasting limitations of inaudible stage business are very narrow, the limitations of action and mise en scne are bounded only by the imagination of the listener himself. The stage author deals in scenes and situations which can be presented to the eye. The wireless author may make use of practically any scene or situation which can be conceived by human thought and imagination (Rodger 14). Lewis noted that radio drama required a different understanding of the human psyche than that required to produce stage drama. Further, it should not be necessary for the announcer to outline the scene where the play is being enacted, or for stage directions to be read aloud; everything should be conveyed to the listener by means of sound and dialogue (Rodger 27). From 1924 to the early 1930s, radio drama audiences frequently attended sound halls and listened to the performance through headphones. Listening, which required 36

great forbearance, was as much a craft as creating the drama. At the broadcast of the first radio dramas, stations advised their audiences to listen to the drama with their eyes closed or in total darkness. The contention was that complete blindness removed external visual distractions and permitted the audience to more completely visualize the events of the drama. For this reason, one often referred to the genre as the theater of the blind. The theater of the blind was just one of the many monikers that radio dramatists and scholars attached to the genre over the last eight decades. George Bernard Shaw labeled radio drama the invisible play, Cecil Lewis called it the wireless play, Elissa Guralnick referred to it as the stage of the mind, and Martin Esslin employed the expression the theater of the mind. They did not all agree on the blindness of the form. Tim Crook, the current Head of Radio at Goldsmiths College, University of London, and the author of Radio Drama: Theory and Practice, fundamentally disagrees with many contemporary scholars and dramatists, stating unequivocally that radio drama is not a blind medium (53-69). Radio drama scholars examine two sides of the same coin. Citing the principal radio theorists of the 20th century, Crook expressed that there is something inherently depressing with the human inclination to establish the concept of hierarchy in any context (54). To refer to radio drama as a blind medium is to say that radio is inhibited by an inferior means of sensory perception.30 Instead of positioning sight ahead of hearing in the hierarchy of senses, Crook maintains that such hierarchy is malapropos. Crook poses the question, what is philosophically different between seeing physically with the eye and seeing with the mind? (54) With an emphasis placed on a mind-

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produced image, Crook remarks that radio drama scholars have overlooked an indispensable element of drama; emotion.
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I maintain that it is this blindness that makes radio truly unique, for it presents the radio theorist, radio dramatist, and the audience with the incongruity that we are able to visualize what occurs on radio or in radio drama without actually seeing what is occurring in the studio. As Andrew Crisell explains in his review of Crooks text on radio drama, to listen to the radio, then, is constantly to experience the delicious ambivalence of being both blind and clairvoyant, of lacking sight and having insight (Review Article: The Rise of Radio Studies 246).
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By the nature of the radio medium,

sight and the imagination work in conjunction with each other, yet they exhibit varying magnitude. The imagination has the power to counterbalance limitations in sight, such as total blindness. The imagination may lack the reality of sight, but its ability to transcend what is real goes far beyond the ability of sight to move from the real to the unreal.

Terry R. Hamblin supports Crooks notion that radio drama is not a blind medium. See Hamblins Radio Drama, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television 2:2 (2001). 31 In Review Article: The Rise of Radio Studies Andrew Crisell, one of the premier contemporary radio theorists, states that Crooks curious insistence that radio drama... is not a blind medium ...cut[s] him off from all the most interesting avenues....it is hard to see what purpose is served by Crooks reluctance to acknowledge the literal blindness of radio, since blindness is the prerequisite of its imaginative power and thus very far from being...deplored as an unqualified handicap (246). 32 I draw attention here to research that has been conducted over the last several years by Paul Bach-y-Rita, MD, Kurt A. Kaczmarek, PhD, Mitchell E. Tyler, MS, and Jorge Garcia-Lara, DDS, all of the Center for Neuroscience and the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Trace R&D Center, at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. In an article entitled Form Perception with a 49-point Electrotactile Stimulus Array on the Tongue: A Technical Note, the above researchers work to develop a practical, cosmetically acceptable, wireless system for blind persons, with a miniature TV camera, microelectronics, and FM transmitter built into a pair of glasses, and the electrotactile array in a dental orthodontic retainer which, through the use of the sense of taste, will allow blind person to see Journal of Rehabilitation Research and Development 35.4: 427. We know that the senses are interrelated (the senses of smell and taste, for example). If the blind can see through the sensory receptors on the tongue, it is reasonable to assume that the imagination has the power to compensate for deficiencies in visual acuity.

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Van Gielgud, radio drama producer at the BBC from 1929 to 1963, explained the paradoxes of radio drama at its beginning: We are all accustomed, in everyday phraseology, to going to see plays, as opposed to hearing them. In consequence, the mere juxtaposition of the words radio and play must imply for many people a contradiction in terms (British Radio Drama 85). The radio medium lacked the elements that made stage drama intriguing: scenery, lighting, and costumes. The absence of the visual component limited the works that radio dramatists created. Limitations included the number of characters presented and the use of stage space. Manipulation of stage space was a complex procedure and involved a comprehensive knowledge of prosemics on the part of the radio dramatist.
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Via the sound medium, he endeavors to recreate the

spatial relationship that exists between characters and between the characters and the audience. Traditional dramatists focus on stage space, while radio dramatists focus on the soundscape. The stage director manipulates stage space by moving characters around the stage, changing the distance between characters, or reducing or increasing the depth of the scene by raising or lowering stage curtains to change the depth of field. The soundscape functions like a physical location created through dialogue, narration, sound effects and music. As Donald McWhinnie outlined in the 1950s, the radio drama audience has a different commitment to drama than its stage theater counterpart. Except at the origin of radio drama when listeners attend performances at sound houses, the members of a radio

Prosemics is the physical position of characters relative to one another on the drama stage. The term paraprosemics applies to this relationship as related to the field of radio drama.

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drama audience have no monetary investment in the performance.

34

There is nothing to

preclude a radio drama listener from leaving the room briefly during the broadcast, or from turning the broadcast off entirely should he lose interest. Since the listener cannot influence the performance in any fashion, turning the radio off may be the best option when the story fails to hold his attention (Art of Radio 36). Radio dramas nature makes it different from stage drama. It is not a collective experience (Radio Drama: The Stage of the Mind 93). Spectators of a live stage drama see the same physical stage, the same characters and prescribed scenery. Such is the paradox of radio and radio drama. Radio is an instrument of mass communication, though when one listens to a radio drama, one is left alone to construct the drama within his own imagination. The listener is an audience of one. The radio drama is a link for us with the rich oral tradition on which literate culture floats like a barque on a sea (Ash 134). The radio dramatist resembles the medieval jongleur, who traveled from carnival to carnival spinning oral tales. The audience of the jongleur uses the imagination to counterbalance the lack of a visual component to the tale. Like the jongleur, the radio dramatists story enjoys a freedom and a spontaneity, the dramatic tension increases as the drama advances, and he adds flesh and bone to his characters and his setting so that his audience might visualize the drama. The radio dramatist also partakes of the dramatic tradition, a theater born in ritual. He inherits the pillars of Aristotelian theater: the unities of time, place, and action.

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The concept of sound houses predated radio drama broadcasting by nearly four centuries. In The New Atlantis and the Great Instauration (1626), Francis Bacon writes of Sound-Houses, which he would install in his utopian universities where we practise and demonstrate all Sounds, and their Generation. (London: Harlan Davidson) 1979: 78-9. In the 1870s, Jules Verne, envisioned sound houses in which students wore headphones and listened to their lessons, music, and drama.

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By manipulating the qualities of the sound medium, the radio dramatist reawakens the sleeping imagination of his audience.

Sound Architecture and the Nature of Listening Since the 1950s, when television reached the masses and dethroned radio as the main form of home entertainment, society has depended upon images created by others to define our world. In the Interwar period, radio listeners were active; they participated in the performance as they constructed the drama within their own minds. Television numbed our aural acuity as we drowned in a sea of images.
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In the wake of the flood of

televised images that have pervaded our homes over the last fifty years, some theorists and radio dramatists have rediscovered the role that the aural plays in awakening the power of imagination. The listener of radio drama encounters a text that he must interpret aurally, and this differs from television and film, where images explode on the screen (silent film is the perfect antithesis to radio drama). The radio dramatist has become a sound architect who structures sound and cultivates its unique properties in order to evoke emotion in the listener that permit visualization. Sound architecture consists of constructing meaning through aural imagery. The sound architect understands the uniqueness of radio and endeavors to use its language to express ideas and feelings. He understands that audio is a process that moves from aural source to the listener and then back to the aural source. The listener distinguishes between the various aural input, the brain decodes the aural input, from which the listener
This idea recalls the main theme of Michel Tourniers novel La Goutte dor (1986). In Tourniers text, the image itself serves to create a vision or perception of a twentieth-century consciousness of the other. Like photography, television defines our perception of ourselves as much as it defines the way that we see
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produces meaning (Ferrington). Aural input includes speech, sound effects, music, and silence. The sound architect knows the limitations of aural imagery and works to facilitate the listeners capacity to interpret the aural input. Each listener negotiates meaning from the aural input that he receives individually and forms mental images of objects and events that he may not have experienced himself. As a result of the power of the imagination, the listener is able to see, smell, hear, taste and touch objects that are not physically present. The smell of a sugar maple, the taste of a warm strawberry, the crackling of a fire, a red sky at sunset, or the feel of the grip on a baseball bat are but a few of the possible experiences that may stimulate the mind.
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Sound defines space.

Aural architecture increases human experience through the brains capacity to create visual representations based on a composite of images produced by an individuals senses. In his article entitled Cognitive Mapping and Radio Drama, Alan Beck underscores his particular radio theory that specifies that listening to radio drama demands a competence in navigating or orienteering through the imaginary scenery via the model of cognitive mapping (1). The mapping to which Beck refers is a two-fold process. Cognitive mapping depends on the ability of the radio dramatist to construct links that will be perceived by the listener. The radio dramatist creates scenery and movements that form a sort of abstract geometry of outlines and a flattening of perspective, and that time-space-motion is compressed (1). The listener perceived these
others. See Susan Sontags, The Image World, On Photography (New York: Dell, 1977). 36 We recall the madeleine scene from Marcels Prousts Du ct de chez Swann from his collection, la recherche du temps perdu, where the power of the senses incites the memory of things past.

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elements through a cognitive process and constructs a visual image of the drama as it unfolds. Don Druker argues that what we hear when we listen to the radio or to sounds depends a great deal upon how these sounds are coded - and coding in this sense involves social, intellectual, geographic, and even physiological factors (Listening to the Radio, 334). The radio dramatist takes this into account when coding his radio dramas. Both radio and radio drama become cultural constructs.

Radio Drama as a Cultural Necessity and a Cultural Construct In the Interwar period, the state of affairs in France made drama a societal requirement of education and entertainment.
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Theater remained primarily a pastime of

the upper crust and continued to exhibit a social and political propensity. Radio leveled the playing field, making theater accessible to all with access to a radio. The range of dramas broadcast via radio, including national and international theater, offered a wealth of possibilities for the radio drama producer and for the listener. Individual and serial dramas enjoyed extreme popularity, which included social action drama, a popular form of didactic radio verse drama that focused on current social issues. When state-controlled and commercial stations in France began to broadcast drama, they shared the same concerns. Broadcasters feared that dramas that had once interested a minority might be unsuccessful when transmitted to the entire nation. For privately sponsored programming, inoffensive drama was essential. Writers created
All types of entertainment, including sports, movies, and drama, increased in popularity following World War I, as Charles Rearick assesses in his work The French in Love and War. New Haven: Yale UP, 1997: Through the press, movie newsreels, and radio broadcasts, these and other sporting attractions became an
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dramatized forms of both classical and popular novels, and socially-minded dramatists such as Bertolt Brecht claimed that drama must be didactic and not exclusively entertainment. Brecht influenced radio theory and many French radio dramatists and he attached a tremendous importance to the power of radio in society. In 1928, he wrote his first radio drama, Der Lindburghflug. Written in a style of theater that informed the public, Der Lindburghflug was a didactic drama directed toward boys and girls. Brecht saw in radio the possibility to inform the people of political problems and also to suggest possible solutions. He wanted to transform radio from a commercial product to a form of communication that improves society.
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Brecht suggests that ...the radio - a technical invention that still must create for itself a mass need rather than subordinating itself to an antiquated, exhausted need - is a grand, productive opportunity for our plays (Silberman 33). Although he wrote about German theater, his vision extended throughout Western Europe. He maintains that our plays are meant for many people, but not for that small elite of snobs who have already seen everything and who claim on every street corner that they are the ones intended.....this elite clearly no longer represents the nation.... (33). Brecht states that if
inescapable part of the life of the times (143-144). 38 The importance of radio in the life of Bertolt Brecht is conveyed in his eloquent poem Radio (1936). You little box, held to me when escaping So that your valves should not break, Carried from house to ship from ship to train, So that my enemies might go on talking to me. Near my bed, to my pain The last thing at night, the first thing in the morning, Of their victories and of my cares, Promise me not to go silent all of a sudden. Translation from Marshall McLuhans Understanding Media. (New York: McGraw-Hill): 1965, 298.

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the stage theater were serving its intended purpose, radio drama would have no reason to exist: If the theatre were doing its duty, then you would find only one person ready to sacrifice at least half of the pleasure of a play, which consists of seeing and the feeling of immediacy, in order to get the other half, listening, in a really cultivated way (34). It was in radio that Brecht saw a theater renaissance. Through radio, theater (drama) had the ability to reconnect with the people and to focus on issues that were pertinent within society. Theater was no longer the puppet of an elite minority. Radio had the capacity to acknowledge that drama was a cultural construct, evolving with the times. French radio drama from the Interwar period was the type of radio drama to which Brecht referred. It focused on social issues and was inherently a cultural construct, and the product of contemporary mores. It was not presented as simple entertainment, but rather as an artistic form that had the ability and responsibility to inform and to transform the public. The procedure of creating radio drama was also a cultural process. Radio drama, as produced by Radio-Paris, Paris P.T.T., Radiodiffusion franaise, etc., was a French cultural object, and since, according to Wendy Griswold, such objects are made by human beings, we must understand radio drama by examining its creation (14). It became a means to express French popular culture. The conditions under which French dramatists and producers created radio drama became an element of this cultural process. The dramatist created the object for a particular purpose; he intended that his drama be heard by an audience and that the audience have the ability to understand the dramas message. This process occurred with the contribution of outside influences. As 45

indicated by Griswold, cultural objects and the people who create and receive them are not floating freely, but are anchored in a particular context. We call this the social world (14-15). At the beginning of this chapter, I explained the mutual dependency that exists between the radio station and the listener base. The station must meet audience expectations or the audience will migrate to a different station, which constitutes part of the cultural process. The producer keeps his intended audience in mind throughout the production process. His success in determining his audience as well as in fashioning a coherent, cohesive drama, will ensure the success of the work. Radio itself became a place of political and cultural opposition. But radio also became an instrument through which the listener could interact aurally with his environment. This new means of communication served foreign policy, propaganda, cultural and religious objectives that no one could have ever predicted. Radio drama began as part of the new radio medium whose parameters were unknown. The French, in particular, were involved in the development of radio and of radio drama. Throughout the Interwar period, a multitude of French writers brought their creative energies to radio dramatic composition, each focusing to cultivate the genres unique characteristics and the genre continued to grow in popularity. This dissertation is essentially an outline of how radio drama developed. I will analyze its key works, both representative and exemplary, in order to illustrate the dual capabilities of the genre. In the next chapter, I shall examine radio dramas created by Pierre Cusy and Gabriel Germinet and Suzanne and Cita Malard, leading collaborative dramatists of the Interwar period, and the popular solo dramatist Louis-Jean Lespine. Our journey into French radio 46

drama of the Interwar period will begin with Cusy and Germinets Marmoto (1924), a somber story of a ship lost in a storm, sending out radio signals of distress. Next, we will explore radio dramatic adaptation in the form of Louis-Jean Lespines Le Procs du loup qui assassina lAgneau, inspired by La Fontaines fable, Le Loup et lagneau. Our journey will end with Suzanne and Cita Malards religious radio drama, Le Dieu vivant, radio-reportage de la passion en 4 journes, where we will witness the Passion of the Christ through the Malards homodiegetic narrator. These radio dramatic works were representative of the nascent genre broadcast during the Interwar period.

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CHAPTER TWO FRENCH RADIO DRAMA OF THE INTERWAR PERIOD

The Rise of the Radio Station: From Public to Private Until 1921, radio had been a tool of the hobbyist. It remained far from impacting mass audiences. On December 24, 1921, Poste de la Tour Eiffel became the first radio station in France to broadcast regular programming. Operated by the Army and under the control of Gnral Ferri, the public station broadcast news, concerts and weather reports for one to two hours per day. Several months later, the private sector launched its own station, which it called Radiola. As the first private radio station, Radiola invented all types of radio programs: the station became the first to broadcast French radio drama and the first to broadcast sporting events. The radio had become both an instrument of communication and a means to entertain. Throughout the 1920s, a host of new radio stations appeared in France. Working in the interest of either corporate entities or in the interest of the state, radio programmers of the 1920s and 1930s saw French listeners as small audiences isolated within individual homes, which was a logical assessment, since individual households owned the lions share of radio receivers. The Ministry of the Poste, Tlphone and Tlgraphe (PTT) created a radio tax to pay for government services.
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Each radio owner owed a tax to the French government in the amount of fifty francs for

From July 31, 1933 to June 30, 1935, the number of officially declared radios (on which a tax was imposed) nearly doubled, increasing from 1,087,147 to 1,996,999 (Robert Chenevier,LEssor prodigieux de la radiodiffusion nationale, LIllustration September 28, 1935, 104). Technical advances made in radio technology permitted stations like Radio-Paris to send stronger signals, allowing the station to reach more listeners.

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every radio owned and a tax of one franc for each radio lamp that was used to power each radio. This law also instituted a one-hundred franc tax on all radios operating within a public area, and a two-hundred franc tax on all commercial radios operating in private restaurants. The tax provided a fiscal foundation for public radio stations, since they could not rely upon the advertising revenue of their private counterparts.
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As a result, public radio stations began to compete on a larger scale with private stations, the former drawing its revenue from the radio-use tax. Under the initiative of Georges Mandel, appointed in 1935 as Minister of the PTT, a plan began to eliminate advertising on state-controlled radio stations that included hiring postal employees to solicit tax money for radio registrations. Postal employees went door-to-door during their regular, appointed rounds to collect registration fees due to the state. Each employee received a two-franc bonus for each new registration collected. This campaign resulted in the collection of more than one million registrations in the first year of implementation and collected a sum totally approximately 150 million francs (Favreau 288-9). With a modest financial base, public stations now offered diverse programming. Mandel endeavored to use the tax money created by radio registrations to fund existing theater projects and to broadcast plays live over the airwaves, as broadcasts of live theater performances became standard practice on public radio stations.
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Mandels initiative

Ccile Madel underscores the fact that by the end of the 1930s, only approximately 54,000 of the more than five million two-hundred thousand radios in France were found in public spheres (Histoire de la radio 200). 41 Although it is not the goal of this dissertation to provide a comprehensive comparison of public versus private French radio stations, it is worthy to note that each had its own unique qualities. Public stations became the voice of the nation: intellectual, didactic, polemical. Private stations became a source of entertainment and distraction for their audiences.

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served a dual purpose: to give suffering theaters the exposure needed to survive and to give audiences the opportunity to attend important plays and hear the nations principal actors. The radio-tax program funded the broadcast of approximately eighty-five Parisian plays per annum, not to mention the numerous orchestra concerts (Favreau 291). From 1922-1935, public stations struggled to offer programming as attractive as that of private stations. Funds were limited to government outlays that fluctuated annually according to various economic factors. Fortunately, public stations benefited from good rapports with national theaters and Parisian orchestras, which permitted the broadcast of their performances, costing the stations very little.
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With tight budgets,

public radio stations could not compete for the most talented directors, actors, and technical crews. The concept of the French listening audience located within the private home dictated the French dramas and songs broadcast over the airwaves. Through music, serials, and news programs, the radio became the mouthpiece of the French people, speaking directly to the masses. Radio shattered the wall that existed between the public and private listening spheres, as stations transmitted a public message into the private home. French radio stations of the Interwar period were inherently conservative, advocating a return to family values. Such conservatism was considered important for France, and was supported, in particular, by the Catholic Church as well as the Right. Radio influenced French culture and French citizens influenced the cultural programs that
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To place these costs in context, in 1938, a public station paid the following rates for plays: one-act play, 37F50; two-act play, 75F; three-act play, 112F50; more than three acts, 150F. Journal Officiel, July 16, 1938, AN, F/43/1.

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found their way onto the radio. Although French society was in a state of transformation following World War I, the family unit remained a solid, safe environment, where French citizens could find a quiet retreat and respite from the realities of the uncertain outside world. A conservative notion of the family centered on the notion that men, working outside the home, composed the public domain, whereas women, filling the traditional roles of wife and mother, composed the private domain.
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Such ideas appeared logical in

the decade and a half following a war in which France had lost so many of its young men. French politicians feared a declining birthrate and the nations focus on pronatalism became apparent.
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In the 1930s, radio programmers centered evening radio programming on the family, creating programs for a family environment that sought pre-dinner diversions for the husband and morning and afternoon serials to please the homemaker. This evolved into full-day entertainment, including after-school and weekend programs for children, soap opera-style dramas for women during the work day, news programming for men at dinner time, family programming after dinner, and adult-oriented shows in the late evening hours. During its promotion period of 1938-1939, private station Radio-Cit boasted eighteen hours of programs, complete with a wide range of shows, offering
In a study on the importance of American radio in the lives of female homemakers, one woman summarized her feelings on radio as follows: In her article, Ruth Palter notes that ...housework is a daylong burden, relieved only by the presence of radio (Radios Attraction for Housewives, Hollywood Quarterly 3, 1948: 251). 44 France suffered some of the highest casualties of any country involved in World War I: approximately 5,623,800 casualties -1,357,800 dead, 4,266,000 wounded. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_war_one>. For more on pronatalism in France in the Interwar period, see Andres Horacio Reggianis Procreating France: The Policy of Demography, 1919-1945, French Historical Studies 19: 1996, 725-754, and Marie-Monique Husss Pronatalism in the Inter-war Period in
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entertainment for both children and adults.

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To promote the success of their stations, owners of private radio stations hired program directors whose programming incorporated popular movements in music and theater. Marcel Bleustein-Blanchet, owner of Radio-Cit, hired a well-known, successful director from Polydor Records, Jacques Cossin, as artistic programming director for the station.
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In his new post, Cossin succeeded in hiring the most outstanding singers and

musicians with whom he had previously worked. Radio-Cit provided the best talent, and offered listeners exciting and diverse daily entertainment. The biggest stars from the public arena now found their way into private citizens homes. Considering radios impact upon French culture in the Interwar period, it is difficult to imagine why scholars have overlooked radio drama and the image of France conveyed by dramatic works broadcast on radio. We must note that it remains impossible to precisely measure the effect of radio drama in France before World War II, as the French government did not conduct any type of listener polling until after the fall of the Vichy rgime. Scant letters written to radio stations either heralding the drama or denouncing it were all that existed. Consequently, radio historians write about the technical aspects of the drama: directors, producers, cast members, duration, the broadcasting power of stations, etc.
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Nonetheless, radio drama comprised a vital part of

the programming grid on both public and private radio stations in France, the importance
France, Journal of Contemporary History 25: 1990, 39-68. 45 Radio-Cit operated under the slogan, Le poste que lon ne quitte plus. <http://100ansderadio.free.fr/pionniers/RadioCite/RadioCite.html>. 46 Jacques Cossins radio drama directing credits included: La Baguette magique, Radio-Paris, July 15, 1937; Un Drame au golfe, Radio-Paris, July 1, 1937; Dans le poste, Radio-Paris, July 7, 1938; Le Justicier, Radio-Paris, November 27, 1938; LEnveloppe, Radio-Paris, February 2, 1939.

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of which Jacques Baudou described as follows: Trs rapidement, la diffusion de pices thtrales quelles soient retransmises des salles de thtre o elles taient donnes ou quelles soient joues spcialement par une troupe de comdiens devant le ou les micros dun studio de radio devint lun des lments essentiels, stratgiques des grilles de programme (17). A study of the impact of radio drama and its reflection on France of the Interwar period is absent from any present accounting of radio of the Interwar period. Since one cannot create a comprehensive directory or evaluation of all radio dramas produced in the period, an analysis of representative radio dramas broadcast remains a first step in understanding the importance of radio drama in the lives of French citizens. In the end, we will better appreciate the culture that radio conveyed and created.
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A plethora of obstacles keep scholars of French radio drama from fully accessing the treasure trove of works created during the Interwar period. Few radio dramas exist in aural form, as they were often performed live in the studio and never recorded on durable media. Of the few preserved until today, most were produced on wax records which archivists have declared too delicate for listening.
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In the post-World War II era,

important innovations in audio recording techniques made the preservation of live broadcasts possible, though few dramas broadcast on the radio were recorded.
See Ren Duvals LHistoire de la radio en France. (Paris: Gallimard, 1980) and Ccile Madels Histoire de la radio des annes trente: du sans-filiste lauditeur (Paris: Gallimard, 1994). 48 We must understand that radio was as important in France from 1930-1950 as television is today. It was inexpensive entertainment, it provided daily news updates and gave the public access to events such as theater and sports, bridging the gap between those who traditionally had access to live entertainment and those who did not have the financial means to attend live sporting or dramatic events. Radio popularized many different forms of entertainment. 49 The Bibliothque Nationale de France (Bibliothque de lArsenal) maintains radio drama scripts. A search of pice(s) radiophonique(s) or similar keyword searches yields little, as radio dramas are listed under the station that broadcast them. The Institut National de lAudiovisuel (INA) in Paris catalogues audio recordings, though its holdings are limited and remain difficult to access. Renewed interest and the
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Many radio dramas included sound elements, and the most elaborate contained musical accompaniments. As I discussed in Chapter One, radio dramas often employed a narrator, who helped to establish the setting and to describe the characters. Sound descriptions replaced scenery. Though popular stage plays were often performed on multiple occasions in front of an audience, the vast majority of radio dramas were performed on only one occasion and remain forever lost into oblivion.
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Because of its

radiogenic qualities, the seminal radio drama Marmoto, authored by Pierre Cusy and Gabriel Germinet, never risked sinking into the abyss.

The Founding Fathers of French Radio Drama: Cusy and Germinet Present Marmoto On October 30, 1938, drama on the radio shocked the United States listening public with a broadcast of War of the Worlds, a radio adaptation by Orson Welles based upon H. G. Wells classic novel, performed by Mercury Theatre on the Air as part of a Halloween special. The live broadcast reportedly frightened many listeners, who believed that an actual Martian invasion was taking place. Welles adaptation is arguably the most successful radio dramatic production in U.S. history, but it was not among the first radio dramas to exhibit such frightening realism. This honor belonged to Pierre Cusy and Gabriel Germinet, the co-authors of Marmoto. One of the earliest French radio dramas, Marmoto, became the cornerstone of a genre that enjoyed tremendous success during the Interwar period.
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Pierre Cusy and

Digital Age may make these works more accessible in the future. 50 In radio, it is said that programs broadcast but never recorded disappear into the ether. 51 The term Marmoto means seaquake. Marmoto was not the first play written expressly for the radio

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Gabriel Germinet brought the radio drama to the ears of the French public in 1924 as part of a radio drama writing competition. Germinet was one of the premier French radio personalities of the Interwar period. In 1922, he dbuted on one of the news programs of Frances first private radio station, Radiola. Germinet served as program manager of Radiola (Radio-Paris) from 1922-1925. Marmoto told a tale of a ship that sends out distress signals while lost during a violent sea storm. Judged by a jury composed of respected members of the French literary community, Cusy and Germinets composition earned first prize in a competition organized by the Impartial Franais, a popular Parisian newspaper.52 Marmotos pure radiogenic qualities (mixing of realistic sound effects and voices) distinguished it from the competitions other submissions. Few radio personalities of the Interwar period understood the development of radio drama in France as well as Gabriel Germinet. Like Marconi, the first inventor to truly comprehend the possibilities of radio communication, Germinet was the first radio program manager in France to appreciate the range of programming that this new medium offered and to completely comprehend the impact that radio drama could have on both radio and theater within France. His earliest work on radio, Contribution ltude des applications de la radiophonie (1923), highlighted his perspective on the

medium, although it had the most impact among early French radio dramas. Other radio dramas from the early period included: Paris-Bethlem, Nol radieux, by Georges Angelloz, broadcast by Radiola (the future Radio-Paris) on December 24, 1922; La Conversation de Circ, by Maurice Privaut, broadcast on Tour-Eiffel on April 14, 1924; Le Concert interrompu, by Benjamin Crmieux, broadcast on Tour-Eiffel on July 10, 1924. Gabriel Germinet claimed to have written another radio drama which preceded the release of Marmoto, entitled La Paix, written in 1923, though there is no record of its broadcast. Marmoto was broadcast in England and in Germany in 1925 and became un classique de laudiodrame (Baudou 18). 52 Marmoto was one of two works cited as ex-aequo during the Littrature Radiophonique competition organized by the Impartial Franais earning this honor for its radiogenic qualities. The Impartial Franais was one of the premier French popular literary journals of the 1920s.

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possibilities of the new medium. In 1924, Cusy and Germinet authored Grand Guignol, a play within a play, in which one of the actors commits suicide on stage. Grand Guignol found its way onto the BBC before its first broadcast in French on Poste-Parisien on January 28, 1934.
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Broadcast with the new title of Prsentation et Innovation du Nouveau Thtre des Tuileries, the drama served as another model for those who had written for radio drama since its beginning. In 1926, Cusy and Germinet published their theories on radio drama in a book entitled Thtre radiophonique: Mode nouveau dexpression artistique, which received critical acclaim.
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Their success jump-started an interest in a genre still in infancy in

France. So inspirational was their work that it motivated the novelist douard Estauni, author of the preface, to comment that Marmoto had permitted him to appreciate une forme dramatique entirement neuve, encore sans lois, ds lors attirante comme les chemins inconnus (Thtre radiophonique: Mode nouveau dexpression artistique v). Station producers of Radio-Paris scheduled Marmoto for an initial broadcast on October 23, 1924, but failing to properly announce the drama during the course of an on air test the day before, amateur French radio enthusiasts mistook Marmoto for a real, live S.O.S. call made from the sea, provoking a mild hysteria among some listeners.
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The Bibliothque Nationale de France holds two of Germinets radio dramas: Marmoto and Soleriana, conte sidral radiophonique en un jeu, initially broadcast on Tour-Eiffel, December 5, 1937. The latter became part of the collection of La Bibliothque de la Comdie radiophonique, headed by Louis Lespine. 54 The second edition of Cusy and Germinets Thtre radiophonique. Mode nouveau dexpression artistique included the original script of Marmoto as well as critiques of the drama published after its broadcast. It is the edition to which I refer in this study. 55 Like War of the Worlds and Marmoto, one of the earliest American radio dramas, Eugene Walters The Wolf, caused similar panic. After its broadcast on August 3, 1922 on WGY in Schenectady, New York, the station received 2,000 letters from listeners. The play contained a scene in which a character screamed.

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Though ship-to-ship communications remained one of the primary uses of radio in the 1920s, amateur radio users ignored the fact that the frequency of the broadcast used by Radio-Paris on that October night laid outside the range of that used for ship-to-ship or ship-to-shore communications. The responsibility for this blunder belonged to Germinet, as he persuaded the producers to conduct the live test of the drama before its official broadcast. Produced by Georges Colin and with music presented by Henri Tomasi, the first broadcast of Marmoto in France occurred on Radio-Paris on April 25, 1937, more than twelve years after originally scheduled for broadcast.
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The listening public received it

well, and critics respected the drama for its use of sound effects to recreate the missing visual component. Like Germinets adaptation of Paul Ginistys one-act play Les Deux tourtereaux, broadcast on Radiola on March 25, 1924, critics recognized the drama for its ability to create une ambiance et transposer visuellement les sensations auditives.
57

The French surrealist poet Paul Deharme stated that it was the first radio he had been able to listen to without splitting a gut laughing.
58

For Marcel Berger, despite its short length

and the rather over-all simplicity, Gabriel Germinet, notre prcurseur tous, a touch-l

One letter stated that a policeman, hearing the scream through an open window, was so convinced by its realism that he burst into the house to find out what was the matter. The dramas success was evident from the fact that, in the fall of 1922, radio dramas became regular features on WGY. We will never know why Germinet insisted on a on air test, but we wonder if it was a mistake or simply a publicity stunt. 56 Georges Colin was arguably the most prominent radio actor-director-producer of the 1930s. He had an immeasurable talent for understanding the requirements of radio drama. His troupe played in the wellknown series entitled France, broadcast on Radio-Paris January 2, 9, 16, and 23, 1938. Colin believed that no traditional stage drama could hold a candle to a well-directed, well-acted radio drama. 57 LImpartial Franais (June 21, 1925), cited in Cusy and Germinet, p. 108. 58 While working for Poste-Parisien and Radio Luxembourg, Paul Deharme was instrumental in the development of radio in the 1920s and 1930s. He is known for his text on radio drama entitled Pour un art radiophonique (Paris: le Rouge et le Noir, 1930.) He died May 3, 1944 before having witnessed the full realization of French radio and radio drama.

57

juste et profond.

59

The drama teams radio work played an instrumental role in the establishment of French radio drama in the Interwar period. During the first two years of the existence of radio in France (1922-1924), few radio dramas had been broadcast. Although the United States and Great Britain had enjoyed increasing success in radio drama by the end of the 1920s, French radio drama was still not very well established: de trs rares exceptions prs, les manifestations du thtre radiophonique ne marque aucune continuit. Des tentatives particulirement intressantes ont t sans lendemain (Radio-Magazine, March 10, 1939, 3). French radio drama matured even more by 1935, under the direction of Wladimir Porch and Paul Vialar, who took over of radio drama programming on state-controlled radio stations.
60

On September 21, 1935, the Tour-Eiffel station broadcast Germinets sinister radio drama Ruysch et ses Momies, developed with the creative assistance of the poetess Huguette Dubois and based on one of Giacomo Leopardis Operetti morali, which told of the Dutch anatomist Fredrik Ruysch (16381731) and his innovations in embalming. On September 29, 1935, Radio-Paris broadcast a second of his sinister plays, created in collaboration with Gaston Revel, pioneer of the silent screen. Entitled La Nuit de Lurzy, it told the story of a lady of a manor who thinks that she and her guest were being attacked by revolutionaries. Two months later, on November 29, 1935, Poste Parisien
59

Dpouille de toute convention, de tout faux lyrisme, de tout emprunt aux techniques thtrales ordinaires, sa pice fait vrai; elle nous saisit, nous treint, nous tient haletant. Nous croyons que cest arriv. Saluons un initiateur! (Marianne, May 5, 1937: 12). 60 En 1935, Wladimir Porch est directeur des programmes artistiques de la station d'Etat Radio-Paris. La tnacit qu'il manifeste pour dfendre la radio aux moments les plus incertains de son dveloppement, en font l'un des pres fondateurs du service public <http://www.france5.fr/echo/w.htm>. Porch served as head of Radio-Tlvision-Franaise from 1946-1956.

58

broadcast Germinets comedy Waterloo ou le respect filial, based on a story by humorist Pierre Cami. Germinet adapted other comic works of Cami, including Le Petit Chaperon rose and LEmpal, the latter presented on Radio-Paris on May 23, 1936 and on Belgian radio on July 12, 1936, and Le Cur de raccommodeur, broadcast by Poste-Parisien on December 8, 1936 and March 16, 1937. Poste-Parisien finally presented Germinets adaptation of Le Petit Chaperon rose on January 12, 1936, together with a humoresque radiophonique entitled Chambre deux that Germinet had adapted from Gerolamo Ragusa Moleti. Critics heralded Germinets transformation of the original in which he introduces a female storyteller into a simple two-character play. He was less successful with an adaptation of Estaunis Le Silence dans la campagne, presented on the TourEiffel station on July 25, 1936. Though douard Estauni championed its cause, the state radio selection committee terminated the broadcast of Germinets radio version of Estaunies novel, LInfirme aux mains de lumire, a psychological drama, stating that it was unwise to adapt works for the radio that were not purely informative, educational or entertainment. Critics lauded Germinet for Soleriana, conte sidral radiophonique en un jeu, based on a comic tale by Leopardi, broadcast December 5, 1937 on Tour-Eiffel with a presentation read by M. Hubert Prlier, in which the sun grows tired of being forced to turn around the earth in the Ptolemy system and longs for a Copernican realignment of the planets with the sun located at the center. Germinets final radio drama was La Madregalia, based on a story by Andr de Richaud, the tale of another ship lost in a sea squall. One of the passengers is a dying man with the ability to speak to the dead. All who approach him think that they can hear the voices of departed loved ones. Presented on Radio-Paris on April 26, 1938, Germinet 59

believed that the play summed up the characteristics of this new dramatic form: De La Madregalia se dgage une des possibilits tonnantes du thtre conu pour le micro: le rve synthtique, inaccessible au thtre scnique. Nos yeux et notre sensibilit ne peroivent pas luniversalit du monde des choses qui, cependant, peuplent les immensits comprises entre la terre et le ciel. Lespace est rempli de prsences invisibles, disait aussi le grand Edgar Poe. Or, cette hypothse est devenue certitude depuis les dcouvertes conjugues aux inventions qui donnrent naissance la prestigieuse radiotlphonie.(Intransigeant, April 27, 1938, 4). Germinet wrote for the radio for the remainder of the 1930s, emerging as pre du thtre radiophonique et novateur impnitent(Intransigeant April 7, 1937: 6.) One of the most prolific radio dramatists of his era, Germinet knew the limitations of the genre quite well. In comparison to other dramatic forms, he found radio drama a limited means of artistic expression: Le thtre scnique tant au cinma cest quune figure de la troisime dimension au regard dune figure de la seconde, le thtre radiophonique serait-il un thtre une dimension? (Contribution lart thtral spcialement pour son application la radiophonie, cited by Roger Richard in Cahiers dtudes de la Tlvision 6). By outlining its limitations, Germinet highlighted its unique strength: the ability on the part of the listener to use the imagination to compensate for aspects that he cannot see. The Impartial Franais announced the Concours de Littrature Radiophonique on May 3, 1924. With a deadline of May 15, 1924, the Concours solicited manuscripts written in French with a maximum of six hundred lines, with an on-air duration not to exceed fifteen minutes. The winning manuscript would receive a prize of five thousand francs, would be published in the Impartial Franais, and broadcast on Radio-Paris. Marcel Berger, Secrtaire Gnral du Concours de T.S.F. at the Impartial Franais and a 60

well-known radio producer, oversaw the drama-writing competition. The jury consisted of some of the most prominent members of the Parisian literary community: Colette, the Comtesse de Noailles, Lon-Paul Fargue, Gabriel Faur, Alexandre Arnoux, Jacques Copeau, Directeur du Thtre du Vieux-Colombier, Fernand Divoire, Prsident de lAssociation des Courriristes Littraires, Edouard Estauni, of the Acadmie Franaise, Horace Hurm, of the Comit du Syndicat des Industries Radio-Electriques, Jean Lorris, Directeur of La Science Nouvelle et ses applications pratiques, J.-H. Rosey An, of the Acadmie Goncourt, and Emile Vuillermoz, radio critic from the Impartial Franais. Convening Monday, June 16, 1924 at five oclock in the evening to select the winner of the competition, the jury narrowed the field of competition to five semifinalists, to whom it granted a final reading.
61

In order to determine which manuscript

submission contained the greatest merit, the members of the jury decided to read each drama as it would be read over the radio, simulating a radiophonique presentation of the manuscripts via a loud speaker. This reading necessitated the installation of a radiodrama studio, made possible through the contribution and expertise of Horace Hume, radio pioneer and an active participant in the nascent genre of radio drama. Finding it extremely difficult to sufficiently evaluate the dramas submitted for the competition, the jury moved to award two first-place prizes, each in the amount of 2,500 Francs, in order to recognize both the best work in literature and the best work for radio (Thtre radiophonique: mode nouveau dexpression artistique 108). The jury selected as best

61

The jury received 427 prose manuscripts, music selections, poems and dramatic pieces. It chose twenty of these works to receive a second evaluation (Luvre, June 25, 1924).

