Earth in Flower is a slight revision of Paul Cravath’s 1985 PhD dissertation on the court dance of Cambodia, an art form with a historically intimate connection to the land and its spirits. Except for the addition of some photographs, the publisher notes that he chose to “remain true to Dr. Cravath’s . . . doctoral the­sis without modifying, deleting, or rewriting content which reflects attitudes or conventions of use that have changed in the past twenty years” (xxiii).

The book is a treasure trove. It includes more than 180 photographs, drawings, and paintings; listings of early and mid twentieth century Royal Pal­ace performance programs; an extensive bibliography of Chinese, Dutch, Eng­lish, and French sources, as well as English and French language publications by Khmer writers; and chapters that start with Southeast Asian prehistory and conclude with the dance’s ritual function.

Earth in Flower - The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama by Paul Cravath. DatAsia Press, 2008. xxx, 544 pp., 188 illus. Cloth, $128.00

Cravath arrived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to undertake research for a degree in theater just as the civil war was tightening its grip on the capital city in early 1975. Before being evacuated to Thailand as Cambodia was about to fall to the communist revolutionaries, he gained access to archival documents, photographs, and artists, some of whom would not survive the following years of deprivation and dislocation.

The Khmer Rouge, under the infamous Pol Pot, took control of the capital in April 1975. By the time that regime was ousted in January 1979, an estimated 80–90 percent of the country’s professional artists (including dancers, musi­cians, playwrights, and poets), along with close to two million of their compa­triots, had perished from starvation and disease or had been executed. Aspects of the cultural knowledge of those who died vanished as well. Therefore this volume presents a unique portrait.

Since 1979, Cambodia’s artistic community has been re­creating what it could of the traditional repertoire, with surviving artists painstakingly recall­ing their embodied wisdom and skills. Performers also continue to develop new works. A resource such as Cravath’s is invaluable in filling in the numer­ous lacunae in the historic record.

Chapter 1 outlines Cravath’s perspective of Cambodia’s classical dance tradition. Cravath sides with historians who posit a Southeast Asian–centric view of Khmer cultural beliefs and practices, wherein the Khmer are given agency for the creation and continuity of their dance as opposed to the art being viewed as derivative of Indian forms.* Cravath concludes that “[f]or Khmer dance drama, India may have provided a literary medium for mytho­logical expression, and in a much later period the Thai influenced it as well. But in form, in structure, in spirit, and in the selective process operative in its evolution, the dance drama—like the culture in which it flowered—is exclu­sively a reflection of the Cambodian people” (7).

Chapter 2 examines archeological, sculptural, and epigraphic evidence up to the reign of King Jayavarman II (802–850) in order to establish the long connection of Khmer dance with both temples and monarchs. Chapter 3 focuses on dance during the time of the Angkor Empire (ninth to fifteenth centuries), when Khmer kings ruled over vast parts of mainland Southeast Asia. Sculpted dancing figures grace the numerous stone temples constructed in that era, and evidence points to dramatic performances by dancers associ­ated with royalty.

Chapter 4 takes us from the mid fifteenth century fall of Angkor up to the early 1980s. Codification of Khmer classical dance gestures occurred during the reign of Ang Duong (1848–1860), according to a 1963 publica­tion of the Cambodian Information Department. Cravath notes that Noro­dom Sihanouk’s first time as king (1941–1955) and then as prince and head of state (1955 until a 1970 coup d’état) saw the dance linked with Cambodia’s nationalist agenda. The dancers, accompanying Sihanouk on travels overseas, came to represent the country to the larger world. Yet, until the 1970s, the special relationship between dance and royalty persisted, as the dancers would perform rituals to connect the people, the land, and the spirits on behalf of the monarchy.

The last part of chapter 4 relies on understandably limited access to information. At the time of the completion of the original dissertation, schol­arly, journalistic, and autobiographical accounts of life and art during the rule of the Khmer Rouge and of the first years under the communist regime that followed in the 1980s were few and often contradictory. We now know, for example, that instead of there being “no dancing taking place—folk, classi­cal or yiké—during the Pol Pot era” (178), newly choreographed folk dances performed in peasant/worker garb were an ubiquitous part of Khmer Rouge revolutionary culture. Further, some principal dancers of the previously royal troupe had survived the genocide to perform central roles again in the 1980s and even into the 1990s, belying the author’s statement that by 1975, “The [classical] troupe retained no dancers possessing both outstanding beauty and lead dancer skill” (170).

