Le Ballet Royal du Cambodge Paris performance.

By Kent Davis – Devata.org

PARIS — At the beginning of time, an extraordinary Hindu legend relates how the forces of good and evil worked together to create Amrita, the nectar of immortality. Today, humankind still seeks this magical elixir and Khmer dancers continue to recreate the tale.

The Royal Ballet of Cambodia will perform in Paris on October 10, 2010 with the support and collaboration of the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts of Cambodia. Their performance is directly connected to their country’s thousand-year-old royal tradition of dance through the choreography, which was arranged by Cambodian Princess Buppha Devi.

Cambodian dancers in full costume.

The Princess, a former prima ballerina in this sacred art, is the daughter of former Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk, and the sister of the present King Sihamoni. At its origin, this dance form was only performed as an offering for gods and royalty. It has only been presented as a performance art in modern times.

“The Legend of the Apsara Mera” presents two Brahmanic tales that became integral to Khmer culture. Act I is the “Churning of the Sea of Milk” (“Le mythe du barattage de la mer de lait”). While the myth originated in India, Khmer interpretation and portrayal are unique, focusing on the naga, or cosmic serpent, and Vishnu at the center of the image balancing the forces of good (devas on the right below) and evil (asuras on the left).

Angkor Wat features the largest artistic representation of the Hindu legend of "the churning of the ocean of milk" on Earth. Visnu appears at the center with the naga Vasuki wrapped around Mt. Mandara. Vishnu also incarnates as his avatar, the turtle Kurma below, to provide a base. The demons, or asuras, pull on Visuki to the left as gods, or devas, pull on the right. This churns the ocean to manifest magical objects, including the apsaras that fly over the scene.

Angkor Wat temple in Cambodia is home to the largest artistic rendering of the “churning the sea of milk” on Earth; a bas-relief panel 49 yards wide. In considering the legend, the Cambodian dance history book Earth in Flower by Paul Cravath quotes French archaeologist Bernard-Philippe Groslier’s observation that the naga is the “god of the waters” that “haunts the whole of Khmer art, from the endlessly repeated theme of the churning of the Sea of Milk down to the most insignificant architectural element which will accommodate it.”

In addition to the elixir of immortality, the art of Angkor Wat reveals that something else associated with Khmer culture manifested from the ocean: the apsaras or celestial women who fly above the scene. Khmer art routinely features women and goddesses, with temples like Angkor Wat honoring women, even to the exclusion of men. The female dance tradition of Cambodia is closely associated with these ancient beliefs.

Performance by the Royal Cambodian Ballet. Copyright 2010 Anders Jiras.

Act II presents “The Legend of Kambu and Mera” (“La légende de Kambu et de Méra”). Quoting historian Thierry Solange, Earth in Flower describes how this legend establishes that “the origin of the kings of Cambodia goes back to the union of the hermit Kambu Svāyambhuva, eponymic ancestor of the Kambujas, with the celestial nymph Merā….” As Cravath explains, Svayambhuva means “self-creating,” and Merā was an apsaras or heavenly dancer given to him by Shiva.

The royal troupe features elaborate costumes, including beautiful new crowns replicating the ancient styles worn by women in the stone portraits at Angkor Wat.

A modern crown created for this special performance of the Royal Cambodian Ballet and a crowned devata seen on the West Gopura of Angkor Wat. Photo left - Copyright 2010 Anders Jiras. Right - Kent Davis

PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Act I: The myth of the Churning of the Sea of Milk

Act II: The Legend of Kambu and Mera

Exécution musicale - Ngornly Seang, Pruong Proeung, Kong Chum, Kol Nol, Sok Chhem, Kimsour san

Chant – Borin Yann, Marey Doung, Sarath Hun

Danse – Phirum Meas, Chamroeumina Chap, Chansoda Chen, Sokhoeum Sok, Pech Heung, Viphearun Yann, Mary Prom, Savin Sam, Sathya Sam, Danida Muong, Borena Chhin, Thida Kao, Samphors Chamroeum, Phirum Keo, Limsothea Sam, Dalis Ou, Lin Seng, Vichivi Praseth, Vichheka Praseth, Chamroeuntola Chap, Chanmoly Vuth, Sovanney Samart, Khankanha Ram, Leakhena Im, Linda Hem, Sophy Yan, Chumnit Penh, Thavrak Seur, Yeng Yang

Chorégraphie – S.A.R. Norodom Buppha Devi, Proeung Chieng

Chorégraphie-Costumes – Soth Somaly

Interprète - Kor Borin

Costumes – Sim Mantha, Pen Sokhuon, Ros Yaran,

Décor -Sek Savuth

Soutien - Ministère de la Culture et des Beaux-Arts du Royaume du Cambodge, Ministère de la Culture et des Beaux-Arts du Royaume du Cambodge

PARIS

Sunday, 10/10 2010 16:00
Sunday, 10/10 2010 20:00

PARIS TICKET INFORMATION – FRENCH

PARIS TICKET INFORMATION – ENGLISH

BRUSSELS

BRUSSELS TICKET INFORMATION – FRENCH

Reviewed by Eileen Blumenthal, Rutgers University

It is a vision of astonishing beauty. Graceful women in glittering costumes form a legato flow of anatomy-defying curves and angles. Tied to royalty and central to religious rituals, Cambodia’s traditional dance has become an emblem of the country’s patrimony. It links modern Cambodians to the ancient Angkor Empire, whose sandstone temples are festooned with bas-relief dancers.

Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama by Paul Cravath. DatAsia, 2008. Pp. xxx +514 +184 illus.

Cambodia’s royal dance has long captured the Western imagination, but until recently there was little opportunity to research it. Before 1941, dancers were in the king’s sequestered harem. Western studies of the dance were based on very few viewings or on second-string companies that played for tourists. Paul Cravath’s 1985 doctoral dissertation, Earth in Flower—-only now belatedly published —blew the field open.

He meticulously gleaned information from the scattered studies of Cambodian dance and related subjects. Most importantly, he did first-hand research in Phnom Penh in 1975, examining royal archives, watching rehearsals, and interviewing dancers, teachers and scholars. His research was heroic. Cravath remained in war-torn Phnom Penh, despite daily shelling, until a forced evacuation days before the Khmer Rouge victory. Most of his sources—both written and human—perished during the ensuing nightmare.

His study begins by presenting the ancient Cambodian references and surviving myths that involve dancers. He then incorporates a broader context of South and South-East Asian research and religious studies to derive his thesis: Cambodian dance is fundamentally an embodiment of the life-creating tension and communion between the

Khmer dancer circa 1911 by George Groslier

feminine and the masculine principle. Cravath proceeds to offer a history of Cambodian dance from ancient times through the twentieth century. And, finally, he documents the dance, cataloguing gestures, movement patterns, costume elements and repertory ­including many dances no longer performed and gone from living memories. This work is invaluable. And the current presentation, including nearly two hundred black-and-white images, is of art-book quality.

Still, Cravath tends to focus on ideas and oral traditions to support his thesis and to dismiss contravening interpretations and oral traditions. As a result, his argument is overstated and lacks nuance. As the first comprehensive study of the field, his work also inevitably incorporates a few lapses. For example, he does not get quite right the Byzantine relationships between dance and politics in the 1930S and 1940s. But those of us carrying Cambodian dance research forward all are standing on his shoulders. This is an essential volume for anyone interested in South-East Asian performance.

About the reviewer: Eileen Blumenthal

Eileen Blumenthal has a Ph.D. in history of the theater from Yale. She received her M.A. and B.A. degrees in English and American literature from Brown. Her specialties include contemporary experimental theater and traditional Asian theater and theater. She is the author of a book on Joseph Chaikin, numerous theater reviews and articles in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the Village Voice, American Theater, Asian Theater Journal, Theater, Natural History, and Cultural Survival. She authored a book and many published articles on the performing arts and the contemporary politics of Cambodia, and produced the American tour of theaters from Cambodia in the fall of 1990.

Blumenthal has served as a consultant for public television performing-arts projects, university theater/theater programs, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Her photographs have appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Dance Magazine, Natural History, Cultural Survival, and the Village Voice. Her awards include a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, a Kent (Danforth) Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism, a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for University Teachers, and a Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Residency. At Rutgers University, Mason Gross Theater of the Arts, she has taught history of theater, theater criticism, introduction to graduate study in theater, and modern experimental theater.

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.

Paul Cravath has seen “Earth in flower.” He’s thrilled, cover to cover.

Cambodian dance is based on ancient traditions that can be traced back to the Khmer civilization that ruled most of Southeast Asia 1,000 years ago. Cravath's book, Earth in Flower is the most extensive documentation of this cultural legacy ever published in any language. Photo copyright Jaro Poncar.

Chatfield, MN - ”Some parts of the book are extremely interesting and some parts of it are simply for the preservation of documentation of the ballet for the Cambodian people,” said the 1962 Chatfield High School alum who is now professor of drama at Leeward College in Honolulu, Hawaii, and author of “Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama,” being presented as a St. Charles Author’s Night event.

“I wrote it as my doctoral dissertation at the University of Hawaii…when the Khmer Rouge took over the city of Phnom Penh in 1975, they did so at gunpoint and killed everyone connected with the royal family and royal court, of which the Royal Cambodian Ballet was a part. There was only one dance company, and any dancers, musicians or support personnel in the capital were killed – people estimate about 90 percent of the company died. I suspect the government knew it was going to happen, so that’s why they arranged for me to research this secretive royal legacy.”

The Fulbright scholar attended Luther College after graduating from Chatfield High School, then redeemed his scholarship in Indore, India, where “at the age of 21, my life changed completely … India was the best place to be in the world.”

Dr. Paul Cravath - Author of Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama

He taught for a year in Tokyo,  earned his master’s degree in drama at Tulane University in New Orleans, then went on to continue his studies in Asian drama at the University of Hawaii. “The University of Hawaii has the best program in Asian theater, so I went there to pursue my Ph.D. in Asian drama. My professor actually was asked to do the Cambodian research,” Cravath explained, “but he couldn’t go. He told them that he had a graduate student who could go, so I did.

“When I got to Phnom Penh in January 1975, the city was surrounded. The Khmer Rouge were attacking the city with rockets. I wasn’t quite ready … I was shocked because there were rockets being fired into the city the day I arrived. It was a very strange place to be when the city was under attack … I realized, ‘Oh my gosh, this is war,’ but I watched ballet rehearsals because I was there to research this ancient dance tradition.”

Cravath explained that the Royal Cambodian Ballet is “not like any other ballet,” in that it is comprised solely of female dancers who, in previous eras, had been members of king’s harem. In the past, dancers entered the troupe as children and lived out their entire lives sequestered in the royal palace.

“There was a school for little girls – who started training at age 8 – the most beautiful little girls were chosen from each province. The very best ones were selected to perform in the national troupe. Their performances were sacred, and were mostly seen by the royal family, except for invited royal guests and public ceremonies.

One of Cravath's danse position photos from a rehearsal at the University de Beaux Arts in 1975. The Khmer Rouge genocide began weeks later. The fate of this dancer is unknown.

“The Cambodian ballet is much more than just a dance in the Western sense – the people believe that their dances, the most sacred of the dances, have power over the spirit world and secure the prosperity of their kingdom. Traditionally, dance was frequently performed for a specific purpose — to appeal to the gods for rain, for example — the dance and dancers were the kingdom’s connection to the spirit world, and represented the power of the king. This sacred rite held that the girls were the embodiment of creation, fertility and the earth itself …everything feminine was associated with the power of the earth. The female dancers represent the blossoming of the earth, which is the meaning of the book’s title ‘Earth in Flower.’”

Mandatory weekly check-ins at the American Embassy punctuated Cravath’s studies of this unique ballet, an art form that he preserved through photographs and meticulously detailed descriptions of each dance’s characters, their histories, and how the various choreographed motions were expressed.

Though Cravath was warned not to remain in Cambodia, he persisted in his research, even as the American government denied him assured protection and, according to mainstream media, ”everything in Phnom Penh was just fine”.

“The official US State Department policy was also ‘everything’s just fine,’ when in fact, the Communist Khmer Rouge were tightening their grip on the capital.”

In Minnisota, area newspapers actually reported Cravath as having disappeared, though it would be several years until he found the articles his mother had saved. One read, “The parents of Paul Cravath, 30, a Chatfield native now in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, on a study program, have been informed that their son is alive and safe. Russell Cravath of Chatfield, Paul’s father, said the family had learned Tuesday that Paul is safe. They had been concerned since letters from Cambodia quit coming after Feb. 17.

In 1975, Cambodia was in the center of a warzone, surrounded by Vietnam, Laos and Thailand.

“The student’s father declined to say how word of his son’s safety was conveyed to him as he is afraid it would jeopardize his son’s future safety. He said his son had been advised to leave Cambodia because of the fighting but he does not know his son’s intentions. Paul Cravath arrived in Cambodia on Jan. 11 to study classical dance drama in order to earn a doctor of philosophy degree from the University of Hawaii.”

In early April 1975 he visited the embassy to check in as usual. The American ambassador informed him that Phnom Penh would be evacuated of foreigners the next morning and that Cravath was to be on the plane for Bangkok, Thailand.

“It wasn’t like the fall of Saigon where everyone tried to rush to get on the planes,” he related.

“We took a bus from the city. When we got to the airport, there were rockets being fired at the runways, so we had to run to a bunker and wait for our airplane. It was a military transport with no seats, only webbing to sit in. I could take only one bag, so I gave away my personal items and brought all my notes, interview tapes and photos.” In Thailand, Cravath was able to continue his dance research because Thai dance is drawn from older Cambodian traditions. By the end of the year he returned to Hawaii and “worked on my dissertation periodically,” but had other commitments that filled his time.

“Finally, in 1984, I finished the paper and got my degree. The world had forgotten about Cambodia, which was then under Communist control. I put the papers under my bed, and they lived there for the next 20 years. I tried to publish a couple times, but the university wanted to shorten it to just more than 200 pages, and I didn’t want to do that.

Twenty years later, a Khmer history researcher named Kent Davis read two sentences of my paper in a column someone wrote about it. He called me and I helped him obtain a copy of the thesis. Upon reading it Davis knew  it should be published because it documented Cambodian history and lives that have now been destroyed.  He describes  it as a cultural treasure.”

Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama

The resulting volume “is marketed primarily to libraries,” but is also available to collectors on Amazon and from a dedicated website: EarthInFlower.com. Cravath is pleased to see it bound and illustrated using many rare photographs he had taken 34 years ago.

“Only 886 copies were printed, and many are now in research libraries around the world. Strangely, on April 17th, 2008…the same day the Khmer Rouge took over Phnom Pehn…Kent’s house burned down and some of the remaining copies burned. I’m just happy to see my research in libraries now, because that’s where it belongs. The Cambodian ballet is a beautiful, beautiful dance form. This book helps to preserve its legacy.”

ST. CHARLES, MN — For Paul Cravath, Cambodia conjures up images of beauty and death.

Dr. Paul Cravath - Author of Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama

Cravath, a native of Chatfield, arrived in Cambodia in 1975 to conduct research on traditional Cambodian dance theater. What he and no one else knew at the time was that within weeks the war would begin that was later the subject of the film, “The Killing Fields,”

Despite the war and death raging around him, he was able to spend months documenting and preserving the history of this artform, and has now published his research about Cambodian dance drama in the book, “Earth in Flower.”

“I arrived 11 days after the siege of the city (Phnom Penh) started,” Cravath recalled. He was one of the few westerners in the city, and managed to escape, with his research materials, before the Khmer Rouge genocide began on April 17, 1975.

