摘 要

随着流媒体逐渐在信息共享和受众分散的信息世界中占据主导地位，现代社会人，特别是青少年的心理特征，表现出更加脆弱，不稳定和迷茫的趋势。然而，正是这样的大众心理现状，当代艺术和文学作品，尤其是戏剧和音乐剧，以其独特的情感张力重新回到公众的视线。戏剧作品唤醒了人们长期沉睡的人文精神，使人得到心灵上的触动，受到启发并最终得到反思。以第71届托尼奖最佳音乐剧致埃文·汉森（Dear Evan Hansen）为例，该研究从角色，音乐，环境和戏剧形式四个方面分析了该音乐剧中体现的沉郁悲凉的青少年心理特征以及本体性责任的体现。结合弗洛伊德的精神分析和拉康的镜像理论探讨当代艺术和文学作品的净化功能是如何唤醒情感认同和人文精神，并证明这种本体性责任的多元升华反映在当代艺术和文学作品中。

关键词：当代艺术和文学作品；音乐剧；《致埃文·汉森》 ；净化

Abstract

As streaming media gradually dominate the world of information sharing and audience fragmentation, the mind of crowd, especially the adolescents ‘psychological characteristics, demonstrates a tendency of becoming more vulnerable, unstable, and perplexed. Nevertheless, also because of the status quo of the popular mind, contemporary art and literature, especially drama and musical, come back to the sight of the public with its unique emotional tension. Drama works awaken the long-dormant humanistic spirit of people, bring them the touching feeling, and then make them inspired and finally reflective. A case study of the best musical of 71st Tony Award —— Dear Evan Hansen, this research analyzes the sublimation from own melancholy to ontological responsibility in the musical in four parts, character, music and environment, and dramatic form. Coming with the theory of Freud’s Psychoanalysis and Lacon’s Mirror Stage, Digging out how contemporary art and literature awaken emotional recognition and the human spirit and prove that the kind of sublimation of ontological responsibility reflecting in contemporary art and literature.

Key Words: Contemporary art and literature; Musical; Dear Evan Hansen; Catharsis; Social Connectedness; Psychology disorder

Contents

1 Introduction 1

2 Literature Review 3

2.1 Aristotelian Catharsis and Catharsis of tragic literature 3

2.2 Critical Reading of Musicals 4

2.3 Broadway View of Aristotelian Catharsis 5

2.4 Social Connectedness of Musicals 6

2.5 Mental Health Issues on Broadway -- A Typical Case of Dear Evan Hansen 7

2.6 The Psychological Mechanism Remains Unclear 7

3 Catharsis of Dear Evan Hansen on the Stage 8

3.1 The Catharsis and the Actor on the Stage 8

3.2 The Catharsis of the Commons and Emotion 9

3.3 The Catharsis from the Actor to the Audience 9

4 Social Connectedness of Dear Evan Hansen in Real Life 11

4.1 Social Connectedness Improves Public Mental Health 11

4.2 Social Connectedness for Adolescents with Social Anxiety 12

4.3 Music Participation 13

5 Sublimation as An Integration of Connectedness and Catharsis in Dear Evan Hansen 16

5.1 Connection Between Denial, Sublimation and Mirror Stage in This Play 16

5.2 Sublimation as A treatment 17

5.3 Sublimation of catharsis and Connectedness 18

6 Conclusions 21

References 22

The Multisensory Sublimation

of Ontological Responsibility in Contemporary Art and Literature —— A Case Study of the Musical Dear Evan Hansen

1 Introduction

As streaming media gradually dominate the world of information sharing and audience fragmentation, the mind of crowd, especially the adolescents ‘psychological characteristics, demonstrates a tendency of becoming more vulnerable, unstable, and perplexed. Nevertheless, also because of the status quo of the popular mind, contemporary art and literature, especially drama and musical, come back to the sight of the public with its unique emotional tension. Drama works awaken the long-dormant humanistic spirit of people, bring them the touching feeling, and then make them inspired and finally reflective. A case study of the best musical of 71st Tony Award —— Dear Evan Hansen, this research analyzes the sublimation from own melancholy to ontological responsibility in the musical in four parts, character, music and environment, and dramatic form. Digging out how contemporary art and literature awaken emotional recognition and the human spirit and prove that the kind of sublimation of ontological responsibility reflecting in contemporary art and literature.

Literature and art is the carrier of ontological responsibility, and aid to sublimate it to a profound aspiration that produces the desire to connect with and help others. With the current prosperity of drama and musical, the audiences gradually realize that a sense of healing stems from arts and literature is hardly substituted, and the theatrical interpretation of emotional cognition is sometimes more direct and intense than text. The research of ontological responsibility has a profound significance at leading people especially adolescent to tackle their mental problem straight and positive instead of drenching in the muttering of decadent aesthetics. And the combination of musical and ontological responsibility research reflect the contemporaneity of human spirits, resonating well with people.