Chapter 5 looks at various Khmer origin myths and their relation­ship to the dance. Cravath locates a complementary dualism enacted through Khmer dance—a tension between male and female that is necessary for the well­being of the king’s country and subjects and the fertility of the land, in essence, a flowering of the earth.

The next chapters capture crucial information about aspects of the dramatic repertoire as well as about non-narrative dances, and they address musical accompaniment, choreography, staging, training, and costumes. The final chapter explores Khmer dance’s ritual function, with descriptions of the dance as an offering in royal rites. Cravath discusses the buong suong ritual in which, through performance of sacred pieces, dancers beseech deities at the behest of the royalty for blessings for the populace. The chapter also covers the formal sampeah kru ceremony, a salutation to the spirits and teachers of the dance, and the informal rituals dancers may do individually before a perfor­mance, as they seek protection and guidance through the offering of incense, candles, fruit, and prayers. The sampeah kru remains central to the lives of Cambodia’s classical dancers today. Since the return of the royalty in 1991, dancers perform at royally sanctioned buong suong ceremonies just as they did prior to the war.

Appendices include a short translation from an early twentieth century French document describing a theater in the Royal Palace; listings of repertoire from selected royal performances between 1931 and 1961; a chart outlining the structure of musical accompaniment, storyline, and timing in a 1971 performance of the Reamker (Cambodian Ramayana); and a list of the pin peat orchestra repertoire as recorded in a late 1960s Royal University of Fine Arts paper. There is a note about the author and a message from the editor about getting this work published.

The dissertation has been circulating among scholars of Southeast Asian performing arts since the late 1980s. Some Cambodian dancers in the United States also have their own treasured copies. Publication in book form invites a broader audience to share in the riches of this tradition’s history and practice and also makes available fine reproductions of photographs, a great improvement over dissertation reprints. The inclusion of additional photo­graphs and an index is also of great value, though some listings of well known individuals discussed in the text are missing or incomplete.

If a second edition of this important book comes, I hope it will con­tain references to relevant research in archeology, dance, and other aspects of Cambodian culture and history that has been conducted since 1985, as well as to dance scholarship more generally. The University of Hawai‘i has been coordinating an archeological program in conjunction with Cambodia’s Royal University of Fine Arts for more than a decade (see Bong and Stark 2001). In the field of Khmer dance, writings by Blumenthal (1990), Bru­-Nut (2002), Sam (1987), Phim and Thompson (1999), and Shapiro­-Phim (2002) offer additional perspectives on historical, ethnographic, and ritual aspects of the art and information on artists’ lives and dance technique. Biographies of some individuals whom Cravath mentions appear in recent reference works such as those edited by Brandon (1993), Kennedy (2003), and Leiter (2007). It would also be important to correct copyediting oversights (for example, the name of a prominent twentieth century dancer is spelled three different ways; in the 1980s the country was called the People’s Republic of Kampuchea and this name should be consistently used for that period; photo captions and refer­ences to them in the text need occasional corrections).

Nonetheless, this impressive and invaluable study will be of interest to those researching or teaching about theatre, dance, or Southeast Asian his­tory. Readers will need to supplement information with more recent cultural/anthropological, historical, and dance studies that correct errors and shine new light on the context and practice of Khmer arts. The writing is accessible and engaging, and the wide-ranging collection of sources and splendid photo­graphic documentation make it a gift to the field.

Toni Shapiro-Phim

Khmer Arts Academy, Takhmao, Cambodia

NOTE

* The term “Khmer” officially refers to the majority ethnic group of Cambodia. In common English usage (and throughout Earth in Flower), how­ever, “Khmer” and “Cambodian” are generally interchangeable.

REFERENCES

Blumenthal, Eileen. 1990. “The Court Ballet: Cambodia’s Loveliest Jewel.” Cultural Survival Quar­terly 14 (3): 35–38.

Bong, Sovath, and Miriam Stark. 2001. “Recent Research on the Emergence of Early Historic States in Cam­bodia’s Lower Mekong Delta.” Bulletin of the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Asso­ciation 21 (5): 85–98.