61

work in literature Agonie, by Paul Camille, and Marmoto, by Pierre Cusy and Gabriel Germinet, as the best work for radio. The jury of the Concours de Littrature Radiophonique selected Marmoto exclusively for its radiogenic qualities, recognizing the work of Cusy and Germinet for the contribution made in the technical aspect of radio theater. More precisely, the jury singled out the authors work for their ability to create an ambiance that visually transposed the auditory sense. The Impartial Franais concluded that leur oeuvre, conue pour la T.S.F., ne prend vritablement toute sa signification que dans un casque ou un haut-parleur. La lecture silencieuse ne permettrait pas de se rendre compte des qualits radiogniques de cette composition (June 21, 1924). Because of its controversy and its prize-winning attributes, Marmoto is a worthy place to begin an analysis of French radio drama. Marmoto began with a strike of a gong, and then the speaker (or presenter) read a humorous story taken from a newspaper. The speaker read in a normal speaking voice, the voice faded in, as the presenter distanced himself from the microphone. In the distance, a conversation took place between two men that faded in and blended with the voice of the speaker. The speaker continued to move away from the microphone, and the two men conversed even more loudly, as they placed themselves in closer proximity to the microphone. Finally, the conversation of the two men faded out, and the voice of the presenter cut out. For a brief moment, the listener heard the three voices again, blended together, then the conversation between the two men became unintelligible and the voice of the presenter was indistinguishable. This provoked an even greater desire within the listener 62

both to follow the conversation and to understand the presenter. The presenters voice faded out, and the conversation between the two men faded in to become increasingly more audible, yet low, to give the impression that the audience was eavesdropping on the conversation. Enter the main characters of the drama: Franois, the first male voice, Badin, the second male voice, the Ngresse, the Speaker, and the Director. In the background, intermittently throughout the drama, the audience heard the blending of the voices of five or six men, the laughter of three to four women, the noise of the sea, wind, rainfall, a siren from a boat, and miscellaneous other sounds.
62

Against this foregrounded

soundcape, Germinet laid the constant sound of telegraphic transmissions, Morse code, which faded in and faded out. As Franois and Badin began to speak, the sound of the sea and the wind cross-faded, nearly drowning out their conversation. The two sailors concluded that their journey was perilous. Quel fourbi, exclaims Badin (43).
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In three years as a sailor, Franois had never witnessed a sea

squall as powerful as this one. They placed their hope in the saving power of the TSF (tlgraphie sans fil), though they feared that the storm would inundate the radio equipment and impede its ability to communicate with other ships: Tiens, tout ce fourbi va nous dgringoler sur la tte... Approchons-nous du poste, cest encore l quon tiendra mieux le coup... (44).

The sound of the sea was produced by placing sand in a large metal can and continually agitating it. The sound of wind was made by taking a silk ribbon and rubbing it on a metallic cylinder. The sound of rainfall was created by dropping lead balls onto pieces of wood. The siren was the sound of a violoncello. 63 The word fourbi was slang and signified a difficult situation or mess.

62

63

The sound of the lamps of the tlgraphie sans fil rattled by the effects of the storm and voices occurred in the distance, as if behind closed doors: Passe-moi la corde. Oui, Capitaine. Fais donc attention. Gare la grue. Dgarnissez donc les chaloupes. Allume la lanterne. Y a plus de courant. a va chavirer.
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Badin insisted that there was nothing that could be done to communicate with other ships or to reach help on shore: Nous sommes dans des beaux draps (44). Franois maintained that their only salvation was to somehow repair the lamps of the tlgraphie sans fil. More lamps exploded in the background, as Franois struggled to replace them. A door burst open, and the shock of it shook the floor of the cabin. The wind howled, the rain fell more heavily with an increasingly louder sound. The above refrain repeated, to which the authors added a second refrain: On ny voit rien. Le phare a disparu. On enfonce. Quest-ce quon prend. Vivement demain matin. a va mal. A quand Panam!
64 65

66

In a later edition, Germinet substituted Dchargez for Dgarnissez and canots for chaloupes. Germinet referred to this text as Texte X. It formed a refrain that repeated in the background while Franois and Badin discused the gravity of the situation, serving to increase the dramatic tension of the drama. 66 Germinet referred to this text as Texte Y. It formed a second refrain repeated in the background while

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Inundated by the din of the wind and the pelting of the rain, the refrains repeated and faded out. The wind began to tear open the cabin door as Franois begged Badin to help him to keep the door closed and they closed the door with a loud crash that cut out. Franois began to abandon all hope, Mon petit Badin, je crois que nous sommes bien foutus, cette fois. Le temps est bouch et la mer est compltement dmonte (46). Badin, however, did not despair, for he believed in the saving power of the tlgraphie sans fil: Nous avons encore de la veine, on nous rpondra, peut-tre, sil y a suffisamment de jus (46). The sound of the wind faded in and the voices of the two sailors became incomprehensible as it faded out. Badin continued to tell his companion that the hope of surviving the sea squall rested in the ability of the radio to communicate with passing ships of with the shore. Franois adjusted the frequency, 1795, he proclaimed (47) and Badin began to shout over the radio their message of distress: ALLO, ALLO, ICI PAQUEBOT VILLE DE SAINT-MARTIN, EN DETRESSE PAR 2315'25" DE LONGITUDE NORD ET 1435'40" DE LATITUDE EST. AU CHRONOMETRE DU BORD (dire lheure exacte, par minutes et 67 secondes). UNE VOIE DEAU A BABORD. NOUS DEMANDONS DU SECOURS DE TOUTE URGENCE. AVERTISSEZ LE PORT LE 68 PLUS PROCHE. NOUS NE SOMMES PAS LOIN DES ILES... (47)

Franois and Badin discussed their pending doom, further increasing the dramatic tension of the drama. A quand Panam refered to a city, perhaps Paris, though this was not clear within the text. 67 By inserting the actual time during the broadcast, Cusy and Germinet increased the authentic feel of the drama. 68 The authors of the text presented the distress call in capital letters to indicate that the sailor making the call shouted it over the airwaves. By stating the exact time during the broadcast of the drama, this contributed to the feeling that it was a real distress call and explained the confusion felt by some listeners during the time of the broadcast test, which led to the broadcast ban of the drama for more than a decade.

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The sound cut out momentarily and was choppy when it returned. Franois and Badin feared that no one would hear their radio transmission, so they decided to attempt the S.O.S. message over other radio frequencies. The two sailors repeated their feeble call for help on a different frequency, as they touched the buttons of the radio, there was a moment of silence, followed by the fading in of Morse code. As the transmission reached completion, the audience heard the sound of Franois slipping and falling on the drenched deck of the ship. Franois believed to have split his skull open during the fall as Badin broadcast the S.O.S. message a third time, this time louder than the previous two attempts. The message was cut off by the sound of silence and that of the sound of Morse code. The noise of the wind and that of the rain blended with the sound of the radio transmission as well as the sound of load footsteps striking against the deck of the ship. The rain and the wind cut out. Badin believed that the storm had passed: Le grain a lair de passer. Si a se calme, on pourra peut-tre sen sortir (49). Franois didnot share the same sentiment as his friend: En tous cas, je crois que nous sommes frits quand mme (49). The shriek of a woman cut the silence. She was quickly quieted by Franois, convinced that she would lead to the ruin of both of the sailors. The sound of voices in the distance faded in, and the voices appeared to become closer. In a moment of desperation, Badin and Franois put on their life preservers, thoroughly convinced that the end was near. They made another weak attempt to use the tlgraphie sans fil to reach other passing ships. Badin could not believe that his life was to end in this fashion: Je naurais pas cru venir crever ici, dans cette mer de malheur (50). Franois had not

66

yet lost all hope, as he attempted, once again, to use the saving power of the radio. Badin gave out a penultimate S.O.S. call. Badin collapsed, exhausted by his call for help. Franois gave it one last attempt, but his message was cut off. The sound of a communication being made via Morse code remained audible, blended with the noise of a siren in the distance. The water began to overtake the ship as the sound of water struck against the ships hull. The noise of the sailors struggle to tread water blended with the roar of the wind and the rain beating against the sinking ship. The laughter of several female voices delivered the final refrain: - Arrtez le moteur de la machine faire le vent. - Incroyable. - Lauditorium nen a jamais autant vu...ni entendu. 69 - Radiolo, tu es le plus grand machiniste de la terre. - On se croirait dans les coulisses du Chtelet. - Attention aux dcors. - Faites rentrer la mer dans le rservoir. - Je garde la sirne pour mon auto (52).

The drama concluded as Radiolo and the metteur en scne discussed the success of the rehearsal. The director remarked that the sound of the sea needed improvement and informed Radiolo that they had unintentionally broadcast the rehearsal over the airwaves. Realizing that there was likely to be some misunderstanding regarding the authenticity of the S.O.S. call, Radiolo closed the broadcast by reassuring anyone who might have been listening that what they had just heard was nothing more than dramatic fiction:
69

Radiolo was the pseudonym used by the well-known radio personality Marcel Laporte while at

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RADIOLO - Mesdames et messieurs, rassurez-vous, les hommes que vous avez entendu mourir sont toujours de ce monde, comme notre ngresse dailleurs. Vous venez dcouter Marmoto, que nous avons pu, notre regret, radiophoner, car certaines personnes, qui ont, par hasard, entendu par sans-fil nos rptitions, ont t alarmes au point quelles nous ont avertis 70 des appels(53). The success of Marmoto centered on its realism, its shock value, its modernity, and the recognition of its true radiogenic qualities.71 Although listeners with 20/20 hindsight claimed to have not been fooled into believing that the drama was real, the fact remained that a large number of people truly believed that a ship was sinking somewhere in the ocean and that its ship hands were making calls of distress. The drama shocked listeners, who heard the pleas of the ships crew and remained helpless to do anything to save them. On the evening of October 22, 1924, between six thirty and seven oclock in the evening, radio listeners had attempted to tune into a concert on the radio station TourEiffel, which operated on a wavelength of close proximity to that of Radiola (RadioParis). Many listeners remained confused as to the nature of what they heard, some understanding from the beginning that the S.O.S. call was part of a radio drama, and others dismayed at the level of inconvenience brought about by the Radio-Paris
Radiola/Radio-Paris. In 1926, Laporte became the head on-air personality at Radio-Vitus, operating under the name Radiolus. 70 In addition, the following was printed in the Excelsior: Excelsior a galement publi une intressante interview trs dtaille, que M. Roger Valbelle, son auteur, a intitule: On croyait un cargo en perdition: ctait uniquement la rptition dun drame. Il y a lieu de rappeler galement que la radiotlphonie nest jamais employe dans les paquebots, surtout en cas de dtresse, seule, la radiotlgraphie tant normalement en usage bord pour la correspondance en duplex ou les appels. Les marins nont pu galement se tromper, car le point dtermin au cours de lappel de loperateur radiotlgraphiste est situ environ 1.000 kilomtres au sud de Tripoli. Malgr ces informations et bien que nous ayons annonc le scnario a notre programme, nous avons cru, dans la crainte de trop mouvoir certains auditeurs non prvenus, devoir ne pas prsenter le scnario par sans-fil (Thtre radiophonique 53-4).

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broadcast.

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Many people who had tuned in to hear the concert on Tour-Eiffel thought

that the concert had been somehow interrupted by this call for distress. In spite of the fact that there were many clues that indicated that Marmoto was radio drama and not an authentic S.O.S. call, Radio-Paris opted to cancel the scheduled broadcast. Seeking to calm the tumult created by the broadcast, the station transmitted the following statement at eight thirty p.m. on the evening of October 22, 1924: Nous avons reu un grand nombre de demandes de nos auditeurs qui ont lu dans un journal de Paris que des appels dsesprs provenant dun bateau en perdition avaient t perus par Radiophonie. Nous vous informons, Mes Chers Auditeurs, que ces appels ntaient autres que ceux de nos Artistes qui rptaient dans notre Auditorium un Radio-Drame prvu notre programme de demain soir. Il ne peut y avoir aucun doute sur la nature apocryphe des dialogues entendus car tous les marins savent que les btiments nutilisent jamais la radiotlphonie pour faire leurs appels, surtout en cas de dtresse, mais uniquement la radiotlgraphie. Dun autre part, le point indiqu par les personnages du scnario est situ en plein Sahara, ce qui a d divertir les hommes de mtier qui ont par hasard capt notre radio-rptition. Enfin, le nom du paquebot Ville-deSaint-Martin, nest pas port sur les registres Veritas qui contiennent les noms de tous les btiments du monde entier et naviguant lheure actuelle. Demain soir, vous entendrez donc le premier drame de la mer prsent radiophoniquement public qui nous coute (Thtre radiophonique: mode nouveau dexpression artistique 134-5).

The Minister of the Navy championed a movement to ban the drama from the airwaves, citing that its broadcast could be detrimental to those uninformed who might hear it and mistake it, once again, for an authentic call for distress. The Compagnie franaise de Radiophonie (mission Radio-Paris) drafted a letter, which it sent to Pierre Cusy and Gabriel Germinet that indicated the same:
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The effect of the real was central to the success of radio dramatic works. As a result of the brouhaha created by the broadcast of the rehearsal of Marmoto, other radio dramatists sought to seek the same effect, including F. Marcignys Naufrage en mer produced in November 1924.

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Pour la scurit de la vie en mer, ainsi que pour le bon ordre et la tranquillit publique, il y avait un intrt capital interdire la RadioScnario Marmoto; quen outre, il vaudrait beaucoup mieux, au point de vue de lencombrement de latmosphre et au point de vue du perfectionnement des procds de modulation, que les Postes de radiodiffusion transmettent des auditions musicales plutt que des dcors de bruits (Thtre radiophonique: mode nouveau dexpression artistique 136). The responsible parties at Radio-Paris decided that a sound hall, in which each listener knew that the shipwreck that they heard was part of a radio drama, provided the only appropriate forum for a broadcast of Marmoto. The station limited the broadcast to fifteen attendees. Those invited to attend the broadcast sat in a small room wearing headphones. Newspapers criticized Radio-Paris for its carelessness, which resulted in limiting the sound hall presentation to such a select few: Une pice radiophonique! Quelle joie! La premire pice radiophonique! Une grande premire. Il et fallu y convier le Tout-Paris, et non pas seulement quelques...privilgis. MM. Pierre Cusy et Gabriel Germinet, laurats dun concours de littrature radiophonique, avaient prfr le cnacle la multitude (Comdia, October 25, 1924). It took several weeks for the fallout from the unintentional broadcast of Marmoto to fully settle. When the dust had cleared, critics could more reasonably evaluate the drama for what it was, and not for the turmoil that it had created. tienne Royer published a critic of the radio drama in Radio-lectricit on November 10, 1924 highlighting the positive aspects of the play, which explained its receipt of a share of first prize in the Concours de Littrature Radiophonique. He wrote that dans Marmoto le dcor optique se transforme en un dcor de sons: bruits de la mer et du vent, du tonnerre et des flots. Cette technique nouvelle est encore dans lenfance, 70

mais elle semble appelle un avenir certain (LAudition de Marmoto RadioParis). Royer attended the sound hall production of the drama, though he claimed not to be an expert of the genre. In 1924, few could have claimed to be an expert of radio drama, yet if there were any experts to be found in all of France, Cusy and Germinet would have found themselves near the top of the list. Royer considered the drama rellement impressionnant. Tous les bruits divers et effrayants de la tempte, les clameurs apeures des passagers, les appels prolongs et lugubres de la sirne, le dialogue prcipit de deux radiotlgraphistes, tout cela sentremle alors dans un affreux tumulte, qui a t rendu certainement avec toute la perfection des moyens dont on peut actuellement disposer (LAudition de Marmoto Radio-Paris). He found Marmoto as realistic a performance as the current technology permitted. His major criticism lay in the subject matter of the drama. Royer believed that radio drama, if it were to fully take root, must avoid subjects that likely occurred in reality: Alors, choisissez donc un sujet, une situation tout simplement comique, voire burlesque, et ne tentez point de nous faire avaler un breuvage qui nest quun affreux mlange, bon peut-tre nous empoissonner! (LAudition de Marmoto RadioParis). We should not be astonished that some listeners believed the S.O.S. call to be real. Those who read the script for the radio drama writing competition or who heard the broadcast agree that the performance was so realistic that it was credible to any listener, in particular, to those who had tuned out before the end of the broadcast. The radiogenic qualities of the drama made it appear authentic. Nonetheless, why did this accidental broadcast frighten some listeners when other broadcasts had not? 71

In his book on Orson Welless broadcast of War of the Worlds entitled The Invasion of Mars: A Study in the Psychology of Panic, Hadley Cantril underlined the principal elements that made this particular performance so believable. According to Cantril, central to believability was the underlying fact that early parts of the broadcast were found within existing standards of judgment of the audience.
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Most importantly,

even in 1924, at the time of the radio test of Marmoto, radio was already an accepted means to announce important events. With the first broadcasts on Tour-Eiffel and Radiola in 1921 and 1922, radio endeavored to achieve a credibility that rivaled the written press.
74

Germinet, a journalist and one of the station directors at Radiola,

exploited his knowledge of the power of radio in his broadcast of the drama. The prestige of announcers played an equally important role in the believability of a broadcast. News station producers, product advertisers, and propagandists acknowledged the fact that an idea had a better chance of gaining acceptance if it was endorsed by a person whom the audience knew and respected. Knowing very little about the nature of an S.O.S. call forced the listener to believe Radiolo, who had become one of the most beloved and credible radio personalities at the Radiola station. The realistic nature of the broadcast was further heightened by the description of events that a listener could easily imagine. Far from the description of Martians invading the earth as described in War of the Worlds, Marmoto told the story of a ship caught in a sea storm. The main characters employed colloquial expressions liberally, as would be
Cantril explained that this standard of judgment is an organized mental context that provides the listener with a foundation for understanding. If the material presented in a drama is found within this standard, it is likely to be believed (68). 74 See Chapters One and Two of Ccile Madels Histoire de la radio des annes trente: du sans-filiste
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expected during a moment of absolute peril. The sounds created in the drama seemed authentic: voices full of despair, waves crashing open the bow of the vessel, a howling wind in the background, the pelting of rain upon the deck of the ship. Like War of the Worlds, some listeners did not stay for the end of the broadcast, as they had left their receivers to tell others about what they were hearing on the radio. Others, caught up in the desperation conveyed by the two men, abandoned the program entirely. We must bear in mind that the letters sent to the station stating that the listener never believed the drama to be real were written after Radiolo informed the audience that the S.O.S. call was part of a radio drama performance. Therefore, hindsight contributed to the un-believability on the part of some listeners of the broadcast. In spite of the realism of the broadcast, it would appear highly unlikely that any listener would have taken it seriously had he heard the announcement that was clearly made by Radiolo at the end of the broadcast. Perhaps he would have been excited, surprised, or even frightened, but it would be an excitement based on the dramatic realism of the program. He would not empathize with the victims, for he would know that they were actors, safe within the confines of a radio studio, performing a drama for the enjoyment and entertainment of an audience. Would the listener not have interpreted the sound of the sea produced by placing sand in a large metal can and shaking it around, or the sound of wind made by rubbing a silk ribbon on a metallic cylinder? Would he not have understood the sound of rainfall created by dropping lead balls onto pieces of wood or the lovely sound of the siren as the sound of a violoncello? An experienced radio-drama listener certainly would never have
lauditeur, Paris: Anthropos Economica, 1994. In the 1920s, many French listeners believed that

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misinterpreted these elements, but there were few radio dramatists in France in 1924 (let alone savvy radio-drama listeners) and, for the most part, the radio drama audience remained ignorant of the characteristics of the genre and had difficulty separating reality from fiction. In spite of amassing an additional fourteen years of experience in listening to radio, listeners of Orson Welles broadcast of War of the Worlds also failed to separate reality from fiction. Radio audiences slowly developed familiarity with the medium.
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As I noted early, we attempt to categorize radio dramas either as entertainment, didactism, or propaganda. The lines separating these three classifications are not fixed, as any particular radio drama can function within one or more categories simultaneously. We can best classify Marmoto as pure entertainment, constructed primarily to amuse the audience and illustrate the characteristics of a nascent popular genre. The next work that I will examine, Jean-Louis Lespines radio drama, Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau, advanced French radio drama one step further, as it served both to entertain and to educate the audience.

A Theater of Morality and Justice: Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau Radio dramatic works with themes similar to that of Marmoto continued to appear throughout the Interwar period, including Lucien Farnoux-Reynauds Le Paquebot Tenacity, broadcast on Radio-PTT-Nord on March 7, 1936. Radio dramas that foregrounded radio technology and that made radio central to the drama became
information disseminated via radio was freer from prejudice than that of the written press. 75 It was out of pure necessity that the French ultimately became more skilled in listening to radio and to radio drama. With the Nazi occupation of France and the subsequent takeover of French radio stations beginning in June 1940, the French relied upon radio stations in the Zone libre, peripheral stations, and international stations as a source of authentic information with regard to what was actually occurring in the

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prevalent. From the first on air test of Marmoto, radio producers in France began to more fully comprehend the power of the radio medium. Through the power of radio, noted author Louis-Jean Lespine created a virtual courtroom. Lespines drama was performed June 25, 1936 (en mission enfantine) on Paris P.T.T., under direction by Mme. Claude Ritter, with music by Mademoiselle Yvonne Mab, and admitted by the committee governing the Comdie Radiophonique during its meeting on July 16, 1936. La Comdie Radiophonique, a group composed of radio theater writers, directors, composers and artists, published Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau that same year. The group sought to print radio dramas successfully broadcast by French radio stations and amassed a collection of radio dramas that would eventually make up the Bibliothque de la Comdie Radiophonique.
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The members of the committee found sufficient reason to include Lespine's work among the greats. Firstly, the Comdie Radiophonique favored the inclusion of works that were genuinely original, and more specifically, it was interested in the adaptation of master literary works for the radio medium. Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau is an adaptation inspired by La Fontaine's Le Loup et lagneau. Lespines work remains one of relatively few fables adapted to the radio medium and was one of the first in the collection created for children.
77

One critic of Lespines radio drama stated: ...qu'il tait

Zone occupe. The understanding of how to separate fact from fiction became essential. 76 Lespines other radio drama credit was En marge d'Homre. Hlne, divine parmi les femmes, pice radiophonique en 3 tableaux dont un prologue et un pilogue, broadcast for the first time on Radio-Paris on February 14, 1937. It was also included in the collection created by the Bibliothque de la Comdie radiophonique. 77 Considrant la radiophonie comme le plus merveilleux instrument d'ducation de vulgarisation littraire, il lui a sembl faire, en quelque sorte, un geste symbolique en sadressant, tout dabord, lenfance (Lespine 4).

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mieux fait pour dmontrer la richesse des moyens radiophoniques que telles uvres thtrales solonelles...! (Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau 3). Louis-Jean Lespine served as Director of the Comdie Radiophonique and Secrtaire Gnral of the Association Syndicale des Auteurs et Compositeurs de la Radio. He also worked as a journalist for the state-operated radio station Toulouse-Pyrnes. Lespine enjoyed success as a lawyer and an author of books whose purpose was the protection of animals, creating Les Souffrances et les droits des animaux: confrence faite Genve, au Bureau international humanitaire zoophile, le 14 septembre 1928, Comment faire punir ceux qui maltraitent les animaux (Paris, ditions de la Ligue franaise pour la protection du cheval, 1933), and Bulletin juridique international pour la protection des animaux (Paris, ditions du Conseil zoophile de France, 1951). It is no surprise that he created a radio drama on such a subject. The general public and contemporary critics of the drama heralded Lespine's work, appreciating its ingenuity and its appeal to both young and adult audiences: ...Pour ce spectacle de rentre, nous emes deux uvres charmantes et finesLa premire a pour notre confrere Louis Lespinequi a pris grand plaisir faire enfin Le procs du Loup qui assassina lAgneau. Les enfants qui, plus que les grands, ont soif de justice cet ge est justicier ! se montraient depuis plus de deux sicles rvolts par limpunit dont jouissait le loup aprs avoir gorg lagneau. Louis Lespine leur donna ample satisfaction dans sa pice ingnieuse, alerte, au dialogue plein de trouvailles et cependant si vrai, car chaque animal y tient le langage de sa condition et de son type...Elle est enveloppe dune potique atmosphre musicale compose par Mlle Yvonne Mab. Signalons en particulier la fable de La Fontaine chante en rponse par le Loup, lAgneau et le Chur (From Comdia, cited in Lespine 29).

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Lespines decision to create a radio drama based upon one of La Fontaines fables seemed logical in light of La Fontaines creation of so many fable-plays.
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For any

dramatist and admirer of La Fontaines Fables, the dramatic elements present become immediately obvious. Inherently theatrical, these fable-plays centered on the conflict between characters; good versus evil, powerful versus weak, wisdom versus innocence. La Fontaine himself apparently recognized the dramatic quality of his fables, using the terms comdie, scne, and personnages to describe his work. One critic of La Fontaines fables commented that transporant dans ses fables la peinture des murs, [il] donne lapologue une des grandes beauts de la comdie, les caractres (C.A. Walcknaer Histoire de la vie et des ouvrages de Jean de la Fontaine 364). La Fontaine became accustomed to playwrights adapting his fables into drama. In 1690, Edme Boursault, acknowledging the great fabulists influence upon his work, adapted eleven of La Fontaines fables into a five-act comedy entitled sope la ville. Successful in its day and for decades thereafter, sope la ville was performed 179 times from its initial performance in 1690 until 1777 (Lancaster 836). This type of emulation and adaptation prepared theater audiences of La Fontaines generation, and those of the next several centuries, for dramatic interpretations of his celebrated fables. At the heart each fable was a moral to be ascertained by the reader. Placed at the beginning of the fable, the moral of Le Loup et lagneau read as follows: La raison du plus fort est toujours la meilleure

78

See E. Wesley ONeills A Trend in Fable Literature after La Fontaine: The Fable-Play, The French Review 27:5 (1954): 354-359.

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We must understand and explain the true meaning conveyed in La Fontaines phrase. It was not a true moral, in the purest sense of the term. The expression raison du plus fort signified that the reasons given by the strongest were the best. The reader understood, however, that La Fontaine spoke ironically and that the reason of the strongest was often the worst, though it most often emerged victorious. In Lespines Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau, the wolf was unsuccessful in convincing the judge and jury that the type of raison to which La Fontaine referred was the best. La Fontaines fable served merely as the subject matter and skeleton of the drama. To this foundation, Lespine added a theatrical setting and created a large, yet manageable cast of characters. He gave his characters voices and developed each character by fully cultivating each animals innate qualities. His radio drama represented a true bricolage. As I outlined in Chapter One, when the radio dramatist participates in bricolage, his task is to convey the essence of the original work in another medium, making the new work his own creation. The bricoleur creates the work as if for the very first time, transforming it for a new purpose. Through divergence from the original work, Lespine avoided answering the question of the original authors intention and focused upon reaching another objective: finding justice in La Fontaines Le Loup et lagneau. Louis-Jean Lespines drama began with a Presentation to the audience: Vous connaissez tous, chers petits amis, la fable Le Loup et l'Agneau, et du reste, vous allez la rentendre sur une musique d'Yvonne Mab.
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The presenter argued that since La

Lespine struck two familiar chords with his audience: La Fontaines fables were well-known by the listener; Yvonne Mab was an extremely popular musician in France in the 1930s, who attracted a fair number of listeners by herself. In 1935, the Comdie Franaise presented an adaptation of La Fontaines Le Loup et lAgneau which enjoyed a great success. La Fontaines works continued to be adapted by the Comdie Franaise, including from January 31 to mid-May 2004, with direction by Robert Wilson. A

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Fontaine had given to his animals ways of thinking that were so similar to that of men, we must believe that there are juries within the animal kingdom that are responsible for judging and punishing criminal activity. To this end, the presenter informed the audience that it will witness the trial of a wolf that had been accused of killing a lamb. Lespine painted the portrait of a typical courtroom. In the rear, there was a bench with the president of the jury and his two assessors, all wearing red robes. To their right, the jurors and the avocat gnral in a red robe, who demanded the conviction of the accused. To their left, the accused was surrounded by two police officers, and the lawyer, wearing a black robe, who would defend him. At ground level, in front of the bench where the president of the jury and his two assessors were seated, there was the bailiff's desk, who was wearing a black robe, and in front of his desk, the box where the witnesses would come to speak. All the characters involved in the drama, save one, were animals.
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The courtroom is full of animals who were watching the trial.

81

As the drama began, the audience heard La Fontaines fable, Le Loup et lagneau, sung to the music of Yvonne Mab. The audience was seated in the courtroom and heard different animal cries faded in, the noise of which ended the first sentence of the text. The elephant-president banged the gavel several times to silence the courtroom. He ordered the wolf to get to his feet and to be prepared to answer the questions that would
seond performance ran from September 13, 2005 to January 28, 2006. < http://www.comediefrancaise.fr/saison/saison2005-06/spectacle_saison.php>. 80 Perfomance directions indicated that special animal cries may be employed for each of the main characters in the drama throughout the dialogue to allow easy identification of characters by the audience; an essential in radio drama performance. 81 The cast of characters: presiding over the courtroom, the elephant-Lucien Weber. The accused, the wolf - Claude Meria; the wolfs lawyer, Matre Corbeau- Robert Tenton; Monsieur le Coq, the avocat gnralMonsieur Derroja, of the Opra Comique; Monsieur Durand, a witness, and the heron- Monsieur Le Prin, also of the Opra Comique; Matre Canard, the baillif- Lucien Weber; the frog, a witness - Mme. Claude Ritter director of the performance; the magpie, a witness - Mlle. Madeleine Chabance; the dog- Mme.

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follow. The wolf responded with a groan: Votre affaire est trs grave. Vous avez sans doute motif avouable, assassin un pauvre petit agneau (7). The listener instantly remembered La Fontaines fable of the wolf and the lamb, in which the wolf encountered a lamb drinking in a stream, accused the lamb of disturbing his watering hole, carried the lamb off, and ate him. Using La Fontaines fable as the general skeleton of his radio dramatic work, Lespine continued to deviate from the original text. He completely immersed the audience in the legal process. The listener heard testimony after testimony and awaited a verdict which would ultimately convict the wolf for the crime that he had committed. The drama reached its climax as the jury deliberated the case. A brouhaha of animal cries faded in inside the courtroom as the jury returned its verdict: Le jury dclare que le Loup est coupable (28). The crowd gathered in the courtroom was elated, as the joy in the courtroom swelled. Voices burst out in song: La raison du plus fort est toujours la meilleure and Oui, quand elle est d'accord avec la justice! (28). served. From its initial broadcast, Lespines radio drama earned praise and became one of the pillars of the radio drama collection of the Biblothque de la Comdie Radiophonique. Writing for the Intransigeant, Carlos Larronde, president of the Association Syndicale des Auteurs et Compositeurs de la Radio, found that Lespines drama finally reconciled the fables paradox: Le procs du Loup qui assassina lAgneau ne devait-t-il pasfigurer parmi les plus clbres affaires criminelles ? tait-il admissible que le
Monique Lagrange. 82 The choir sang these two responses; the first was sung by men, the second by sopranos.
82

Justice had been

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coupable tous les petits connaissaient le forfait ne fut chti ? Cette lacune est prsent comble grce M. Louis Lespine, dont la nouvelle pice donne aussi un pendant Poulot jug par les btes. Nous retrouvons, en effet, les mmes qualits dinvention et de dialogue. Chaque animal parle toujours le mme langage conforme sa nature, vraie ou traditionnelle. Enfin la musique de Mlle Yvonne Mab enveloppe le tout de 83 son charme vocateur (Intransigeant, cited in Lespine 29). Lespines drama spoke to both young and old audiences. Throughout the Interwar period, children had become avid consumers of radio drama, often composing a larger listening share than that of adults.
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Families comprised the largest listening

demographic, so it became important for radio dramatists and producers to develop programming that would be sensitive to the needs of its largest audience. Radio dramas emphasizing family values dominated the programming grid of the Interwar period. With the rise of the Popular Front in 1936, the radio began to air dramas with a left-wing agenda, containing its own cultural and social ideological initiatives. Well-received at the time of its broadcast, the purpose and attraction of Lespines radio drama became evident: its basis in morality and justice. Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau appeared during this moment in the mid-1930s when the French endeavored to rebuild the moral and cultural constructs of a nation. It was also the time of the rise of fascism. Touched by the effects of World War I and a difficult period of
Carlos Larronde played an instrumental role in the development of radio and radio drama in France in the 1920s and 1930s, serving as a journalist at Radio-Cit until the Nazis took over the station in June 1940. Larronde directed a radio drama policier entitled Arsne Lupin, presented in 3 episodes on Radio-Cit in 1936. In addition, he authored Thtre invisible: Le douzime coup de minuit; Le chant des sphres (Paris, Les ditions Denol & Steele: 1936) and his work inspired Cora Laparcerie-Richepins radio drama La maison menace; pice radiophonoque en trois actes et six tableaux (Paris, L'Illustration: 1939). 84 In Comdia in 1936, Paul Derm, president of the Union d'Art Radiophonique, wrote: Les enfants qui, plus que les grands, ont soif de justice - cet ge est justicier! - se montraient depuis plus de deux sicles rvolts par limpunit dont jouissait le loup aprs avoir gorg lagneau. Louis Lespine leur donne ample satisfaction dans sa pice ingnieuse, alerte, au dialogue plein de trouvailles et cependant si vrai, car chaque
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economic, political, and social reconstruction in the Interwar period, the French longed for a return to a point of solidarity: a foundation based on morality and justice. They found a common bond in stories like this re-telling of La Fontaines famous fable. The radio drama audience understood the parallels between the characteristics exhibited in La Fontaines animals and those reflected in the world of men. The French saw how La raison du plus fort est toujours la meilleure justified the domination of one individual over another. Lespines drama illustrated how the race of men is composed of the powerful and the weak. As Thomas Cone summarizes, The young and artless should never trust themselves with the wicked and unprincipled....Where cruelty and malice are in combination with power, nothing is so easy as for them to find a pretense to tyrannize over innocence, and exercise all manner of injustice... (292). This foreshadowed the rise of the National Socialist Party (Nazi) and the German Occupation of France, when malicious leaders used their power to subdue. In La Fontaines Le Loup et l'Agneau, the moral soundness of the lamb was reflected in the peacefulness and politeness of his language, whereas the moral ambiguity of the perspective of the wolf was illustrated through his reasoning: the wolf lost the argument, though he still devored the lamb. In Lespines adaptation of the fable, the justice for which the French had longed since the appearance of Le Loup et lAgneau in the 17th century finally was served. Lespine shattered the notion that La raison du plus fort est toujours la meilleure. It was a justice that children understood well, for the teaching of La Fontaines tale had been a part of the French educational system for three centuries.
animal y tient le langage de sa condition et de son type... (cited in Lespine 29).

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In her work on La Fontaine entitled O Muse, fuyante proie: essai sur la posie de La Fontaine, Odette de Mourgues considered La Fontaine strictly as a moralist; an observer of the ways of man, adept at providing a description and assessement of what he saw, leaving the reader to reach his own conclusions. To begin to make judgments of men or to offer punishment for their actions would have made La Fontaine a moralisateur. La Fontaine appeared to offer no conduct manual for men.
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Margaret

McGowan considers de Mourgues assessment an oversimplification. She sees La Fontaine as a moralisateur, arguing that his fables serve mainly to plaire et instruire, which is also the main purpose of Lespines adaptation. McGowans thesis is a legitimate one, which reveals the many levels at which one can read La Fontaines fables. From the beginning of the drama, the presenter told that audience that it was going to witness the trial of a wolf that had killed a lamb, suggesting that since La Fontaine had given to his animals ways of thinking that were so similar to that of men, juries must exist within the animal kingdom that judge and condemn criminals. Unlike the fable, which ended with the wolf carrying off the lamb and eating it Sans autre forme de procs, Lespines radio drama created a forum based on justice and righteousness in which the people judiciously decided the fate of the wolf. As a writer and lawyer, Lespine championed the ethical treatment of animals. When man abused his authority over nature, Lespine criticized him, and when man abused his authority over another, he also subjected himself to criticism. As a result, Le
85

See her Moral Intention in the Fables of La Fontaine, Journal of the Wartburg and Courtauld Institutes 29 (1966): 264-281. On the teaching of his fables in the 19th century, see Ralph Albaneses Le discours scolaire au dix-neuvime sicle, The French Review 72.5 (1999): 824-838.

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procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau moved beyond holding up a mirror to society. Lespine was not an observer of men, providing a description of what had happened, leaving the fate of the matter in the hands of his audience. Like a lawyer, he presented the case to the audience. In spite of the excuses the wolf had presented, Lespine condemned the wolf for his action. The wolf had evaded justice for too long. Le procs du Loup qui assassina lagneau concerned bringing evildoers to justice. The characters that appeared as witnesses of this heinous act insisted that the wolf pay for his actions, for the lamb was innocent. When the radio drama ends and the jury returned a guilty verdict, the joy displayed by the shouting and singing on the part of the animals gathered in the courtroom affirmed that justice and raison are not mutually exclusive.86 Radio stations broadcast radio dramas with a moral center throughout the Interwar period, which evolved into the appearance of an increasing number of religious-based radio dramas. Religious radio works could be found at the genesis of radio drama, and their continued existence during the time period underscored the necessity to broadcast morality. Since the end of World War I, France had been in a rebuilding period, as she worked to restore her population after the casualties sustained during four years of military conflict. An interest in the family and in religion on the radio increased.

Cita and Suzanne Malard: Radio Drama and Religion

With the malaise of the Interwar period, entertaining and didactic radio dramas, such as those of LouisJean Lespine, continued to appear on French radio stations. The Popular Front began to take further advantage of radio as means to disseminate both information and ideology. This resulted in the broadcasting of radio dramas of an increasing didactic and propagandistic nature. The goal of entertaining the masses still lay at the heart of radio programming, and the Popular Front did not miss the opportunity to use the power of the radio to influence culture.
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Like family and religion, radio exhibited its own unifying power.