The domestic exploration of musical is mostly pointed to the discussion of musicality and artistry. Most of scholars focus on the study of stage effect, stagecraft and characters. A few researchers have analyzed from the sight of the literariness of musicals, but there are few interdisciplinary researches and intersections of musical and other fields. This paper combines with the social psychology theory of Psychoanalysis, Mirror Stage and Literary criticism theory of Aristotle’s Poetics and Lacanianism, focuses on catharsis, social connectedness, sublimation and adolescent society to explore the multisensory sublimation of ontological responsibility in contemporary art and literature, especially for modern Broadway’s musical.

2 Literature Review

2.1 Aristotelian Catharsis and Catharsis of tragic literature

Between 384 BC and 322 BC, the ancient Greek era of Aristotle, the famous art form at that time, was a tragedy. The Athenians watched offensive plays at community festivals and the huge amphitheater. Among those splendid playwrights, Estrous, Euripides, and Sophocles were household names at the time. Furthermore, that is why Aristotle wrote "Poetics", a guide to writing great plays. There are many exciting suggestions to tragedy: For example, the author must use the "sweeping plot" to change the hero from great to ugly. There are also dramatic moments of "discovery" when the protagonist suddenly discovers that his life is a disaster.

But what is the use of Catharsis of literature? What's the point of people from the whole community getting together to watch the horrible things happening to the protagonist? For example, in Sophocles' Oedipus, the King, Oedipus, negligently killed his father and married his mother. After discovering what he has done, he dug out his eyes in regret and despair. Aristotle's answer is that Catharsis, which is a process of purifying minds. Catharsis is a kind of purification to remove negative moods or grim thoughts from a person when he is touched by a unique emotion in literary works, especially our confusion about feelings of depression, fear, and sympathy.

We are naturally puzzled at this situation: we are hard-hearted and lack sympathy for those who should be sympathized, tending to either exaggerate fears or scare ourselves enough or drowning in the plot of tragic literal works or drama with extreme emotion. It is a question about Catharsis, which is a metaphor originally used by Aristotle in the Poetics, comparing the effects of tragedy on the mind of a spectator to the effect of Catharsis on the body. However, such debates have happened in the past centuries. Lessing interprets Catharsis as a purification, an experience that brings pity and fear into their proper balance: In real life, men are sometimes too much addicted to pity or fear, sometimes too little; tragedy brings them back to a good and happy mean. The tragedy is then a corrective; through watching tragedy, the audience learns how to feel these emotions at proper levels. F. L. Lucas opposes the use of words like purification and cleansing to translate Catharsis; he proposes that it should instead be rendered as purgation. He claimed that it is the human soul that is purged of its excessive passions. Overall, Aristotle's concept of Catharsis provides a mechanism that generates the rational control of irrational emotions. Tragedy reminds us that bad things happen to upright people, including ourselves. Small mistakes can also lead to the collapse of a life. Therefore, we should have compassion and remorse for those whose missteps lead to catastrophic errors and must review these essential facts together in real life. It is a necessary process of Catharsis that tragedy brings to us. Finally, uncover the tray of Catharsis; it is known to us that the responsibility of art is to keep these profound truths in the human heart. 

2.2 Critical Reading of Musicals

Inheriting the crown of ancient drama, as the most popular art form in the western world, the musical becomes the primary carrier to arise and purge the excessive passions of the audience in this era. With the development of economy and culture, the musical has conquered the whole world with its diverse artistic charm. It is such a comprehensive art form that integrates many types of art, including music, dance, drama, art, acrobatics, magic, whose compatibility is incompatible with any entertainment or arts. Nevertheless, the musical, especially the stage musical, rarely attracts critical writing of quality. Unlike the opera or the popular arts, the Broadway musical seems to inspire passion or disdain but not a serious thought. (Refer to Reading Musicals). In the past ten years, re-arranging the successful musicals in the past has become the guarantee of Broadway's box office. There are various kinds of Broadway musicals this time, and representative ones are the following three: First, adapting classic operas. The famous opera Miss Saigon in 1990 was inspired by the Italian opera Madame Butterfly and had been successfully created.Second, the re-arrangement of past successful musicals provides a favorable guarantee for Broadway's box office. For example, they re-arranged showboat in 1994, The King and I in 1996, and 42nd street in 2001 with excellent works. Third, Broadway often adapts successful films to the stage of musicals. For example, in 1994, the musical version of classic film Beauty and the Beast appeared , and The Lion King was adopted in 1997. However, because of the mentioned features, Broadway tends to attach more attention to stage effects in order to keep the box officer. The Lacks of literariness and humanity in script were always being criticized by columnist until 2005 when rent appealed on Broadway. The gorgeous stage effect can arouse the emotions of the audience, but the physiological reactions on the senses cannot replace the Catharsis. Hence, most of Broadway's repertoires in recent years look more like the shows of Cirque du Soleil in the theater than drama. In recent years, the box office guarantees brought by the adaptation of Disney movies have also caused producers to ignore the value of excellent original scripts. When entering the twenty-first century, it is fortunate to see more humanistic stories colored with social concern and literary adaptations of famous historical events, such as Next to Normal(2008) and Hamilton(2015), especially the latter widely-recognized the best musical of world stature these years.

2.3 A Broadway View of Aristotelian Catharsis