Brandon, James R., ed. 1993. The Cambridge Guide to Asian Theatre. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bru-Nut, Suppya. 2002. “Phalla, danseuse sacrée d’Angkor.” In Les Danseuses sacrees d’Angkor, edited by Christophe Loviny, 46–51. Paris: Editions du Seuil/Jazz Editions.

Kennedy, Dennis, ed. 2003. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Theatre and Performance. Oxford: Oxford Uni­versity Press.

Leiter, Samuel L., ed. 2007. Encyclopedia of Asian Theatre. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

Phim, Toni S., and Ashley Thompson. 1999. Dance in Cambodia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Sam, Chan Moly. 1987. Khmer Court Dance: A Comprehensive Study of Movements, Gestures, and Pos­tures as Applied Techniques. Newington, CT: Khmer Studies Institute.

Shapiro ­Phim, Toni. 2002. “Dance, Music, and the Nature of Terror in Democratic Kampuchea.” In Annihilating Difference: The Anthropology of Genocide, edited by Alexan­der Hinton, 179–193. Berkeley: University of California Press.

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Scene from Pamina Devi, a ballet for classical dance choreographed by Sophiline Cheam Shapiro

PHNOM PENH – Two recently published books on Cambodia’s classical dance reveal aspects of the art that have rarely been addressed in previous works.

They also very much complement each other and target different readerships.

With a total of 544 pages and more than 180 historical photos and illustrations, Paul Cravath’s “Earth in Flower” delves deep into the essence of Khmer dance beyond its resplendent costumes and mesmerizing gestures.

The book also contains little-known facts on the role of the Royal Palace’s dancers over the centuries, and how they became symbols of the King’s prestige. So powerful a symbol were they that the French attempted a royal troupe takeover in the 1930s as a way to reduce the power of the Khmer monarchy.

Earth in Flower - The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama by Paul Cravath

The story of “Earth in Flower” began in 1973, Cravath writes, when Cambodia’s Ministry of Culture contacted several international universities with a pressing need assistance to document classical dance. The country was under siege to communist rebels and ministry officials feared that dance traditions – in large part transmitted orally – would be a casualty of war.

Cravath, then a student at the University of Hawaii, took up the topic as his doctoral thesis. Delays followed due to the deteriorating situation in Cambodia, so that by the time he landed in Phnom Penh in January 1975, the Khmer Rouge were dosing in on the city.

Given access to dancers, teachers and the Royal Palace’s archives, Cravath started compiling data and conducting interviews while rockets regularly rained down on the city. He kept on working until the US military ordered his immediate evacuation on April 5, the one suitcase he was allowed to take with him stuffed with his notes and the rest of his belongings left behind.

Twelve days later on April 17th, Phnom Penh fell and the Pol Pot regime began.

The thesis he submitted for his degree in Asian theater in November 1984 – featuring references in eight languages – was the result of nine additional years of research and interviews with refugee dancers.

Given its origins, it is not surprising that some portions of the book are of more interest to scholars and dance researchers, but others, including the historical overview, are bound to appeal to lay people and experts alike.

Cravath writes that in pre-Angkorian and Angkorian times, female and male dancers were assigned to temples for religious rituals. Although slaves, the fact that dancers are mentioned by name in a stone inscription dated 611 would indicate that they had a higher status than other slaves.

King Jayavarman VII put more than 3,200 dancers in temples, according to inscriptions around the end of the 12th century There also were dancers for entertainment in the households of kings and dignitaries. And dancers constituted the king’s harem.

The most beautiful girls would be brought as young as six years old to the palace by their parents who were compensated according to the beauty of their child. From the time of King Ang Duong in the mid-1850s until the 1920s, dancers were cloistered in the palace – King Norodom, who had around 500 dancers at the start of his reign in the 1860s, allowed them one day per year to visit their families under escort.

Dancers were so much a symbol of prestige in the 19th century that Thailand’s King Rama III refused to accede to the request of Laotian King Chao Anou for dancers so that he would not “presume to be his equal,” Cravath reports. This would later prompt King Norodom to welcome a dance troupe headed by a high-ranking Thai lady who had fled the Bangkok court.

King Sisowath's Prima Ballerina as she appeared in the 1915 book "In the Lands of the Sun" by Prince William of Sweden.