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Radio had the

ability to bring together the family to enjoy a bit of entertainment, to become educated, or simply to forget, if even for a little while, the problems of the day. We envision a family gathered around the radio, sharing a moment together, being drawn into a new world, or being instructed as to how to better their own world. More importantly, for some radio dramatists, including Cita Malard and her daughter Suzanne, the radio had become the playwrights mouthpiece, advocating over the airwaves a renewal of the Catholic faith. In 1931, Cita and Suzanne Malard composed a collection of poems entitled Radiophonies (ditions de la Revue des Potes) designed to honori the radio, and the two playwrights later developed radio drama with a particularly religious objective. The existence of a mother-daughter radio drama writing team was an anomaly in French radio writing of the Interwar period.
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The Malards were socially-minded dramatists,

fashioned from the same mold as Bertolt Brecht, who maintained that drama must be didactic (and propagandistic) and not primarily for entertainment purposes. They believed that radio drama should be the peoples genre, accessible to all, and that it should treat subject matter important in society. The desire to bring religious drama to the radio was part of a vogue that began with the dawn of French radio.
87 88

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The broadcast of the very first French radio drama,

Let us not forget Brechts poem entitled Radio, in which he evoked radios power to soothe. Among the important female radio dramatists writing in French included Andre Symboliste, author of France-Brsil, broadcast once per week on Radio Nacional, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from February 1, 1943April 20, 1945 and the contemporary Qubcoise, Marie-Claire Blais, author of numerous radio dramas included in the collection Textes radiophoniques (Montral: Boral, 1999). Nonetheless, their work has remained of unestimated importance. 89 On January 2, 1921, the vesper service from Calvary Episcopal Church was broadcast on the premier American radio station, KDKA Pittsburgh. The radio industry early recognized that in addition to these regular Sunday and week-day religious services, the great festivals of the Christian year, such as Christmas

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Georges Angellozs pastoral piece entitled Paris-Bethlem, Nol, radieux, established a foundation for religion-conscious radio drama. Broadcast on Radiola on December 24, 1922, with musical arrangement by Victor Charpentier, Angellozs work is generally acknowledged to be the first French play written for radio.
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By 1936, the Malards had already begun to work on their first religious-oriented radio drama entitled Le Dieu vivant: radio rapportage de la Passion en 4 journes.
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They

envisioned a play based on the Passion of Jesus Christ, recounted over the course of four evenings. By beginning the drama on Palm Sunday, and with the remaining three broadcasts occurring on Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday, the Malards hoped to capture the spirit of Lent and the Easter season, which motivated so many Catholics to attend mass in numbers unmatched at any other time of the year save, perhaps, Christmas. Entertaining and didactic, the Malards sought to take advantage of this Catholic zeal to invigorate their drama and to provide proof to non-believers that Jesus Christ died on the cross and rose again.92 The station producer at Paris P.T.T. scheduled the broadcast of the drama to begin

Eve, Christmas Day, and Easter morning, witnessed a great outpouring or religious expression from all over the civilized world (Spencer Miller, Radio and Religion, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences 177 (Jan. 1935): 138. 90 There is but one extant copy of Angellozs work, which is held at the Bibliothque Nationale de France. It has been lost for some time as a result of reshelving the collections of the library. 91 The Malards other radio drama credits included Central-ternit, broadcast on Radio-Paris on December 9, 1932, L'Impntrable, comdie en un acte, broadcast on Poste-Parisien on June 4, 1934, Les Survivants, broadcast on Radio-Paris on February 14, 1937, La Nativit, vocation radiophonique, broadcast on Paris P.T.T., December 25, 1938, vocation mongasque, pice radiophonique, broadcast on Radiodiffusion nationale franaise on February 27, 1942. In addition, they coauthored a religious text entitled Les Femmes dans l'glise la lumire de Vatican II (Paris: Mame, 1968). Suzanne Malard authored her own religious works: Prisons du ciel (Paris: Plon 1957) Un million de religieuses (Paris: Fayard, 1960), and De Vincent de Paul Jean de la Croix: Mre Marie des Anges, fondatrice du Carmel de Bagnres, 1790-1863 (Monaco: Imprimatur, s.n., 1965). 92 The Malards also created a childrens version of Le Dieu vivant entitled Le Dieu vivant chez les jeunes: drame en quatre journes (Paris: Union des uvres catholiques de France, 1947).

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March 21, 1937. The Malards created an extensive cast of characters, including Jesus, the reporter, the priest, Barthlemy, the Polytechnicien, Jacques le Mineur, The Acadmicien, Mathieu, the Jociste, Philippe, Premier ouvrier, Premier Isralite, Deuxime ouvrier, Deuxime Isralite, the Antiquaire, Premier Pharisien, the Agent, Deuxime Pharisien, the Acteur, a Gentil, a Marchand, the Voix liturgique, the Marchande de rameaux, the Vieille Hinsolymite, the Veuve, Marie-Solom, Marthe, La Dame chic, a child. Georges Colin, one of the most prominent radio directors of the 1930s, directed the drama and read the role of the reporter, the main character of the performance.
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Cita and Suzanne Malard exhibited the same motivation to create La Nativit, broadcast at 8:30 p.m., December 25, 1938 on Paris P.T.T. La Nativit told the story of the birth of Jesus Christ from the point of view of an eyewitness, the berger des ondes, played, once again, by Georges Colin, director of the drama, who leads the audience through the events that led up to Jesus birth. Like Le Dieu vivant, La Nativit included an extremely large cast representing the most prominent participants at the birth of Jesus. Together, these two radio dramas formed the foundation of the Malards faith-based radio dramatic works. On the evening of March 21, 1937, Suzanne Malard presented Le Dieu vivant in front of the microphone of Paris-P.T.T.: Mes chers auditeurs! Au moment de vous inviter faire avec nous un grand voyage, dans le temps et dans lespace, laissez-moi vous prciser dans quel sens nous faisons appel votre collaboration tous.
As I have noted earlier in this chapter, Georges Colin, the well-known radio drama producer, also produced Marmoto (see footnote 56).
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Quallons-nous faire? Avec un respect absolu de toutes les opinions et de toutes les croyances, essayer de vous suggrer, dans son actualit, le drame qui est la base de notre civilisation, et de vous rendre prsent, dans la permanence de son rayonnement, lauteur de la plus sublime parole qui ait jamais t dite lhumanit (29): Aimez-vous les uns les autres! Au bout de la quatrime journe seulement, nous saurons qui est Jsus de Nazareth. Alors, ne nous quittez pas avant litinraire.... (30) As Suzanne Malard finished her address to the audience, the noise of a street in Paris faded in, present-day, the voices of men crying out to sell newspapers, the horns of automobiles, the din of a Parisian crowd, and voices singing in the street. A reporter moved against this sound dcor, wandering through the streets of Paris asking everyone that he met the following question: Qui est Jsus de Nazareth?
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From the people

circulating about the streets, he received several replies: a widow claimed that he was celui qui me rendre l-haut, et pour toujours, le mari et les enfants qui jai perdus, monsieur. SIl navait pas pris sur Lui toute la douleur du monde...je me serais jete dans la Seine. An actor remarks: Qui est Jsus de Nazareth? Cest le plus beau de tous les rles! (34) A worker responded: Jsus...eh bien! Je vais te le dire, moi, ce que cest: un bobard, ni plus ni moins, un bobard (34). The reporter continued to walk around the streets of Paris, asking the same question of anyone that he met, receiving a myriad of replies. The sounds of the city cut in; horns from automobiles, the clamor of pedestrians talking. The second day of the broadcast of Le Dieu vivant occurred on March 25, 1937, Holy Thursday. From the second day, the reporter became an increasingly more essential
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The reporter in the Malards drama functioned like a chroniqueur. His eyewitness account gave the

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part of the drama, both in terms of his function as the narrator of the drama and as a character within the drama. Once again, he found himself in the middle of the action of the drama, as he witnessed the plot by the Pharisees to capture Jesus. He feared that, because he was so moved by the events to which bore witness, that he would be unable to fully recount the details to the listener.
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Before him he saw Jesus as the Last Supper

took place. Jesus washed the disciples feet and told Peter that he would deny him. The reporter plunged the listener into the action of the drama. Day three of the broadcast took place on Good Friday, March 26, 1937. Like the two preceding broadcasts, Susanne Malard first thanked her audience and previewed the third chapter about to unfold. She spoke of the importance of faith and she introduced the reporter, who once again traveled through time to bring the events of the last days of Jesus Christ to Interwar France. The reporter (narrator) visualized these events for the listener, to make it seem as if he was standing there watching the pain and suffering in person. His descriptions painted powerful images: images of blood, sweat, and tears running down Jesus face, Jesus wailing out in pain, the din of the crowd desiring his execution. The reporter felt involved in the crucifixion, that he may have been guilty of doing nothing to help Jesus: Jai peur davoir fait comme les autres, de lavoir dfigur sans le savoir, davoir interpos entre son rayonnement mystrieux et des miliers dmes lcoute un voile dobscurit, derreurs, peut-tre (182-3). The nights broadcast came to a close as the reporter asked the audience to return to the radio Easter Sunday for the fourth and final part of the performance.
drama a realistic, believable quality. This gave the reporter the credibility necessary to convince nonbelievers of the importance of Jesus in ones life. 95 The reporters shakiness contributed to the believability that he was actually witnessing events as they

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The last night of the broadcast occurred on Easter Sunday, March 28, 1937. Like the three proceeding parts, Suzanne Malard presented the drama to the audience, assuring her audience that it would be worthwhile to attentively listen to the impending broadcast. As promised, the reporter was there when they found Jesus tomb empty. He was there when Jesus spoke to Mary Magdalene. He was there on the road to Emmaus, when Jesus spoke to a stranger concerning the answer to the question: Who is Jesus of Nazareth? The audience participated as well. The listeners heard everything that transpired from the time that Jesus was first persecuted, until his crucifixion and resurrection. They saw everything is their minds eye, the images made visible by the narration of the reporter. Cita and Suzanne Malards Le Dieu vivant was a simple religious radio drama, relating the Passion of the Christ, which used extensive biblical references to illustrate a Catholic perspective already well-known in Interwar France. Unlike Cusys and Germinets Marmoto, whose controversy and radiogenic qualities made it noteworthy, or Louis-Jean Lespines Le Procs du loup qui assassina lAgneau, who adapted La Fontaines famous fable into a commentary on justice and morality, Le Dieu vivant, entertaining, didactic, and propagandistic, embraced a return to a French society with a religious cornerstone.
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The Easter season remained the most important season of the Catholic liturgical year and religious programming became an important means to impact the soul of the

occurred. It made his character more human, frailer. 96 In The Medieval French Drama, Grace Frank underscored the fact that French drama was indebted to religious liturgy: For drama, with its distinguishing characteristics of dialogue, impersonation, action and scenic effects, was also latent in that nucleus of all medieval life...Each of these elements actually made important contributions to the medieval stage, but it is primarily to one of them, the liturgy of the Mass, that we owe the beginnings of the formal drama of the Middle Ages (18). This gave religious radio drama its raison dtre.

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nation. Religiously-based radio dramas continued to appear in response to the secularization of French society, including Andr Deleuzes La Femme qui pousa le diable (Strasbourg, March 12, 1937), Theo Fleishmanns Le Peuple aux yeux clairs (Radio-Paris, April 26, 1938), and Hugues Nonns Rencontres Immortelles: Adam et Eve, a radio dramatic series broadcasted from 1935-1940 over several French radio stations.
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The Malards used the radio, which enjoys a unique power to marshal the

spiritual and ethical forces of the nation, to restore the Catholic faith (Angell 357). Evidence of the continual secularization of French society prevailed, a current against which dramatists like Suzanne and Cita Malard struggled. Eugen Weber notes that in the 1930s, ...better than nine in ten French babies were baptized Catholics, but only one third of adults observed their religious duties once a year, at Easter... (186).
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The pastoral drama reached the very core of what radio dramatists and radio producers sought to achieve in the late 1930s; reinvigorating the religious propensity of the French people. Like the Passion of the Christ that unfolded over several days, Paris P.T.T. broadcast Le Dieu vivant over the course of four evenings, beginning March 21, 1937. The broadcast became a ceremony itself, as Suzanne Malard began and ended each
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Secularization had taken an increasingly stronger hold over French society since the 1930s, reducing the number of Catholic adherents. For more on secularization in France, see John Hellmans Vichy Background: Political Alternatives for French Catholics in the Nineteen-Thirties, The Journal of Modern History 49.1, On Demand Supplement. (Mar. 1977): D1111-D1144. Also see Robert Pigotts editorial entitled Losing the Faith, BBC News World Edition January 7, 2005. <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own correspondent/4149645.stm >. 98 Weber noted further evidence of the secularization of French society: In the department of the Seine [Paris] in 1937, 23,223 civil marriages far outnumbered 18,124 religious ones. Baptism shrank more slowly: 94 percent in 1930, 80 percent in 1970. Religious burials receded a bit faster: 70 percent in 1930, 63 percent in 1935. On the whole, though, rituals and their performers waned more or less in step (186). Also see Franois-Isambert, Archives de sociologie des religions 9 (1960), cited in Histoire de ldition franaise (1986) IV, 271.

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installment in similar fashion. The radio drama was a mass, which began with the Invocation, continued with the scripture readings and the sharing of the Eucharist, and ended with a Benediction.
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Throughout the entire series, narration remained the most essential part of the radio drama, much more important than sound effects and music. Through the reporter, this first-person narration remained a credible narrative approach. The narrator became a character in the drama and contributed information that he had obtained through his own unique experience. This narrative technique allowed the listener access to the inner thoughts of the characters. By creating a cast of nearly thirty characters, the Malards diverged from one of the traditional rules of radio drama: a radio drama must not contain more than five characters, for if there are too many characters, the dramatist fails to sufficiently describe each character to the extent that the character will remain in the mind of the listener throughout the performance (See Chapter One). Through the use of the reporter, Cita and Suzanne Malard reconciled this divergence, for the reporter inevitably became the central character of the drama, making all other characters, except Jesus, background figures in the recounting of the Passion. Since the reporter mediated the speech of every character except Jesus, they were only two genuine characters in the drama. The use of the narrator in Le Dieu vivant remained one of the most intriguing aspects of the drama and the driving force behind the telling of the Passion. The Malards
The passion play is one of the oldest dramatic genres of French literature. Among the most important were Arnoul Grbans Le Mystre de la passion (1450), and Eustache Mercads Le Mystre de la passion dArras (circa 1440) and La Passion du Palatinus (Rome, Bibliothque du Vatican, Palatinus Latinus 1969, ff. 221-234; edition Frank, CFMA, Paris, 1922). For more on French passion plays, see mile Roys Le Mystre de la passion en France du XIVe au XVIe sicle: tude sur les sources et le classement des
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discovered that the drama had much greater impact if the audience shared the experience of the action, rather than simply hearing a second-hand account of it. Their choice to create a character-narrator (homodiegetic narrator) indicated a desire to make the narrator an active participant in the story. Employing a narrator that served as our eyes and who directed our attention was inherently problematic. In a sense, the narrator presented a myopic view of the events unfolding. The audience saw one perspective of what occured in the drama and was not free to interpret on its own. However, in Le Dieu vivant, the narrator posed the same questions about the conviction and crucifixion of Jesus as the audience might be presumed to pose. The narrator was responsible for developing what Alan Peacock calls the space of narration. According to Peacock, the space of narration is the location of a semiotics of narration the signs that indicate that a story is taking place (announcements, tone of voice, graphical style), the kind of story it is (genre), how it relates to the broader social world (parable, allegory, moral, simulation, exaggeration, etc).
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Narrative exists as a

shared space, or diegesis, which is separate from but part of the social world. The Story Teller and the Listener meet in the story world (the diegetic level), inside the space of narration. The story world contains the sequence of events. The Story Teller and the Listener also meet at the extradiegetic level, which is the social world. In Discours du rcit: essai de mthode, Grard Genette outlined several narrative moods/voices that facilitate an understanding of Cita and Suzanne Malards
mystres de la passion (Paris: Champion, 1905). 100 Cited in his paper entitled Signs of Telling: Narrative Voice and the Interactive, available on-line at <asp.cbs.dk/cade2004/proceedings/fullpapers/9_peacock_final_fullpaper.pdf>. For more on the semiotics

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narrative approach. His four general categorizations are as follows: distance (digse/diagesis, mimsis/rhesis), perspective (focalisation/focalization interne/internal, externe/external), narrative levels (intradigtique/intradiegetic, extraigtique/extradiagetic), and persons (homodigtique/homodiegetic, htrodigtique/heterodiegetic). The Malards employed a narrative mood in which the narrator speaks (diegesis), which operates in contrast to the narrative mood in which the fictional character speaks (rhesis).101 Narrators in radio drama function as either external from the action (extradiegetic) or involved in the action (intradiegetic). The extradiegetic narrator often becomes a structural necessity, in particular, if the dramatist must describe information that cannot be described, or at least cannot be described efficiently, through action and sound alone. The radio dramatist commonly employs extradiegetic narration as follows: to describe events that have happened or are happening outside the action of the drama, which affect the action of the drama; to create the scene in visual terms that cannot reasonably be explained through sound; to portray important visual characteristics or behaviors of the characters, to describe a flashback; to show that a substantial amount of time has passed; to alter the pace of the drama.

The narrator may stand outside the action without being completely external from it. This is the heterodiegetic narrator. The narrators role transforms as soon as he begins to judge the characters of the drama or if he expresses his opinion of the events.
of narration, see Keir Elams The Semiotics of Theatre and Drama (London: Routledge, 2002). Terminology taken from Grard Genettes Discours du rcit: essai de mthode, Figures III, Paris,

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Heterodiegetic narrators indicate the presence of the writer as a moderator of the action, actively interfering with the audiences interpretation of the drama. This form of narration deeply affects the drama, especially if the narration challenges how the audience interprets the drama. If the heterodiegetic narrator does not represent the writer himself, it may become necessary to make the narrator a full part of the action of the drama; a homodiegetic narrator. Like heterodiegetic narrators, homodiegetic narrators, such as the one employed in Le Dieu vivant, can perform any or all of the same functions as extradiegetic narrators. However, their relationship to the action is much more explicit. It is as if the audience hears the drama inside the head of the character narrating. The homodiegetic narrator can: criticize other characters, suspend the action, in order to describe his own emotions, leap forward or back in time, leave out information that he does not want the listener to hear, transform the words and actions of other characters, manipulate the action of the drama.

Homodiegetic narrators influence the audiences perception in ways not easily achieved without narration or with the help of exclusively external narration. For example: The character of the narrator may be explored in much greater depth because the listeners see into the world of his mind; The emotional impact of the drama may be increased by making the audience feel the characters emotions; The potential for conflict is increased by the homodiegetic narrators ability to expose conflicts to the listener that may not be made apparent through speech or sound.

Seuil, 1972, 65-282.

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The reporter or commentator remains a form of first-person narration seldom employed within French radio drama. Since radio is a blind medium, the narrator functions as the audiences eyes describing the scene, conveying the action, and providing exposition. He is what Genette calls the focalizer. Used to bridge the gap between what the audience sees and what it does not hear, it is an effective means to save time and alleviates confusion that can cause listeners to abandon the drama entirely. Tony Polermo, radio dramatist and composer who has written, adapted and scored numerous radio plays for the Museum of Television and Radios Los Angeles ReCreating Radio Workshops, argues that radio dramatists frequently overuse the narrator, which interferes with the audiences appreciation of the drama. Polermo writes that radio dramatists are like the great and powerful Wizard of Oz working his fire spouting magic show. If you want your audience to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, its best to keep the narrator out of the way... Unless you make him a character.102 By becoming a character in the drama, the narrator of Le Dieu vivant (the reporter) does not impede the development of the story, but rather enhances it. Narration in the form of a reporter or chronicler is not a new concept in French literature, for it has been a component since the Medieval period. Geoffroi de Villehardouin, participant of the 4th Crusade, and Jean de Joinville, participant of the 7th Crusade, created chronicles in prose outlining events of the Crusades to which they bore witness. Villehardouins La Conqute de Constantinople (1203-1207) and Joinvilles Vie de Saint Louis (1309) related eyewitness accounts of battles and depicted life in the East.

102

Cited at <http://home.sprynet.com/~palermo/radio_23.htm>.

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Like the medieval chronicler, the reporter functions as an eyewitness to events, an intermediary between the characters in the drama and the audience, or as a character within the drama. In Le Dieu vivant, the reporter transitions from an observer to the main character, who ultimately guides the development of the drama, relates the principle themes to the audience, and creates the action of the story as he recounts it. At the beginning of Le Dieu vivant, the reporter represented the contemporary non-believer, navigating the streets of Paris searching for an explanation of Jesus Christ. He had to sort through the various explanations that he heard, struggling to determine for himself and for the audience, what Jesus represented in the life of French citizens. His struggle was complicated by the tension created by the sounds of the city; cars sounding their horns and the talking of passersby, which became increasingly more intense. Transported to Jerusalem, the reporter was the eyes and ears of his audience, its proxy, showing empathy for Jesus in the same way that the audience would presumably feel empathy for Jesus. He did not lurk in the shadows, spying on what transpired, but actively participated in the events and interacted with Jesus disciples, creating a means by which the audience could compensate for the absence of the visual component: the reporter painted the scenery and described the soundscape. The reporter made the drama real by creating the illusion that it was occurring as the audience listened. The Malards use of the reporter as narrator in Le Dieu vivant recalled the narrator employed in the Biblical narrative. The majority of Biblical narrative was presented through a single narrator who was omniscient and trustworthy. He created a world filled with characters, described their words and deeds, showed their hidden feelings, and yet separated himself from their world. The characters lived, breathed, and 97

interacted with each other largely without the knowledge of the existence of the narrator. At the same time, through the mediation of the narrator, the words and feelings of these characters were addressed to the audience. The audience had to understand that the homodiegetic narrator walked the line between storyteller and participant in the action of the drama. If he failed to remain an observer, he would influence the events and transform their natural course.
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Employed for a variety of purposes, the homodiegetic narrator did not compete with the authority of an omniscient narrator. Limited by his humanity and his personal involvement in the story that he told, he remained as reliable as possible. The Je and Moi heavily imprinted his narrative. He might, however, quote direct speech of another character in the Biblical account, such as the reporter did in the Malards drama. While the omniscient narrator typically reported direct speech, the absence of such a narrator in Le Dieu vivant necessitated the passing on of this authority to the reporter. The role that quoted direct speech played in the drama strengthened the homodiegetic narrators credibility. In Le Dieu vivant, the Malards presented a narrator that was both active and passive. Due to the absence of an omniscient narrator, the homodiegetic narrator was obliged to take control of recounting the story. His free rein to quote the direct speech of the important participants of the Passion story and to focus on the most essential events (as he saw them), in order to achieve the primary goal of convincing the audience
In many ways, the homodiegetic narrator is a cultural anthropologist who navigates the slippery slope of his field: he must observe a culture in order to understand it, but his observations must not be intrusive to the extent that they influence or contaminate the culture. For an explanation of this, see Gerard Machados Cultural sensitivity and stereotypes in Journal of Multicultural Nursing & Health, Summer 2001. <http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3919/is_200107/ai_n8988486/pg_2 >. This slippery slope
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of the importance of Jesus Christ, demonstrated a great deal of autonomy. His speech remained a commentary on the words of others as he transformed their phrases and feelings into a reality for the audience. On the level of discourse, we must understand the homodiegetic narrator as a component of the narrative.
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If the homodiegetic narrator recounts a story or directly

quotes the speech of other characters, he simply fulfils his role as narrator. The liberty that he may exhibit as a privileged speaker within the world of the drama is offset by the fact that he is also a character created in someone elses discourse. The character that functions as narrator always exhibits a conflict between autonomy and dependence. Why did the Malards create a homodiegetic narrator with such a mixture of liberty and dependence? Why not employ a narrator that was in control of the events of the story or one that remained on the sidelines to comment on the events that transpired? The answer to this question lies in the relationships that exist between author and homodiegetic narrator and between homodiegetic narrator and audience. Though more powerful and omniscient than the homodiegetic narrator, the author fashions the latter to also function as a character in the story. This narrator existed because of literary necessity, for the authors could not reasonably enter the story of the Passion of the Christ
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recalls Alcofribas Nasier in Franois Rabelais Pantagruel. 104 The discourse to which I am referring may be understood in the structuralist sense of the term. See Jonathan Cullers Structuralist Poetics (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1975) 197-200. Also see Terence Hawkess Structuralism and Semiotics (London: Routledge, 2003). 105 The more authority an author gives to a homodiegetic narrator, the more self-effacing the homodiegetic narrator becomes, and the more we see emphasized the supreme control of the author. The more a character holds the role of the narrator, the more he must take on a certain level of passivity, or anonymity, in the interest of objectively telling the story. Since the story told is not primarily the characters story, the narrators story is ultimately an expression of his dependence upon the author for his knowledge and point of view.

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themselves.106 The homodiegetic narrator established his credibility with the audience through his eyewitness account and served as an intermediary between the drama and the audience. By establishing his credibility, he aspired to draw the audience into his world and to encourage his listeners to believe in the veracity of the Passion story. This credibility assured the receipt of the message. In the next chapter, I will examine French radio drama of the World War II period. During the course of this examination, I will evaluate radio dramas produced during the Occupation that reflect the propagandistic and entertainment aspects of French radio drama in the zone occupe and the zone libre. This examination will facilitate an understanding of representative French radio dramas created during World War II and an appreciation of their reflection of contemporary reality.

106

The authors were working against the notion of Catholicism as religion and Catholicism as culture. Because of the secularization of France, Catholicism changed from the cornerstone of French society to merely a cultural component of French identity.

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CHAPTER THREE FRENCH RADIO DRAMA OF THE WORLD WAR II PERIOD

Wartime France: An Entertainment Renaissance Before the onset of World War II, France had already become a diversified country. France contained a wide range of individuals who had endured social, economic, and political change. Whether residing in the zone occupe or zone libre, French citizens had different experiences of the Occupation, though the goal to survive during a time of adversity became a common thread. Between June 1940 and August 1944, France divided itself into two separate administrations: the German authority situated in Paris (zone occupe), and the Vichybased French rgime under the leadership of Marchal Philippe Ptain (zone libre).107 To ease the emotional burden of French citizens living under the Occupation, the need for entertainment grew in importance. Parisian theater, in particular, witnessed an ge dor, in spite of the fact that many of its prominent artists had fled the city (Le Thtre Paris sous loccupation allemande 199).108 Wealthy Germans poured into the French capital, sampling whatever cultural fare that Paris offered, as music halls and cafs sprouted throughout the city. Cinemas opened in France and dozens of new films

Germany violated the 1940 armistice and invaded Vichy France on November 10, 1942 in an operation code-named Case Anton, which dissolved the zone libre. Franois Darlan maintained the Vichy system in North Algeria. 108 In Histoire de Vichy: 1940-1945 (Montral: Le Cercle du Livre de France, 1955), Robert Aron notes that toute guerre enrichit la littrature ou encombre les manuels scolaires (176). Nonetheless, artists such as Pablo Picasso found his creative endeavors heavily impacted in both the zone occupe and the zone libre. See Michle C. Cones Artists under Vichy: A Case of Pride and Prejudice. (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1992).

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dbuted.109 The popularity of literature soared as well, as stage dramas and romans policiers by already established authors such as Georges Simenon and Leo Malet became increasingly popular.110 Private and state-sponsored theaters, which grew in Paris during the Occupation, benefited greatly from the existence of the German and Vichy governments. French theater enjoyed its own renaissance, pushing Paul Claudels Le Soulier de satin, Jean-Paul Sartres Les Mouches, and Jean Anouilhs Antigone rose to the forefront of prominent plays created during the war.111 With the deluge of new films, novels, and dramas that appeared during the Occupation, the line separating entertainment from propaganda became difficult to identify. Propaganda, disseminated through the written press, films, stage performances and radio broadcasts, became an integral part of life in both the zone occupe and in the zone libre, and played a decisive role in presenting Nazi, Vichy and Resistance ideologies. The media bombarded French citizens daily with images and sound bites
Jean-Pierre Rioux estimates that there were 200 million visits to the cinema in 1938. By 1943, that number had increased to 304 million. Box office revenues increased from 1.5 billion francs in 1941 to 3.2 billion francs in 1944 (93). Rsistants et collaborateurs (Paris: Seuil, 1985), ed. Franois Bdarida. 110 Claudels Le Soulier de satin aired in four thirty-minute parts (April 30, May 1, 2, 3, 1943). Several of Georges Simenons works were adapted to radio drama, including Le Soi-disant M. Prou ou les silences du manchot (November 27, 1943), La Maison du juge and LAffaire du Floria, the latter two from the Maigret series. All aired on Radiodiffusion nationale. The roman policier as a radio drama sub-genre is the study of Jacques Baudous Radio mystre: le thtre radiophonique policier, fantastique et de science-fiction (Paris: Encrage, 1997), which focuses upon French crime dramas, fantasy plays, and science fiction produced in the form of radio plays from the 1930s to the 1980s. Jacques Baudou has already created an excellent text, so I will not repeat his work. Also see Hlne Ecks A la recherche dun art radiophonique, appearing in Pierre Riouxs La Vie culturelle sous Vichy. (Paris: ditions complexe, 1990): 283. 111 See Kenneth Krauss The Drama of Fallen France (Albany: SUNY P, 2004) for more information of this renaissance. Anouilh adapted his version of Antigone for the time in which he lived. First performed in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1944, Antigone contained coded messages of resistance destined for the French audience (some critics dispute this). It also involved an exploration of the problematic moral dilemmas of the 1940s. For more on the importance of Antigone, see Patrick Marshs Le Thtre Paris sous loccupation allemande, Revue de la socit dhistoire du thtre. 3 (1981): 264-268. Sartres Les Mouches and Huis clos were staged in Paris during the Occupation. For more on the staging of these dramas, see Serge Addeds LEuphorie thtrale dans Paris occup, appearing in Pierre Riouxs La Vie culturelle sous Vichy. (Paris: ditions complexe, 1990): 317, and Patrick Marshs Le Thtre Paris sous
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designed to sway public opinion, as Propaganda Abteilung took charge of radio, newspaper, poster and film propaganda in Paris.112 The majority of the French rejected the messages that the Vichy government and the Nazis disseminated, and some openly rejected the propaganda that filled the streets, theaters, and cinemas, and the propaganda that entered their homes via radio. Couching entertainment in propaganda and propaganda in entertainment, radio responded to Frances hunger for diversion.

A Climate of Anti-Semitism, Collaboration, and Vichy Values Under Vichy, Henri-Philippe Ptain, World War I hero and leader of the Vichy rgime, cultivated images of French society that emphasized a Vichy point of view: antiSemitism, the importance of the role of mothers, the noble veteran, an envied rural life, a strong religious center, and a cult of national heroes such as Joan of Arc, liberator of France. Persecution of Jews in the Northern zone began upon the arrival of the Nazis, which transformed into a policy of extermination beginning in 1942. France had its own longstanding anti-Semitic traditions that fueled the Vichy rgime, many of which were found in the entertainment industry. As Charles Rearick notes, Vichy deemed such measures necessary for Frances regeneration (252).113 Attacks on Jews permeated
loccupation allemande, Revue de la socit dhistoire du thtre. 3 (1981): 257-260. 112 One of the most important forms of Vichy propaganda was posters. The main theme of Vichy posters was the image of Ptain as the father of the French nation. Other posters centered on the slogan Travail, Famille, Patrie emphasizing the value of hard work, family, and service to the state. Some posters denounced France's foes: the Jews, freemasons, and the Allies. Yves Durand, La France dans la deuxime guerre mondiale 1939-1945 (Paris: Armand Colin, 2001) 76- 88. Also see Pierre-Marie Dioudonnats L'argent nazi la conqute de la presse franaise, 1940-1944. (Paris: ditions J. Picollec, 1981) and Eva Berg Gravenstens La quatrime arme: la presse franaise sous l'occupation. (Lausanne: Esprit ouvert, 2001). The telling of fairy tales played an important role in the dissemination of Vichy propaganda as well, serving to initiate children into Vichy ideology. See Judith K. Prouds Children and Propaganda: Il tait une fois: Fiction and Fairy Tale in Vichy France. (Oxford: Intellect, 1995). 113 See Loi portant statut des juifs, Journal officiel (October 18, 1940): 5323, Loi sur les ressortissants trangers de race juive,Journal officiel (October 18, 1940): 5324, and Loi du 2 juin 1941remplaant la loi

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theater, the written press, the silver screen, and radio. In the fall of 1940, Marshal Ptain began to popularize the term collaboration, describing cooperation with German authorities. Ptain enlisted the services of several very important Nazi sympathizers, including Philippe Henriot, radio broadcaster, who became Secretary of Information and Propaganda under Ptain, and Marcel Dat, homme politique and affirmed Fascist, who became Ptains Minister of War and of National Solidarity. Collaborators flooded all strata of French society, employing an extensive media campaign of posters and pamphlets to paint a picture of those responsible for the ruin of France (Jews, Freemasons, etc). They sought to expand their ideas beyond the boundaries of France, whereas Vichyites focused their efforts most exclusively on assuring the future of France as a whole. A national struggle had emerged.114 Meanwhile, Ptain extolled the virtues of woman; she fulfilled her role in France by being a productive mother. By instituting a holiday to celebrate mothers, Vichy did not deviate from the pronatalist movement of the Interwar period (see Chapter Two), as the mother became one of the most important ideological symbols of Vichy.115 Such ideology inspired the following widely-circulated leaflet, which aligned with Nazi discourses on family:
du 3 octobre 1940 portant statut des juifs, Journal officiel (June 14, 1941): 2475. 114 In writing about collaboration and the result of the Vichy government, Stanley Hoffmann maintains that The drama of Vichy was not in the motives but in the consequences and, alas, the ethical value of the policy has to be assessed in light of the outcome, not the intentions: the circumstances placed ltat franais in a situation of mandatory involuntary collaboration Many Vichyists who can hardly be accused of pro-Nazi sympathies and who were sure that their policy was one of serving strictly French interest moved to voluntary collaboration out of conviction that Germany would win the war (378). Collaborationism in France during World War II, The Journal of Modern History 40:3 (Sep. 1968): 375395. 115 Denis Peschanski writes: Mother or veteran, peasant or artisan: propaganda offered the country a series of obligatory references. The fertile mother became one of the major figures in the National Revolution. Government policies and speeches, moralistic or repressive, make constant references to the birthrate, a preoccupation that reaches far back in time (29). In Collaboration and Resistance: Images of Life in Vichy

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Philippe Grach, 1942.

Under Vichy, the hard-working mother that produced a large family symbolized a stable, moral rgime. By September 15, 1940, Ptain had already stated, La famille est la cellule essentielle; elle est lassise mme de ldifice social; cest sur elle quil faut btir, si elle flchit, tout est perdu; tant quelle tient, tout peut tre sauv, as the slogan Travail, Famille, Patrie replaced the French revolutionary motto Libert, Egalit, Fraternit.116 Throughout the Interwar period, France had also invested a tremendous effort in bolstering public opinion of the World War I veteran. This tactic continued during World War II, as the Vichy government made heroes of these soldiers, organizing parades and marches in their honor.117 On August 29, 1940, Ptain created the Lgion Franaise des

France 1940-1944. Ed. Yves Durand et al. (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2000). 116 Philippe Ptains La politique sociale de l'avenir, Revue des Deux Mondes September 15, 1940. 117 The veteran was continually offered as a role model, the personification of discipline, of past suffering, of a victory. The constant references to the fatherland only marginally concerned occupying forces; the nationalism of Vichy remained resolutely internal. The restoration of France would occur through an interior regeneration. Whether the mother, the peasant, or the veteran, the images and references of official propaganda all pointed to the condemnation of the rgime Vichy replaced. The symbol of the trilogy of the French state Travail, Famille, Patrie supplanted that of the Republic Libert, galit, Fraternit. Vichy thus represents a reactionary movement that, for many of its leaders, strove to erase what they saw as

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Combattants, a paramilitary organization, which played a crucial role in the policy of social containment. Ultimately, splinter groups of the Lgion formed, including the lUnion Provinciale de la Lgion Franaise des Combattants de lAlgrie, which disseminated Vichy values throughout Algeria. Vichy propaganda sought to return France to a supposedly authentic French culture by exalting rural life, pushing for a development of the culte de la petite patrie (Rearick 253). Ptain maintained that the peasant, who had remained uncorrupted by Nazi ambitions, would replenish the population of France, and France would be saved.118 In addition, the Vichy government sponsored the production of films about peasants and artisans, encouraged the development of regional theater, and endorsed the performance of local songs, dances and traditions. Religion also played a key role in the dissemination of Vichy values, for throughout the Interwar period, France had witnessed increasing secularization.119 Among others, Monsignor (Gabriele) Piguet, Bishop of Clermont, firmly supported Ptains return to family and religious principles. On the first anniversary of the Lgion Franaise des Combattants in August 1941, for example, he ordered that all the churches in the diocese ring their bells to demonstrate the link between Catholics and Ptain (43). Many French Catholics supported Ptains objectives.

Frances major historical lapse, the French revolution, a lapse reiterated at the beginning of the century by the Dreyfus affair and the separation of church and state, then in 1936 by the government of the Popular Front (30). Denis Peschanski in Collaboration and Resistance: Images of Life in Vichy France 19401944. Ed. Yves Durand et al. (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2000). 118 It is signigicant that Ptain himself was of peasant stock. 119 For more on the support given by many French Catholics to Vichy, see Allen Welsh Dulless Germanys Underground: The Anti-Nazi Resistance (Reading: Perseus, 2000): 79-88, Oscar L. Arnals Catholic Roots of Collaboration and Resistance in France in the 1930s, Canadian Journal of History/Annales canadiennes d'histoire 17:1 (Apr. 1982): 87-110 and Michael Kellys French Catholic Intellectuals during the Occupation. Journal of European Studies 23 (1993): 179-191.

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The Vichy government sought to create a cult of national heroes; heroes who were truly French in the most objective sense of the term. No national hero proved more effective to the Vichy cause than Joan of Arc (Jeanne dArc). As part of the tactic to employ Joan of Arc as the central heroic figure of the Occupation, the Vichy government instituted a day of celebration in her honor in the zone libre, which was very reminiscent of the fte des mres initiated under Ptain (233).120 For citizens of the zone libre, Ptain was their Joan of Arc, their deliverer from Nazi propaganda.121 The Vichy rgime circulated its own propaganda that ultimately permeated every imaginable media source. Propagandistic posters promoting the slogan Travail, Famille, Patrie were ubiquitous, and songs sang the praises of Ptain, the most famous entitled Marchal, nous voil! This song complemented La Marseillaise and combined all major Vichy themes: Ptain as the father France; the promotion of the fatherland and the value of hard work; and a desire for an end to the war. Music and drama played an important role in the battle of ideas. These ideologies circulated on a radio system that had become increasingly powerful.

French Radio under the Occupation

120

See also Eric Jenningss Reinventing Joan of Arc: The Iconology of Joan of Arc in Vichy Schoolbooks, 1940-44, Journal of Contemporary History 29 (1994): 711-30, Patrick Marshs Jeanne d'Arc during the German Occupation, Theatre Research International 2:2 (1977): 139-145, and Nick Atkins The Cult of Joan of Arc in French Schools, 1940-1944, in Roderick Kedwards and Roger Austins Vichy France and the Resistance: Culture and Ideology. (Totowa: Barnes & Noble Books, 1985): 265-268. 121 The Vichy rgime failed to establish a complete monopoly of the cult of Joan of Arc, as Vichy adversaries quickly learned that it could serve their purposes equally well. The communists, seeking the widest possible national legitimation after June 1941, utilized the symbol of Joan of Arc as well. Upon Liberation, Charles de Gaulle used the image of Joan of Arc to serve his own ambitions.

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Radio was the television of the 1930s and 1940s, a powerful mass medium that entered the homes of millions of families. Of the more than 40 million people living in France in the early 1940s, nearly every individual had access to a radio receiver at home (Benhalla 51). Upon entering Paris on June 14, 1940, German troops quickly seized French newspapers, and the only information available on the progress of the war was that obtained via foreign radio, which remained nearly impossible to control.122 Free from Nazi control, the BBC continued to broadcast counter-propaganda throughout Europe. On that June day, when the Germans entered the French capital, French radio, which had experienced such considerable development throughout the 1930s, briefly ceased to exist. The French had sabotaged the majority of its radio transmitters before the arrival of the Germans, but the latter quickly put them back into service in order to disseminate Nazi propaganda. The French continued to listen to their radio receivers as they sorted through the vast number of radio reports and serials in order to better understand the unfolding events. With the onset of Occupation, the types of programs broadcast on the radio began to change. Light music and entertainment programming continued, though more news and information programming filled the airwaves, mais il serait faux de penser que les chanes franaises ne comportaient que des missions de propagande et dinformations, noted Jacques Baudou (Radio mystre 33). In Paris, Radio-Paris broadcast entertainment programming, completely under the control of the Germans. In southern France, Radio-Vichy developed a programming schedule designed for
122

In her article entitled Scrutinizing France: Collecting and Using Newspaper Intelligence during World War II, Isabelle Tombs underscores the importance of newpapers to obtain information on France during the Occupation, though we should not forsake the importance of radio in this same endeavor. Intelligence

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retransmission to all private stations, called Radiodiffusion nationale, under the complete control of Ptain and Pierre Laval, Prime Minister of France under the Vichy government. Other private radio stations, such as the once prominent RadioLuxembourg, ceased to broadcast in 1939 (Duval 366). The only French news that did not contain Nazi or Vichy propaganda emanated from the BBC, whose powerful program entitled Les Franais parlent aux Franais, filled the airwaves.
123

On the morning of June 18, 1940, Prime Minister Winston Churchill gave permission to General Charles de Gaulle, who had arrived from France the previous evening, to address his compatriots during a special program on the BBC. In his first speech, General de Gaulle urged his listeners to fight against the Occupants, ending his speech with his now famous words: Quoiquil arrive, la flamme de la Rsistance franaise ne doit pas steindre. Elle ne steindra pas (Bianca). Radio became a particularly powerful medium because of its potential to invade the homes of millions of families and individuals. Radio historians speak of a guerre des ondes, a war fought over the radio waves to sway public opinion.124 Because of its accessibility, some of the most important announcements and appeals to the French aired on the radio. As soon as the French Resistance began, the use of radio as a tool of propaganda soared. Charles de Gaulles broadcasts from London offered a ray of hope.

and National Security 17:2 (Summer 2002): 105-126. 123 The BBC broadcast the program Les Franais parlent aux Franais from July 14, 1940 (8:30 p.m.) to August 31, 1944. See Christine Levisse-Touzs Le gnral de Gaulle et les dbuts de la France Libre in Revue historique des armes 2 (2000). For more information on French broadcasts from London, see JeanLouis Crmieux-Brilhacs Les Voix de la libert: Ici Londres 1940-1944 (Paris: Documentation franaise, 1975). 124 In Hlne Ecks text entitled La Guerre des ondes. Histoire des radios de langue franaise pendant la Deuxime Guerre mondiale (Paris: Armand Colin, 1985), she employed the expression La guerre des ondes to describe the evolution of French radio during World War II.

