Reality and Fantasy: The Performing Body in an Australian Noh Play

Abstract

This article is based on a project undertaken jointly by the Centre for Performance Studies and the Department of Music of the University of Sydney which culminated in the performance of the noh play, Eliza.1 The performance featured in An Evening of Noh Drama, held in the Downstairs Theatre of The Seymour Centre, Sydney University.2 The aim of this project was to provide an opportunity for students of performance studies, music, and Japanese to learn about noh through active participation in the production. This included the month-long training of students in the movement, singing, and instrumental techniques of noh, which was undertaken by visiting scholars Richard Emmert and Akira Matsui.3 Eliza was written, as are many noh plays, against a background of a number of literary and other sources. It deals with the story of Eliza Frazer, a white Englishwoman who was a passenger on the Stirling Castle, which was shipwrecked in an uncharted section of the Great Barrier Reef while on its way from colonial Australia to England. Eliza, her husband, and the male crew of the ship were eventually cast ashore in their long boats on a remote island off the Northeast coast of Australia (now called Frazer Island). According to the story, the native islanders separated Eliza from her husband and the crew, and took her to the women's camp where she lived until led to a white settlement by an escaped convict. Only one of the men, a crew member, returned to civilization. When Eliza returned to England, she took a booth in Hyde Park, London, and spoke of her adventure on Frazer Island to the fairground mob. There is, however, a great deal of ambiguity surrounding these events which is evident in the sources' treatment of the Eliza Frazer story. There appear to be two distinct approaches. In the first case, Eliza is portrayed as a victim, a defenseless white woman in the hands of native savages. In the second case, she is portrayed as a woman of insight whose visionary powers are enhanced by her experiences of aboriginal life and ritual on Frazer Island. Patrick White, for instance, writes that Eliza had recorded the following in her journal from Van Diemen's Land: