External Alienation: ‘She Cried into Her Sleeve, and He Touched It as if He Had Found It Wet’

Whereas Brecht more often than not speaks in the same breath of internal attitude and external effect, this lack of distinction, one may object, is counterbalanced by various techniques that unequivocally surface on the outside. This chapter presents an overview of three types of techniques that more clearly seem to materialize the alienation effect externally. It is in fact in the more concrete, yet often surprisingly lyrical, descriptions of Mei Lan-fang's performance that the evidently exterior nature of the duality between actor and dramatic figure comes out. Another technique that describes a clearly external aesthetic of alienation refers to the actor's manipulation of the gaze his own and concomitantly that of the spectator. The alienating technique of the gaze can take on a variety of forms. A conscious aesthetic effort is made on the part of the male actor to translate the inner state of the woman he represents into an external sign.