After the signing of the 1863 Protectorate Treaty, the French, who among many other things controlled the country’s finances, tried to reduce the number of palace dancers in order to lessen the King’s prestige. In the 1930s, the French would go as far as subsidizing the private troupe of Princess Wongat Say Sangvann, which performed for tourists, calling it the “one and only true” troupe. But after King Norodom Sihanouk acceded to the throne in 1941, his mother Queen Sisowath Kossamak found ways to reestablish the royal troupe’s ascendancy.

In support of her son, Queen Kossamak transformed performances so that the royal troupe could best serve Cambodia’s image nationally and abroad, Cravath writes. She shortened dance programs, had pure dance pieces followed by dramatic or comic works, and added musical interludes.

The presence of Princess Norodom Buppha Devi, “a most skillful and beautiful dancer,” Cravath writes, helped make the royal troupe a powerful political tool.

During the Khmer Rouge regime, most artists who had remained in the country disappeared A former Royal University of Fine Arts teacher who survived, Chheng Phon, would become in the early 1980s “the strongest force in the struggle to preserve any of the per¬forming arts of Cambodia,” Cravath writes.

One of Cravath’s goals was to research the role dance played in Khmer society: “Cambodian dance has always been a representation of two natural forces or principles – the Feminine and the Masculine – in confrontation, and dance was a means of contacting the spirits who could influence the outcome of their interaction,” he writes.

Dance could be seen as an odd subject to be tackled by Cravath, as the actor, theater director and drama professor at the University of Hawaii has walked all his life with braces on his legs due to a childhood illness, according to his publisher Kent Davis of DatASIA.

Earth in Flower received international recognition with a Kiriyama Award of Notable Book and a Nautilus Award.

Since being released in book form a few months ago, “Earth in Flower” has received two international awards – the Kiriyama Prize Notable Book and the Nautilus Silver Award – and was selected by the Independent Book Publishers Association to appear on the cover of Publisher’s Weekly’ in February 2008, Davis said.

Rather than focusing on the distant origins of Khmer traditional dance or an in-depth academic discourse of the form, Denise Heywood’s book “Cambodian Dance, Celebration of the Gods” is one of the few recent books detailing dance in Cambodia today.

"Cambodian Dance - Celebration of the Gods" by Denise Heywood

A British journalist and Asian art lecturer, Heywood has crafted a 144-page work in a coffee-table format that contains superb historical information as well as illustrations and photos.

These illuminating images include French posters for King Sisowath’s dancers 1906 performances in Paris, paintings of dancers published in Pierre Loti’s 1912 book “Un Pelerin d’Angkor,” or Angkor’s Pilgrim, and photos of a masked lakhaon kaol dancers performing ‘Weyreap” in Phnom Penh in 2004.

In her book, released by River Books in Bangkok, Heywood briefly covers all aspects of dance, supplying the type of basic facts certain to attract all readers, regardless of their familiarity with Cambodian dance.

In the chapter “Preparation for Performance,” she explains that costumes must fit so tight on dancers’ bodies that they have to be sewn on them before each performance. Women’s makeup used to consist of lead and rice or alabaster powder, which gave their faces an otherworldly whiteness, but this has now been replaced by regular cosmetics. Masks for male lakhaon kaol dancers are made of clay or papier-mache, and may take a month to sculpt and paint.

Heywood also summarizes storylines of the most commonly staged dances, such as the epic tale Reamker, the Apsara Dance and the Story of Mekhala. In the gestures section, she shows with illustrations that hand movements usually signify parts of flowers, the hand pointing up indicating a leaf and the index finger held up the stem.

Of interest in the historical portion of the book is Heywood’s section on Western dancers such as Belgian dancer Xenia Zarina, who came to Cambodia in the 1920s and 1930s to study Khmer classical dance in order to perform works in that tradition in the West.

Later in the book, she mentions that Pol Pot whose regime would cause the death of about 90 percent of the country’s artists, had a sister in the royal troupe and a cousin who had been a star dancer and a favorite of King Sisowath.

Star dancer Piseth Paeklica killed in 1999 at 34 years old. No suspect was ever apprehended.

Writing about dance today, Heywood puts a name on the faces of people who receive little recognition in the field, some of the leading advocates and masters responsible for classical dance’s high standards and vibrant works at the present time.

