Appropriate Gesture
Appropriate gesture presents difficulties, and, although occasionally a powerful aid, it is more often a stumbling-block to the inexperienced reciter. Many otherwise excellent recitals have been marred by superfluous demonstrations, which remind one forcibly of the action songs and recitations performed in a kindergarten, whilst not a few reciters hedge themselves in with boundaries. They will mention the sea, and point to a horizon, indicate distant hills, wood and lake, frequently forgetting their respective situations. I have seen upon more than one occasion a reciter engaged in a ludicrous juggling of her scenery, pushing the sea aside to make room for the hills, and merging her forests in the lake. This forgetfulness, usually engendered by extreme nervousness, renders an artist ridiculous. How much better, then, to refrain from gesticulation, unless she has mastered its intricacies.
In drawing-room reciting the voice must expand according to the acoustic properties of the apartment. A good way of making the voice carry is to imagine it an india-rubber ball, which is being thrown against the opposite wall. This thought will gradually insure its elastic properties.
When reciting, the eyes should be kept from roving among the audience, nor should they be fixed in a strained, glassy stare on the ceiling, for they are too useful to the performer, and will be needed to express different shades of thought.
If the reciter is nervous, she should endeavor not to show it by twisting her fingers or moving her feet. The best cure for this harassing affliction is to glance quietly at the audience before beginning to recite. Taken individually, they will be found far from alarming. After this, a determined endeavor should be made to concentrate the mind on the artistic rendering of the recital.
Fig. 3.—The epic radius, or mental zone.
To many elocutionists, costumes are a help, enabling them to grip more powerfully the character portrayed. In this case a certain amount of gesture is advisable, but there are no hard and fast rules. Actions must be governed by discretion and common sense.
The hand may properly be called a second tongue. As such it should be treated, and, to continue the simile, should not be allowed to stammer behind or chatter meaninglessly before the reciter.
The hands and arms are capable of a vast amount of expression when properly used.
Gesture may be divided into three classes:—
1. The epic radius, or mental zone, is the movement above the head and horizontal with the shoulder ([Fig. 3]). These are sweeping and graceful, not jerky movements, indicating such sentiments as honor, conscience, awe, veneration, &c., and may be used with advantage in such lines as—
“Great ocean! strongest of Creation’s sons,
Unconquerable, unreposed, untired,
That roll’d the wild, profound eternal bass
In Nature’s anthem, and made music such
As pleased the ear of God! original,
Unmarr’d, unfaded work of Deity.
From age to age enduring and unchanged,
Majestical! inimitable! vast!
Uttering loud satire day and night on each
Succeeding race, and little pompous work
Of man!—unfallen, religious, holy sea.”
In Shakespearean recitals and other blank verse, this epic zone may be used, as, for instance, in such pieces as the choruses of Henry V.
Fig. 4.—Rhetorical radius or moral zone.
2. The rhetorical radius, or moral zone, includes the movements of the arm from breast to shoulder and from the region of the heart ([Fig. 4]), and may be used to appeal, implore, beseech, express love, hate, fear, contempt, &c., as in Queen Katherine’s speech in Shakespeare’s “King Henry VIII.,” Act ii. Scene 4:—
“Sir, I desire you do me right and justice,
And to bestow your pity on me.”
3. The colloquial radius, or vital zone, from below the waist ([Fig. 5]), is used to express ordinary sentiments that do not emanate in the heart or higher intellect, and may be used to give point to a simple, everyday occurrence, or narration, as in—
“Only a pin, yet it calmly lay
On the tufted floor in the light of day;
And it shone serenely fair and bright,
Reflecting back the noonday light.”
During the long winter evenings, when amusements and entertainments are cordially welcomed in home circles and at friends’ firesides, the youth or maiden who is unable to play or sing, may, with a little care and practice, provide a delightful item in the programme, which will add considerably to the evening’s enjoyment.
Fig. 5.—Colloquial radius or vital zone.
An hour’s regular practice a day will work wonders with the voice of these aspirants, and there are many simple and exquisite poems that are easily committed to memory, for the student is far more likely to succeed and give pleasure to others in memorizing at first only the simplest and shortest poems, remembering always Shakespeare’s invaluable counsel to players:—
“Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue; but, if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand—thus; but use all gently; for in the very torrent, tempest, and (as I may say) the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness ... Be not too tame, neither, but let your discretion be your tutor; suit the action to the word, the word to the action, with this special observance, that you o’erstep not the modesty of Nature.”