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General de Gaulle lent his voice to a group of journalists and radio personalities who continued to broadcast from London during the Occupation, including Yves Morvan, Jean Marin, and Pierre Maillaud, who took the name Pierre Bourdan, and the painter Jean Oberl. Poets and playwrights, including Pierre Lefvre, Jacques Brunius, Jacques Duchesne, joined the group. The latter became the director of the team that created Les Franais parlent aux Franais. Pierre Dac, Andr Diamant-Berger, who later called himself Andr Gillois, and Maurice Schumann, the official porte-parole of France Libre, the name given to the resistance group situated in London, all eventually lent their voices to Les Franais parlent aux Franais.125 Until the fall of the Nazi rgime, Les Franais parlent aux Franais blasted the Occupants from London with the slogan Radio-Paris ment, Radio-Paris ment, RadioParis est allemand.126 Every evening, French men and women who refused to collaborate with the Nazis listened to the broadcast in the hope that the governing rgime would collapse. In the program Les Franais parlent aux Franais, the message remained the same: nous annonons toutes les mauvaises nouvelles, cest pourquoi on nous croit aussi lorsque nous annonons les bonnes nouvelles.127 Honesty and sincerity became the cornerstone of the program. During the Occupation, the French living in the zone occupe did not enjoy the same freedom of expression, free press, or freedom of assembly that they had known

125 126

See Cahier 34 (1992) of the Comit dHistoire de la Radiodiffusion. The slogan Radio-Paris ment, Radio-Paris ment, Radio-Paris est allemand, was sung to the tune of La Cucaracha (Tico Tico). The slogan is attributed to Pierre Dac. Radio-Paris, as known during the Occupation, was launched July 18, 1940. Pierre Dac authored a song as part of the Resistance movement entitled Variations sur un thme ancien, created for Radio-Londres (Les Chansons de Pierre Dac la Radio de Londres 16). 127 Les Franais parlent aux Franais, <http://www.francelibre.net/france_libre_france_combattante/>.

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before the installation of the Nazis.128 The Nazis controlled newspapers and radio programs, as Hitler used the media to weaken the enemy. From 1940, those forming the Resistance reacted against this ideology, seeking to strengthen the French morale and to show the French people how to fight against the enemy. Charles de Gaulle understood the multivalent uses of radio.
129

The year 1940 quickly became the most important year that French radio had ever witnessed. On March 31, 1940, Paul Reynaud created the first Ministry of Information under the direction of Ludovic-Oscar Frossard. In June, the French sabotaged the Eiffel Tower broadcasting tower to impede the Germans from using it. On June 17, 1940, Marshal Ptain broadcast the announcement of an armistice with Germany. The following day, June 18, 1940, General de Gaulle spoke on the BBC in what would become his most famous radio broadcast, encouraging French citizens to continue to fight against the Nazi rgime. Henceforth, the BBC provided sympathizers of de Gaulle fifteen minutes of air time per evening, then thirty minutes per evening beginning July 1, 1940, which led to the broadcast of his program entitled Ici la France.130

In his book entitled Voices in the Dark: Esoteric, Occult & Secular Voices in Nazi-Occupied Paris 194044, William Patrick Patterson outlines the following: The only conduit of news was the radio. The constant barrage of propaganda over Radio Paris and Radio Vichy soon had Parisians listening to the neutral Swiss radio which broadcast military communiqus and the BBC. The popularity of the English broadcasts is shown in this joke that made the rounds of Paris: Did you hear what happened! a man asked his friend. Last night at 9:20 p.m. on the rue de Clichy, a Jew killed a German officer, cut open his chest, and ate his heart! Impossible! cried his friend. And in three ways. One, a German does not have a heart; two, a Jew does not eat pig; and three, at 9:20 p.m., everyone is listening to the BBC (55). 129 In his war Memoirs, de Gaulle stated: On comprendra quelle importance nous attachions nos brves missions de Londres. Tous les huit jours environ, je parlais moi-mme avec l'mouvante impression d'accomplir, pour des millions d'auditeurs qui m'coutaient dans l'angoisse travers mes allocutions sur des lments trs simples : le cours de la guerre. la fiert nationale. Enfin, l'espoir de la victoire et d'une uvre de grandeur pour notre dame la France. Cited in Les Franais parlent aux Franais: La premire radio libre invente Londres en 1940 published by the Concours National de la Rsistance et de la Dportation. <http://www.concours-resistance.org/pdf/cnrd_2004_parties/cnrd_2004_55.pdf>. 130 For more information on radio in 1940, see Cahier 27 (1990) of the Comit dHistoire de la

128

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In fulfillment of the specifications of Article 14 of the armistice, beginning June 25, 1940, broadcasting of all French-controlled radio programming within the territory ceased and the landscape of French radio broadcasting changed forever.131 Later that summer, Radio-Vichy began to broadcast under the direction of Commander Duvivier. In July 1940, Radiodiffusion nationale operated again in the free zone, and in December, regular programming emanated from Radio-Brazzaville via shortwave radio (Duval 327). De Gaulle created his own form of propaganda to combat Nazi propaganda circulating within France. From June 18 to July 2, 1940, he spoke to the French people on many different occasions, encouraging the nation to oppose the Occupation at any cost. Broadcasting from London, de Gaulle entitled his broadcasts Ici la France. Each day, the French tuned into a short program introduced by the slogan Honneur et Patrie.132 The Royal Air Force distributed flyers throughout France to inform French listeners how and when to listen to Charles de Gaulles messages. The Vichy government attempted to scramble BBC broadcasts, but experienced limited success. Radio had made a lasting impact, and would provide the French people access to information throughout World War II.

French Radio Goes Underground: The Clandestine Station The radio broadcasts of General de Gaulle did not comprise the only radio
Radiodiffusion. Ptains speech (June 17, 1940) is available online at <http://www.chr.asso.fr/cahier/fiche.php?numero=27>. 131 Article 14 of the Franco-German armistice specified the following: There is an immediate prohibition of transmission for all wireless stations on French soil. Resumption of wireless connections from the unoccupied portion of France requires a special regulation. See United States, Department of State, Publication No. 6312, Documents on German Foreign Policy 1918-1945, Series D, IX, 671-676 (Washington: GPO, 1956). 132 Archives of the program Honneur et Patrie are held at the Archives nationales, 60, rue des Francs

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propaganda created to combat the Nazi propaganda disseminated both within and outside of France. As a result of the Occupation, black radio stations (secret stations run by anti-Nazis) broadcasting on shortwave radio emerged within Great Britain. Ellic Howe described these stations in his work entitled The Black Game: Two French stations began to broadcast about November 1940; Radio Inconnue on November 15 and Radio Travail two days later. The offerings from Radio Inconnue were distinctly subversive. The small team of script-writers and broadcasters which served both French stations was accommodated at the Old rectory at Toddington, a village about four miles from Woburn (85).

In order to advertise the station, the British distributed a small adhesive sticker that could be stuck on walls and mirrors in France by partisans:

133

British records indicate that Radio Inconnue broadcast from November 15, 1940 to January 10, 1944, broadcasting a total of 1,145 propaganda programs to the French.134 Radio Inconnue offered few indications of its location, but purported to emanate from near Paris. From the point that Germany invaded Russia on June 21, 1941, the
Bourgeois, Paris (72 AJ 58). 133 Permission to use image obtained from Edward Rouse, owner of image. (January 5, 2006). This image also appears in Ellic Howes book entitled The Black Game. (London: Michael Joseph, 1982). 134 Ellic Howe notes the following information on the Radio Inconnue station: 1145 programs, broadcasting from November 15, 1940-January 10, 1944 (83). There is no record of extant scripts.

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station became increasing more propagandistic, attacking Marshal Ptain and the Vichy rgime and going so far as to suggest that French citizens vandalize German automobiles (Howe 89). The station created an imaginary anti-German entity called Les Chevaliers du coup du balai, who would sweep away the Germans, appearing for the first time during a broadcast on July 3, 1941. Radio Inconnue served as a forum to slander both Germans and collaborateurs, inventing stories and stretching the truth on actual events. The station operated until January 1944, though the French press contested many of the rumors it perpetuated. In response to Radio Inconnue, the Vichy administration created its own radio station called Radio Rvolution, established at the Grand Casino in Vichy. Its broadcasts served to undermine those of Radio Inconnue and to condemn the speeches of Winston Churchill and Charles de Gaulle. Radio-Travail, another clandestine station, served the northern part of France and focused on a listening public interested in the labor movement. Hosted by a former miner from Lille, the announcer began each broadcast with the phrase, coutez, cest un ouvrier du Nord qui vous parle! (91). The station sought to appeal to both the German and the French working classes, distancing itself from Charles de Gaulle and the Free French movement. As long as information on labor in France remained accessible, Radio-Travail continued to broadcast. Its voice fell silent on May 21, 1942.135 A third clandestine station, La France Catholique, offered its initial broadcast on July 2, 1941, broadcasting periodically (three and one-half hours per week) until its closure on May 15, 1944. Capitaine Lagrave, the stations first announcer, presented a message of encouragement to the French people, urging them to rely upon their Catholic
135

Radio Travail, 551 programs, November 17, 1940-May 21, 1942 (Howe 267). There is no record of

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faith to see themselves through the troubled times. Speaking under the authority of a Catholic bishop, Lagrave presented bi-weekly radio addresses of a strongly propagandistic character, citing the Pope as the origin of many of the broadcasts.136 The effects of World War II had spread far beyond the boundaries of Europe, as nations throughout the world contemplated the dangers that would result from a Nazi dominance of Europe. French-language radio programming worldwide spoke of the need to fight against Nazi aggression, imagining its reach stretching across the sea, dominating the nations of the far western hemisphere. In Canada, South America, and North African, radio dramatists, producers, and actors presented programs commenting on the state of France, its vulnerability, and the fear that if the Nazis succeeded in taking over her, they might proceed to subdue the rest of the world as well. The desire for radio entertainment had never been greater.

French Radio Drama of the World War II Period: Thtre engag or Escapist Theater? In his book entitled The French in Love and War: Popular Culture in the Era of the Two World Wars, Charles Rearick claims, the producers of popular culture did not bear primary responsibility for addressing the nations difficulties; that lay with political, military, and religious leaders (278). It is a mistake to underestimate the impact of the entertainment industry (radio, cinema, theater) in the formation of French ideas and notions of identity. Further, I disagree with the view taken by some scholars, including
extant scripts. 136 Although the Vatican never confirmed that broadcasts of La France Catholique originated there, it never denied it either. Some in the Vatican speculated that the station may have been located in Hungary (Howe 91-2). Regardless of its location, the station offered black propaganda with a religion angle. La France

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Serge Added and David Bradby, in particular, who maintain that popular culture in a capitalist society is not really popular, but largely the result of what the culture industry wants the masses to believe and that such culture renders the masses socially and politically inactive.137 Such a system of thought does not explain the complex nature of entertainment of the World War II period. While French movies, stage plays, songs, and French radio dramas of the World War II era presented messages that required citizens to reach their own conclusions, we must acknowledge that citizens played a role in influencing the type of entertainment programming that became available. Though the media played a major role in forming public opinion, a dialectic existed between the creators of this propaganda and their recipients. Many viewpoints were represented as each viewpoint contributed a part in a mosaic that completed the French perspective of the World War II period. Under the German Occupation and Vichy, French radio operated with a lighthearted tone, and French entertainers continued to portray a fairly conventional notion of francit.138 Vichys promotion of a culture of lightheartedness promoted a denial of the realities of the World War II era. Many French mainstream films produced under the German occupation and Vichy avoided political messages and Vichy authorities maintained, at least insofar as entertainment was concerned, that escapism became more

Catholique, July 2, 1941-May 15, 1944 (Howe 268). There is no record of any extant scripts. 137 See Serge Addeds Le Thtre dans les Annes Vichy. (Paris: ditions Ramsay, 1992) and David Bradbys Modern French Drama 1940-1990. (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1991): 17. See also Theodor Adornos The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception (written in 1944), in Max Horkheimers and Theodor W. Adornos Dialectic of Enlightenment. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1972): 120-167. 138 According to the Robert dictionary, the French Ministry of Culture created the word francit in 1965 to refer to characteristics unique to French culture.

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effective than propaganda in preventing political dissent (Rearick 260).139 During the Occupation, many singers, radio actors and dramatists, not wanting to confront an uncertain political system, followed the necessary rules that would bring their works to the performance arena. The Vichy rgime used well-established motifs of popular culture, such as dedication, unity, and strength in Frances glorious past, to serve its political ends and condemned those in opposition such as the Free French broadcasting from London. In cinema, the Vichy rgime banned all French films released before October 1937, stating that they did not represent the moral fabric of French society. On radio, through music and radio dramatic works, Vichy furthered the attitude that one could surmount adversity through entertainment. David Bradby, Serge Added, Patrick Marsh, prominent scholars of the period, cite no evidence of a thtre engag in operation in Vichy, and no proof exists to support such a theater (Marsh Le Thtre Paris sous loccupation allemande, 363-5). Though I acknowledge that drama of the Vichy period is largely escapist, this explanation skirts the notion that the theater of the Vichy era addressed contemporary social or political issues. We should understand this escapism as a construct imposed by the Germans as part of the collaborative system. As Serge Added states, il ntait pas question de convaincre du bien-fond de la guerre allemande, mais de les dtourner de toute rflexion. Cest le divertissement qui tait recherch (128). I will argue, however, that

139

How can one explain the general need for escape. In Escapism is necessary, Kate Kosinski explains: Why do we feel the need to, if only for a few hours, shed the constraints of our real lives and immerse ourselves totally in another world?...Maybe the reason humans can't resist a bit of fantasy in their lives is because weve gotten ourselves so wrapped up in the details of daily life that we stopped having fun and we stopped having adventures (Technician November 15, 2005).

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regardless of the absence of such a thtre engag, radio drama produced in Vichy failed to escape Vichyite ideology. Radio dramas performed under Vichy were still susceptible to ideological and political interpretations by those who attended performances or listened to radio broadcasts. The subject matter alone, including traditional French stories from Frances history, promoted by collaborationists to bolster a French identity that centered upon notions of the past, became a powerful tool in the courting of public opinion. Radio drama of the World War II era is a complex genre; it contains elements of censorship, anti-Semitism, escapism, collaboration, and Vichyite ideology, all the while wrapped in a blanket of entertainment.

French Radio Drama under the Occupation: An Altered Radio Dramatic Landscape In 1951, Roger Pradalie wrote: La guerre de 1914-1918 avait arrt le dveloppement technique de la radiophonie. La guerre de 1940-1944 mit en veilleuse son dveloppement artistique (30). Between those pioneers who witnessed the dawn of radio drama and the radio dramatists of the Post-World War II period who championed its development, there existed a great chasm. Radio dramatic creation of the World War II period slowly crossed this great divide. It left little evidence within the minds of radio professionals of the era of any significant radio dramatic production occurring during the World War II period. Jean Tardieus radio work in the 1960s validated Pradalies observation. In his book entitled Grandeurs et faiblesses de la radio, Tardieu presented a history of French radio drama comprised of three periods: its genesis (1924-1925), the Interwar period, 118

during which it witnessed its greatest development (1932-1939), and the post-war period (150). Tardieus brief history of radio drama did not mention radio dramatic creation during the Occupation. This underscored the reality that the Occupation significantly reduced both the quantity and quality of radio dramatic production over the four year period. This further explained the assessment of noted contemporary radio dramatist Roger Richard who claimed that LOccupation na pas laiss duvres radiophoniques notables.140 Radio dramas produced during the Occupation may not have been as unimportant or worthless as Roger Richards words implied. Whether in the zone occupe or in the zone libre, radio drama had its raison dtre. In the zone occupe, radio drama became a part of the imposed escapism advocated by the Germans as part of the initiative to distract citizens. In the zone libre, radio drama exuded Vichy notions of morality and a return to Frances glorious past in an effort to restore the nation to prominence. During the Occupation, radio drama certainly was not absent from radio, but it was significantly reduced, particularly in the zone occupe, where German censors strictly monitored the radio programming schedule. The war years became a period of survival for the genre. Radio drama presented within the zone occupe did not reflect a tremendous amount of creativity either.141 Those that contained a musical component

Cited in Hans Hartjes article Radio-plume, Histoires littraires 13 (Jan.-Mar. 2003): 7. Also see Roger Richards articles entitled Thtre radiophonique ou audio-dramaturgie?, Le Thtre contemporain, Recherches et dbats. 2 (1952): 213-224, and Les tapes franaises de la radiodramaturgie, La Nef (Mar: 1951): 71-81, as well as Roger Pradalies LArt radiophonique. (Paris: Que sais-je?, 1951). 141 See Hlne Ecks la recherche dun art radiophonique, in Jean-Pierre Riouxs La Vie culturelle sous Vichy. Hlne Eck argued that French radiophonic art truly began after the Occupation, citing the failure of any real radio drama during the war.

140

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were more likely to reach the airwaves. The programming schedules of radio stations in the zone occupe and the zone libre reflected this altered radio dramatic landscape. At Radio-Paris, in particular, radio drama comprised very little of the typical daily programming grid. At Radiodiffusion nationale (Radio-Vichy), radio dramatic creation was much freer and played a more important role in comparison to Radio-Paris, but it certainly did not mirror its pre-war status. A glimpse of the programming schedules of the two stations on any given day demonstrates this reality (See Appendix 4). Radio drama of the two zones contained different varieties of works. Those of the zone occupe included German-produced anti-Semitic dramas and traditional stage plays performed directly over radio, whereas those of the zone libre offered a wider range of radio dramatic works, such as adapted stage dramas, poetry, and one-act and multi-act dramatic nostalgias created expressly for the radio medium. The sub-genres treated in the two zones varied as well. Radio-Paris broadcast few textes trs originaux, trs occasionnels, while Radio-Vichy promoted an expansion of popular Interwar subgenres, including fantasy works, police and detective dramas, and radio dramas that embraced Vichyite themes (Baudou 34). By the end of the summer of 1940, Propaganda Abteilung, the Nazi propaganda agency operating in the zone occupe, had launched its own permutation of the former Radio-Paris station, which had served the needs of Paris well from its birth in 1922 as the station Radiola. German-controlled radio recruited collaborationists from various antiSemitic French media sources. By 1943, Radio-Paris had become a radical station, with a mixture of anti-Semitism and anti-Gaullism. 120

The Radio-Paris network included the stations Radio Normandie, Poste-Parisien, Rennes-Alma, and Radio-Paris. Since the Occupation began, Radio-Paris had become a station of propaganda. With Docteur Bofinger as station director, Docteur Friedrich, as agent of German radio propaganda, Lieutenant Morenschild, as director of Radio-Journal, and Otto Sonon and Raoul Sussdorff, as directors of artistic programming, many watchful eyes governed French radio programming in the zone occupe, resulting in the banning of the radio dramatic works of many French playwrights. Contemporary dramatist JeanJacques Bernard, for example, witnessed the exclusion of several of his radio dramas, including the politically charged Richelieu, vocation radiophonique, written during the Occupation, for les vnements en avaient empch la diffusion (Bernard 199). After the liberation of Paris, Radiodiffusion Franaise ultimately broadcast Bernards polemic radio work (February 16, 1945). Radio-Paris invested the majority of its efforts in entertainment in order to give greater force to its propaganda and maintain the seductive image of Paris. Station directors focused on the development of musical programming, in particular, which occupied approximately half of the fifteen hours of broadcasting per day (Guerre des ondes 53). Radio-Paris had a large symphonic orchestra at its disposal, some of the more well-known soloists, including Jacques Thibaud, Marguerite Long, and Alfred Cortot, as well as renowned musicians Raymond Legrand, Alec Siniavine, Aim Barelli and Richard Blareau. The network also used a number of French actors and script writers. The remainder of the daily programming scheduled was completed with news bulletins (Le Radio-Journal de Paris, which aired five times per day), miscellaneous programs, and finally, radio drama. The German-controlled Radio-Paris network had created a need 121

for diversion. Radio-Paris presented its programming in a weekly journal entitled Les Ondes, which emanated directly from the Radio-Paris station. Though the station employed so many Germans, it sought to give the impression of very French programs. Jacques Chardonnier (Muse de Radio France) assessed the networks programming needs as follows: [artistic programming]se devaient dtre les plus attractifs possible de faon fixer lauditoire et assurer lcoute la plus large aux messages vantant la collaboration avec lAllemagneIl sagissait de conqurir et de garder un auditoire trs important, runissant tous les types du public, du plus populaire au plus intellectuel, avec un seul programme de type gnraliste, destin la zone occupe.142 Radio-Pariss coherent program distribution remained virtually unchanged throughout the Occupation.

Anti-Semitic Radio in the Occupied Zone With Doctor Bofinger at the helm of Radio-Paris, a mixture of propagandistic and entertainment programs filled the airwaves. Radio-Paris presented highly censored performances, the implications of which the fascists fully understood. The first true propaganda programs that illustrated the Franco-German relationship included Les Roses des vents, Un neutre vous parle and Un journaliste allemand vous parle. The latter focused on the exploits of Docteur Friedrich, who played the role of the good German who tient la main des Franais intelligents (Duval 335-6). During the broadcast of April 20, 1941, he explained the French/German conflict:
142

Cited in Jacques Chardonniers article Radio-Paris, un foyer artistic trs actif, Paris: Cahiers

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Je prcise: si moi, Allemand, je suis mme de vous parler, vous Franais, en pleine guerre car larmistice nest pas encore la paixsi donc je puis vous parler, vous expliquer, attirer vos regards sur ce quil y a de commun entre les intrts de nos deux peuples, cest dj un premier fait rvolutionnaire. Franais ! Franais que nous ne voudrions pas considrer comme ennemis, mais comme partenaires de la rvolution europenne, ne gchez pas cette rvolution qui sera la vtre comme elle est la ntre. Chaque jour qui scoule conduit les troupes rvolutionnaires allemandes plus prs de la victoire finale, cette victoire que nous ne considrerons comme complte qu linstant o lordre nouveau dont la France devrait faire partie sera tabli. Que la France comprenne son rle futur dans lEurope future, cest lunique dsir que jai vous formuler ce 20 avril 1941, anniversaire dAdolf Hitler. (Ellipses by author)143 During his speech, Friedrich attempted to cajole the French worker: Voyez-vous, quand, en 1933, Adolf Hitler a pris le pouvoir, il sest trouv devant une situation qui pouvait paratre aussi inextricable que celle de la France lheure actuelle, la diffrence prs que nous avions sept millions de chmeurs, quelques milliers de communistes et, point important, personne ne nous demandait de collaborer avec nous !... Je vous ai expliqu dimanche dernier, en peu de mots, comment le Fhrer est arriv se rendre matre de la situation, et je vous ai dit en plus quil ne sagit nullement pour la France de copier aveuglment ce que nous avons fait, mais que sur le chemin prendre pour se donner un socialisme qui rende justice tout le monde, il convient peut-tre de profiter de nos expriences. In December 1943, Friedrichs broadcasts disappeared from the radio, for his tone had become increasingly critical after Germany had invaded Russia. Les Roses des vents began as a weekly radio program that evolved into three programs per week (Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday) from January 1941. The work of Robert Peyronnet, the program was purely propaganda, but later evolved into an

dHistoire de la Radiodiffusion, 34 (1992): 55. 143 In a brochure entitled Un journaliste allemande vous parle. (Paris: ditions Le Pont, 1941), which collected the causeries of Friedrich Grimm.

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innovative program that requested that listeners send their opinions to the station on how to better the program. Little is known of the fate of this program, as no extant scripts remain. Un neutre vous parle was the work of Georges Oltramare, a Swiss journalist and playwright. Before the war, Oltramare had enjoyed some success as a dramatist, including a performance of his play LEscalier de Service, comdie en 4 actes in Paris at the Thtre Michel on November 28, 1929, and a performance of Le Mari clairvoyant, comdie en un acte in Paris at the Odon on April 1, 1931. Under the penname Charles Dieudonn, he created three programs for Radio-Paris, Au rythme du temps, a cabaret anti-smite, directed by Maurice Rmy, Les Juifs contre la France, and a personal chronicle, Un neutre vous parle. These activities cost him his life, as he was sentenced to death following the Liberation.144 His work left little doubt about his perspective of the Occupation: Grce aux Juifs, aux francs-maons et ses policiers, la Grande-Bretagne peut forcer les serrures et crer partout les malentendus, les quivoques et la discorde, et quand tout est envenim, John Bull rentre tranquillement dans son le. Il sait que pour se laver de tant de crimes, il a leau de la Manche et de lOcan. Il est grand temps de forcer le bandit dans son repaire. Les peuples dlivrs retrouveront confiance et joie quand le pril John aura disparu.145 The German ambassador Otto Abetz called upon Dieudonn to neutralize the activism of communist organizations and trade unions within France. Influenced by Mussolini whom he had met in Rome, Dieudonn took charge of the mission of
144

After the war, Georges Oltramare was put on trial for collaboration, convicted and sentenced to three years imprisonment. He was released, then sentenced to death in absentia by a French court January 12, 1950. He fled to Spain and then to Egypt where he made anti-semitic radio broadcasts. He died in Paris in 1960. 145 In a brochure of Radio-Paris containing the causeries of Charles Dieudonn from October 7 to December 7, 1940. See Cahier Numro 46 (October 1995) of the Comit dHistoire de la Radiodiffusion.

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collaborating in a newspaper whose objective was to infuse trouble within the sectors influenced by the Communist Party by adopting a message of protest. This resulted in the journal entitled La France au travail (1941), in which Dieudonn printed articles overflowing with virulent anti-Semitism. Before long, he would reach an even larger audience through the radio dramatic program entitled Les Juifs contre la France, which reinforced the anti-Semitic tone of the Radio-Paris station. Radio drama did not escape anti-Semitism. Les Juifs contre la France represented the most anti-Semitic radio dramatic program broadcast on Radio-Paris during the Occupation. The drama comprised a series of sayntes written with the help of the songwriter Martini. Dieudonn hired a team of actors, several of prominence, to perform in the dramatic program, including Robert Le Vigan, Paul Lantric, Jacques Rmy, Dumontier, Sardet, Blondeau and Nobis. The concept of the radio drama was very simple: to create a list of all of Frances problems and place the blame upon the shoulders of the Jews. The performance that aired on Radio-Paris on the evening of December 18, 1943 provided a clear example of the essence of the program: RMY: Qui est responsable, au premier chef, de la conflagration actuelle? LE JUIF BLONDEAU: Qui tait belliciste acharn en 1939 pour venger les petits copains corrigs par Hitler ? LE JUIF LE VIGAN: Qui est responsable de nos 150.000 morts, de nos centaines de milliers de blesss, de nos millions de prisonniers ? Qui est lartisan incontestable de notre effondrement ? LE JUIF NOBIS: Qui pousse le monde la guerre et ne la fait jamais ? LE JUIF 125

SARDET: Qui est Karl Marx ? UN JUIF DUMONTIER: Qui est Lnine ? Qui sont les tyrans sanguinaires ROSA LUXEMBOURG, TROTSKY, Lon BLUM, et tant dautres partisans et auteurs du chambardement gnral ? DES JUIFS RMY: Qui est lorganisateur de tous les troubles, qui est un destructeur n ? LE JUIF LANTRIC: Qui rve de la domination universelle? LE JUIF RMY: Qui tait le matre de la presse, de la radio, du thtre, du cinma et la Finance en France ? LE JUIF Each installment of the program echoed the same sentiment: the Jews are responsible for all of Frances problems and they must be held accountable. The phrase death to the Jews, was never openly uttered on the airwaves, but the sketches were sufficiently tendentious that Dieudonn and Robert le Vigan, among other actors, were convicted as collaborators at the time of the Liberation. No radio dramatic program offers a better example of German bootlicking than Les Juifs contre la France. The title of the work was as accusatory as the drama itself: Les Juifs contre la France. It was not the French that are against the Jews, but rather the Jews that were against France. The dramas dialogue stated that the Jews were responsible for the problems of the past, but it also implied that they were also responsible for Frances failure to forge its own destiny. This explained the Germans initiative to quickly expel Jews from the written press, radio, cinema, and theater, as suggested in the broadcast of

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December 18, 1943.146 Like many of the non-musical programs broadcast on the Radio-Paris station, Les Juifs contre la France contained an important musical element that resonated throughout the work. The refrain LE JUIF, repeated through each installment, initially served to unify the actors lines. More significantly, however, the refrain became a chorus permeating the drama, which the actors recited in a loud unison to underscore the points that they had made. With each criticism of the Jews, the chorus LE JUIF resounded even more loudly, reaching a crescendo at the very end of the drama. When the program closed, there remained but one idea imprinted within the mind of the listener: the French were victims of the carelessness, greed, destructive nature, and power mongering of the Jews.

Radio Dramatic Originality in the Occupied Zone Not all radio dramatic works broadcast on Radio-Paris were soaked in antiSemitism. The artistic programming directors, Sonon and Sussdorff, also selected works from the theatrical canon, as well as the occasional original radio drama. The repertory comprised traditional French plays, poetry, and novels adapted to the radio medium. The radio dramatic programming schedule included a small contingent of traditional soapopera style programs that had become extremely popular during the Interwar period. Police and detective series, which had enjoyed tremendous popularity on RadioParis before the war and which became a popular sub-genre on Radiodiffusion nationale (Radio-Vichy), never emerged as an important sub-genre on the Radio-Paris network. In
146

See Patrick Marshs Le Thtre Paris sous loccupation allemande, Revue de la socit dhistoire du

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a police and detective series, the audience participated in solving the case. The artistic programming directors certainly did not wish to yield complete control to the audience. When individual police or detective dramas aired, Sonon and Sussdorff primarily opted for adaptations of previously successful detective novels.147 Only one such detective series is identified on the Radio-Paris network: Jean Ashelbs Avec le commissaire Baudouin, which dbuted on September 21, 1942 as a fifteen-minute program. The series ran only a few weeks, was cancelled, then remerged on January 18, 1943 with the title Quelques minutes avec le commissaire Baudouin. It ran as a bi-weekly series until November 1, 1943. Sonon and Sussdorff ultimately did not embrace Ashelbs work. Jean Ashelbs radio dramatic detective series better suited the airwaves at Radiodiffusion nationale (Radio-Vichy), where his imaginative eight-part sequence entitled Confidences, directed by Ange Gilles, aired from January 31 until April 17, 1944. The thirty-minute episodes contained the following sub-titles: Confidences dun billet de mille, Confidences dun chien, Confidences dun diamant, Confidences dun micro, Confidences dun secrtaire Louis XV, Confidences dun tlphone, Confidences dune pendule, Confidences dIsidore (Baudou 35). Pierre Thareaus Les Mystres de la fort vierge, broadcast on April 11, 1943, remained one of the few individual police or detective dramas identified on Radio-Paris. Thareaus radio drama was presented under the direction of Jacques Ferreol, with the acting talents of Maxime de Guy, Christian Argentin, Georges Cussin, Jeanne Arnoux,
thtre. 3 (1981): 208-9. 147 This became an important distinction for Radio-Paris, for before the Occupation, the station had embraced police dramas and detective series. This caused several writers of these sub-genres to bring their work to Radio-Vichy. Jacques Cossin, who had authored and/or directed more than a dozen such plays on Radio-Paris before the war, was one such radio dramatist. It was not uncommon for radio dramatists to migrate between the two flagship stations. See Bernard Lauzannes article in Cahiers dhistoire de la

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and Rene Lomes. Thareaus other radio drama broadcast on Radio-Paris was La Royale aventure, comdie en 1 acte, which aired on January 16, 1944. Among the original works broadcast on Radio-Paris included several serials, or feuilleton-fleuve, created by Claude Dhrelle (n Robert Leclercq).148 Before the Occupation, Dhrelle had created a very successful radio series entitled Paradis dangereux, a mixture of novel and theater, which abruptly came to an end after its 235th episode in 1939. On the new Radio-Paris, that of the war years, Dhrelle presented one of his most important series to date, Lpingle divoire (1941), with Jean Servais, star of the silver screen, in one of the main roles, which completed a run of 130 episodes. Each installment ended with the phrase, Quadviendra-t-il de nos trois hros? Vous en saurez en coutant le Xe pisode de Lpingle divoire (Cahiers dhistoire de la radiodiffusion n. 34). Lpingle divoire became the first feuilleton-fleuve on Radio-Paris, which the station broadcast twice per week (Tuesday and Friday) during a fifteen-minute block at the top of the 9:00 p.m. hour. Ultimately, Dhrelle added two additional series to the Radio-Paris programming grid: in November 1942, La Chimre trois ttes, with Serge Reggiani, hit the airwaves on Tuesday and Friday evenings, and in October 1943, Dhrelles Monsieur de Chanteloup, pirate greeted listeners Tuesday and Friday evenings at 9:45 p.m.149 Following the war, Dhrelle created the series LOasis, broadcast on Radio Luxembourg in 1950. Unfortunately, he no longer benefited from having the

Radiodiffusion 34: (1992). 148 There are no extant copies of Claude Dhrelles radio scripts. The only remaining information is that which can be gleaned from Radio-Pariss weekly radio journal, Les Ondes. 149 In addition to the vocal talents of Serge Reggiani, La Chimre trois ttes enlisted the expertise of prominent actors including Luce Clament, Gaby Sims, Yves Furet, Simone Gerbier, and Jean Rioldo.

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captive audience of the Occupation for whom his radio programs provided moments of entertainment. Claude Dhrelle is best known for his adaptation of a radio drama originally created by Pierre Dac entitled Le Mystre de la cancoillotte et la vengeance du yaourt (1943). Pierre Dac, famous for his radio work with the Free French in London, crafted his radio drama as a creative entertainment piece. Before leaving for London to join the Free French movement on October 30, 1943, Pierre Dac published a radio drama entitled Le Mystre de la cancoillotte et la vengeance du yaourt, pice policire radiophonique (1942). Pierre Dac was more of a jingle writer than a radio dramatist, though he had penned several radio sketches which had aired on Radio-Cit and Poste Parisien during the Interwar period. On December 22, 1943, Claude Dhrelle brought Dacs radio drama to the airwaves of Radio-Paris. He only slightly modified Le Mystre de la cancoillotte et la vengeance du yaourt, pice policire radiophonique, which had yet to be broadcast in France. Dhrelle had created an anti-radio drama, a critique of the genre itself, a spoof of police and detective dramas, as well as a criticism of Pierre Dac. There was no evidence to suggest that the audience knew that this play belonged to Dac, nor was there any confirmation that Dac heard the broadcast. We can be assured that he never would have supported its airing on the German-controlled Radio-Paris network. The subject of the radio drama, the way in which Dhrelle organized the work, as well as its relatively lifeless plot and story, would have made it the laughing-stock of serious radio dramatic composition of any other time period. If not for the dramas relationship to Pierre Dac, it might have become yet another worthless radio drama. 130

Dhrelles introduced his radio drama as a pice policire radiophonique en 3 prologues, 6 actes, 8 pilogues et 6 conclusions au choixavec le concours des tambours et clairons de ltincelle du XIIe et de la mancanterie des petits chanteurs la gueule de bois (1). He completely deconstructed any notion of radio dramatic tradition, as the scenic divisions that he actually employed did not in any way mirror his prefatory descriptions. There were, in fact, two prologues, which were somewhat contradictory, four acts, which he oddly called premier acte, troisime acte, sixime acte, and huitime acte, one epilogue, and no conclusions au choix. Dhrelles work was the complete opposite of what he describes, which revealed its raison dtre. With each acte, Dhrelles radio adaptation moved the audience through a seemingly disconnected setting, beginning first at the Gare de Lyon in Paris, next to a Parisian police station, to the Palais de Justice, to Les Landes, to the slopes of Mount Everest, and finally, sur la route nationale qui va du Perreux Grigraltar (4). While at the police station in Paris, we met LInspecteur Feuillemolle, the protagonist of the work, who appeared to transition through each of these settings without any noted or perceived (on the part of the audience) logistical difficulties. The intrigue remained completely disjunctive, as the Inspecteur encountered a deceased man, determined whether a pine tree was really a pine tree, and asked a poor orphan why his automobile went so fast: Cest que, explique lhomme, la place dessence, je mets du yaourt (3). This was the only mention of yogurt in the text, and there was never any mention of any cancoillotte. There were no drums, no sound of clarions, and no mancanterie des petits chanteurs la gueule de bois. Further, at the beginning of the radio drama, Dhrelle 131

developed a long cast of actors presented in order of their radio appearance, whom he called le Chanteur sans voix, la Voix sans chanteur, le Chef du protocole, Un cheval, Le Pre, Le Fils, Le Grand-pre, La Grand-mre, les Neveux, les Oncles, les Amis, lOrange, la Femme de mnage, les bruits, la foule et les autres. None of these characters emerges anywhere in his radio drama. Only a minuscule amount of character development occurred with LInspecteur Feuillemolle, whom the author also haphazardly referred to as Le Commissaire. In what type of mystery could a cheese originating from Franche-Comt and a yogurt have embroiled themselves? There was no vengeance displayed on the part of the yogurt, for Dhrelle did not develop it as a character. It served merely as a substitute for gasoline. There certainly was no mystery surrounding the cheese. Dhrelles radio drama remained enigmatic and represented the epitome of radio dramatic absence on Radio-Paris. Nonetheless, Le Mystre de la cancoillotte et la vengeance du yaourt, pice policire radiophonique was not worthless radio drama. In adapting this work for radio, Dhrelle had created a critique of radio drama of the World War II period. During the Interwar period, in contrast, radio drama had flourished and comprised an important part of the radio programming schedule. Under the Occupation, the Golden Age of Radio and of radio drama had passed. Dhrelles radio drama not only illustrated the genres decay, it also posed the question of how a radio dramatic work or such low caliber could actually find its way onto the airwaves. Further, it parodied the successful police and detective series of the Interwar period. Dhrelles adaptation contained one important purpose. His version of Le 132

Mystre de la cancoillotte et la vengeance du yaourt, pice policire radiophonique openly criticized its original composer, Pierre Dac. By reworking and presenting the radio drama on the Radio-Paris station while Dac was bombarding France with antiGerman propaganda from London, the Radio-Paris station had taken Dacs authorial power and used it against him. Dhrelle licked the Germans boots with Dacs radio dramatic work. Dhrelle proved Dacs radio work to be poorly developed and neither very dramatic nor comedic, which may explain why the work had yet to be aired in France. The failure belonged more to Dac than to Dhrelle, the latter suggesting that this author-musician may not have been worthy of radio dramatic composition. There were certainly author-musicians who were better suited to create radio drama in the World War II period than Pierre Dac. On January 20, 1944, Radio-Paris broadcast Salade radiophonique, grand sketch comique... cr dans les cabarets par Paul Bonnamy, l'Europen par Poulot (1941), a one-act radio drama created by Paul Bonnamy and Henri Poulot. The two writers had begun to work on their radio drama before the war, but it had not fully matured until the Occupation. Bonnamy was a poet and musician by trade whose most noteworthy work had been a musical poem entitled Nous resterons ce soir (1938). He had also contributed to a work entitled Deux sous dhumour et de posie, begun before the war, but which remained unpublished until 1987. Poulot, a musician by trade as well, had enjoyed a career in musical and radio writing dating from the beginning of the century. His works included La Grve des musiciens, excute par Aristide Bruant. Avec une trompette comme la sienne, pas besoin de musique... (1902), for which he had written the words,

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and Les Voix inhumaines, monologue... (1935) and Titine a dcouch, monologue... (1942). The latter two he wrote in collaboration with musician Ren Perriot. Salade radiophonique, grand sketch comique... cr dans les cabarets par Paul Bonnamy, l'Europen par Poulot resonated with the writers backgrounds in music and vaudeville. A veritable salade or mlange confus, as the title indicated, the radiophonic work combined realistic sound effects, a simple story, and a strong musical component. The drama figured among the small quantity of original radio dramatic works approved by artistic directors Sonon and Sussdorff of the Radio-Paris station. Bonnamy and Poulot had published a previous edition of their radio drama in 1936, but it contained anti-Nazi elements that, in 1944, did not escape the censors radar. References including Vous venez dentendre la grande chanteuse nazi Eva Bathauschloff vous naziller Valse damour, remained in the 1941 printed edition, but were removed from the radiophonic version that aired on Radio-Paris (1). Exclusion of these references occurred unbeknownst to the French listening public. Bonnamys and Poulots radio dramatic work contained several important characteristics that made it attractive for inclusion on the relatively limited radio drama schedule of Radio-Paris. The work employed sound effects to transport the audience live to the scene. It used music to provide an aural background for the play. Finally, the work as a whole exhibited a hypersensitivity to the radio drama genre itself and foreshadowed radio dramas future (the antithesis of Dhrelles radio drama). The juxtaposition of sound effects and music employed throughout the work revealed the radio dramas true merit. Salade radiophonique presented a radio drama about radio itself; in particular, the power of radio to entertain as well as to provide information. The 134

narrator prefaced the work as follows, in order to establish a belief in the authenticity of the messages that radio delivers: Des amis mont fait entendre le superptarondine 6 lampes. La matresse de maison ma dit: Il est dune slection parfaite. Elle a tourn les boutons de lappareil de T.S.F...et voici laudition que nous avons eue... (1). Bonnamy and Poulot created a play within a play whose main characters, Le Haut-Parleur, Imitation, and Chant, personified the elements of radio: Le Haut-Parleur represented radio in the physical form, Imitation symbolized the sounds of radio (sound effects, background noise), and Chant signified the music that permeates the radio medium. The story, if we can say that the work really contained a story, centered on informing the audience of songs, concerts and plays that they could hear on various radio stations and sporting events that they might wish to attend. The story remained of secondary importance to the authors manipulation of the soundscape.150 Le Haut-Parleur spoke first and set in motion the dialogue that took place between Imitation and Chant. His words served to convey the dramas story. The sifflements, grincements caractristiques de la T.S.F. emitted by the character Imitation formed the backbone of the soundscape, which the two writers juxtaposed with the songs of colloquial gibberish that Chant sang. For every sifflement uttered by Imitation, Chant sang another meaningless song that related neither to Imitations sound-based monologue nor to any previous song put forth by Chant. With every pronounced grincement, another meaningless tune emerged: IMITATION: Sifflements, grincements caractristiques de la T.S.F.