Heading the list are Chheng Phon and legendary Pich Turn Kravel, a well known actor in the 1960s who survived the Khmer Rouge regime to write and choreograph dramas in the 1980s and 1990s. Now respectively in their 70s and late 60s, the two men regularly serve as advisers on dance and theater productions in the country.

At the end of the book, Heywood describes the Cambodian government’s lack of support for the arts. Not only do artists no longer have an appropriate national theater to perform, but also the Royal University of Fine Arts has been relocated at a site on which, she writes, “buildings are already cracking…a remote, barren area of landfill where they are sometimes mugged en route to classes.” The start of RUFA classes was delayed in October 2008 due to the campus being inundated for weeks by knee-deep flood water.

In April 1995, Heywood had interviewed the future King Norodom Sihamoni who told her that while Cambodia “must keep the strict classical traditions intact” new works and forms must be developed.

‘Too much emphasis is placed on Angkor,” Heywood reports Norodom Sihamoni telling her. “Glorious as it is, it’s the past. It is the witness of a great culture, we must safeguard it. But now Cambodia needs other expressions.”

Siem Reap, Cambodia – Balanced precariously atop a metal scaffold 20 stories above the Cambodian jungle, publisher Kent Davis unveiled Angkor the Magnificent (ISBN: 978-1-934431-00-9), an expanded edition of Helen Churchill Candee’s 1924 Asian travel classic featuring the first published biography of the 20th century adventuress.

Titanic Unveiling at Angkor Wat

“It’s astounding to think of ancient Khmer stone masons experiencing this view 1,000 years ago. This is the type of travel adventure Helen Churchill Candee lived for…her spirit is certainly here today!” said Davis at the top of the temple’s central tower on a temporary metal framework erected for restoration of the complex pinecone-shaped structure.

Davis held the ceremony at Angkor Wat before donating copies of the book to Cambodia’s key libraries including the Biblioteque Nationale, the Center for Khmer Studies, the Khmer Arts Academy and L’Ecole D’Extreme Orient.

“Angkor Wat is one of the most magical places on earth. Candee’s travelogue vividly portrays an Angkor of yesteryear for those looking for insights into these truly magnificent Cambodian ruins” comments Yale archeology professor Dr. Dougald O’Reilly who founded Heritage Watch to preserve Cambodia’s heritage.

This historic release marks the first time in 85 years that readers can enjoy Candee’s evocative descriptions of Asian adventure travel in the land of the lost Khmer civilization. Today, Helen Candee is still the perfect guide to bring the temples to life…for visitors experiencing these wonders in person or from their reading chairs. Angkor the Magnificent (ISBN: 978-1-934431-00-9) is available on Amazon.com in the US and Europe.

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> DatAsia press publishes books focusing on Cambodia and Southeast Asian history. As a researcher with Devata.org, Kent Davis works to document the importance of women in Asian history and to decode the meaning of the 1,780 apsara (female goddess) portrait carvings found Angkor Wat.

> Dr. Dougald O’Reilly is an author, archaeologist and Yale University professor specializing in prehistoric Southeast Asia. He is committed to preserving Cambodia’s cultural heritage and founded Heritage Watch (www.heritagewatch.org), a non-profit organization working to preserve cultural icons and stop antiquity theft in Cambodia.

by George Groslier

Foreword by Paul Cravath -Edited by Kent Davis

ISBN 978-1-934431-11-5

Cambodian Dancers, Ancient and Modern presents the first English translation of George Groslier’s 1913 work, Danseuses Cambodgiennes, in an expanded hardcover edition.

In 1913, George Groslier’s book Danseuses cambodgiennes, anciennes et modernes became the first significant historic account of Cambodia’s sacred royal dancers. Today, his work stands as a milestone in understanding this ancient tradition.

Historian, curator and author George Groslier (1887-1945) dedicated his life and career to Cambodia, becoming the motivating force behind the revival in traditional Cambodian arts and crafts in the early 20th century. His devotion to preserving Khmer traditions helped shape the proud cultural identity shared by all Cambodians today.

Cambodian Dancers, Ancient and Modern presents the first complete English translation of Groslier’s pivotal work in an expanded hardcover edition, beautifully typeset with nearly 200 of the author’s original drawings and supplemented by the complete original French text, bibliographic data and index. This edition also features an exclusive 2008 interview with the author’s daughter, Nicole Groslier, and select personal photos from the Groslier family archive.

Scheduled for release Spring 2010