The White Mask Falls

Extract

What makes The Blacks an entirely unique, entrancing, and disturbing theatrical venture is that the very ground of theatrical experience—the community of understanding and sympathy between the people in the audience and the humanity represented on the stage—seems to be pulled out from under our feet. Instead we become parts, both as objects and participants, of a “black” rite of murder and exorcism. The actors inform us at the opening of the play that there can be no relation between us and them other than hostility and contempt. They assure us, moreover, that they shall have the decency to make real communication between us and them impossible. The Negro (Diouf) who tries to adopt a conciliatory tone, who hopes to come to an understanding by engaging our sympathy, is promptly denounced by the group as a traitor; his place is in the ranks of the white spectators.