Salade radiophonique foreshadowed the radio dramas of Samuel Beckett, in particular Words and Music and Cascando, which reached the pinnacle of perfection with regard to the relationship between sound effects and music (See Chapter Four).

150

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CHANT: Je tai donn mon cur, En pain dpics pour tes quatr heurs (1). The result was a joust between sound and music, which remained in competition with each other throughout the entire fifteen-minute radio drama. As the work progressed, Imitation began to experience a metamorphosis. When he alternated between sifflement and grincement, he began to dominate Chant, making music subordinate to sound effects. Imitation did not imitate at all, but rather ebbed and flowed, faded in and faded out, as his sounds transformed themselves as they worked to structure the aural part of the work. When the drama approached its acoustic climax, we heard the sifflement clearly emerge to the foreground of the soundscape, while the musical component maintained by Chant began to move into the background. At the point that Chant was nearly subdued, Imitation wielded a finishing blow with sifflements de la T.S.F., imitation dun chanteur ou dun instrument (4). As Imitation began to emulate a singer or an instrument, he had replaced Chant; sound effects had supplanted music. The play within a play was rather complex for a fifteen-minute radio dramatic composition. While Imitation and Chant went back and forth with their dialogue, Le Haut Parleur spoke to the audience in an attempt to explain the nonsense of their conversation: IMITATION: Grincements de la T.S.F. CHANT: Par les mois damour Mais, Juin, Juillet, Aot, Septembre. Que de beaux discours Avez-vous dit dans votre chambre...

LE HAUT PARLEUR: Allo ! Allo ! ici Radio-Toulouse; veuillez couter dans un quart dheure lOuverture des Os de Jeannette de 136

Mass, par lharmonie des abattoirs du Sud-Ouest (3). The syntheses offered by Le Haut Parleur were as ridiculous, incongruous and incomprehensible as the dialogue between Imitation and Chant. Le Haut Parleur mixed people and places that the audience knew (Maurice Chevalier, Toulouse, Bruxelles) with a host of invented ones (Boulevard Makns; rue du Marchal Phoque; Nicholas Yvan Labibinosouzoff), which gave the radio drama the illusion of being real and current but, in the end, only contributed to the level of impenetrability that made any attempt on the part of the audience to derive meaning from the work nearly impossible. Let us return to the full title of the radio drama: Salade radiophonique, grand sketch comique... cr dans les cabarets par Paul Bonnamy, l'Europen par Poulot (italics mine). We better understand Bonnamys and Poulots radiophonic work through the optic of cabaret culture. Cabaret, as form of entertainment featuring comedy, song, dance, and drama, took place within a restaurant or club with a stage for performances, and the audience gathered around the tables watching the performance, eating and drinking and having a good time. Spectators felt at ease at the cabaret: they were not obliged to remove their hats; they were free to chat, eat, and smoke as they desired. Like the rules that distinguish radio drama from stage drama, the typical rules of society did not apply in the same fashion to the cabaret. Bonnamys and Poulots cabaret-style radio drama was a metaphor for the creative freedom of their own radio dramatic work, as well as for the freedom enjoyed by the audience while it listened in an attempt to decipher the characters words, sounds, and songs. An avant-garde style piece, Bonnamys and Poulots work spoke of the future of radio and of radio drama. It addressed the relationship between sound and music, as the 137

authors demonstrated that sound effects should never be subjugated to music. By making sound and music the main characters in the work, Bonnamy and Poulot forsook any real character development, preferring rather to focus their efforts on a discussion of the radio medium and the role of radio drama. The use of music as a radio dramatic backdrop remained the popular current throughout the Interwar and World War II eras, where radio dramatists continued to employ background music either to complement the radio dramatic work or to facilitate transitions between scenes. The conflict between sound and music continued to be a subject of discussion throughout the post-World War II period. There was no strong political subtext presented in Salade radiophonique. The radio drama was representative of the kind of radio dramatic works that aired on the Radio-Paris network that, on the surface, exhibited little importance. When we removed the layer of confusion surrounding what was going on in Bonnamys and Poulots drama, we were able to see that the authors had created experimental sound theater that would be further expanded after the Liberation.

Radio Drama of the Free Zone and Vichyite Ideology: Radiodiffusion nationale (Radio-Vichy) The history of radio and of radio drama under the Vichy rgime shows a different, yet parallel, history to that of Radio-Paris. From the arrival of the Nazis on June 14, 1940, radio broadcasting remained non-existent until July 5, when Ptain used his authority to reinstitute radio in the zone libre. From that summer, a radio studio appeared at Casino de Vichy, which became one of the main propagandistic tools of the nascent Vichy rgime. The Vichy government controlled Radiodiffusion nationale 138

(Radio-Vichy), which had become one of Frances premier radio stations. Paul Marion, a former communist, quickly rose to head the new station. Working along side him, though not always on the best of terms, was Commander Duvivier, Chef de la Direction de la Radio. The listening audience remained small, as initial broadcasts focused mainly on the Vichy political message. As a solution to the lack of listenership, Duvivier established a series of entertainment programs, including music, which ultimately formed a large part of the programming grid.. With the establishment of two new administrations under the Occupation, the look and feel of radio was transformed. Under control of the Vichy rgime, Radiodiffusion nationale became the most popular radio station in the zone libre. In fact, the station comprised a series of broadcasting towers scattered throughout the free zone, which included towers in Toulouse, Marseille, Lyon, Nice, Grenoble, Limoges, Montpellier and Nmes, serving to spread the Vichyite message (Duval 327). During the first several months of its existence, Radiodiffusion nationale operated with a similar tone as Radio-Paris, which was attributed to the fact that several collaborators worked for the station (who later went to work for the latter). Radiodiffusion nationale (Radio-Vichy) quickly developed its own radio stars, including Philippe Henriot, who began to immediately speak out in opposition to radio broadcasting from Radio-London by Pierre Dac. Despite the competition that may have existed between Radio-Paris and RadioVichy, the two radio stations shared the same desire to develop and to maintain a listener base that would lead them into the future. To accomplish this task, both needed to determine the type of radio programming that each audience sought. Though the Nazi 139

and Vichy propagandistic messaged may have differed, the need to create radio dramatic entertainment united the two stations. Radio-Vichy broadcast a variety of programs from 6:30 a.m. until midnight, under the direction of Jean Antoine (June 1940-July 1942) and A.M. Julien, and finally, Maurice Bourdet. Sports, variety shows, game shows, news programs, and radio drama comprised the lions share of programming. Radio-Vichy sought to promote programming that advocated traditional French values and notions of morality. Without the notion of traditional morality evoked in radio dramatic works, in particular, we would be left with worthless radio drama of the World War II period within the zone libre.151 These worthless plays, when cloaked with the mantel of morality, gave them legitimacy. Through radio, and through radio drama, Vichy proclaimed a restoration of France that would occur through good old fashioned values. milien Amaury, director of Vichy family propaganda, created an initiative that resulted in the production of radio dramatic works that embraced Vichyite ideology. One of the results of this initiative was the program LAlphabet de la famille. The action of this radio drama centered on a typical French family who lived a fairly simple life, yet who attempted to reinvigorate its patriotic soul by visiting the tomb of Napolon Bonaparte, the Archives nationales, the Muse de lArme, and Versailles. The drama welcomed popular French actors, such as Pierre Fresnay, to come to reenact important historical events, which were often recorded at the historical site.152 In the story, the grandfather takes his grandchildren to evaluate France on stage, to prove to them that
151

Let us remember that Richard and Eck argued that there was no noteworthy radio drama from the World War II period. 152 Pierre Fresnay was a well-known movie actor. He played the role of Capitain de Boeldieu in Jean

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although she may be enduring some tough times now, she once knew an era of victory and happiness. The programming grid at Radio-Vichy dedicated more time to radio drama and offered a wider variety than its counterpart at Radio-Paris. Radio-Vichy printed its programming schedule in its weekly journal Radio National. From the fall of 1940 until the winter of 1943, the Service des dramatiques essentially left the door open for authors to have their works considered for the program Banc dessai, a thirty-minute per week opportunity for authors to present unedited texts that had been written expressly for the radio medium (La Vie culturelle sous Vichy 12).153 Among radio script writers that contributed to this program included Georges Hoffmann, who created several radio dramas for Radio-Vichy, including Baudruches (1942), Les Complices (1943), and an adaptation of Thophile Gautiers Le Capitaine Fracasse (1943). The most famous writer of this genre to lend his pen and his works to the radio medium was Georges Simenon, author of the well-known Maigret series of novels. On November 27, 1943, Simenon brought his first radio dramatic series to Radio-Vichy, Le Soi-disant de M. Prou ou les silences du manchot, which aired until February 12, 1944. Several of the novels from his Maigret series were adapted to the radio medium, including La Maison du juge (May 2 and May 9, 1944), directed by Ren Ginet, and Les Dossiers de lagence O (1944), directed by Georges Colin.154

Renoirs La Grande illusion (1937), one of Renoirs most famous films. 153 For more on the Services des dramatiques, see Hlne Ecks article appearing in Cahiers dHistoire de la Radiodiffusion 30: (1991). 154 The feuilleton policier became an important entertainment sub-genre on Radio-Vichy. Other radio dramas of this sub-genre included LEnnemi dans lombre, by Pierre Maudru, a feuilleton policier consisting of 9 episodes, which aired from February 14, 1944 until April 10, 1944 and Mystres de Paris, a feuilleton policier, based upon the novel by Eugne Sue that aired in four episodes in August 1943. One month after his series ended, Pierre Maudru became a commentator on the Radio-Paris network.

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Along with those writers new to the radio drama genre, popular radio dramatists of the Interwar period brought their work to Radio-Vichy, which included Cita and Suzanne Malard, the mother and daughter dramatic duo that had created religiousbased radio dramatic works during the Interwar period. During the Occupation, the two writers worked with Gabriel Ollivier to produce the radio drama entitled Evocation mongasque, pice radiophonique, broadcast on Radio-Vichy on February 27, 1942. The pro-Catholic Church policies of the Vichy rgime aligned well with the Malards radio drama. Vichy ideology showed in the radio dramatic work of Robert Cardinne-Petit, a prominent playwright and film writer/director during the Occupation, who created two radio dramatic works for Radio-Vichy. His first radio dramatic work, La Dame de lentresol, comdie en un acte, broadcast on Radio-Vichy on April 21, 1942, comprised a cast of four main characters who lived in the same residential building: Valentine Tournesol, a 25 year old blond-haired woman, Alain Carreau, a rather distinguished nonchalant thirty-something man, Madame Pche, a large, weak fifty-year old woman, and la dame de lentresol, who we soon learn had just passed away. Cardinne-Petit described a simple studio apartment, containing little more than a couch, an armchair, and a bed, painting a picture of the simple life in Vichy. The twenty-five year old Valentine felt a sense of obligation to the lady living above her, who believed Valentine to be an upstanding, happily-married young lady. The truth of the matter was that Valentine and her boyfriend, Alain, were nothing more than lovers, who lived together in the small studio apartment below la dame de lentresol. Since the death of la dame, Valentine had become increasingly critical of the life that 142

she led with Alain. She felt shame and embarrassment, wondering how she could have entered such an impure life with him: ma reputation ne me laisse pas indiffrente. Mais je dois te prevenir que je suis rsolue ne plus vivre dans lerreur, moi (194). Valentine sought to restore the self-respect that she had lost when she embarked upon this impure path. There was a powerful message here, which struck at the very heart of Vichyite propaganda: a return to the pure tradition of Catholic morality. Cardinne-Petits second radio dramatic work for Radio-Vichy, Il faut croire aux revenants, ou monsieur chez madame, comdie en un acte, aired on February 3, 1943, under the direction of Louis Seigner of the Comdie-Franaise. Cardinne-Petit presented a radio drama that focused on the development of two characters, Elle, played by Germaine Royer, and Lui, played by Maurice Escande, both Socitaires de la ComdieFranaise.155 Like the setting of La Dame de lentresol, comdie en un acte, that of Il faut croire aux revenants, ou monsieur chez madame, comdie en un acte remained simple: a modern salon with two doors, with a couch and an armchair in the foreground. We learned that the two lead characters, Francis (Lui) and Hlne (Elle), were formerly married, and that Francis had returned after ten months to get back together with her. He hated the very idea of marriage, and we soon learned that he had returned to gloat in his bachelorhood. Francis wanted to take Hlne as his mistress, an idea that she initially dismissed, but then found very tempting. As his mistress, Hlne would have been free from the circumstances of wifehood, such as family responsibility, commitment, and trust, and she could have reaped all the benefits of a liaison amoureuse. In the end, the

155

Louis Seigner played the role of Frre Lon in a Comdie Franaise production of Paul Claudels Le Soulier de satin (November 27, 1943). See Chris Floods Theatrical Triumph and Political Ambiguity: Le Soulier de satin at the Comdie-Franaise in 1943-1944, French Cultural Studies 3:1 (1992): 17-30.

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former couple concluded a rather long discussion of the importance of marriage. Robert Cardinne-Petit underscored the importance of marriage and family within the Vichy rgime. In Il faut croire aux revenants and La Dame de lentresol, the second component of the Vichy slogan Travail, Famille, Patrie resounded. We begin to fully comprehend that it was in the family that the true sanctity of life existed. By becoming a good, productive wife and mother, Valentine could realize one of the most important objectives of the Vichy administration. She could play a part in the pronatalist movement that would lead to the rehabilitation of the fatherland. Her acceptance of this responsibility would bring about important secular and religious consequences. Valentines acknowledgement of the importance of religion spoke to a focus on faith that played a key role in the dissemination of Vichy values necessary to combat the increasing secularization that France had experienced during the Interwar period.156 It also spoke to an acknowledgement that religion was not simply attending the mass, but rather a system of core values (Vichy values) that directed the way that one conducted ones life. Valentines guilt of committing adultery underscored this fact when she and Alain discussed how they had dishonored Valentines grandmother: ALAIN. Ta grand-mre se porte comme le Pont-Neuf et se moquerait de toi si elle tentendait. VALENTINE. Dabord, tu ne sais pas si elle se porte comme le PontNeuf. cause de toi, je ne la vois plus. Tu las dshonore. ALAIN. Je lai dshonore, moi ?
156

The secularization of French has never ebbed. In a 2003 poll, 41% of French people said that the existence of God was excluded or unlikely, 33% declared that atheist described them rather or very well, and 51% said they were Christian. When questioned about their religion, 62% answered Roman Catholic, 6% Muslim, 2% Protestant, 1% Jewish, 2% other religions (except for Orthodox or Buddhist, which were negligible), 26% no religion and 1% declined to answer. http://a1692.g.akamai.net/f/1692/2042/1h/medias.lemonde.fr/medias/pdf_obj/sondage030416.pdf.

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VALENTINE. En couchant, de la main gauche, avec sa petite-fille. Ma mre, je te laccorde, a un peu badin avec lamour. Mais ma grand-mre, qui ma leve, est cheval sur les principes (192). Valentine remained haunted by the fact that she and Alain lived in sin, continually wondering what la dame de lentresol would think of their union: Si la dame de lentresol avait su que nous vivions en concubinage (194). Guilt and selfconsciousness penetrated her being, as Valentine would have much preferred marriage to the pursuit of an adulterous relationship. The la dame de lentresol represented Valentines conscience, her internal voice that questioned the very way in which she had been leading her life and which would ultimately lead her to change her path. The guilt that Valentine felt as a result of living with Alain outside of marriage overwhelmed her. The fact that Alain initially stated that he never wished to marry did nothing to calm Valentines restless heart: Parce que je tai dit que jallais me marier. Je parie que cest pour cela que tu fais cette figure Mais cest une blague. Me marier ?... Jai encore toute ma sant, tu sais ! (186). She could only hope to convince him of the importance that society placed on marriage and family. With the passing of la dame, a new perspective emerged. It was a perspective based upon a focus on family responsibilities, a commitment to ones spouse and to ones self, a development of trust between married couples, and a hope for the arrival of children. Valentine had been married before her liaison with Alain, but that was a marriage that did not succeed. She realized that she can never be truly happy unless she and Alain wedded, and this remained impossible if Alain maintained such a stance against marriage. She felt shackled, and would never be freed from the mistresss chains until the two pronounced their wedding vows: La libert, pour une femme, mais cest 145

justement le mariage, le vrai (203 - Ellipses by Cardinne-Petit). Alain finally began to understand Valentines logic and eventually yielded to her, and the couple resigned to live a separate life until they were properly wed. Cardinne-Petits radio drama exuded Vichy pronatalist ideology, the starting point of which remained the happily married couple. Vichy extended pro-natalist efforts much further than the Third Republic, for the family had become one of the most vital units of the ideal French society, the moral barometer of the French people. Under Vichy, divorces became more difficult to obtain, and Cardinne-Petits reference to Valentines failed marriage and her desire to marry Alain underscored the need to build a marriage on principles that would endure. In Il faut croire aux revenants, ou monsieur chez madame, comdie en un acte, Robert Cardinne-Petit painted a parallel Vichy perspective in his description of the marital relationship of Francis (Lui) and Hlne (Elle). Their relationship was one of deception, misunderstanding, and a lack of common family-centered goals. Like Valentine, Hlne sought marriage that was based on love and mutual respect whose cornerstone was a faithful husband. Hlne had never known true love and had never found the kind of honorable man that she had sought. We doubt that Francis had ever truly loved her either. Hlne rejected Francis proposition to become his lover, for, like Valentine, she did not wish to pursue an impure path. Soon this dark, forbidden idea tempted her, as Francis proposition would free her from the family responsibilities that would control her married life. Hlne initially represented the complete antithesis of Valentine, who found her single life a prison in comparison to the image of married life that she had 146

painted in her mind. In the end, Hlne became a personnage raisonnable, who refused to accept Francis immoral proposal, preferring to cast aside their former relationship in the hope of finding a suitor who shared her vision of the importance of marriage and family life. Her decision completely played into the Rightist, conservative perspective of Vichy. Hlne had put on the cloak of morality and become a Joan of Arc-like figure. The instant that Hlne came to her senses, she realized that she could begin anew with Francis, but this time they would forge a relationship of love, trust, and family values, not the liaison dangereuse that had brewed in Francis mind. Robert Cardinne-Petits La Dame de lentresol, comdie en un acte and Il faut croire aux revenants, ou monsieur chez madame, comdie en un acte exhibited a parallel message in which Vichy family values emerged from a radio dramatic soap opera. Though some contemporary scholars, such as David Bradby and Serge Added, maintained that radio drama of the Vichy period emerged to fill a need for escapism, such an assessment remained an oversimplification, as it failed to validate the notion that radio drama of the Vichy era addressed contemporary social or political issues. The subject matter alone, including discussions of prominent Vichy themes (marriage and family, for example), became a powerful tool to sway public opinion as the rgime worked to forge a new French identity. Lies, deception, and infidelity, these were some of the themes that drew listeners to the radio dramatic works of Robert Cardinne-Petit broadcast on Radio-Vichy during the Occupation. It was through these themes, however, that Cardinne-Petit underscored the ultra-right Catholic conservatism pervading in Vichy. One of the primary purposes of radio drama that emerged under Vichy, we should note, was to illustrate decadence 147

failed marriages, loving without responsibilities of the Interwar period, which had led to Frances defeat. A return to Vichy conservatism would bring about the renewal of France and hope for a promising future. Vichy conservatism and the importance of the family as the building block of French society took on a new angle in the work of Louis Laloy. Laloy, who had authored opera-ballets, several works on Debussy, and texts focusing on Far Eastern themes, brought his penchant for the Far East to the airwaves of Radio-Vichy. Laloy created three radio dramas published in the collection entitled Trois drames de lAsie (1943), Le Songe de la vie (October 30, 1942), under the direction of Georges Colin, Vikrma et Ourvsi ou le roi et lApsra (November 6, 1942), and Le Chagrin au palais de Hn (November 13, 1942). Laloys radio dramatic trilogy presented a history of important figures of Far Eastern history, religion, and cosmology. Initially, Laloys body of radio dramatic works appeared to have little to do with France or with Vichy life. The first of these dramas, Le Songe de la vie, which I will examine here, belonged to the Taoist religious tradition and retraced the conversion of a saint, Li Yn.157 Li Yn was one of the eight Immortals often represented in Chinese painting or on objets dart. Because of his bellicose nature, he is represented as wielding a powerful sword. Li Yn followed a simple path; a path which he hoped would lead to his own personal salvation and immortality. He was joined by Tchoung-l, another of the eight Immortals. At the beginning of the tale, Li Yn had yet to achieve immortal status. His entire voyage of understanding, a sort of vision quest, occurred within a dream-like state. Tchoung-l sought to show to Li Yn what had brought their
157

We can only speculate as to why Laloy was so drawn to China and the Taoist religious tradition. I feel

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country to hardship and war. At the end of the drama, Li Yn achieved the status of an Immortal and joined the other Immortals to look down upon the world. The image of Ptain as the father of France resonated in the character Tchoungl. Tchoung-l, who emerged in the prologue in a white robe and hat, was wise and powerful, and descended upon the scene comme des nuages blancs (17). He has lived a life similar to that of Ptain, dabord fonctionnaire civil, javais pass ensuite la carrire militaire, he said (17). Like Ptain, Tchoung-l ultimately became a General in the Army. Upon reaching immortality, Tchoung-l looks down at the world and the race of men who struggle with the seven passions (joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, hate and desire) that impede them from understanding Truth. Laloy contrasted this Ptain-like character with Li-Yn, the son of a simple farmer, who struggled to make his way across the rough landscape in search of lodging and work on his own path to immortality.158 When he encountered Tchoung-l at an inn, the Vichy saying Travail, Famille, Patrie rang out in Li-Yns words: Elle [his fiance] ne perdra rien pour lattendre. Je reviendrai pour lpousersitt que jaurai un bel emploi (17-18). A recent bachelier, Li-Yn recognized that it was his responsibility to work not only to take care of his future bride, but also to take care of his parents and in-laws during their golden years. His sense of the importance of the family extended to a love for the fatherland, as Li-Yns words echoed his ultimate

that Laloy recognized some very simple principles in Taoism that would apply well to Vichy culture. 158 The theme of the peasant played an important role in the renewal of French culture. The Vichy rgime sought to promote rural values and peasant culture, favoring a traditional right-wing philosophy seeing the countryside as the real France. In Li-Yn, we noticed Laloys allusion to Ptain who was also the son of a peasant.

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destiny: Secourir sa famille est une bonne uvre. Secourir le peuple est une belle action (22). Vichyite ideology resonated in Laloys minor characters as well. We learn of the Grand Chambellan who had lost his wife in childbirth.159 Faithful to his wifes memory, he raised his daughter alone and never remarried, in order to not give his daughter a wicked stepmother. When the daughter, Tsoi-gn, reached the age of marriage, the Grand Chambellan married her to a young man of modest means, a decision that he had not regretted these last nine years. The son-in-law even treated the Grand Chambellan like an adopted father. The Grand Chambellan lived with his daughter, his son-in-law, and their two children. Family had become the cornerstone of the Grand Chambellans existence. The father-like figures presented in Laloys radio drama were strong, but the absence of Tsoi-gns mother in the text remained significant when considered through the optic of Vichy ideology. The mother was the most essential element in the Vichy pronatalist initiative. The fact that Tsoi-gns mother had been dead for nearly a decade, by the time that we reached the end of the drama, signaled a breakdown in the plan to repopulate the fatherland. The inclusion of relatively few female characters further underscored this absence. The fate of the nation was the responsibility of men. Li-Yn moved from scene to scene in Candide-like fashion, passing through a series of adventures and meeting a host of lesser characters that reappeared throughout the drama. As he proceeded, he became increasingly wiser and more powerful. As the

159

In the French tradition, the grand-chambellan was one of the Great Officers of the Crown, along with the constable, the chancellor, the steward, the admiral and the marshals of France. One of his prime tasks was to attend the king's rising every morning and hand him his shirt.

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years passed, like Tchoung-l, Li-Yn emerged as a General in the Army and an expert in the art of civil administration, calling himself le gnral ministre, le commandant des livres, le chef des critures (29). Like France, Li-Yns land fell under siege, and Li-Yn had no choice but to create alliances with neighboring armies and rally his troops for battle to fight off the invaders. With her husband gone to war, her mother dead and her father (Grand Chambellan) killed by the invaders, Tsoi-gn, whom Li-Yns meets while she was washing cloths in the Yellow River, epitomized the Zeitgeist of an invaded China: Le bonheur. Je ne laurai plus en cette vie. Quelles fautes ai-je pu commettre dans une prcdente existence, pour tre ainsi punieIls [les Barbares] ont dtruit notre village. Ils ont tu mon pre (33). If Li-Yn was this Candide-like character who navigated through his world in order to better understand it, then Tsoi-gn was a Cungonde-like figure that had fallen from riches to rags.160 Her words and her station in life reflected the reality of the Occupation. She was no longer beautiful and she had to do manual labor, which had become the bane of her existence. The Catholic underpinnings of Laloys radio drama echoed in Tsoi-gns words, as they not only expressed her angst, but also the feeling that she bore responsibility for her current situation. With the beginning of Act 3, we learned that Li-Yn and Tsoi-gn were actually husband and wife, but her fall from beauty attributed to her loss in station impeded Li-Yn from recognizing her when he saw her washing cloths in the river. Li-Yn held himself responsible for the death of his father-in-law and the suffering that his wife had endured. If only he had remained at home, instead of answering the call to
160

There is no textual evidence to illustrate Voltaires influence on this radio drama, but the similarities in

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go to war, he might have prevented this tragedy from befalling this family: Par ambition, jai manqu la foi promise et dlaiss ma famille. Par orgueil, jai couru au dsastre. Par jalousie, jai voulu faire le justicier. Voil o mont conduit les passions humaines (43). His guilt pervaded him and he had to overcome it in order to complete his journey toward truth and immortality. Li-Yns tragic flaw was his own pride. It was also his failure to control the seven passions (joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, hate and desire). His realization of how to control the passions that lead to the downfall of men brought about his salvation. Nonetheless, the guilt that he felt as the result of his actions could only be removed through an act of reconciliation. As Li-Yn confessed his sins to Tchoung-L, he became an immortal: Votre purification est accompolie, Toutes vos fautes sont effaces (57). This act of reconciliation resonated a Catholic experience. Li-Yn was now reconciled, but what would his penance be? In Le Songe de la vie, Laloy created a powerful commentary on the responsibility of the individual within his society. Li-Yns primary duty was to take care of his own family. His mistake was found in his belief that only he could save his country. The attack that his home sustained, the ensuing loss of his father-in-law, the Grand Chambellan, and his wifes subsequent misery underscored the fact the Li-Yns false pride ultimately led to the doom and the despair of his own family and did nothing to help his nation. Laloys criticism of Li-Yn was found in his arrogance, for the latters motivation to save his country was based more on the personal glory that he might achieve than on assuring the future of his people.
the progression of his characters remain noteworthy.

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Laloy advocated a partnership between men and women to bring back family values in order to restore France to the days of old. He suggested that the fate of the nation was not the responsibility of one individual, but rather it was shared by all peoples. When Li-Yn battled alone, he was met with defeat. Li-Yn represented each of the pillars of the Vichy slogan, Travail, Famille, Patrie, but he initially failed to embrace them as a whole. It was not until he understood the larger picture that the hope for a renewal of his homeland became possible.

French Radio Drama: Vichyite Ideology from Across the Sea The Germans censored all radio programming produced in France that contained anti-Nazi sentiments, but there was little that they could do to control the content of programs transmitted from abroad. Some radio dramas produced outside of France were meant to reach the ears of the Vichyite. Octave-Henri Gautrets Femme et mari, pome (pice) radiophonique en un acte (1942), broadcast on Radio-Alger on January 3, 1942, offered a radio poetic portrayal of the importance of marriage within contemporary society. Camille Morels poetic radio dramatic work entitled France!..Prsent!.. Pome pique Radiophonique et Thtral en un acte et deux tableaux, broadcast on Radio-Alger on May 6, 1942, which earned the Grande Diplme de Mdaille (avec flicitations du jury) presented by the Acadmie des Jeux Floraux de Tunisie (section de posie), remained critical of the direction which France had taken in the Interwar and World War II periods. Heralding Mother France, Morels work sought to fashion a new view of the French, which aligned well with the Weltanschauung of the Vichy rgime. 153

A part of Radiodiffusion nationale de Vichy, Radio-Alger echoed Vichy ideology from across the sea. Since 1830, France had had a real presence in Algeria. The latter ultimately welcomed the Vichy rgime, when Admiral Franois Darlan, French naval officer and senior figure of the Vichy France rgime, supported Ptains government from within North Africa. As a result, radio programming similar to that of the zone libre emanated throughout Algeria. Morel created a standard radio drama containing a cast of six characters: La France, La Pessimie, LAmbassadeur de pessimie, Le premier combattant, Le deuxime combattant, and Lintroducteur, which personified the French experience. Sound effects remained simple: gun shots produced by the knocking of a wooden rod on a hollow metal container, the roar of an airplane passing overhead, and the playing of Frdric Chopins Tristesse between the first and second tableaux. At the beginning of the premier tableau, just before the rise of the curtain, the sound of gun fire faded in. The curtain went up, and two French soldiers, armed with rifles, entered hastily onto the scene. The voice of the first soldier described the state of affairs in France. The sound of rifle fire and fighter planes zooming overhead blended with the voice of the second French soldier. Exchanges of gun fire rang out in the background once again, and the second scene melted into the third scene. The radio drama moved from a criticism of World War II presented by the two French soldiers to a plea from Mother France to end the military conflict. Like a mother balancing the complaints and demands of her two children, La France entered the radio drama with her own heartfelt words.

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The sound of gun shots cut in back stage. Both soldiers began to fire their weapons, each preferring to die in the name of freedom rather than to yield before the Nazis tyrannical face. Mortally wounded during the exchange of gun fire, both soldiers fell to the ground. As the curtain fell to signal the end of the first tableau, Mother France cried out as Chopins piece Tristesse, played on piano and violoncello, blended with her voice until the beginning of the second tableau. When the second tableau began, the audience found itself on a park terrace, standing in front of a palace. The curtain rose and we witnessed France, mourning over the death of her two sons, as she moved slowly toward the forefront of the soundscape. In the face of the loss of her two sons, Mother France did not despair, for she held on to the hope that one day soon the war would end and that France would, once again, be free to chart her own course into the future. La Pessimie, one of Morels allegorical characters, entered into the drama, expressing her surprise that France did not waiver, even during such a period of trial and tribulation. La France believed in the resolve of the French people, their power to meet the most challenging of obstacles, and to triumph over them as they had done in the past. The history of France was largely about overcoming adversity, so as long as hope remained, the French people would rise up again and regain freedom. It is in her words that the Vichy program emerged: LA FRANCE. Mon histoire est pour moi le plus riche chquier ! Je conserve Corneille et Racine et Molire, Rien ne peut menlever Pascal et La Bruyre Et glisser dans loubli Napolon Premier !... Les atomes de lair rappellent Lavoisier. Sur locan, le soir, dans la brise jalouse, Passe le souvenir du vaillant La Prouse. Cest encor un Franais : de Lesseps Ferdinand 155

Qui osa le premier couper un continent (17). Au seul nom de Pasteur le monde se dcouvre Et dans mon Livre dor que simplement jentrouvre, Un nom brille dj dun clat souverain, Vous le connaissez tous, cest celui de PTAIN !... (approbation) Quand on a...mes amis...une telle rserve, Dune chute sans fin, lhistoire vous prserve (18). France acknowledged this difficulty, but she remained confident that the two sides would join again. The key to the reconstruction of France was found in its unique history and in the knowledge that Ptain would restore the fatherland to glory. This was the Vichyite message that resounded throughout Morels radio dramatic work. Camille Morels France!..Prsent!.. Pome pique Radiophonique et Thtral en un acte et deux tableaux offered a prime example of nascent radiophonic art produced in the zone libre. Morels radio drama was, at once, drama and poetry, rapportage and dream, which expressed the Zeitgeist of Vichy during the Occupation: the fear that France would not be able to rid herself of the aggressor and that, once the Nazis were gone, that she would struggle to rebuild herself, as well as a focus on the importance of the family a theme that dated from the Interwar period. France was engaged in a war on two fronts: against the Nazis and against her own notions of the future. It was a fight without end; nous nous battons toujours, wrote Morel, et ripostons sans cesse (9). Moreover, it was a battle in which the audience remained fully involved, as the listeners participated in the encounter, hearing gun shots ringing out and loud aircraft continually flying overhead. In the Deuxime Tableau, France remained troubled. It was here when Morels inner voices chimed in, in the form of his characters La Pessimie and LAmbassadeur. 156

These two characters advocated an escape into French culture, a return to its folk traditions and desire to regain the francit lost during the Occupation. La France had witnessed Occupation before, and she had endured: LA FRANCE. Maintes fois dans le cours de ma bien longue histoire, Je vis un tranger fouler mon territoire, Mais toujours balay par un soufflet puissant Il dut se retirer confus et plissant, Laissant derrire lui quelque flamme nouvelle Qui fait dire partout que je suis immortelle (15).

Morel presented an experiment in the manipulation of the soundscape with a contemporary theme; Frances struggle to regain her right to sovereignty. He employed simple sound effects and music to paint the picture of a nation in transition. The gun shots, which we heard even before the rise of the opening curtain, underscored the tone of the drama that continued throughout the work. Frances two sons, Le Premier combattant and Le Deuxime combattant, paid the ultimate price in the service of their country. The musical accompaniment remained simple as well: Chopins Tristesse. The power of Chopins music, which constituted the driving force of Morels radio drama and created a secondary framework, was to recall French culture in its days of power. Though it consisted only of a piano and a violoncello, his musical accompaniment to the drama served as a cross-fade or segue from the first tableau to the second tableau, as well as to create a distinctive contrast between the melancholy music and the roar of gun fire in the premier and deuxime tableaux. To this powerful Chopin piece, Morel juxtaposed La Marseillaise. Morels use of the Marseillaise introduced an interesting paradox into his radio drama. The Marseillaise was banned during the Vichy rgime, which had replaced it 157

with Marchal nous voil (Marshal, here we are), in reverence to Ptain, and considered singing the song an act of resistance (such as Franais Libres Chant des Partisans). How could Morel reconcile his use of this song of resistance, banned by the Vichy rgime, when he had written the radio drama for a Vichy-sympathetic audience as evidenced by his prefatory letter to Ptain? Did he intend his radio dramatic work for the resistance movement as well? Morels use of the Marseillaise suggested a desire to re-appropriate the song and reinvent it within a pro-Vichy context. Without question, Morel knew the power of the song, just as he knew the effect that employing Chopins piece in his work would create on his audience. By using the Marseillaise in conjunction with a stated approval of Ptain as messiah or the Joan of Arc who would lead the French people to liberation, Morel reinvented France under a Vichy optic, which would serve as a point of departure to a prosperous future. The radio dramas of Dieudonn, Dhrelle, Bonnamy and Poulot, Cardinne-Petite, Laloy, and Morel were representative of radio dramatic works broadcast in France during the World War II period. Though created primarily for entertainment purposes, they were certainly not void of contemporary themes. I disagree with dramatists and scholars including Roger Richard, David Bradby, Roger Pradalie, and Hlne Eck, who concluded that radio drama of the World War II era was hardly noteworthy. I believe that their assessments misrepresented the importance of radio drama during the Occupation. During the Interwar period, radio and radio drama were both in infancy. Radio was a new medium whose parameters were unknown and radio drama was a hybrid genre that few understood. During the Occupation, radio producers and listeners in France began to 158

truly understand the power of radio not only to disseminate information and to entertain, but also to promote ideology. In the post World War II period, two exemplary radio dramatists emerged who would define the history of French radio drama: Antonin Artaud and Samuel Beckett. Both already successful on the stage, the works of Artaud and Beckett impacted radio drama in France and throughout the world.

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CHAPTER FOUR FRENCH RADIO DRAMA OF THE POST-WAR PERIOD The Post-War Climate of France: Government in Transition Although Allied intervention had liberated France from her Nazi aggressor, France emerged from World War II with a host of new problems. After a short period of a provisional government controlled by General Charles de Gaulle, leader of the Free French, a new constitution put into effect on October 13, 1946 established the Fourth Republic with a parliamentary form of government ruled by coalitions. This new government remained tumultuous, with numerous disagreements concerning issues both at home and abroad. In the post-war period, France became embroiled in a mission civilisatrice, which found her seeking to strengthen power in her colonies.161 Colonial wars in Indochina and Algeria provoked successive cabinet catastrophes and changes of government. France withdrew from the war in Indochina in 1954 and became entrenched in a war in Algeria beginning in 1954 (la guerre sans nom) that ended in her defeat in 1962. General Charles de Gaulle remained active in French politics while in retirement. He was called out of retirement in 1958 to settle the Algerian crisis. He instituted Frances Fifth Republic in 1959. By 1968, much of French society grew restless, which month of May, 1968, when students demanded educational, labor and governmental reforms, artistic and sexual freedom, and an end to the on-going Vietnam War. May 1968 became a turning point in French social relations, which led to changes in the
161

The assumption was that France, because of its status as an enlightened culture, had the responsibility of disseminating her ideas to less fortunate cultures. This is commonly termed by historians as the White Mans Burden. The ideology of the mission civilisatrice combined with the concept of French nationalism

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personal freedoms and less social control, in the work place, in personal relations, in education and in private life. From the moment of Liberation, France had prepared herself for an age of reform and revolution; an age that would present itself in many forms, including radio.

