Confessions of Zeno is a puppet play created by William Kentridge, Jane Taylor, Kevin Volans and the Handspring Puppet Company.

Original source

The piece is based on La coscienza di Zeno ("The conscience of Zeno")[1], a novel by Italo Svevo (1861-1928)[2], published in 1923, about the memoirs kept of the fictional character "Zeno Cosini", kept as a therapeutic action at the behest of his psychoanalyst. In it he writes about his father, his business, his wife, and his tobacco habit.

The original English translation of the novel was published under the title Confessions of Zeno, but is also known as Zeno's Confessions.

The stage versions

Aspects of the novel have been dramatised in various forms by William Kentridge, the Handspring Puppet Company and colleagues - initally as a a series of prints and a shadow oratorio named Zeno at 4am (2001), then as a full-scale stage production called Confessions of Zeno (2002).

The Art work/oratorio: Zeno at 4am

Zeno at 4am is the title of an artwork by William Kentridge (1955-) and an accompanying shadow puppet play, referred to as a shadow oratorio, also by Kentridge.

Also found as Zeno at 4 a.m..

The artwork

Zeno at 4 a.m. consists of of a suite of 9 prints of various objects, printed by Maurice Payne and published by David Krut Fine Art, Inc. in 2001.

Sources

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/492354

https://www.kentridge.studio/confessions-of-zeno-directors-note/

https://collections.artsmia.org/art/127490/zeno-at-4-a-m-william-kentridge

The oratorio

A multimedia oratorio, devised and directed by William Kentridge, with a libretto by Jane Taylor (based on "The Death of My Father" from Svevo's novel), music by and art works by William Kentridge, the piece featured live music by the Duke Quartet and the Handspring Puppet Company (manipulating puppets that act as a silent, mimetic chorus to the actions of Zeno, simultaneously filmed and projected onto a large panelled screen just behind the tormented father and son).

Created by and company as a shadow oratorio which combines a range of media to depict Zeno (played by David Minnaar) during in the state between waking and sleeping and the dilemmas which swirl through his mind – about his wife and his mistress, whether his pleasures (smoking being one) will cause his death, his precarious business dealings and the death of his father whom he did not love enough when he was young. Presented internationally, in collaboration with the Handspring Puppet Company, in 2001. The feature performance, Zeno at 4 a.m., used Kentridge's aesthetic to portray the story of one man's night of coming to terms with existential angst. Made up of intensely emotional, often humorous dialogue between actors, puppets, projected visual imagery and live and recorded music, the performance was a spectacular display of many artforms and genres working together.

In the piece, Zeno, an obsessive man with remarkable self-knowledge, lies awake at 4 a.m. trying to conquer self-doubt and think through his inability to quit smoking, making such declarations as: "With a life without wine and cigarettes I feel that I am cheating death; and I am cheating life."

The performance began with Zeno (played by David Minnaar) talking to himself aloud and pacing around his tiny bed. This monologue proved Zeno to be intelligent, articulate and crafty with the spoken word. Though, his mastered tongue became worthless once Zeno's father (played by Otto Maidi) entered the scene and tried to communicate with his son. Zeno's eloquence failed him at the moment he needed it most; ironically, Zeno was damned to be misunderstood by the man he wanted to understand him the most - his own father.

During the dialogical tussle between Zeno and his father, the Handspring Puppet Company manipulated small-scale jointed paper figures in the backstage. The puppets, acting as a silent, mimetic chorus to the actions of Zeno, were simultaneoulsy filmed and projected onto a large paneled screen just behind the tormented father and son. These humanoid figures, which looked like futuristic Mad Max constructions, simulated industrial machines.

As communication between father and son turned futile, the father lay on the bed, at first to rest, and then to die. Unexpectedly, the death of Zeno's father summoned life from the shadow puppets. Once flat and awkwardly moving through an uncertain landscape, the shadow puppets (with the help of actors and costumes), came to life and advanced in a procession of song and dance around Zeno and the bed that held his father. The animated figures were no longer unconscious aberrations on a two-dimensional screen, but active participants in a reality shared by Zeno. This inspiration of the shadows' life cued the end of the show.

For the past 15 years the Handspring Puppet Company and Kentridge have created compelling multimedia theater works that transform the psychology of life in post-apartheid South Africa into universal themes. While much of the symbolism and metaphor at play in Kentridge's theatrical work remain ambiguous, they create mysteries that are compelling and beautiful. A satisfying catharsis seemed to have been achieved, for the crowd greatly applauded as the curtain fell after Zeno at 4 a.m.

2002: Presented by MCA Performances, as part of the William Kentridge survey exhibition until January 20, 2002.

Translations and adaptations

The piece was precursor to the full-scale work Confessions of Zeno in 2002.

Performance history in South Africa

2001: Directed by William Kentridge with Dawid Minnaar, Otto Maidi, Pumeza Matshikiza (tall), Lwazi Ncube (short). Taken on an international tour, it was performed in Brussels, Paris, Angoulême, Toulouse, Amiens, Minneapolis, Chicago, and New York.

Sources

https://www.handspringpuppet.com/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handspring_Puppet_Company

Sources

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno%27s_Conscience

https://www.handspringpuppet.com/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handspring_Puppet_Company

Ruphin Coudyzer. 2023. Annotated list of his photographs of Market Theatre productions. (Provided by Coudyzer)

Go to ESAT Bibliography

The play: Confessions of Zeno

Confessions of Zeno was created in 2002 as a collaborative project between artist/director William Kentridge, the Handspring Puppet Company, composer Kevin Volans(1949-)[3] and writer Jane Taylor. It combines puppets and humans to explore the worlds of work and of erotic pleasure that sustain the life of the modern European bourgeoisie in the years before the outbreak of World War I. The central character (Zeno) recalls the great moments of indecision and irresolution that have marked his life, and that have set in place his unresolved relationships with his father, and his wife and his mistress.