The (R)Evolution of the Radio Station As a result of the German Occupation, radio within France changed forever. The uses of radio had multiplied, now serving to provide information, entertainment and to disseminate propaganda. The healthy competition that once existed between public and private stations in the Interwar period would never return. In the post-World War II period, the state completely controlled radio stations (Cheval 52). This governmental control continued until 1968, when France experienced a radio renaissance.162 The post-war period became a time of revolution and evolution. The war had destroyed many of the towers making up the state-radio network as well as those of the private sector. After months of uncertainty with regard to the future of radio within France, independent stations began to spring up. The end of the 1940s ushered in the success of many private stations situated on the periphery of France, offering programming very similar to that just before the Occupation, which was much more

formed a tool of propaganda that could easily be manipulated to convert public opinion within France. 162 Governmental control over radio occurred in several steps. The government ordinance of June 22, 1944 established initial control over all stations. This motion was supported by further resolutions passed on November 20, 1944 and March 23, 1945, which revoked the authority of private stations, placing control now in the hands of the state. This brought into effect the establishment of the RDF (Radiodiffusion franaise), which became the RTF (Radiodiffusion Tlvision Franaise) in 1949 (Cheval 52). In the 1960s, the law of June 27, 1964 created the Office de Radiodiffusion Tlvision Franaise, which assured French radio and television broadcasting from that point onward. On May 17, 1968, a strike resulting from the censoring of news programming took place at the ORTF. State control further solidified in the passing of the law of July 3, 1972, which reaffirmed the state monopoly over radio and television (Cheval 55).

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interesting and popular than that of state-sponsored radio. Until 1955, the peripheral stations (radios priphriques) were Radio MonteCarlo, Radio Andorre, and Radio Luxembourg. Their transmitters and registered offices were located abroad, but their shareholders and their listeners remained mainly French. Radio Monte-Carlo began in July 1943 as a German-controlled station designed to disseminate Nazi propaganda throughout the south of France. Upon Liberation, the French government took control of the station. Thanks to the neutrality of the Principality of Andorra, Radio Andorre became the only French private radio to broadcast throughout World War II without the control of either France or Germany. Radio Luxembourg became the most popular of the stations, thanks to entertainment programs produced primarily by its subsidiary company Programmes de la France, taking the radio of the Interwar period as a starting point (Benhalla 65). The post-war era became a time of glory for radio variety programs and music, with the stars of radio enjoying success parallel to that of stars of the silver screen. Whether a peripheral or a national station, French radio stations of the 1950s held tremendous power. Like radio of the Interwar period, French radio of the 1950s continued to be a family affair, with a large amount of after-dinner programming. Television had yet to become a real competitor in France, as most French homes did not own a television until the beginning of the 1960s. To succeed in the post-war era, French radio stations reinvented themselves for the post-war audience. One of the premier radio stations to emerge in the post-war period was Europe 1, which began to broadcast from the Saar (Germany) on January 1, 1955. Europe 1 quickly responded to the changes occurring in radio that had resulted from the 162

appearance of television and the emergence of the transistor radio and quickly adapted to its modern audience. The station began to focus on a youthful audience, transforming its tone and interest, creating programs that differed from rival peripheral station Radio Luxembourg (Miquel 332). Station managers substituted the traditional radio speaker with disc-jockeys, eliminated sponsored programs in favor of advertising blocks, and began to present news reports live from the field.163 Europe 1 sought to personalize the radio-listening experience, distancing itself from the traditional greeting Chers auditeurs that characterized French radio of the Interwar and Occupation eras (Miquel 332).164 Other stations adapted rather slowly to the new format. It required nearly a decade for Radio Luxembourg to reinvent itself and emulate the format used by Europe 1. By the end of the 1950s, few French radio stations resembled their counterparts of the Interwar or World-War II periods. Rapid expansion of peripheral stations characterized the beginning of the 1960s. Europe 1 continued to grow as a result of its youthful programming schedule and the development of information programs (Cheval 60). Large-scale variety programming and game shows gradually faded to make room for more personal programming. Radiorecording techniques emerged in the post-war period that permitted the taping of spots outside of the studio that could later be played in studio and mixed with live coverage. The year 1966 marked a turning point for French radio. Radio Luxembourg, finally aware that it had become a dinosaur, reinvented itself, hiring new producers and

American radio stations had some influence on French radio stations during the post-war period. It is important to note, however, that after the Liberation, French radio was controlled by the state until 1981. See Chapter Four of Jean-Jacques Chevals Les radios en France: histoire, tat et enjeux (Rennes: Apogee, 1997). 164 See Cusys and Germinets Marmoto and the Malards Le Dieu Vivant.

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disc-jockeys and developing a programming grid that resembled more closely that of the more successful stations (Duval 365-6). Most importantly, the station changed its name to RTL. In the south of France, Radio Monte-Carlo and Radio Andorre abandoned broadcasting from the series entitled Programmes de France in favor of developing their own programming (Miquel 332). Little by little, the majority of French and peripheral radio stations began to follow the Europe 1 model. State-sponsored radio followed a similar path, reinventing its image and changing its programming directors and creative teams. During the 1960s, state-sponsored stations molded themselves into the form that has continued until the present time. In addition, French radio witnessed the emergence of what remained the most important radio stations, including France Inter, which focused on cultural programming and France Culture, which offered mainly classical music. By the end of the 1960s, the radio had become a medium equally effective in entertaining, disseminating information, and in engaging the audience in a dialogue with programming. The student Revolution of 1968 gave French radio stations the opportunity to broadcast live from the scene. The idea of catering to a youthful audience continued into the 1970s. Popular music filled the airwaves as radio producers sought to increase market share. France-Inter, the popular national radio station, rose to the forefront, surpassing Europe 1 and RTL. The year 1971 witnessed the emergence of yet another national radio station, FIP (France Inter Paris), whose cornerstone became continuous music as well as traffic reports and weather bulletins. The station focused its efforts on the Parisian audience. In addition to the arrival of rock music, station directors broadcast prominent social events over the airwaves. In 1975, the ORTF (Organisation de Radio et 164

de Tlvision Franaise) appeared and Radio France took control over French radio (Miquel 172). In the south of France, a similar radio renaissance began. Radio-Monte-Carlo switched from shortwave to longwave transmissions in 1974, evolving from a small regional station to a national network (Duval 397). Other small stations passed by the wayside, as French radio, in general, took on a Parisian tone. Throughout the post-war period, French radio drama continued to entertain the listener. Europe 1 made its radiodramatic works more eccentric in the 1960s.

French Radio Drama after Liberation: An Uncertain Future With the close of the war, all aspects of French society entered a rebuilding period: economic, political, and artistic. An attempt to create distance between the immediate past and the present became a focal point of the post-war reconstruction, as the Vichy rgime had made extensive use of popular culture in an attempt to win over French citizens, for as Brian Rigby noted in Popular Culture in Modern France: In the immediate postwar years, not only was there a need and a will to proceed to the modernisation of France, but the folk image of old France also now carried the stigma of the Vichy period, since the traditional folk values and folk ways had been harnessed by Vichy propaganda in the service of collaboration. (10) One might have expected the literary floodgates to burst open immediately upon Liberation, for after having suffered several years of censorship, French radio stations would have sought quickly to broadcast radio dramas censored during the Occupation. This supposition could not be further from the truth. From the point of Liberation, French radio producers hesitated to broadcast radio dramas once considered 165

controversial. With the French state exercising control over radio broadcasting in the post-World War II period, radio programming directors overlooked works containing uncertain content. Gradually, a number of dramas that had been censored appeared on the radio, though the majority of these works lacked, in retrospect, anything substantial that should have excluded them from broadcasting during the Occupation. Radiodiffusion Franaise finally broadcast Jean-Jacques Bernards Richelieu, vocation radiophonique, banned during the Occupation (some thought it to be a critique of the Nazi rgime), on February 16, 1945. Other controversial radio dramas to emerge in the post-war period included Roger Vaillands Appel Jenny Merveille, pice radiophonique (Paris, Radiodiffusion nationale, February 15, 1948), and Jacques de Beauprs, La Grande aventure de Reginald Thomson (Paris, Radiodiffusion Franaise, February 12, 1947), written during the war, which criticized the role of the modern soldier.165 Some radio dramatic works remained excluded from broadcast, including Ren Streiffs Michel Ney, Marchal dEmpire, pice radiophonique en un acte, a critique of Napolon Bonaparte (and perhaps Ptain or Laval). Streiff published his radio drama in 1953, though it would never be broadcast over the airwaves. French radio stations eventually broadcast a host of radio dramas in the post World War II period: George Adams and Jacques Berlands Le Mystre du Mobiline (Radiodiffusion Franaise on September 19, 1950), which continued the tradition of

Jacques de Beauprs radiodramatic works included a collection entitled Les Histoires de tante Lucie, which contains several radio plays, including Cupidon ou la Pendule chinoise, LAmiral sur le toit, Poisson davril, La Fleur de lge, all broadcast on Radio-Luxembourg, as well as his drama Manque de pot, part of the series entitled Les Matres du mystre, broadcast for the first time on December 8, 1953 on Chane parisienne.

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Pierre Cusys and Gabriel Germinets Marmoto; Hubert Dumass La Demoiselle au miroir (France-Culture, April 30, 1967), an external monologue in which the protagonist spoke in front of a mirror to gain a deeper understanding of the self; Andr Camps adaptation of Alejandro Casonas Cocu, battu et content, farce tire du Dcamron (Chane Parisienne de la Radiodiffusion franaise, March 8, 1952). These radio dramas were representative of the type broadcast during the post-war period and in reality continued the tradition of the Interwar and World War II periods. Accomplished stage dramatists including Jean Genet and Jean Tardieu also brought their works to the radio medium. Several of Jean Genets works adapted for the radio medium were also censored. This included Frolics and LEnfant criminel in 1947. Genet also adapted and broadcast his plays Les Bonnes and Haute Surveillance in 1948. In his collection entitled Une Soire en Provence, ou le mot et le cri. Thtre III, pices radiophoniques et Livrets dopras de chambre (1975), Tardieu produced a series of radio dramas, including an adaptation of Voltaires Candide, which were broadcast throughout Europe. Largely adaptations, Genets and Tardieus radio dramas also continued the radio dramatic tradition of the Interwar and World War II periods and there was no great change from the norm. Ultimately, radio dramatic fiction reappeared on French radio. Nearly every Tuesday evening from 8:30-9:30 from 1952 to 1974, French radio set new attendance records. Thousands of listeners flocked to their radio receivers to listen to Les Matres du mystre, a radio-cinematic fiction series. Les Matres du mystre was a product of many of the successful police and detective radio dramas of the Interwar period. For nearly twenty-two years, the series entered French homes with a variety of mystery-themed 167

programs. Thanks to post-war advancements in collection and in audio recording, the Institut National de lAudiovisuel in Paris has preserved nearly one thousand original scripts and recordings from the series.166 Close monitoring on the part of French broadcasting directors had never truly disappeared. As a result, some French dramatic works never reached the radio audience. Scheduled for broadcast on February 2, 1948 on Chane parisienne, just moments before the broadcast, the station manager prohibited transmission of Antonin Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, citing its format and controversial subject matter. Radio producers in France did not broadcast Artauds radio drama until March 6, 1973. Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu remains the most controversial radio dramas of any period of French radio. In the 1950s and 1960s, Samuel Beckett brought his creativity to the radio medium. The radio dramas of Artaud and Beckett represented the exemplary French radio dramatic works of the post-World War II period. Their exemplary radio dramas illustrated the possibilities of how original the genre could be and established a new standard for French radio drama production, in which the French should continue to take great pride.
Produced by Pierre Billard, Les Matres du mystre remains one of the most successful French radiodramatic series to date. Chapter Five of Jacques Baudous Radio mystre: le thtre radiophonique policier, fantastique et de science-fiction. (Amiens: Encrage, 1997) offers an outstanding analysis of the series and of Billards work in general. During the course of an interview, Billard offered the following: vrai dire, les auditeurs se souviennent surtout de moi propos des matres du mystre, pour moi aussi cest un excellent souvenir : je voulais faire une mission qui ne ressemble pas du tout un polar classique ou un thriller. Ctait une mission familiale qui ne devait pas faire peur, il y avait un vrai suspens mais sans crime horrible ni meurtre sanglant. Il fallait que toute lhorreur ne se trouve que dans le gnrique qui constituait en quelque sorte lalibi noir de cette srie. Cette mission touchait vraiment tous les publics, jai mme reu une lettre dun directeur de sminaire qui faisait couter les matres du mystre ses sminaristes tous les mardi soir. Il souhaitait que j'aie lobligeance de le prvenir avant la diffusion de lmission si par hasard un sujet devait ne pas convenir leurs chastes oreilles ! Je nai jamais eu le faire. <http://www.ina.fr/voir_revoir/patrimoine/billard.light.fr.html>. Pierre Billard also produced the radio dramatic series entitled Mystre, Mystre. For more on this series, see Lynne Barretts, Tonino Benacquistas, and Lawrence Blocks Mystre, mystre: 9 doses de littrature policire (Paris: Denol,
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Radio Resists: The Censored Radio Dramatic Work of Antonin Artaud Antonin Artaud recorded Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu from November 22-29, 1947, during the course of several sessions in the broadcasting studios of Radiodiffusion franaise, rue Franois 1er, Paris. Artauds renouncing of religion during World War II became the source of its radio dramatic creation. In this radio drama, the author played on the double meaning of the expression, jugement de Dieu, suggesting both that man should be judged by God and that God should be judged by man (or that neither should be judged).167 As Allen Thiher notes, Artauds dream was to abolish the continual theft of the self that the Father inflicts upon us (507). Immediately barred from broadcasting by the station producer, Artauds propagandistic and polemic drama quickly became a legend. Artaud had previously presented a work of similar tone during the course of a conference presentation given at the Thtre du Vieux Colombier on January 13, 1947, which he called Histoire vcue dArtaud-Mmo.168 The controversy that emerged from this conference provoked the station producer to second-guess his decision to broadcast the drama. The station director banned Artauds radio drama the evening of its scheduled broadcast at 10:45 pm on Monday, February 2, 1948. Yet unaware of the content of the drama, Fernand Pouey, director of dramatic and literary programming at the station, had

1994). 167 Antonin Artaud was best known for his works Le Thtre et son Double and Le Thtre de la cruaut. In the latter, Artaud forced the audience to confront basic human nature, in all its complexity and grossness. Artaud associated with the surrealist movement, but was ultimately expelled from it. His Le Thtre de la cruaut influenced many French writers, including Jean Genet, Eugne Ionesco, and Samuel Beckett. 168 Jacques Bonnot, director of the Thtre de Nesle in Paris, invited the Passe Thtre Company to perform their creation, Artaud Mmo, Tte Tte, based on the well-known Vieux Colombier conference by Antonin Artaud. The company gave 30 performances from January 14 through February 22, 2003. Bulletin International : Antonin Artaud 5 (October 2004). < http://www.cavi.univ-paris3.fr/Rech_sur/Av_Mod/BIAA_5.pdf>.

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previously invited Artaud to include his work as part of the series La Voix des Potes. Pouey yielded to a group of well known literary and radio personalities, including Ren Clair, Jean Cocteau, Max-Pol Fouchet, Louis Jouvet, Pierre Laroche, Maurice Nadeau, Jean Paulhan, Raymond Queneau, and Roger Vitrac, who had scheduled an audition of the recording on February 5, 1948 in the Radiodiffusion franaise studio.169 This group favored the broadcast of the drama, failing to find any reason to exclude it from the programming grid. Ultimately, the Director-General of the station, Wladimir Porch, who maintained that the radio dramas screams and shrieks, combined with its risqu subject matter (including a discussion of human feces), chose to ban the work. Indignant at the course of events that had taken place, Fernand Pouey resigned.170 Before his resignation, Artaud requested that Pouey schedule a private broadcast on Monday, February 23, 1948, for himself and for various members of the radio community unable to attend the first broadcast.171 Not all who attended the private screening greeted the work with open arms. Arthur Adamov, well-known French dramatist of the post-war period, expressed considerable concerns regarding Artauds radio piece. The latter became quite displeased with Adamovs criticism of his work, and expressed his feelings in a letter addressed to Paule Thvenin dated February 24, 1948:

See the article entitled Antonin Artaud censur, appearing in Le Monde on May 7, 1999. See Cahier Numro 58 from November 1998 of the Comit dHistoire de la Radiodiffusion intitled, L'anne radiophonique 1948, Antonin Artaud, Louis Merlin, Wladimir Porch, Arno Charles-Brun, Francis Crmieux, Henry Barraud, divers. 171 In his article entitled Crise de conscience la radio, which appeared in Le Populaire, Ren Naegelen wrote that approximately sixty journalists, writers, playwrights, and radio personalities gathered to hear the drama. The majority voted for an eventual broadcast of the play, mais M. Wladimir Porch, qui porte la responsabilit des reactions fcheuses de nos chers-z-auditeurs, passera outre (Cited in Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu 64).
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Les critiques de M. et de A.A. [Arthur Adamov] sont injustes mais elles ont d avoir leur point de dpart dans une dfaillance de transition, Cest pourquoi je ne toucherai plus jamais la Radio et me consacrerai dsormais exclusivement au thtre tel que je le conois, un thtre de sang, un thtre qui chaque reprsentation aura fait gagner corporellement quelque chose aussi bien celui qui joue qu celui qui vient voir jouer, dailleurs on ne joue pas, on agit. Le thtre cest en ralit la gense de la cration uvres compltes XIII (Paris: Gallimard, 1974) 146-7. Porch adopted a conservative position: he questioned whether the listening public would be ready for such information. Artauds radio drama was not a light piece of entertainment; it contained controversial material criticizing the involvement of the United States during World War II, and the emergence of American and Russian imperialism following the war. Further, it passed judgment on the Catholic Church. Most importantly, Artauds radio drama contained bizarre sound effects and obscene material, which did not align well with French culture.172 Antonin Artaud died on March 4, 1948 at the age of 51, and the script of the transmission was published in April 1948 by K diteur. A second publication appeared in 1974, containing supplementary material including letters and press articles that
I must underscore the fact that Artaud was particularly influenced by Eastern theater, especially that of Bali. His experience witnessing Balinese theater in Paris marked him greatly, and it influenced his play Les Cenci (1935). See Nicola Savareses 1931: Antonin Artaud Sees Balinese Theatre at the Paris Colonial Exposition, The Drama Review 45:3 (2001): 51-77. Also see Bettina L. Knapps Artaud: Mythical Impact in Balinese Theater. Antonin Artaud and the Modern Theater. (Rutherford: Fairleigh Dickinson UP, 1994) 89-101 and Patricia Clancys Artaud and the Balinese Theatre, Modern Drama 28:3 (1985): 397-412.
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emerged at the time of its initially-scheduled broadcast. Evidence of the popularity of the drama existed even before this second publication, as a pirated edition could be found in several Parisian bookshops on the rive gauche throughout the summer of 1973.173 Antonin Artaud wrote his radio drama in 1947, his health destroyed after numerous electric shock treatments and many years spent in mental facilities.174 At a time in world history when most considered American military forces heroes of the Liberation, Artaud criticized the intervention of the United States. He presented a cry of rage against the reduction of the human animal to a collection of gross appetites and a prophetic warning against the dangers of a new American and Soviet imperialism.175 For Artaud, the theater presented two immovable obstacles: the first was the external pressures of audience, critics, and spectators; the second, the actors themselves (Ho 16).176 Artaud believed that the theater of his era had become a preserver of culture,
A letter to Marc Barbezat, February 16, 1948 in Artauds LArve et Faume (Dcine: L'Arbalte, 1989) 96. Evidence also suggested that some had obtained a pirated copy of the recording of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu just before the scheduled broadcast of February 1948. 174 Artaud spent more than three years in a mental facility, in which he endured more than fifty electroshock treatments. See Philippe Dagens article Artaud, un art furieux contre lordre du monde, appearing in Le Monde on August 2, 2005. 175 Peter Sellars underscored Artauds thesis with intense film footage of the Afghan war and by complementing Artauds drama with a dramatic reading of a June Jordan poem about the appropriation of God to endorse racist and sexist attitudes. (Michael Billington, Review: Theater: For an End to the Judgment of God: Tate Modern, London, Guardian Leader Pages, February 10, 2003, 16. <http://web.lexisnexis.com.content.lib.utexas.edu:2048/universe/document?_m=f2156ae76e581eda51d1a54a03200fe7&_do cnum=33&wchp=dGLbVtb-zSkVb&_md5=a429ee9d359186d31d718232c5969dd7>. 176 In Artauds last extant letter, which he wrote on February 24, 1948 in reponse to the cancellation of the broadcast, Artaud expressed the importance of the theater: Je voulais une uvre neuve et qui accrocht certains points organiques de vie, une uvre o lon se sent tout le systme nerveux clair comme au photophore avec des vibrations, des consonances qui invitent lhomme A SORTIR
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devoted to a narrow range of societal problems, which remained unresolved. He also believed that theater had the capacity to heal people of psychoses. Finally, Artaud sought to present theater as a myth, Oscar Brockett explained in his book entitled Century of Innovation: a History of European and American Theatre and Drama since 1870: The great myths are dark, so much so that one cannot imagine, save in an atmosphere of carnage, torture, and bloodshed, all the magnificent fables which recount to the multitudes the first sexual division and the first carnage... in creation (225-6).177 News of the imminent radio broadcast of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu provoked a range of letters published in the French press. On January 25, 1948, Dimanche-Records printed a spot on the coming broadcast entitled La Radio: Antonin Artaud va faire du bruit et des bruits de la T.S.F. avec son Jugement de Dieu. : lheure tardive que la radio rserve aux potes, nous entendrons bientt (le 2 fvrier 22 h. 45, chane parisienne) une mission qui porte ce titre dfinitif Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu.On attend avec curiosit et un peu dinquitude ce Jugement de Dieu, dont lenregistrement a dj fait quelque bruit parmi les professionnels de la radio (Jugement de Dieu 59). The author of the newspaper article expressed both interest in hearing Artauds work and trepidation with regard to the content of the drama. His fears did not lack foundation. The day of the scheduled broadcast, February 2, 1948, one newspaper headline

AVEC son corps pour suivre dans le ciel cette nouvelle, insolite et radieuse Epiphanie. (...) Qui que ce soit et le dernier bougnat doit comprendre qu'il y en a marre de la malpropret physique comme physiologique, et DESIRER un changement. CORPOREL de fond. (uvres compltes XIII (Paris: Gallimard, 1974) 130-2. 177 Oscar Brocketts work presented citations about Artauds work that do not exist elsewhere (225-6).

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simply read: Programmes radiophoniques: 1er et 2 fvrier: Chane parisienne: 22.45: la Voix des Potes (premire): Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, dAntonin Artaud, avec Maria Casars, Roger Blin, Paule Thvenin et lauteur (60).178 These were among the top actors and actresses in France. The audience of Chane parisienne awaited the broadcast, aware of the controversy that the drama had created in the course of its recording sessions. No one foresaw that the station director would cancel the broadcast, though the French radio audience had witnessed a similar scenario during the banning of Marmoto (see Chapter Two). When the station director banned Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, he ensured its popularity as well as its legacy. Throughout the month of February 1948, a host of journalists printed articles in the French press regarding Fernard Poueys decision to postpone the broadcast of the controversial radio drama. Certain journalists applauded Pouey for having the courage to schedule a private screening of the play, in spite of the controversy, but still wondered whether a French audience of approximately fifteen million listeners would be ready to hear Artauds alarming message.179 For all practical purposes, the private screening of Artauds radio drama was scheduled in order to ascertain whether Wladimir Porch, Director-General of radio at Chane parisienne, avait eu radiophoniquement tort ou raison en interdisant la
Mara Casars was well-known for her voice work, performing roles in many motion pictures in the 1940s and 1950s including, Varsovie quand meme (1954) (voice).... Rcitante/Narrator ;Le Cur d'amour pris du roi Ren, (1952) (voice).... Rcitante/Narrator; La Vie de Jsus (1952) (voice).... Rcitante/Narrator, toiles de demain (1942). She is perhaps best known for her work in the film Les Enfants du paradis (1945), from the pen of Jacques Prvert. <http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0143018/>. Roger Blin was a well-known comdien and motion picture actor. He directed and played the role of Pozzo in the premire of Samuel Beckett's En attendant Godot at the Thtre Babylone in Paris on January 23, 1953 (Samuel Beckett The Complete Dramatic Works (London: Faber & Faber, 1986). 179 Writing for Combat on February 6, 1948, an undisclosed writer expressed the feeling that Artauds text may some day be released in printed form, but it may never be broadcast: Ce texte sera probablement
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diffusion sur les ondes dun texte inaudit du grand pote surraliste (61). Opinions resulting from this audition differed greatly. One thing became certain: if a radio drama contained material too controversial for broadcast over the airwaves, no maison ddition would publish it either.180 Much ado about nothing, one would think, though no less than six papers printed within Paris and its environs contained articles in reference to Artauds unbroadcast radio drama. This became the best thing that never happened to his radio dramatic work, which even today echoes the clich, There is no such thing as bad press. Artaud continued to receive bad press throughout the month of February 1948, as contemporary journalist Pierre Joffroy referred to Artaud as un homme qui inquite les hommes[qui] na pas de popularit ni de coterie (62). Joffroy presented a flawed assessment of Artauds literary contribution. Artaud created troublesome works that truly challenged the body and the spirit. I would argue, however, that this was his signature, and it increased an interest in his works both during his lifetime, and after his untimely death at the age of 51. On the second point, Joffroy oversimplified Artauds contribution to theater: to say that Artaud did not have any popularity or that he did not have a coterie shows a lack of understanding of the great influence of his work Le Thtre de la cruaut. A wide range of artists found inspiration in Artauds works and often sought to collaborate with him, regardless of the content of his writings or the nature of his personal life.181 Helga Finter and Matthew Griffin sum
crit, mais lmission sera-t-elle donne? (Scnes et camras: Le Jugement de Dieu sauvera-t-il Antonin Artaud, appearing in the K Editeur edition of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu 61). 180 This sentiment resounded in a press article written in Franc-Tireur entitled Tempte autour dun micro ou la controverse Artaud-Porch, printed February 6, 1948. The author signed his writing J.D. (Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu 62). 181 Artaud was more than a littraire: he was a graphic artist and a musician. He created the sounds for the

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up well the function of Artauds theater in a way that Joffrey, perhaps, could not appreciate at the time of the initially scheduled broadcast of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu: Artaud was much more concerned with finding a form of theatre, which, through performance, would be capable of integrating unconscious emotional affects into the Symbolic by way of the Imaginary in such a way that the force of these affects could not be sublated in the symbol (16).182 Ren Farabet, Radio producer at France Culture, broadcast Artauds radio drama on March 6, 1973 as a 45-minute radio sketch offered as part of the collection entitled Atelier de cration radiophonique, a radio workshop that soon became celebrated for its experimental programs. By the early 1970s, French radio (and society) had evolved to the extent that it could now welcome the kind of drama that Artaud had created. This was true to the extent that essentially no critical press exists from the March 6, 1973 broadcast. The passage of more than twenty-five years between the moment of initial controversy and the radio premire provided the French audience the necessary distance to appreciate the drama for its true worth: Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu remained an innovative, highly critical evaluation of the climate of World War II that used authentic sound effects to stimulate the audience. In the 1970s, a critique of American intervention during World War II did not enrage the French people as it might

recording of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu. For more on Artaud the artist, see Paule Thvenins and Jacques Derridas Antonin Artaud: Dessins et portraits (Paris: Gallimard, 1986) and Evelyne Grossmans 50 dessins pour assassiner la magie (Paris: Gallimard 2004). Many biographies exist on Artaud, though few biographers truly knew him. For an intimate perspective on Artaud, see Paule Thvenins interview entitled A Letter on Artaud, translated by Bettina Knapp, The Tulane Drama Review 9:3 (1965): 99-117 and Knapps and Paul Grays Two Interviews with Roger Blin, The Tulane Drama Review 11:4 (1967): 109-112. 182 The work of Helga Finter and Matthew Griffin examined Artauds theatrical legacy and the impact of Artauds thtre de la cruaut on theater as a whole. Antonin Artaud and the Impossible Theatre, The Drama Review 41:4 (1997): 15-40.

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have immediately following the Liberation. Further, with the secularization of France that had increased, the French were less likely to oppose criticism of the Catholic Church than they would have been had radio producers presented Artauds work in the years immediately following the war. Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu consisted of a grouping of texts that Antonin Artaud had conceived for the initial broadcast, which he had dictated in November 1947 to a secretary working for Radiodiffusion franaise. Some scholars have divided the drama differently, because their perceptions of the work differ, though we understand that Artaud himself generally preferred the scenic distribution indicated below. Scenic division of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu with running time: 1. opening text (10:04) 2. sound effects which fade into the text performed by Maria Casars (0:29) 3. the dance of the Tutuguri, text (3:38) 4. sound effects (xylophones/polyphones) (0:25) 5. La recherche de la fcalit (performed by Roger Blin) (4:33) 6. sound effects, beating and exchanges between Roger Blin and I (2:13) 7. La question se pose de (text performed by Paule Thvenin) (5:55) 8. sound effects and my cry in the stairwell (1:43) 9. conclusion, text (9:28) 10. final sound effects (1:01)183

In a letter to Fernand Pouey dated January 16, 1948 in Artauds uvres compltes (126-127), Artaud indicated his preference for the above division of his work. The publisher, K Editeur, divided the radio drama as follows: Jai appris hier, Tutuguri, La recherch de la fcalit, La question se pose de,

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In Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, Artaud created a series of inter-related texts held together with a mlange of music and screams. Artaud manipulated the soundscape to link the scenes of the drama as well as to increase the dramatic tension within the work as a whole. In the opening text (scene 1), Artaud shouted at the audience in an angry, shrill voice in a style analogous to that of Hitlers radio speeches of 1930s. He criticized the American war machine: Car de plus en plus les Amricains trouvent quils manquent de bras et denfants, cest--dire non pas douvriers mais de soldats, et ils veulent toute force et par tous les moyens possibles faire et fabriquer des soldats en vue de toutes les guerres plantaires qui pourraient ultrieurement avoir lieu (10). Artaud challenged the productivity of the United States and her desire to detract from the natural world by creating synthetics. As Scene 1 segued into Scene 2, the soundscape expanded, and comprised a blending of variety of sound effects, the majority of which remained indiscernible (Scene 2). The beating of a drum cut the intermittent shrieks and shouts produced by Artaud himself.184 A poem performed by cinema star Maria Casars describing The Dance of the
Conclusion. The K Editeur edition also includes variantes, a different conclusion, and diverse notes, as well as articles de presse and letters regarding the radio drama. Artauds radio production of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu consisted of four parts to be read over the radio to introduce a program entitled Voix des potes. Part One attacked American ambitions in the Marshall Plan, Part Two evoked pagan gods from a Mexican cult to which Artaud belonged, Part Three talked about feces, and Part Four discussed flatulence. Not all parts of the original written text were included in the radio broadcast because of time limitations. See Allen S. Weiss Radio, Death, and the Devil, in Wireless Imagination: Sound, Radio and the Avant-garde eds. Douglas Kahn and Gregory Whitehead (Cambridge: MIT P, 1992) 269307. I obtained the running times indicated above from the audio CD Pour en finir avec le jugement de dieu dAntonin Artaud, presented by Ren Farabet, (1999), France Culture, Collection Atelier de cration radiophonique,1 disque compact (1 h 13 min 45 s), Bibliothque nationale de France, salle P: cote PDC12.001697.4. 184 Speaking of Artauds voice in an Article entitled Les rvlations dArtaud, appearing in the July 4, 2003 edition of Le Monde, Patrick Kchichian remarked, la voix dArtaud, elle rsonne longtemps dans loreille et dans lesprit. Elle produit une sorte dbranlement dont la nature est difficile deviner, mais ladquation entre le timbre et le propos, aussi obscure soit-il, apparat totale. Voix de ventre et de tte que la gorge libre, ou plus exactement expulse, voix davant les mots et dans laquelle les mots, comme stupfies, viennent habiter (v).

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Tutuguri faded into Artauds soundscape of shrieks and shouts (Scene 3).185 Initially quiet, Casarss utterances increased in intensity as the end of the poem approached. At the climax of the poem, her tone was full of anxiety and terror. Her poem entitled Tutuguri Le rite du soleil noir painted an apocalyptic and enigmatic vision of death and destruction, which ended with the blasphemous image of the Christian cross: Or, le ton majeur du Rite est justement LABOLITION DE LA CROIX.186 Casarss tone visualized this ritual, as the listener envisioned the Tarahumaras chanting and dancing around a fire.187 The listener eavesdropped on a sacrifice, the ceremonial slaughter of a bull and the drinking of its blood, a parallel with the Catholic symbol of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and the transubstantiation and consummation of his blood during Holy Communion.188 Casarss voice faded out to close the ritual (mass). Through his soundscaping, or cross-fading, Artaud led the listener from the tense atmosphere of the Dance into an acoustic lieu agrable featuring a peaceful xylophonic melody played by Artaud himself (Scene 4). The xylophonic music faded out as Roger Blin began his recital entitled La recherche de la fcalit (Scene 5). There was no greater a contrast in the drama than that created between the preceding peaceful
The Tutuguri is a ritual dance of the Tarahumaras people. It involved consumption of peyote. For more on the dance of the Tutuguri and the use of peyote, see Artauds Les Tarahumaras (1935). 186 Artauds reinvented poetic language in his radio drama. He made it raw, natural, and unfettered. See Alice Turkss Antonin Artaud: la recherche dun nouveau langage potique, The French Review 49:2 (1975): 247-255. 187 In contrast to the Americans, who destroy the natural in favor of the artificial and who kill people holding guns and knives with tanks and airplanes, Artaud preferred a simpler people, a people more in touch with the Earth; the Tarahumaras. The Tarahumaras are Native Americans from Northern Mexican who live in the Sierra Madre. They use a hallucinogen, peyote, during shamanistic sances, which Artaud observed during the course of a stay in Mexico. Artaud appreciated the organic, humble relationship that the Taramumaras maintained with their world. 188 Adherents of the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox faiths maintain that the bread and wine of Communion become, in substance, the body and blood of Jesus Christ at consecration. They are no longer
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tune and the explanation of the reason for the existence of human excrement uttered by Blin. Blins tone increased in intensity as the radio drama climaxed on the word CACA. What followed was complete gibberish blended with screams: o reche modo to edire di za tau dari do padera coco Blin criticized the Catholic mass, Christian baptism and the existence of God, advocating the End of Gods Judgment of Men. Artaud described man as a conflicted being. He was torn between the desires of the spirit and the desires of the body. He toiled his entire life to reconcile this paradox, but the solution remained out of his grasp.189 The screams from Scene 5 blended with those of Scene 6, as Artaud and Blin formed a duet, screaming in unison, singing, beating on the drums, and playing notes on the xylophone, and dialoguing unintelligibly. Their cries of horror increased the dramatic tension of the scene and underscored Artauds desire to move beyond the limited ability of language to express meaning.190 The last four scenes of Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu formed a unified act. The screams and drum beat cut out, and calmness overtook the drama as Scene 7
merely symbolic. 189 In The Language of Presence, John Erickson maintained that in Artaud the body is at war with the spirit, and in these battles of articulation the loser is threatened with extinction (286). 14:1/2 (1985-6): 279-290. Artaud underscores one of the main realities of the human condition, but the means in which he does this is raw and direct. His solution to this dilemma: give man a body without organs. 190 Denis Hollier underlined the reason for such an intense aural component to the drama: [Artaud] wants the spectator to be brought to feel uneasy, to worry that during the performance of what he thought was going to be nothing more than a spectacle, something compromising may unfoldArtaud wants his spectator to feel vulnerable, framed, like a politician caught in the act, discovered during a polic raid in a place where he shouldnt have been (33). The Death of Paper, Part Two: Artauds Sound System, October 80 (Spring 1997): 27-37.

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began, in which Paule Thvenin presented a text entitled La question se pose de, an exploration of the afterlife and of humanity; in particular, our bodily needs. As she navigated through her rcit, her voice increased in intensity and timbre and blended into the screams, unintelligible mumblings, and drum beats produced by Artaud himself (Scene 8). The drum beat slowed and Artaud rang a bell, signaling the approach of the end of the radio drama. In Scene 9, which corresponded in form and function to the opening scene, Artaud outlined the raison dtre of his radiophonic work: En principe dnoncer un certain nombre de salets sociales officiellement consacres et reconnues (35). As the radio drama drew to a close, a regular drum beat faded out to end the work. For Artaud, one of the main purposes of his theater consisted of illustrating the universal forms of life. These were the characteristics that all human being held in common. Life is full of double meanings, one of which he created in Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu. Artaud acknowledged that the theater could not create reality, but only fashion its own constantly changing perspective that surpasses human understanding. If the theater could lead the spectator/listener back into mans world of dreams and primitive instincts, he would be submerged in a vicious and inhuman world. Artauds drama remained cathartic and analytical. He underscored the importance of modern psychoanalysis in which the patient finds a cure by evaluating his psychosis from the outside.191 Through an analysis of the repressed forces of man, man would learn to free himself from the very characteristics that make him human. In Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, Artaud highlighted the distinction between Eastern and Western theater; the latter remaining too reliant upon text. Eastern
191

For more on psychoanalysis and Artaud, see Jeffrey Atteberrys Reading Forgiveness and Forgiving

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theater, in contrast, focused on the physical conception of theater, distancing itself from the verbal Western theater drawn from the well of literature. In the Eastern productions (Balinese) that Artaud witnessed in Paris, the words became secondary. They were mere utterances of the body. Artaud maintained that we should seek understanding in the metaphysical, not in the physical or spiritual (Fowlie 209). The inspiration of Balinese theater and Artauds experiences sampling peyote in Mexico resulted in a highly ritualistic element in his Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu. 192 In the course of developing his radiophonic work, Artaud described gruesome and fear-provoking death rituals. He exalted human bodily waste as proof of the existence of man. In the audio recording, such images mixed with intermittent shrieks, screams, groans, and a well-developed lexicon of made-up words: a dictionary of onomatopoeias invented by Artaud to explain the dissociation of meaning from language, and a use of harsh, disturbing sounds that had already been an established trademark of his drama.193 Artauds experience in metaphysical theater dated from the Interwar period. On May 6, 1935, Artaud set out to stage his drama Les Cenci, based upon a play by Shelley and a short story by Stendhal. His work failed at the box office, running only seventeen days. It consisted of an experiment in the theater of cruelty, the characteristics of which he had outlined in his text bearing the same name. Artaud centered his drama on the idea
Reading: Antonin Artaud's Correspondance avec Jacques Riviere MLN 115:4 (September 2000) 714-740. 192 For more on the influences of Balinese theater in the work on Antonin Artaud, see Henri CartierBressons work entitled Les danses Bali (Paris: R. Delpire, 1954). Also see E. Westlakes Drama: Drama and Religion. Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. Vol. 4. 2nd ed. (Detroit: Macmillan Reference, 2005) 2435-2440. 193 Alen Beck maintains that, in radio, intelligibility of words is the most important and this is especially obvious in radio dramaRarely does a radio fiction confound the narrative effect with sounds and silences from domains other than speech. Cited in The Death of Radio?. An Essay in Radio-Philosophy. Sound

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of a theater in the round, which he believed would create closer contact between actors and spectators than the traditional theater. The performance used mechanical devices to create an acoustic chaos: harsh and cacophonous sound effects, revolving stage sets, flashing lights to represent storms, unusual vocal effects, etc.194 The Parisian theatergoing audience of the Interwar period had not prepared itself for Artauds brand of theater based on cruelty, violence, incest, and rape, nor the fact that its characters spoke bizarrely and unnaturally. This performance foreshadowed the sound effects that Artaud would employ twelve years later in Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu. At times, Artauds sounds seemed unfocused. Artauds voice, and voice coupled with the music, percussion and words reflected a constant tension between sanity and insanity, between artistic control and reckless abandon. Artauds voice communicated a state of emotional and psychological turmoil that intentionally undermined the sense of the text. Artaud also criticized poetic composition: Il vomit les tats-Unis, immense usine de fcondation artificielle de chair canon et viande de labeur, ce btail humain, arme de rserve de la mondialisation, dirait-on aujourdhui. Mais, il crache aussi sur la posie abstraite rimes sublimes et sornettes lgiaques.195 Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu represented one of the most innovative, polemical cases of radio dramatic sound poetics of the post-war period. Sound poetry, as suggested by John Erickson, is a sub-

Journal, 2002. <http://www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/rp/sec6.html>. 194 Artauds ideas on the use of light and sound in the theater recall those used by Adolphe Appia at the turn of the 20th century. Appia was a Swiss stage designer and musician who used light (often combined with musical pieces, such as those of Richard Wagner) to exploit the aural element to enhance the visual. See Denis Bablet and Marie-Louise Bablet, eds. Adolphe Appia 1862-1928: Actor-Space-Light (London: Riverrun, 1982). 195 This reference comes from the article entitled Une profession de foi anale, from the online journal entitled Lire. (2003) <http://www.lire.fr/critique.asp/idC=45526/idTC=3/idR=219/idG=2>.

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group of sound-text which operates through a denial of signification toward an ideal of the unification of expression and indication (279). The radiophonic language created by Artaud centered on emotive language, designed to move beyond a language enrooted in signification. The repeated use of onomatopoeia formed the core of Artauds sound poetics. Artaud used onomatopoeia as an intermediary step between signifying language and the language of presence.196 Rita Thalmann states that it is mans natural inclination to use onomatopoeia (15). The ambiguity of the sounds makes little difference to ones understanding. By frequently using onomatopoeia, Artaud simply replaced one set of signs for another. Though these utterances appeared unimportant and unintelligible to the listener, the onomatopoeia represented the most important element of Artauds radiophonic work: these sound elements fostered the externalization of human thought. By employing onomatopoeia and seemingly senseless utterances, Artaud shattered established language and created his own. His sound manipulation resembled that of Russian Futuristic poets Velemir Klebnikov and Alexei Kruchenykh, some of the leading practitioners of Zaum poetry ( ). Zaum, meaning beyond sense, sought to undermine the conventional meanings of words, which permitted sounds to generate their own array of meaning, or even the invention of new words based entirely on sound. The word
196

By signifier, I am referring to a symbol, sound, or image (as a word) that represents an underlying meaning, contrasted with the signified, which is a concept or meaning as distinguished from the sign through which it is communicated. This is Saussures definition: The sign, he argued, is the union of a concept and a sound image, which he labeled signified [signifi] and signifier [signifiant] (Cours de linguistique gnrale 66-67). Saussure defined the basic element of language (the sign) relationally and made the basic assumption of historical linguistics (the individuality of the basic units of language and signification) subject to intense examination. The reason we can recognize different occurrences of the word arbre as the same word is not because the word is defined by inherent qualities, but because it is

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cacophony also described Artauds use of sound effects. Cacophony refers to an unpleasant combination of loud, often jarring, sounds or the use of harsh unpleasant sounds in language to reach a certain literary effect.197 We may also refer to the musical term dissonance. In music, dissonance refers to an unstable combination of notes that, when played simultaneously, sounds displeasing. These terms accurately represent Artauds use of sound effects in Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, as they gave a jolt to his radiophonic work. This jolt found its genesis in the life of its creator. When Artaud finally left the psychiatric facility in 1946, his body had been beaten down by more than fifty shocktherapy treatments, as well as numerous insulin injections. From this point forward, Artaud developed his vision of an organless body, eviscerated, and naked. He called this image Le Mmo, which Gregory Whitehead labeled the pure energy of direct brainwave transmission, born from an occult synthesis of needles, electricity and a cacophony of irrefutable inner voices (90). Artauds Le Mmo focused on the disembodied, complete with abrupt sounds, noisy jolts and grotesque imagery. This became the sound poetics that defined Artauds radio drama, which served to shock his audience in much the same way that he had been shocked during his stay at the asylum. The drums, the shrieks, and the groans that made up part of the dramas soundscape signified the move beyond language, as words alone could no longer describe the energy inside the organless body. The drum was a significant ritual instrument in the Balinese theater that Artaud had witnessed in Paris. It was evident that Artaud wanted to

defined as an element in a system, the structural whole, of language. 197 How can we not think of the parallel between cacophony and Blins interjection CACA ?

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use Balinese theatre as an affirmation of something very important: that the theater must have its own language, a language that differed from the language of words that was based on the physicality of the actor. After listening to a recording of the broadcast, Wladimir Porch felt the presence of an even greater fear than exposing the listening public to the obscenity, blasphemy, and anti-American sentiments evoked in the drama. Artauds radiophonic work underscored the dichotomy that exists between textual and aural literature, for as Klaus Schning noted, the breakdown of boundaries between text-based literature and acoustic literature, oral poetry and forms of articulation not amenable to notation of any kind, opened new paths to suppressed, formerly taboo realms of expression (319). With the broadcast of Artauds radio drama, the taboo, such as a discussion of human excrement and an exploration of the Catholic faith, emerged as possible topics of debate that the authorities felt society was unprepared to broach. Thus I pose the following questions: What would have happened if fifteen million radio listeners had been exposed to Artauds shock treatment, his cacophonic haunting on Chane parisienne in the years immediately following World War II? How would they have handled Artauds message that underscored the harsh realities of mans existence? What would they have made of the onomatopoeia, of the dissonance of his sound poetry? The answers to these questions may forever escape us, but they speak to the climate of France in the post-World War II period. This was a national question, which touched all corners of France. The banning of Artauds radio drama truly reflected the power of radio in post-war France. Even with the advent of television in the 1940s, radio

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producers in France recognized that radio remained a major media force.198 Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu remains popular in the 21st century. Several modern performances have taken place, including a performance directed by internationally-renowned American opera and theater director Peter Sellars, which took place Saturday, February 8, 2003 at the Tate Modern in London.199 Artauds theater and radio dramatic ideas remain modern and inspirational as they transcend various media. In an article entitled Marsyas, part 2: Theatre by Peter Sellars, which appeared in the January 25, 2003 edition of The Guardian, Sellars explained his own motivation in using Artauds drama to explain Anish Kapoors statue of Marsyas (Ma), on display at the Tate in London from October 9, 2002 to April 6, 2003, stating: In a certain stratum of the art world, it is very difficult for political content to be acknowledged. Few have responded to Marsyas politically, but this sculpture, about a person skinned alive, make it a Guernica for the 21st century: three gigantic mouths are screaming from the flayed skin in a great howl of pain. Which is why I wanted the voice of Artaud, that voice coming from a man who spent years in asylums. His voice is at that extreme pitch. I wanted that voice to echo through the sculpture.200 Sellars drew inspiration from Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu to criticize George W. Bushs decision to wage war in Iraq. In the words of Sellars, Artaud's piece was made in response to the climate of 1930s Germany. It asked: why are the German people silent? So I ask: why are the American people silent now?201

Although television in France dbuted in France on April 14, 1931, it was not until 1947 that programming and a viewing public developed. See Miquels Histoire de la radio et de la tlvision (Paris: ditions Richelieu, 1972): 224-234. 199 In general, the life of Artaud has remained a popular subject of study. Several films have been made, including, En compagnie d'Antonin Artaud (1993) and La Vritable histoire d'Artaud le mmo (1994), and a television film entitled Un sicle d'crivains: Artaud cit atrocit (2000), appearing on France 3 on March 23, 2000. 200 Marsyas (Ma) was the flute player who engaged in a musical contest with Apollo, and after having lost, was flayed alive by the latter. 201 Cited <http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/tateandegg/story/0,,875275,00.html> in The Guardian (January

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Performed at the feet of Kapoors statue, Artauds radio drama screamed out to the audience. The audience is like Marsyas, flayed alive by the American government into believing that the war in Iraq is a worthy cause. Sellars saw great purpose in Kapoors work, and Artauds radio drama offered a useful springboard to attack the government of the United States. The war in Iraq presented the perfect opportunity for Sellars to bring his work to the stage: The purpose of my art is to reach more deeply and challenge the public discourse. Artauds work was so repellent: its terror plunging you into an area you dont know (Sellars). Further, Sellars commented that this piece meets with uncanny accuracy policies coming from the Pentagon at this momentIn the last 10 months we have seen serious threats to democracy and the world, not from al-Qaida but from our own government (Sellars). Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu has impacted the United States as well. In October 2004, Peter Sellars brought his adaptation to the U.S. premire on October 21-24, 2004 at the Roy and Edna Disney CalArts Theater (REDCAT) in Los Angeles, California.202 Once again, Sellars staged his own translation of Antonin Artauds radio drama, coupling it with poet June Jordans epic Kissing God Goodbye, creating a politically-charged performance. Acclaimed Los Angeles actor John Malpede played a high-level Pentagon official (Rear Admiral John Stufflebeam) who delivered Artauds drama as a live press briefing on the progress of the U.S. governments War on Terrorism.

25, 2003). 202 See Claudine Mulards article entitled LAmricain Peter Sellars met en scne la fureur des mots d'Artaud, which appeared in Le Monde on October 31, 2004.

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Rewriting the Realm of French Radio Drama: Samuel Beckett and the Art of Radio Samuel Beckett remains one of the most prolific of all dramatists that have written for radio drama. In France, Beckett is considered part of the French patrimony and his dramatic work is found within the context of the French mentalit. By writing in both English and French, Beckett revealed his bilingual radio dramatic genius.203 He always maintained that his work is a matter of fundamental sounds (no joke intended) made as fully as possible (Beckett Collection of Critical Essays 3). Becketts extensive corpus of radio dramas included of some of the most innovative radio works of the postWorld War II period. Many of his radio works have been featured in subsequent broadcasts and in new adaptations up to the present day and have been recorded onto audio cassette or are available in other electronic formats (CD/MP3). Becketts artistic manipulation of the soundscape redefined the genre and impacted radio drama development in both England and France. Radio drama offered Beckett a new medium in which to present his powerful themes: solitude, memories of the past, the complexity and difficulty of the creative process. For Beckett, radio drama was not exclusively verbocentric. Music became the backbone of his sound vocabulary, which he employed to add another dimension to his radiophonic work. Different from his stage plays, his radio drama esthetics defined a strict hierarchy of sound, whereby music and sound effects (and silence) were balanced in importance often above the characters dialogue.204 His first radio drama, Tous ceux qui tombent (BBC Third
Beckett would have resented anyone questioning his francit. We are reminded of the French journalist who innocently inquired whether he was English. Beckett simply replied, au contraire. 204 Becketts insistence that certain of his radio plays not be performed on stage gives evidence to the distinction that he made in radio and stage drama aesthetics. See Everett C. Frosts article entitled Fundamental Sounds: Recording Samuel Becketts Radio Plays, Theatre Journal 43 (Oct. 1991): 361376.
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Programme, January 13, 1957), contained a fresh musical quality and ushered in a new era of radio drama evolution in which music no longer played a secondary role to plot but permeated the very essence of the drama. Production of Becketts Tous ceux qui tombent redefined radiophonic creation, contributing to the formation of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, which developed in 1958 to create the sounds required to produce the most authentic-sounding radio dramas.205 Beckett followed his first radio drama with more than two dozen works for radio, including poems, prose readings and dramas. Some of his radio works found their way onto television, much to the chagrin of their creator.206 The complete body of Samuel Becketts radio dramas consisted of the following works, all initially broadcast between 1957 and 1976: Tous ceux qui tombent (In English, BBC Third Programme, January 13, 1957; In French on ORTF, February 25, 1963), Cendres (BBC Third Programme, June 24, 1959), Words and Music (In English, BBC Third Programme, November 13, 1962; In French in 1963), Cascando (In French, ORTF, October 13, 1963; In English, BBC Third Programme, October 6, 1964), The Old Tune (BBC Third Programme 1963; RTE Ireland 1963), Rough for Radio II (BBC Radio 3, April 13, 1976). Rough for Radio I (never broadcast), written first in French in 1961 as Esquisse radiophonique, remained an unfinished draft that ultimately evolved into
205

The BBC Radiophonic Workshop closed in 1997, although much of its traditional work had already been outsourced by 1995. The techniques first employed consisted of creating everyday sounds such as voices, wind or footsteps which could be manipulated later. During the course of manipulation, an audio tape could be played backwards, played back at varying speeds, mixed with other sounds, etc., to create a new audio effect. See Desmond Briscoe and Roy Curtis-Bramwell The BBC Radiophonic Workshop, The First 25 Years (London, BBC 1983). 206 Beckett was always reluctant to allow his writing to be adapted for different media. However, he was far more willing to let his work be set to music. From 1976 to 1977, Becketts agents approved at least six different musical settings or operas of his work: Furthermore, That Time, Not I, and Come and Go were all set to music around the same time. Becketts radio dramas brought to television include All That Fall,

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Cascando. In this chapter, I will examine the four longer radiophonic works; Tous ceux qui tombent, Cendres, Paroles et musique and Cascando. I shall analyze the uniqueness of Becketts radio drama in its manipulation of the soundscape through the use of sound elements and music. Like Antonin Artaud, Samuel Beckett was no stranger to censorship. As early as 1934, censors in Ireland had banned his play entitled More Pricks than Kicks because of its crude title. In 1937, Beckett moved to Paris in an effort to escape censorship. The post-World War II era was no less receptive to some of his works: two of his plays, Molloy (1951) and Watt (1953) were banned in Ireland during the 1950s for their controversial content.207 In response to the cancellation of a performance of James Joyces Ulysses at the 1958 Dublin International Film Festival, Beckett rescinded permission to stage a performance of Tous ceux qui tombent. Further, the Lord Chamberlain, the British censoring authority, forced Beckett to edit various scenes and expressions in En attendant Godot considered blasphemous. Beckett rarely yielded to the censors without a fight. Inspired by the Irish people he knew as a boy, Beckett created Tous ceux qui tombent, a mystery tale in which Maddy Rooney heads toward the train station to pick up her blind husband on his birthday.208 The Saturday morning sun shone brightly as she headed along a country road to Boghill railway station. En route, Maddy met a variety of
adapted by Robert Pinget in France in 1963, and Krapps Last Tape, directed by Donald McWinnie in the United Kingdom in 1977 (also aired in Italy in 2000). 207 See Jerome OCallaghans Censorship of Indecency in Ireland: A View from Abroad, The Institute for European Studies December 1998. <http://www.ciaonet.org/wps/ocj01/>.

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gentlemen, each heading her way at varying speeds. Upon arrival at the station, a pious spinster named Miss Fitt helped Maddy to climb the platform steps. We do not know why, but her husbands train had been delayed, which made both the characters rather anxious. When the train finally arrived, Dan, Maddys husband, failed to explain the delay to Maddys satisfaction. As the couple slowly walked home, Dan tapped his walking stick on the ground, and Maddy stepped with her noisy, heavy feet. The sun no longer shone, as clouds overtook the skies. Rain began to fall when Jerry, the station boy, caught up to them carrying an object that he claimed Dan had forgotten at the rail station. The station boy informed Maddy of the reason for the delay: a child had had a fateful accident and had been killed. Dan and Maddy disappeared into a tempest of wind and rain, and the background filled with accusations and classic Beckettian comic banter. In Becketts second radio drama entitled Cendres, Henry, the protagonist, sat on the beach, tormented by the sound of the sea. Throughout the drama, we heard the sound of the waves fading in and out, which became a real character in the story. The entire drama took place in the mind of Henry, who was a lonely, old man contemplating the absurdity of life. He continually talked to himself to drown out the sound of the sea, which reminded him of the passage of time and his inevitable death. Sometimes, he directed his monologue to his dead father; sometimes he spoke with his dead wife, Ada; occasionally he recounted stories to himself, none of which he ever finished.

The title of this radio drama comes from Psalm 145 v.14: The LORD upholdeth all that fall, and raiseth up all [those that be] bowed down. Becketts All That Fall remains popular. Irish Repertory in Chicago presented a one-night-only celebration of the life of Samuel Beckett at the Chicago Cultural Center on April 10, 2006. <http://www.irishrep.com/allthatfall.html>.

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The main theme of Cendres was the dramatic contrast between the burning fire (embers), symbol of life, and the sea, symbol of death. Although Beckett mentioned the sea only in the stage directions (Seaaudible throughout what follows whenever pause indicated), we heard it in the background and in Henrys minds eye as he paused to reflect on his life and on his stories (253). Throughout the radio drama, the sea formed the soundscape that structured the entire work. In Becketts third radio drama, Paroles et musique, the two characters, appropriately called Words and Music, were asked by Croak, a third character, to express certain Beckettian themes. Words attempted to use the spoken language to communicate, and Music employed the language of music to express his feelings. The themes of love and age permeated the text as Beckett underscored the difficulties of the creative process itself. Becketts fourth main radio drama, Cascando, observed the same basic structure as Paroles et musique. The radio sketch centered on a character named Opener (Ouvreur), who opened and closed the never-ending stream of words of the other characters on the one hand, and on the other, produced an unending spring of individual musical phrases and motifs composed in a stream of consciousness style monologue. In this radio drama, Beckett completed the unfinished idea for which he had laid the groundwork in Rough for Radio I. In Cascando and Paroles et musique, Beckett isolates the essential elements of radio art, the background noise of civilization (Monaco 430). These two radiophonic works reconciled a lack of the balance between words and music in the radio dramatic experience. In each of these works, Beckett created a dramatic tension between structural 193

components of the radio drama (words and music).

Tous ceux qui tombent: Rhythm and Pause As I stated in Chapter One, traditional dramatists focus on stage space, while radio dramatists focus on the soundscape. The stage director manipulates stage space by moving characters around the stage, altering the distance between characters, or increasing or reducing the depth of the scene by raising or lowering stage curtains to change the depth of field. The radio dramatist alters the soundscape to create a physical location through dialogue, narration, sound effects and music. In Tous ceux qui tombent, Becketts use of sound deviated from that employed by earlier radio producers who made music secondary to the drama. Becketts Tous ceux qui tombent was broadcast in both England and in France. The English broadcast was part of the BBC Third Programme, which aired on January 13, 1957. It was broadcast in French as Tous ceux qui tombent on ORTF, February 25, 1963. Tous ceux qui tombent recounted the story of a journey to and from the railway station of a rural village in Ireland.209 Beckett divided the action of the drama into three parts: (1) Mrs. Rooneys walk to the station where she plans to greet her husband on the 12:30 train; (2) the confusion at the station and the arrival of the train, and; (3) Mr. and Mrs. Rooneys walk back along the country road. These divisions allowed the listener to visualize the drama and created a sense that it contained both a physical and a temporal

Beckett is hors catgorie as the French say. Thus, I will work with the English version when it is the first production: All That Fall, Embers, Words and Music. All That Fall and Words and Music were also broadcast in French (See the beginning of this chapter for dates). All references come from Becketts The Complete Dramatic Works (London: Faber and Faber, 1986). I will work with the French text for Cascando, which comes from Becketts Comdie et actes divers (Paris: ditions de minuit, 1985).

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movement. In creating Tous ceux qui tombent, Beckett organized sound effects in order to create a musical narrative in which one could extract the main themes while perceiving a central sound-based structure. In Tous ceux qui tombent, Beckett employed artificial sound effects to paint the overall mood of the drama. In the place of authentic animal sounds that could have been recorded beforehand and played back at the time of broadcasting, Beckett used stylized human simulations to lay the groundwork for the drama which, according to Donald McWhinnie who produced the first BBC production in 1957, offered a mixture of realism and poetry, frustration and farce (133). This recalled Artauds use of sound effects in Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu, where the power of the human voice elevated the dramatic tension and underscored the main themes of the drama. Tous ceux qui tombent became the first of Becketts truly musical radio dramas; in essence, it was a sonata containing a prelude and three movements.210 Though the verbal component was important to the drama itself, it was through the manipulation of the soundscape that the true richness of the drama emerged. 211 Although these parts had a similar duration, Beckett altered the tempo in accordance with the discourse of the characters and the action of the drama. Beckett manipulated the tempo to underscore the importance of essential parts of the drama. Beginning with the prelude, Beckett employed a particular four-beat-rhythm,

210

A sonata is defined as an instrumental musical composition typically of three or four movements in contrasting forms and keys. 211 Alan Beck generalizes that radio drama characters are more likely to operate on each other verbally than physically. This is especially so as the sound effects of bodily motion in themselves - mostly rustling of clothing, and paralinguistic grunts and squeals- fail to signify unambiguously and unaided by description, for the most part. This did not hold true for Becketts work. Cited in The Death of Radio?. An Essay in Radio-Philosophy. Sound Journal, 2002. <http://www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/rp/sec6.html>.

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which continued throughout the length of the work. We heard this rhythm for the first time in the sound of Maddy Rooneys dragging feet. To this beat, Beckett blended other sounds, starting with Maddy Rooneys panting, which struck on the first and third beats of the measure. We heard music playing on an old gramophone, emanating from a house as Maddy passed by; the music faded in and eventually consumed her footsteps. Then her husband Dans voice blended with the sound of the music: Poor woman. All alone in that ruinous old house (172). With Dans speech finished, the music continued a few seconds, and then the sound of the footsteps repeated. As the music faded out, Maddy Rooney started to hum to the music that she heard, as she followed Becketts four-beatrhythm. This cadence set the tone for the remainder of the drama (1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4, etc.). During the first movement of Becketts sonata, he introduced a range of sounds: carts, bicycles, automobiles, the tapping on the ground of Dan Rooneys cane, culminating in the sound of an approaching steam train. The sounds of automobiles became increasingly more intricate, creating a crescendo with the arrival of the train at the rail station, cutting out all other noises with the sound of its whistle. The vehicles of the other characters of the drama played an important role in Becketts sonata; Christys cart, Mr. Tylers bicycle, Connollys van and Mr. Slocums car foreshadowed the arrival of the powerful train. Beckett clearly organized the succession of sounds representing the vehicles in the first movement of the drama in a logical progression of increasing loudness and danger: Christy walked quietly beside the cart and mule, the bell on Mr. Tylers bicycle alarmed Maddy, and then Connollys van suddenly passes with thunderous rattles, almost knocking them all over (175). Finally, Mr. Slocum offered Maddy a ride in his car. She accepted, and we heard the comic 196

sound effects describing the difficulty involved in starting the car and Mr. Slocum ultimately running over a hen. MR. SLOCUM: [Dreamily.] All morning she went like a dream and now she is dead. Thats what you get for a good deed. [Pause. Hopefully.] Perhaps if I were to choke her. [He does so, presses the starter. The engine roars. Roaring to make himself heard.] She was getting too much air! [He throttles down, grinds in his first gear, moves off, changes up in a grinding of gears.] MRS. ROONEY: [In anguish,] Mind the hen! [Scream of brakes. Squawk of hen.] Oh, mother, you have squashed her, drive on, drive on! (178-9) All of these sounds served to indicate progression or movement in the work. Like a musical composition complete with crescendos and decrescendos, Becketts fading in and fading out of vehicular sounds specified the rising and falling of the dramatic action. The sound of the first train rushing through the station, which became quieter as the down train arrived with its own hissing of steam and the sound of its turning metal parts, created a greater impact than words alone. At the end of the drama, the train reached full strength when we learned that it had run over and killed a child. To this din of the whistle that signaled the high point of the movement, Beckett contrasted the quiet tapping of Dans cane (1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4), which highlighted Dans handicap and made him the complete antithesis of the powerful train. It also created a counterpoint to the clackety-clack of a train on the tracks. The sound effects made by Maddy Rooneys panting and the slow, regular 1-2-34 rhythm of her dragging feet filled the first movement with melancholy. The use of pauses remained of utmost importance, as Beckett filled his drama with descriptions indicating stasis: Maddy stopped to listen to the music from the nearby house, and 197

stopped again whenever she met other characters, the mule refused to walk, Mr. Tylers flat bicycle tire slowed him down and Mr. Slocums car would not start.212 Maddy Rooneys thoughts further slowed down the tempo of the work, which delayed her arrival at the train station. The opening of the drama itself unified the entire radio drama. When Maddy said, Poor woman. All alone in that ruinous old house, she offered a description of her own condition; Maddy was childless, and, in spite of the presence of her husband Dan, she felt lonely (172). As for the musical component of the work, Beckett employed Schuberts Death and the Maiden in the opening sequence to establish that his drama would have a tragic theme, specifically the theme of the death of a child. The fact that Beckett utilized a piece of music to introduce the principal theme of his drama underscored the difficulty of using words alone to illustrate the childs imminent death. Beckett underlined the theme of death at the beginning of the drama when Maddy Rooney had an encounter with Christy, whose mule glared at her incessantly, making her think about herself and her own preoccupation; she would never have a child of her own. Now elderly, the hope of bearing her own offspring has vanished; What have I done to deserve all this, what, what? (174) Maddy created a comic image of herself, provoked by a stare from the mule: Oh I am just a hysterical old hag I know, destroyed with sorrow and pining and gentility and church-going and fat and rheumatism and childlessness. [Pause. Brokenly.] Minnie! Little Minnie! (174).213 Beckett addressed the theme of death with a similar tone at the end of the drama.

212 213

The pauses in Becketts functioned like the musical quarter rest. Like Maddy, the mule was a creature that could never reproduce on its own.

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Prior to the appearance of Jerry, the young boy who delivered the news about the childs death, Maddy and Dan Rooney passed by the house whose music the listener recognized from the opening of the drama; Schuberts Death and the Maiden. There was a brief silence. Maddy Rooney broke this silence by noting that Dan was crying. Jerry arrived to deliver the news of the childs death. MRS ROONEY: What was it, Jerry? JERRY: It was a little child, Maam. [MR ROONEY groans.] MRS ROONEY: What do you mean, it was a little child? JERRY: It was a child fell out of the carriage, Maam. [Pause.] On to the line, Maam. [Pause.] Under the wheels, Maam. [Silence. JERRY runs off. His steps die away. Tempest of wind and rain. It abates. They move on. Dragging steps, etc. Tempest of wind and rain.] (199) Despite the pain that they felt, the couple remained trapped in the Beckettian obligation to go on, indicated by the sound of their dragging feet. Whether Dan Rooney caused the childs death was inconsequential. Beckett did not play the blame game. The silence that ended the drama underscored the theme of mans helplessness and the necessity to persevere in spite of a lack of hope. In Tous ceux qui tombent, Beckett created an innovative radio drama by developing a script that we could read at many different levels: tragedy, tragi-comedy, literary sonata. Beckett moved his characters against the musical backdrop of the drama. His audience participated in a musical performance, gathering the cues of sound and music presented throughout the work. Becketts dialogue remained best discernable when understood within this context of the soundscape. Radio dramatist C.A. Lewis noted that radio drama required a different understanding of the human psyche than that required to produce stage drama. Becketts 199

radio drama displaced the human psyche. Beckett permitted music to retain the power of vagueness. A measure of that vagueness was found within the temporal domain. For the listener, music and sound existed in the intensity of the present.

Cendres: The Voice of the Sea After Tous ceux qui tombent, whose characters remained similar in development to those of stage drama, Becketts radio art became more conceptual, as he continued to exploit the soundscape. His next radio drama was Cendres, written for the BBC and first broadcast on BBC Third Programme, June 24, 1959, which remains one of Becketts most original radio works. It was perhaps the best example of Becketts sound architecture, where sound exerted a powerful force within the drama.214 From the beginning of Cendres, the listener saw Henry, the protagonist, sitting on the beach, tormented by the clamor of the sea. This sound faded in and out, though Henry could not escape it. None of this was real, as the sounds and faces depicted by Beckett existed only in Henrys imagination. His own voice was the only one that he heard, and the only voice that could counter the sound of the sea. Cendres was a drama of the mind.215 The universe which the radio audience is confronted with, said Clas Zilliacus, is a totally subjective one: it is one mans world. The interplay between Henry and other characters takes place in Henrys mind (Beckett and Broadcasting: A Study of the Works of Samuel Beckett for and in Radio and
The term embers represented the sound of silence, or, as Beckett writes, silence in the house, not a sound, only the fire, no flames now, embers. [Pause.] Embers. [Pause.]not a sound, only the embers, sound of dying, dying glow (255). (ellipses are mine) 215 This label referred to the radio drama genre as a whole as well, upon which several articles bearing a similar title appeared, such as Martin Esslins The Mind as a Stage, Theatre Quarterly 1:3 (1971): 5-11, and Elissa Guaralnicks The Stage of the Mind, Virginia Quarterly Review. 61 (1995): 79-94.
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Television 82). Martin Esslin offered a similar assessment: The background--a background of sound, the sea, Henrys boots on the shingle--is still real, but the voices are all internal: Henrys internal monologue as he tries unsuccessfully to conjure up his dead fathers presence, and later the voices of his wife and daughter and her instructors, which materialize in his memory (On Beckett: Essays and Criticism 368). And in a survey of Becketts radio and television dramas published in the Cambridge Companion to Beckett, Jonathan Kalb noted that Cendres has no surface narrative other than that of a haunted man talking about talking to himself, telling stories that he never finishes, and sometimes experiencing (along with us) the ghostly people and things in his story (129). It is the voice of the sea, this eternal nothingness, which dominated in Cendres (not that of Henry). This voice continued to rattle around in his mind, asking him questions to which Henry could offer no responses. Henrys internal voice (the sea) asked about his father: Can he hear me? [Pause.] Yes, he must hear me. [Pause.] To answer me [Pause.] No, he doesnt answer me [Pause] Just be with me (253). Beckett personifies the sea; he presents it as a living, breathing character. Addressing himself to the audience, Henry remarks: That sound you hear is the sea. [Pause. Louder.] I say that sound you hear is the sea; we are sitting on the strand. [Pause.] I mention it because the sound is so strange, so unlike the sound of the sea, that if you didnt see what it was you wouldnt know what it was [Pause.] (253). From the beginning of Cendres, Beckett created a scene that became increasingly more difficult to visualize. As a result, the audience initially struggled to comprehend what transpired in Henrys mind. We inferred that the sea represented the setting of Henrys fathers suicide, though Beckett left this fact open a bit: We never found your 201

body, you know, that held up probate an unconscionable time, they said there was nothing to prove you hadnt run away from us all and alive and well under a false name in the Argentine for example, that grieved mother greatly. [Pause] (253-4). The sound of the sea, the voice of his dead father that rebounded off the walls of his mind, became Henrys lasting obsession. He began to recount endless stories to himself, which he never finished, in an attempt to drown out the voice of the sea/his dead father. Henrys wife Ada failed to understand why he remained so tormented by the sound of the sea; Its only on the surface, you know. Underneath all is as quiet as a grave. Not a sound. All day, all night, not a sound. [Pause] (261). Despite the fact that Henry fully believed his wife, he could not shake this sound from his head. Going to great extremes, Henry walked around with a gramophone with the volume up full blast in order to drown out the voice of the sea. His wife reproached him, There is no sense in that. [Pause]. There is no sense in trying to drown it (261). How could Henry drown out the sound of the sea, the grave of his father? How could the gramophone, this manmade device, conquer the power of nature and death, the fate of us all? The sound of the sea was the passage of time, ever fleeing; our inescapable destiny. Beckett added a visual component to the soundscape based on the noises of the sea, in order to help the listener to better understand the drama: Henry recounted the story of a man named Bolton, seated in front of a warm fire. It would become another of the stories that Henry never finished, . . . I never finished anything, everything always went on for ever (255). It began as follows: Bolton [Pause. Louder] Bolton! [Pause.] There before the fire. [Pause.] Before the fire with all the shutters . . . no, hangings, hangings, all the hangings drawn and the light, no light, only the light of the fire, sitting there in the . . . no, standing, standing, there on the hearth-rug in the dark 202

before the fire in his old red dressing-gown and no sound in the house of any kind, only the sound of the fire. [Pause.] Standing there in his old red dressing-gown might go on fire any minute like when he was a child, no, that was his pajamas, standing there waiting in the dark, no light, only the light of the fire, and no sound of any kind, only the fire, an old man in great trouble. [Pause.] (255, ellipses included in Becketts original text) The fire was the complete binary opposite of the water image evoked by the sea. The sea had the power to squelch the fire, if Henry permitted. Beckett created a parallel between the outside world, in which Henry was unable to escape the sound of the sea, and the private world, the interior of the house, where the only sound that he heard was the sound of the fires burning embers: the sound of silence. The central sequence of the radio drama centered on a dialogue between Henry and Ada, which evoked specific memories from Henrys past. The listener lived his memories as three flashbacks; the first focusing on Addie, the couples daughter, in a scene with her music master; the second concerning Addie with her riding teacher; a third with Henry and Ada engaged in intimate relations on the beach, some twenty years earlier. We experienced these flashbacks at the heart of the work. These flashbacks led to the high point of the drama. In true Beckettian radio style, sound effects and music structured the work. First, we heard notes played on a piano (in the first episode with Addie), next we heard a horses hooves (in the second episode with Addie), juxtaposed with the sound of the sea (which becomes increasingly louder), ending in Ada bursting into tears. Forgetting about Ada, Henry continued to recount stories to erase the sounds and voices from his mind, focusing now on the Bolton story. Before the drama ended, Henry read from his diary: This evening . . . . [Pause.] Nothing this evening. [Pause.] Tomorrow . . . tomorrow . . . plumber at nine, then nothing. [Pause. Puzzled.] Plumber at 203

nine? [Pause.] Ah, yes, the waste. [Pause.] Words. [Pause.] Saturday . . . nothing. Sunday . . . Sunday . . . nothing all day. [Pause.] Nothing, nothing all day nothing. [Pause.] All day all night nothing. [Pause.] Not a sound (264, ellipses included in Becketts original text). Cendres closed without any definite resolution other than the assurance that Henry would experience the same things over and over again. Like many of Becketts protagonists, Henry remained entrapped in the notion of the necessity to venture forward, without having any real sense of why one had to carry on. In reality, Henry went nowhere, as he was an entirely static character. He moved only three times throughout the drama, once at the beginning, once in the middle and once at the end. The rest of the time he sat stationary and alone, his endless stories, the voice of his wife, and the sound of the sea his only companions. Like the setting in En attendant Godot, the barrenness of the setting expressed the inner emptiness of Henrys life and the futility of his existence. In Cendres, we heard the ennui of Henrys life; the waves that continually struck the seashore created a rhythm that became the aural backdrop of the text. The sea sound was a drone. Consistently audible throughout the drama, the din of the sea blended with the voices in Henrys head and the sound of the burning embers to create a visual image. While the sound remained the same throughout the drama, its representational functions varied. Within the inner narrative that Henry told in order to drown out the voice of the sea, the sound became the sound of the dying embers. He imagined it as the sound of light: listen to the light now, you always loved light, he says to his father (253). Later in the drama, the absence of sound, the not a sound, haunted Henry as well (258). With all these sounds and silences in the foreground, the din of the sea became a constant background murmur that created a cacophonous symphony in Henrys mind. 204

The sea served as a visual metaphor of Henrys existence, as he attempted to search the depths of his mind in order to find out what had happened to his father. It remained the great paradox of Henrys life (he had always lived by the sea, he believed that his father had drowned there, and it was there that he had experienced his first sexual encounter), because of its perplexity: HENRY: And I live on the brink of it! Why? Professional obligations? [Brief laugh.] Reasons of health? [Brief laugh.] Family ties? [Brief laugh.] A woman? [Laugh in which she (Ada) joins.] Some old grave I cannot tear myself away from? (258). Henry felt that since the sea was the source of his problems, it may also be the sea that offered solutions. The symbolic use of the sea has become a clich. Like the music in Tous ceux qui tombent that Beckett permitted to explain itself, Beckett alluded to the symbolic meaning of the sea to underscore the fact that we often use symbols to represent concepts that we do not entirely comprehend. Beckett emphasized the importance of manipulating the soundscape to paint an image of his descriptions, as the sound of the sea and the voices repeated so many times in Henrys head expressed his chaotic state of mind in such a way that the listener saw the chaos filling the characters mind.

Paroles et musique / Cascando: Symphonies of Sounds and Voices The English novelist and essayist Aldous Leonard Huxley, famous for his dystopian novel Brave New World (1932 ), once said: After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music (Bedford 10). This was a fact that Samuel Beckett knew quite well. With the arrival of Cendres, Becketts radio art had 205

become increasingly more abstract, relying more extensively on the implementation of music as a major structural component of the radio drama. Beckett created two radio dramas in collaboration with musical composers: Paroles et musique, developed with his cousin John Beckett, and Cascando, produced with his friend Marcel Mihalovici. In Paroles et musique, Beckett moved his radiophonic work into uncharted territory. Paroles et musique was a complex radio drama, broadcast for the first time on the BBC Third Programme on November 13, 1962. It was also broadcast in France in 1963 with the title Paroles et musique. Paroles et musique was innovative in its use of juxtaposed character voices: the voices of the characters named Words and Music formed a musical duet. The mstro of the dialogue, Croak, commanded Words and Music, whom he called Joe and Bob respectively, to engage in a dialogue on a range of topics including Love, Age, and a description of the Face. Words and Music did not get along at all, and as Croak forced the two to work together, they find that the only means by which they could express their feelings was in song. As Beckett painted a picture of the Face, the character of Croak recused himself and fell silent. With Croaks departure, Words and Music struggled to express their feelings without the presence of the mstro to direct the performance. Unlike Tous ceux qui tombent, which contained a detailed description of setting, Paroles et musique remained void of scenery.216 Further, Beckett did not paint a background description of the three characters, as they remained rather hollow beings created expressly for the radio medium. Through radio, Beckett experimented with a

216

The absence of setting in Words and Music made it very difficult to present this drama in any medium other than radio, a fact which may have been intentional and, at minimum, must have pleased Beckett greatly.

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medium in which he could remove the hierarchy of visual over aural. In Paroles et musique, Beckett achieved meaning through the manipulation of the soundscape, as silence, sound effects, voices and music replaced the visual elements important in stage drama. Paroles et musique represented operatic farce. In contrast to Tous ceux qui tombent and Cendres, which lacked a comedic subtext, Paroles et musique focused on the characters farcical utterances as they sang and chanted their way to a better understanding of their existence. Like the sea in Cendres, Music became a character that engaged in a meaningful dialogue with Words. Word and Music did not contain easily recognizable human qualities, which made them true characters of the radio drama genre. Competing theories exist on the function of the three characters. Vivian Mercier envisions the characters Words, Music, and Croak as three separate beings, with Croak being an old man who shuffles in to ask Words and Music to be friends (155). Eugene Webb suggests that Croak is the name the dialogue directions give to the conscious self of the artist (102). Clas Zilliacuss view seems the most valid, in which he maintains that in Paroles et musique, a mental process is unfolding, in which Croak instigates two of his faculties, at odds with each other, to provide him with solace and entertainment (Beckett and Broadcasting 105). Croak was found half way between the meaningless word and pure musical sound. In Paroles et musique, Croak initiated the other characters, Words and Music, in a discussion of the themes of sloth, love, age and the face, that latter of which he would explain later in the drama. Words defined these themes through verbal expression, consisting of definitions recited from the dictionary, whereas Music defined or 207

interpreted these same terms through the language of music. The theme of sloth became one of the most important themes evoked in the drama; sloth suggested a laziness that functioned in direct opposition to the Beckettian notion of perseverance that remained prevalent in his play En attendant Godot.217 The clash between Becketts use of voice and music underscored the power of his tools of the trade. It illustrated the struggle of self-expression, both on the part of the individual and on the part of the writer. In his dictionary definition-like soliloquy, Words underscored the danger of sloth for humanity: Sloth is of all the passions the most powerful passion and indeed no passion is more powerful than the passion of sloth. This is the mode in which the mind is most affected and indeed - [Burst of tuning. Loud, imploring.] Please! [Tuning dies away. As before.] The mode in which the mind is most affected and indeed in no mode is the mind more affected than in this (287). Words speech was music itself; circular and repetitive. His repetition revealed a struggle to reach meaning and self-expression, which inevitably became farcical when Words attempted to express old age: Age is . . . age is when . . . old age I mean . . . if that is what my Lord means . . . is when . . . if youre a . . . man . . . were a man . . . huddled . . . nodding . . . the ingle . . . waiting- [violent thump of club] (289). The struggle to define old age revealed the type of confusion that one typically experienced during old age. Becketts themes remained monosyllabic (sloth, age, etc). Croaks thumping club was another example of Becketts use of rhythm to explain his themes. The sounds that Croak made with his club echoed the monosyllabic themes themselves, hammered out by
217

Beckett condemned sloth, a sin of waste, because it impeded one from reaching a solution.

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Beckett in monotone fashion: WORDS: [As before.] Of all these movements then who can number them and they are legion sloth is the LOVE is the most urgent and indeed by no manner of movement is the soul more urged than by this, to and-[Violent thump of club.] CROAK: Bob. WORDS: From.[Violent thump of club.] CROAK: Bob! MUSIC: As before. CROAK: Love! MUSIC: Rap of baton on stand. Soft music worthy of foregoing (288). Beckett succeeded in reconciling the disparity that existed between his compositions, particularly those of Words and Music. In a sense, Beckett attacked his themes from two angles, the verbal and the non-verbal. When Music later made suggestions for the how Words should structure his verbiage and Words followed this advice, an equilibrium was reached that permitted the listener to better understand the absurdity that Beckett created. Paroles et musique and Cascando (1963), Becketts next radio drama, shared a parallel radio dramatic structure, and they are best studied together. Cascando held two very important distinctions among Becketts corpus of radio dramas: it was the most fully-developed experiment of the manipulation of voice and music; it was the first to be broadcast in French, premiering on ORTF on October 13, 1963. With Cascando our analysis of French radio drama in the post-war period returns to continental Europe. In Cascando, Beckett employed three main characters, Voice (Voix), Music (Musique) and Opener (Ouvreur) to tell the story. Unlike the three characters in Paroles et musique, the characters in Cascando operated more independently from each other. Like Croak, Opener controlled when Voice and Music spoke, though he did not influence 209

what they said, as the two performed their monologues in isolation from one another. In a sense, Croak directed the discourse of Paroles et musique from within the drama, whereas Opener directed the discourse of Cascando from the exterior. Cascando is the culmination of Becketts radio sketch entitled Rough for Radio I (never broadcast) completed two years prior. 218 In Cascando, Voice spoke with a stream of consciousness appropriate for the radio medium, which gave his discourse a very live quality. Beckett frequently interrupted Voices speech at predetermined intervals.219 Opener, the mstro of the drama, exhibited a similar stream of consciousness, as he opened and closed the repetitive monologues of both Words and Music. Cascando remained the most elaborate of Becketts radio dramatic works in terms of the manipulation of the soundscape to create distinctive voices that complemented one another. Like the conductor of an orchestra, Opener directed Voice and Music to perform at specific moments, establishing distinctive, harmonizing voices with a steady tone and

Becketts radio drama resembled a quartet, a dialogue between a man, he, and a woman, she, interspersed by music and voice. Music and voice are, we were led to believe, continued all the time; he had two buttons which allowed him to listen in to them. Becketts first version of the text was written in French in 1961 and published as Esquisse radiophonique; an English version followed and was first published in 1976 under the title Sketch for Radio Play. Subsequent reprintings saw the title change to Radio I and finally, in Collected Shorter Plays (1984), it became Rough for Radio I. Plans for a BBC production, with Humphrey Searle providing the music, were made soon after the publication of the original French version but came to nothing and a later BBC proposal to produce the play without music was rejected by Beckett in the late 1970s. According to the Beckett estate, the French version was produced by ORTF in 1963, although Beckett himself seemed later to have forgotten about this production. In July 1999 the first staged version of the work was given in Melbourne, with live he and she and taped 'music and voice. See Richard Rijnvos What Is It Like Together?: Genesis of the First Production of Becketts Radio 1, Samuel Beckett Today: An Annual Bilingual Review/Samuel Beckett Aujourd'hui: Revue Annuelle Bilingue 2 (1993): 103-109 and Martin Esslins Beckett's Rough for Radio, Journal of Modern Literature 6 (1977): 95-103. 219 Voices speech was pre-recorded. As for the composition of the radio drama, Beckett first wrote the complete part for Opener and inserted the spaces for Voice and Music, before writing out the complete part for Voice. The music was composed separately by Marcel Mihalovici, who used the radio text to guide him. For the English-language broadcast, Donald McWhinnie combined the three parts and produced the drama in the BBC studio (BBC Third Programme, October 6, 1964).

218

210

tempo. Opener balanced the parts of Voice with Music to create two independent melodies, which, in the end, formed a complete blend. Opener first cued Voice, then Music, and then cued both of them to play together, as they joined voice and music in harmony.220 When a musical phrase ended, that was when Opener said Et je referme. [Silence.] Et recommence, his utterance being like the musical repeat sign at the end of the phrase (49).221 Openers structural role served to create

a harmony between Voice and Music by facilitating the necessary solos, pauses, and blends of their two distinctive sounds. Unlike in Tous ceux qui tombent and Cendres, Beckett did not give the listener the tools in Cascando (nor in Paroles et musique) to permit the listener to develop a comprehensive visualization of the characters. The listener relied on a strange voice and unusual music, which Beckett used to emphasize the fact that his characters were not real humans, but simply creatures that possessed human-like qualities. Therefore, it remained essential that Becketts characters employ distinctive sounds in order to fully convey the contribution of each character to the drama. There were parallels between Becketts sound techniques in Cendres (Henry), Paroles et musique (Words), and Cascando (Voice). The characters Henry, Words, and Voice all underscored the difficulty in finishing a story, the ultimate challenge to make a decision and to reach a conclusion. Henry continued to recount the same stories ad infinitum, trapped in the words that make up the story. Words offered definitions
220

Voice and Music performrf a symphonic function: Voice spoke, silence, music alone, silence, and then both together, this time without being prompted. The fact that Voice and Music ultimately performed together without being prompted by Opener signified that the process has succeeded: the two disparate sounds of voice and music had united to form a complete harmony.

211

revealing a dictionary-like understanding of the world. Voices incessant ramblings suggested a lack of desire to finish, as he found a safe haven within the realm of familiar stories. The three characters underscored the importance of the story that cannot end; the need to keep silence at bay. For Beckett, the desire for silence expressed a desire for the end of consciousness. This was best illustrated in Cascando, in which the disembodied voice, a pure consciousness, spoke about the need to carry on. Cascando presented the culmination of Becketts principal radiophonic works, as I would argue that it is the most radio-dramatic of the four works analyzed here. Even the title had an important meaning within the work as a whole. Cascando is a musical term that refers to the end of a musical composition, suggesting a story with a conclusion. Voice alternated between a discussion of the story-telling process, narrating the story, and the hope to find the mother of all stories, which Beckett called the Maunu story.222 Opener opened and Voice began in mid-sentence: - histoire si tu pouvais la finir tu serais tranquille pourrais dormirpas avantoh je saisjen ai finides mille et des unefait que aa ma vieen me disantfinis celle-cicest la bonneaprs tu seras tranquillepourrais dormirplus dhistoiresplus de motset la finissaiset pas la bonnepas tranquilletout de suite une autre commencer (47).223 Ultimately, Voice introduced the story itself, which concerned a character named Maunu, an unhappy man who waited for night to fall so that he could leave his shed pour sortiraller ailleursdormir ailleurs (48). As the drama proceeded, Maunu navigated through a familiar deserted Beckettian landscape, advancing towards the sea
221 222

Cascando appeared in Becketts Comdie et actes divers. (Paris: ditions de minuit, 1978). In the English version of Cascando, Beckett called this character Woburn. 223 We note the intertextuality of Becketts work; we cannot help but think of Sheherazades One Thousand

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(as in Cendres), where he boarded his boat with ni bancsni barreni rames flotdun bondsloigneMaunu, eventually losing sight of the land and drifting tirelessly onward into uncertainty and despair, venturing deeper into the Beckettian sea of doubt (as in Cendres, once again), while Voice himself seemed assured that he would succeed in recounting a story that he would successfully finish (56). In Cascando, this goal remained unattainable. The narrative underscored this reality by insisting on an irregular rhythm as Maunu tripped, stumbled, and fell on his way into the unknown, first le visage dans la boue (50), then le visage dans le sable (51), and ending up, visage dans les galets (54).224 At this moment, the narrative slowed, leading towards a description of the contrasts of the open sea: Maunutenir bonna pas lcherlumiresde la terrequelquesunespresque plustrop lointrop tarddu cielcelles-lsi lon veutquoi que lon disequ se mettresur le dosil les verraitlclairermais nonil sagrippeMaunu (58). Voices Maunu story slowly disappeared only to begin once again. His story represented both our desire for resolution and Maunus longing for the sea (a search for understanding). We remember Becketts opening to the drama: Moi je suis au mois de mai (47). Voice remained trapped in the month of May, one of the longest months, a fact which Beckett repeated on several occasions throughout the drama. The telling of the story was a slow, endless process, as was our journey through the month of May. Clas Zilliacuss assessment of the character relationships in Paroles et musique applies to Cascando as well. When Opener looked at Maunu, he saw himself, lost and

and One Nights. 224 This is the face of which Beckett spoke and to which I referred during the introduction of this work. It was the face of humanity, dragged along the ground, marked by the hardships of our existence.

213

full of desolation, drifting into the Beckettian sea of uncertainty. Furthermore, when Opener said, Nous nen avons plus pour longtemps. Cest bien, he entered into the action of the drama and becomed a true character (55). If Voice was Openers own mental voice, and Music evoked his emotions, then Maunu became the objectification of Opener himself. With all three characters (Voice, Music, Opener) working together to finish the Maunu story, Beckett created a classical unity of action within the drama. Unlike Words and Music (Paroles et musique) who worked against each other, in Cascando, Voices and Musics goal to finish telling the story remained one in the same. This explained the necessity for the two characters to perform in unison. There was a musical crescendo at the end of the drama, and a gradual decrescendo. In harmony with Music, Voice closed the radio drama: Cest la bonnefinirplus dhistoiresdormira y estpresqueencore quelquesne pas lcherMaunuil sagrippeallons [Silence.] (60). Cascando was the shortest of Becketts principal radio dramas, simple in its character development, and complex in meaning. It was the most highly condensed of those considered in this study. Cascando remained Becketts most innovative use of music as a character in a story. It was the disembodied voice echoing the Beckettian need to persist, to get up after falling on your face, which drove the listener toward understanding. The story that Opener recounted, the Maunu story, was our story, the story of humankind, caught up in a desire for resolution, but unable to persevere or finish. Thus, in Cascando, Beckett portrayed the wonder of radio drama in which pure musical sound rose to the forefront of the soundscape. His use of music represented a 214

unique contribution to and exploitation of the radio drama genre. Through his exemplary radio dramatic works, Beckett reached the pinnacle of artistic accomplishment and showcased the medium of the radio drama, thereby creating a new standard in French radio dramatic sthetics. The exemplary radio dramatic works of Antonin Artaud and Samuel Beckett emerged during a period in which banality had become the norm of French radio dramatic composition. The stricture that had defined French radio and French radio drama of the Occupation continued in the form of state-controlled radio of the postWorld War II period. As a result, the radio dramatic forms and themes, which had originated in the Interwar period, were perpetuated on French radio of the fifties, sixties and seventies. Outside of the work of Artaud and Beckett, there were relatively few attempts to cultivate the characteristics that made radio drama unique (sound effects, music) during the post-World War II period. The goal of the Club dessai (1952-1960) had been to cultivate the soundscape through experimental radio drama. The works that this group produced never became as experimental as intended. Club dessai largely perpetuated the radio dramatic norms of the Interwar period, which included the broadcast of a large number of adaptations, including Blaise Pascals Penses, Guy de Maupassants Le Horla, Antoine de Saint Exuprys Vol de nuit, and Albert Camus Ltranger. Club dessai recycled the elements that had made French radio drama successful during the Interwar period, such as adaptations and fantasy and detective themes, but such tired elements idled the development of French radio drama. Prominent French dramatists, including Jean Genet and Jean Tardieu, also failed 215

to expand the possibilities of radio dramatic composition. Genets Frolics and LEnfant criminel, broadcast in 1947, and Les Bonnes and Haute Surveillance, broadcast in 1948, were adaptations of his stage plays and reflected an unawareness of the possibilities of how original the radio drama could be. By the arrival of Tardieus Une Soire en Provence, ou le mot et le cri. Thtre III, pices radiophoniques et Livrets dopras de chambre (1975), French radio drama had already reached its peak. The best years of French radio dramatic composition were ending. Tardieu claimed his work to be experimental, but his radio drama really did not build on advances in soundscaping already made by Artaud and Beckett. Pierre Cusy and Gabriel Germinet wrote the first chapter and Antonin Artaud and Samuel Beckett wrote the final chapter on the evolution French radio drama. Artauds and Becketts work exemplified the possibilities of radio and radio drama. Like Cusy and Germinet, Artaud and Beckett understood the uniqueness of the radio medium. Their radio dramatic creations proved that radio drama did not have to be confined to traditional notions of theater. They were among the few who knew how to place sound at the forefront of dramatic composition in order to express the inexpressible. The decline of French radio drama was already occurring as television began its march into the future. Television presented a new source of information and entertainment. Since the 1950s, French society has depended on images created by television to define the world. Before the advent of television, radio listeners were active; they created these images within their own minds. Nonetheless, radio remains, and through exemplary radio dramatic works such as those of Artaud and Beckett, the French audience can regain its creative power. 216

CONCLUSION This project began as an examination of the development of French radio drama during three important periods in the history of France: the Interwar period, the World War II period, and the Post-World War II period. Though much has been written about the development of radio in France, no single study has ever examined the evolution of French radio drama. I divided the study into four (4) main chapters that focused on an examination of the evolution of French radio drama from 1922-1973. Chapter One outlined the radio medium and the radio drama genre by presenting radio drama sthetics and the various typologies that existed throughout the periods before, during, and after World War II. Chapter Two highlighted the radio drama genre as it existed during the Interwar period by examining radio drama as entertainment, propaganda and a reflection of the contemporary reality. Chapter Three illustrated the form and function of radio drama of the World War II period, produced both within France and outside of France, in an effort to reach a better understanding of the development of entertainment in propaganda and propaganda in entertainment that occurred during the German Occupation of France. Finally, Chapter Four reflected on the evolution of French radio drama during the Postwar period by analyzing the evolution in French radio drama as an innovative artistic form. When I began this study, I fully expected to see a constant progression of French radio drama from its genesis in 1922 until 1973, where I ended this study. I anticipated seeing that genre initially struggled, but then moved out of the learning curve as radio 217

producers and dramatists began to better understand the intricacies of the radio medium and the characteristics that made creating drama on the radio truly unique. What I discovered, however, revealed a more complicated relationship between radio and radio drama and between radio drama and society. After experiencing this initial struggle during the 1920s, French radio drama moved into the 1930s where it experienced relative success as a popular dramatic form. The 1930s was the ge dor of French radio drama production. The arrival of the Nazis in France in 1940 severely hindered the progression of the genre. Nazi control over French radio stations in the zone occupe created a stricture that stifled radio dramatic creativity during the World War II period. Radio dramas that emanated from the zone libre were steeped in Vichy ideology. The control that external forces had over broadcasting made French radio drama production distinct in comparison to its German, British and American counterparts. In the post-World War II period, this stricture released quite slowly, which explained, in part, why Artauds radio drama Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu met such opposition. French radio dramas of the post-World War II period simply perpetuated the forms of the Interwar and World War II periods, with the exception of Artaud and Beckett, who pushed French radio dramatic composition to a new level of sthetics through a comprehensive understanding of the distinctiveness of the radio medium. This study illustrates that French radio drama comprised an important component of French popular radio culture from the early 1920s until the early 1970s. It also serves as a theoretical and practical reflection of the development of French radio drama over 218

three radio generations. Overall, this dissertation illustrates the stylistic elements that define French radio drama, its emergence as an important form of popular literature, a medium for the dissemination of entertainment and information, a culture necessity both to provide escapist entertainment as well as to facilitate the propagation of Nazisympathetic ideologies, Vichyite ideology, a powerful tool of propaganda, and a springboard to further development in French theater sthetics. Do any commonalities exist between the radio dramatic works examined in this study? From its genesis during the Interwar period, radio drama served primarily as a means of education and entertainment, though as I illustrated in Chapter Two, as the genre evolved, the line separating entertainment from propaganda blurred. Therefore, a radio drama could become simultaneously entertainment and propaganda. Nonetheless, some divergences exist between the radio dramatic works examined in this study, which is a question of form rather than a question of function. The radio dramatic works analyzed in this study remain quite diverse and representative of those included on the programming grid at radio stations in France throughout the three periods. They included fairly traditional dramas resembling those presented on the stage in Chapter Two all the way to the ultimate manipulation of the soundscape presented in Chapter Four. Forms included multi-character developments, adaptation from other genres, highly stylized uses of a homodiegetic narrator, and radio dramatic sound architecture. These representative forms illustrated the gamut of French radio drama from the Interwar to the Postwar-period that was characterized by an increasing variety, diversity, and originality. 219

The radio dramatic works of Antonin Artaud and Samuel Beckett redefined the characteristics and the capabilities of French radio drama. No radio dramatists in France have contributed to the development of the genre as greatly as Artaud and Beckett. Until the post-War period, sound and music had always played a secondary role to dialogue, but by the time we reached the works of these two exemplary artists, sound and music surface as a means to structure and carry symbolism and meaning in radio drama. In conducting this study, I selected primarily radio dramatic works that were representative of the forms produced during each of the three respective periods. The majority of these radio dramas had not been examined in scholarly fashion. The choice to include rather diverse works should be evident, though I could, at best, only superficially examine the vast repertory of thousands of French radio dramas. My primary research at the Bibliothque nationale de France in Paris immediately revealed a treasure trove of works, though sifting through these works presented a great challenge and an apparent limitation. As a follow-up to the obvious limitation of my study, I would like to suggest a series of possibilities for future research on the subject of French radio drama from the Interwar to Post-War period. Firstly, no study on French radio drama has included an examination of the narration of historical events, i.e., history or politics through the optic of the radio dramatic text. Such a study may reveal an interesting perspective on how the radio dramatic text recounts history. Second, I have read no in-depth study focusing on the importance of radio dramatic religious texts. We must remember that the very first radio dramatic text, Georges Angellozs pastoral piece entitled Paris-Bethlem, Nol, 220

radieux, was a religious drama. 225 The discussion of religion appeared several times throughout this study, though it did not comprise the main theme. The religious element is one which distinguished it from its American and British counterparts. Though I included an examination of one such radio dramatic work, Le Dieu vivant, the work of Suzanne and Cita Malard, an analysis of this theme in additional radio dramatic texts may reveal an important relationship between radio drama and religion. Lastly, women have played an important role both as listeners of radio drama and in the development of this radio drama, though no scholar, to date, has attempted to evaluate the combined contribution of female radio dramatic writers dexpression franaise. The future of French radio drama remains uncertain. Speaking of BBC radio drama in 1988, Geoffrey Heptonstall wrote, radio drama appears to be at the crossroads (273).226 This sentiment holds true for French radio drama as well. The genre experienced a tremendous amount of development from its genesis in 1922 throughout the Beckettian era, but, after that period, one cannot truly speak of a prominent French radio drama. Becketts radio dramas continue to find their way onto the airwaves and in other forms, though no disciple of Beckett has come forth to assure the genres

225

Angellozs pastoral piece entitled Paris-Bethlem, Nol, radieux (broadcast on Radiola on December 24, 1922) established a foundation for religion-conscious radio drama. Though I have inquired of the Bibliothque nationale de France for the past three years, Angellozs radio drama still remains unavailable, presumed lost during reshelving of the librarys holdings. 226 In an important side note, BBC radio drama remains prolific, unlike that of France. In The BBC is the worlds biggest patron of drama - but is more necessarily better?, Gillian Reynolds writes: There are more new plays on BBC radio than in any other performing arena in the world. (The Daily Telegraph November 8, 2005). The United States also continues to produce radio dramatic programming and in Germany, the Hrspiel also continues to be popular. See Jonathan Padgets Radio Days, and Nights, Too; Tune In Tomorrow for New Takes on an Old Drama Form in The Washington Post of December 8, 2005 and Lynette Clemetsons and Holli Chmelas Young Ears Tune In To Theater On Radio, The New York Times of December 24, 2005.

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prosperous future. The death of Samuel Beckett on December 22, 1989 signaled the decline of the genre. The questions that I hold regarding the past and future of French radio drama remain numerous: What will the thousands of manuscripts from the Interwar, World War II, and Post-War periods that still await further investigation reveal about the genres relationship to society? Did the advent of television quell interest in radio drama or had the flame that had kept the fire of French radio drama burning been extinguished by some other means? What will the future hold for the continued development of radio drama in France and how will it reflect not only innovations in technology, but also the cultural landscape of 21st century France? Radio dramas are still performed in France, but the glory days are over. To say that the ascent of French television did not impact the continued development of radio drama would be an error (Miquel 231-2). The economic impact of television in the 1960s caused a sharp decline in the amount of radio drama being created and broadcast. In the United States, in particular, this decline proceeded much further than in most European countries, perhaps because television impacted American culture in a much wider fashion and from a much earlier date. Could we argue that French radio drama had become too obscure an art form during the Beckett era to have remained popular forever? It seems reasonable to determine that the rise of the genre to such a high level of sthetic accomplishment signaled its inevitable decline. As we stand here at the crossroads, we examine the challenge of renewing an interest in French radio drama in order to ensure its future. The future of French radio 222

drama is rooted in its past. Its future is found in an appreciation of those texts by radio dramatists such as Artaud and Beckett who truly exploited the genres unique characteristics. When compared with radio drama of England and of Germany, the history of French radio drama is unique. Four years of Occupation could not squelch French radio drama. The same innovations, including the use of dissonant musical structures, stylized sound effects, and polyphonic voices, which were pioneered by the leading French radio dramatists Artaud and Beckett, made French radio drama unique. These are the innovations that will lead French radio drama into the future. Further, the future of radio in France may lay in the utilization of the most contemporary technology: the Internet.227 Theorist Mark Poster refers to the Internet Age as the Second Media Age, claiming that radio, television, and cinema belonged to the First Media Age. Poster cites George Robertsons idea, which emphasizes a multidirectional and interactive communications environment that emerged as a result of the Internet revolution:

In the Introduction of this study, I discussed the terms radio drama, radio theater, audio drama, and audio theater, which scholars and practitioners have employed to refer to the types of radio dramatic works examined in this dissertation. As I explained, radio drama and radio theater refer to the historical aspect of the genre, whereas practitioners employ the terms audio drama and audio theater to speak of radio drama in the digital age. The term radio itself limits its application exclusively to dramas produced and broadcast for the radio medium. Throughout this study, I attempted, as best as possible, to exclusively employ the term radio drama when referring to the radio dramatic works examined here within, for it allowed me to include texts that did not fit within the strict parameters of traditional theatrical works. As I mentioned in the Introduction of this study, radio drama remains the most common label for the genre, employed by contemporary British scholars and radio drama producers, including John Drakakis, Peter Lewis, Alan Beck, and Tim Crook. Tony Polermo, radio dramatist and composer working in Los Angeles, prefers the terms audio drama and audio theater. The latter two terms are more appropriate for digitally-based dramas, broadcast over the internet. It is these terms, audio drama, and audio theater, which may be the saving grace of radio drama, for they suggest dramatic works performed to exploit the capabilities of the Internet Age.

227

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the mode of information indicates communication practices that constitute subjects as unstable, multiple and diffuse . . . if that is done the questions of the mass media are seen not simply as that of sender/receiver, producer/ consumer, ruler/ruled. The shift to a decentralised network of communications makes senders receivers, producers consumers, rulers ruled, upsetting the logic of understanding the first media age (191). Unlike the tremendous production costs involved in television and cinema, the Internet is extremely cost-effective. Access to the Information Superhighway requires essentially no further financial contribution than that already paid by the consumer to access email. Like radio, audience space becomes limitless, as a seemingly infinite number of Internet listeners can crowd inside the cyber-soundhall to listen to a radio drama broadcast. Let us not forget the soundhall, which served as a broadcasting forum for Cusys and Germinets Marmoto and for Artauds Pour en finir avec le Jugement de Dieu. Therefore, it is possible to harness the power of the Internet to create an interest in radio drama for the 21st century audience.228 The advantages of internet-based radio drama are numerous and benefit both dramatist and audience. The Internet provides a complete media-based portal. The dramatist can create a background of information through text, pictures and video designed to accompany the radio drama broadcast. He can provide biographical information for his audience. He can make the drama interactive by providing options in the presentation of plot that would permit the listener to choose how the story unfolds, creating a sort of choose-your-own-adventure.

228

The BBC continues to broadcast radio drama via the Internet on BBC 7. BBC established this allentertainment PC radio station with rebroadcasts of their older programs. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/bbc7.shtml>.

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Schools, universities, families and individuals in France have already expressed great interest in the Internet, and French continues to be the second-most popular language used on the Internet (after English). A commitment to financial and educational investment in computers and in the Internet in French schools suggests that radio drama writing on the World Wide Web could provide a comprehensive educational Internet service that would be valuable to teachers and students at all levels.229 The family could welcome a return to radio listening of the 1930s, this time, via the Internet. The advent of recordable media, such as the compact disc, could have given radio drama a new channel of distribution were it not for the lack of extant radio dramatic works, as the radio dramas of Antonin Artaud and Samuel Beckett still remain among the only ones available. Newer media formats could help in the distribution of post-Beckett radio dramas: satellite radio, podcasting, MP3. Satellite radio, podcasting, and MP3 could provide a new avenue in on demand listening.230 Satellite radio would provide a commercial-free environment for radio drama broadcasting. Podcasting would permit an individual or an entity to broadcast a recorded program. MP3 is already the preferred file format for Old Time Radio (OTR) hobbyists in the United States and other parts of the world. Radio began in France as a tool of the hobbyist, and it is likely that the hobbyist may be responsible for the fate of French radio drama.

229

A Harvard-sponsored study on Internet usage in Europe revealed the following information: In 1998, only 2 percent of the French population used the Internet; this figure had risen to 10 percent by 2000.In July 2000, the French government reviewed progress to date, revealing that 100 percent of high schools and 65 percent of middle schools were connected to the Internet (Stephanie Hutchinson, .fr, Ranking in Internet Access in Schools 29). <http://www.cid.harvard.edu/cr/profiles/France.pdf>. 230 For the most part Internet radio is NOT radio - it's more like an audio-on-demand service, stated Eryl Price-Davies of Thames Valley University in an e-mail to the UK radio-studies list (June 3, 1999). <http://www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/rp/index.html>.

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Appendix 1

Events in Radio History 1873 1888 1890 1894 1898 1899 1904 1906 British physicist James-Clerk Maxwell publishes theory of electromagnetic waves Heinrich Hertz detects and produces radio waves Edouard Branly invents and builds the first radio conductor Branly creates the first antenna; Marconi builds his first radio equipment, a device that rings a bell from a distance of thirty feet First wireless link between the Eiffel Tower and the Pantheon by Eugne Ducretet and Alexander Stepanovitch Popov Guglielmo Marchese Marconi establishes the first radio link across the English Channel First radio transmission of music at Graz, Austria Reginald Fessenden invents wireless telephony, a means for radio waves to carry signals a significant distance; Fessenden broadcasts first radio program of voice and music broadcast in the U.S. Socit franaise radio-lectrique founded by Raymond Braillard Braillard initiates the creation of a Belgian radio station broadcasting messages to unknown listeners (realized in 1918) Radio Act of 1912 (USA) assigns three- and four-letter call letters to radio stations and limits broadcasting to the 360m wavelength, thereby jamming signals 1914-8 1918 1919 1920 Radio used as an instrument of war (private broadcast of radio messages forbidden until 1919) Edwin Armstrong develops the superheterodyne radio receiver Radio Corporation of America (RCA) is founded KDKA Pittsburgh (Westinghouse) created 226

1910 1912

1921 1922

Radio Tour-Eiffel created British Broadcasting Company and Radiola (Radio-Paris) created First American radio drama, New York, WGY Station First English experiment in radio drama (Peter Eckersley at Writtle), October 17

1923

First British Broadcasting Company transmission of scenes from Shakespeare, February 16 (the official birth(day) of radio drama) First B.B.C. full-length Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, May 28 First issue of British Broadcasting Company Radio Times published. Warren G. Harding becomes first President of the United States to broadcast a speech, Saint Louis, June 21

1925

Dbut of The Smith Family, the first radio soap opera (USA) First Australian radio drama, Melbourne station 3LO, Sweeney Todd, The Barbarous Barber

1926

RCA, General Electric and Westinghouse establish the National Broadcasting Company (NBC), which operates two national radio networks Radio Act of February 23 makes a license required for installing a radio transmitter (USA) British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) established by Royal Charter Herbert Hoover becomes the first politician to use the radio during an electoral campaign Radio-Moscow created Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) is founded by William S. Paley

1927 1927 1928 1929

1932 1933

Franklin Delano Roosevelt begins Fireside Chats during his campaign for the American Presidency Josef Goebbels becomes Minister of Propaganda under Adolf Hitler France establishes a license fee for each radio receiver 227

Creation of Radio-Luxembourg 1934 1935 1936 1938 1939 Communications Act of June 19, 1934 led to government control by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) (USA) Georges Mandel, Minister of PTT in France, gives the order to eliminate advertising from state-owned radio stations First use of radio in France during election campaign Orson Welles War of the Worlds alarms American listeners Declaration of war broadcast on the BBC by Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain Radio International is set up by the International Broadcasting Company (IBC) to broadcast English-language programming to forces in continental Europe, using facilities located at Radio-Normandie Germany transmits internationally in 26 languages, though listening in Germany to foreign broadcasts is a capital offense Law of July 29 gives radio in France an autonomous administration 1940 Winston Churchill makes his first BBC radio broadcast as Prime Minister, "Be Ye Men of Valour" General de Gaulle launches his famous BBC broadcast appeal to France from London, "Rien nest perdu" Ici la France, which becomes Les Franais parlent aux Franais, broadcasts to counter Vichy radio propaganda General Electric markets the first FM radios Creation of Radiodiffusion nationale under the authority of the Vichy government 1941 Decree by General de Gaulles French government-in-exile sets up Radiodiffusion Franaise (RDF) President Franklin Delano Roosevelt addresses the nation after Japanese attack Pearl Harbor and Eleanor Roosevelt addresses the women of the United States General de Gaulle broadcasts from Radio-Brazzaville and Radio-Beyrouth 228

1942

General de Gaulle broadcasts from Radio-Algers United States creates the Office of War Information, from which is launched the Armed Forces Network

1943 1944

Creation of Radio-Monte Carlo BBC broadcasts War Report to mark the D-Day landings Catchphrase Radio-Paris ment, Radio-Paris ment, Radio-Paris est allemand is broadcast from London French-language broadcasts are made from Moscow (Radio-France) and the United States (The Voice of America)

1945

Ordinance of March 23 reinforces state radio monopoly in France Creation of Office nationale de radiodiffusion in France

1946 1946 1947 1949 1956 1964

Faraway Hill, the first network soap opera, dbuts on the DuMont network (USA) BBC Third Programme begins in September Dbut of Paris-Inter The RDF becomes Radio-Tlvision Franaise (RTF) Creation of Sorafom (Socit de radiodiffusion de la France dOutre-Mer) in French colonial Africa BBC Launches Radio 3, formed from Third Programme Creation of the Office de radio-tlvision franaise (ORTF)

229

Appendix 2
Principal French Radio Stations (1922-1945) Government-operated Radio Stations: Poste de la Tour-Eiffel (1922-1940) Radio-Paris-Poste National (1933-1940) Paris PTT (1923-1940) Lyon La Doua (1925-1940) Bordeaux-Lafayette (1926-1940) Marseille-Provence (1925-1940) Limoges PTT (1927-1940) Rennes-Bretagne (1927-1940) Toulouse-Pyrnes (1925-1940) Radio Strasbourg PTT (1930-1940) Radio PTT Nord (1927-1940) Alpes Grenoble (1927-1940) Nice Cte-dAzur (1936-1940) Montpellier-Languedoc (1927-1940) Poste Colonial (1931-1938) Paris Mondial (1938-1940) Private Stations: Radiola (1922-1924) Radio LL (1925-1935) Radio Vitus (1926-1934) Radio-Paris (1924-1933) Radio Cit (1935-1940) Poste-Parisien (1924-1940) Radio 37 (1937-1940) Radio Ile-de-France (1934-1940) Radio Toulouse (1925-1944) Radio Lyon (1924-1944) Radio Saint-Etienne (1927) Radio Dauphin (1927) Radio Savoie (1928) Radio Strasbourg (1925-1931) Radio Rivira (1923) Radio Juan-les-Pins (1926-1930) Radio Cte-dAzur (1930-1937) Radio Mditerrane (1937-1943) Radio Toulon (1926) Radio Limoges (1926-1927) Radio Caen (1924-1931) 230

Radio Normandie (1928-1939) Radio Bordeaux Sud-Ouest (1924-1940) Radio Midi (1934-1937) Radio Nmes (1927-1944) Radio Montpellier (1925-1944) Radio Agen (1924-1944) Peripheral Radio Stations: Radio Andorre (1939-1981) Radio Luxembourg (1933-1939) Radio Monte-Carlo (1943-1944) Government-operated Radio Stations: Radio-Paris (1940-1944) (Occupied Zone) Rennes-Bretagne (1940-1944) (Occupied Zone) Paris-Mondial (1940-1944) (Occupied Zone) Radiodiffusion Nationale (1940-1944) (Free Zone) La Voix de la France (1941-1944) (Free Zone) Private Radio Stations in the Free Zone: Radio Toulouse (1925-1944) Radio Montpellier (1925-1944) Radio Agen (1924-1944) Radio Mditerrane (1937-1943) Radio Lyon (1924-1944) Radio Nmes (1927-1944) Radio Stations of the Libration (1944) Radio Cherbourg La Radiodiffusion de la Nation Franaise Paris National Radio Cit Radiodiffusion Franaise Le Studio dEssai Radio Quercy Radio Nice Cte dAzur Radio Libration Prominent Post-World War II Radio Stations Radio Luxembourg Europe 1 Radio Monte-Carlo See Ren Duvals Histoire de la radio en France. Paris: A. Moreau, 1979, and Pierre Miquels Histoire de la radio et de la tlvision. Paris: ditions Richelieu, 1973. 231

Appendix 3
Radio Under the Occupation Vichy Director of La Voix de France: Director of Literary and Dramatic Broadcast Services Director of Radio-Journal de France Commentators: May 1943: Mlle, Suzanne Fernard La Baille Jacques Brevin Paul dAgenet Count de Guedon Lebon Alex Dulpeyrou Firmin Roz Henri Chautier Paul Demasy Paul Creyssel Philippe Henriot Paul Chasseigne Andr Demaison Lon Boussard Alex Surchamp Georges Gros Jean Thomas January 1944 Lon Boussard Pierre Sabatier Lucien Bourges

June 1943: July 1943: October 1943: November 1943: December 1943: January 1944:

February 1944: August 1944:

232

Paris Editor-in-Chief Press Reviewer Commentators: (since the German Occupation) Jacques Barthaud (December 1943) Jean Loustand (to December 1943) Maurice Cottals (since Dec. 1943) Paul Fredonnet (under the pseudonym of Jean Franais, or Alain de Bertois Jean Herold Paquis Ellen Davis (American) Jean Azema General Menjeau Robert Peyronnet Alain de Bertois Jean Franais Georges Claude Georges Oltramare Pierre Aubertin Roland Miles Pierre Maudru

August 1942: May 1943:

June 1943: August 1943: November 1943: January 1944: March 1944: May 1944:

Adapted from A Selected Whos Who in Vichy France June 1940-August 1944 Office of Strategic Services, October 24, 1944.

233

Appendix 4
Mon cher Morel, Vous mavez demand de prsenter votre pome pique : France !...Prsent !... A moi, un soldat ! Avez-vous song ce que diront et penseront vos lecteurs ? De quoi se mle-t-il en apprciant des vers ? Et cependant, pote que je suis, sans avoir fait de vers. Aviateur pendant plus de 25 ans, jai got la posie de laltitude, du ron-ron merveilleux des moteurs au-dessus des mers de nuages, de la terre vue den haut pure de ses mesquineries humaines, du fracas de la foudre...ou des bombes. Et maintenant au soir de ma vie, comme Don Quichotte, je poursuis un idal. Cela aussi, cest de la posie. Et vous, mon cher ami, vieux combattant de la Grande Guerre, cruellement meurtri dans votre chair, aprs de longs mois de captivit, vous nous avez montr dans votre Histoire dun soldat de 1914, si simple, si mouvante dans sa simplicit, ce quest une me bien trempe. Puis vous avez connu les joies saines de la famille franaise (6). Et puis...et puis, cest de nouveau la guerre et, cette fois, la dfaite. Alors il faut servir, servir encore, servir toujours. Vous vous donnez la Lgion. JE sais ce que, pour elle, vous faites chaque jour. Et vos loisirs, cest encore pour servir. Pour clamer, en prose et en vers, que la France est peut-tre vaincue, mais que la France nest pas morte. Elle vit dans ses fils et dans son Empire. Vous le dites avec toute votre foi et toute votre ardeur. Dans des vers vibrants qui ne peuvent quenthousiasmer ceux qui partagent votre esprance. Bravo et merci, Gnral J. MARTIN, Chef de lUnion Provinciale De la Lgion Franaise des Combattants de lAlgrie (France!..Prsent!.. 7).

234

Appendix 5

Tous ceux qui tombent first broadcast on BBC Third Programme on January 13, 1957. Directed by Donald McWhinnie. Featured Jack MacGowran, Patrick Magee, Mary Farell, James Gerard Devlin, Allan McClelland, Harry Hutchinson. broadcast (as Tous ceux qui tombent) on RTF/ORTF, Paris on February 25, 1963. Directed by Michel Mitrani. Featured Alice Sapricht, Guy Trjean, Christian Marin, Pierre Palau, Hubert Deschamps. modernized version broadcast on June 4, 1972. Directed by Donald McWhinnie. Featured Marie Kean, J. G. Devlin, Alan McClelland. Cendres first broadcast on the BBCs Third Programme, June 24, 1959. Directed by Donald McWhinnie. Featured Jack MacGowran, Kathleen Michael, Kathleen Helme, and Patrick Magee. Paroles et musique first broadcast on the BBC Third Programme on November 13, 1962. Directed by Michael Bakewell. Featured Felix Fenton and Patrick Magee. Music by John Beckett. Broadcast in French in 1963. Cascando first broadcast in French on ORTF on October 13, 1963. Broadcast in English on the BBC Third Programme on October 6, 1964. Adapted from http://www.themodernword.com/beckett/beckett_theater.html

235

Appendix 6

Programming grid from Sunday, October 19, 1941

236

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248

Vita

Richard J. Gray II was born in Monroe, Michigan on October 26, 1971, the son of Richard J. Gray and Madonna K. (Knabusch) Gray. After completing his work at Milan High School, Milan, Michigan, in 1989, he entered Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, Michigan. In the academic year 1994-1995, he studied in Angers, France, at the Centre International dtudes Franaises of the Universit Catholique de lOuest, from which he earned a Diplme de langue et de culture franaises. He received the degree of Bachelor of Arts with a major in French and a minor in History in December, 1995 from Eastern Michigan University. In August 1996, he entered the Graduate School at Purdue University. He taught as a Teaching Assistant of French from August 1996 until May 1998. He received the degree of Master of Arts in French Literature in May 1998. He entered the Graduate School at The University of Texas at Austin in August 1998, where he taught as an Assistant Instructor from August 1998 until June 2002. He also taught as an Adjunct Instructor at Austin Community College from July 2000 until August 2002, and an Instructor in French at Ole Miss (University of Mississippi) from January 2004 until July 2005. He is currently Assistant Professor of French at Carson-Newman College in Jefferson City, Tennessee.

Permanent address:

11400 Chandler Rd., Jerome, MI 49249

This dissertation was typed by the author.

249