Cravath graduated from Chosen Valley High School in 1962 and from Luther College in 1966. He went to India as a Fulbright tutor, spent some time in Tokyo, and along the way became interested in Asian theater traditions.

“I had never taken a theater or drama class,” he said. But after earning a master of fine arts degree from Tulane University, Cravath went to the University of Hawaii to study Asian theater. While he was a graduate student in Hawaii, he had the opportunity to go to Cambodia and observe, first-hand, not only the royal dance company and training school, but also the violence of a country torn by a vicious war.

These days, Cambodia has been out of the news almost as long as Cravath’s dissertation languished before being published.

“I’m really glad the book is published, because it was a doctoral dissertation that lived under my bed for 20 years,” said Cravath, who will give a presentation about Cambodian dance drama tonight in St. Charles.

Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama

The book, which is intended primarily as a scholarly reference, is regarded as the major English-language source on Cambodian dance.

“In my talk, I’ll talk about the book and how it was written, being in Cambodia in 1975, and I’ll talk about the artform itself, what it looks like,” he said.

Cravath has been a professor of drama at Leeward Community College in Honolulu for 20 years. He returns each year to southeastern Minnesota to visit family and enjoy the summer weather.

“Minnesota in the summer is very, very beautiful,” he said. “I can’t come in the winter because I’m teaching — and it’s so cold here.”

For more information please visit EarthInFlower.com.

After Paul Cravath’s research on the Royal Cambodian Ballet was cut short, following intensive bombing in Cambodia in 1975, his dissertation languished until completion in 1984. After years of releasing portions of the dissertation for scholarly articles, publisher Kent Davis read two sentences quoted in one journal and contacted Cravath immediately, realizing the historical significance of his unique study.

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

Davis published the dissertation as a book in 2008 under the title Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama, and it is now available for sale on Amazon. You might ask, how did a Chatfield native end up in Cambodia studying dance?

Cravath graduated from Chosen Valley High School in 1962. He immediately enrolled at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, and graduated with a B.A. in 1966. A history professor at Luther helped Cravath earn a Fulbright Scholarship, which took him to Indore, India, for one year. Cravath says he thought he’d “died and fallen into a National Geographic magazine.”

He also taught for one year in Tokyo. Until earning a master’s degree in drama at Tulane University in New Orleans, Cravath never took a theater course. As his education progressed, however, Cravath’s interest in the world of drama grew and he decided to attend the University of Hawaii because it had the best Asian theater program in the world. Located on the shores of Pearl Harbor, Cravath studied there for about 3-1/2 years, honing his language skills and narrowing his focus to the Royal Cambodian Ballet.

Cravath originally was unaware of Cambodia’s unique dance form. He initially wanted to study Tibetan theater, but there was no one available with whom he could study the Tibetan language. He then switched focus to the Beijing opera and learned Mandarin Chinese. But by his third year of study, he was introduced to the military struggles in Cambodia and became passionate about the country’s unique ballet and the need to preserve it, at least on paper.

The Royal Cambodian Ballet – now called the National Troupe – used to belong to the king and included his harem and ritual dancers. As many as 1,000 dancers were involved in the ballet troupe. Young girls from all over the country were given to the king and the most beautiful girls were trained to dance. Those who were extraordinarily gifted joined the performing company. Cravath says, “It’s the embodiment of the country’s energy in a sense.”

The fighting in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh ranged from 1974 – 1979. The capital was taken in April of 1975. Because holding a performing part in the ballet troupe was considered a government position, dancers knew that they would be killed for their association with the king. The government of Cambodia wanted the art form documented before it was destroyed; a professor at the University of Hawaii was given the chance to do this, and passed the opportunity on to Cravath.

Two students rehearsing Cambodian dance in 1975, weeks before the Khmer Rouge genocide. Their fate is unknown.

Cravath arrived on January 11, 1975. In a letter written just two days earlier, while traveling through Bangkok, Cravath wrote: “On Monday, the rebels shelled the airport with 43 mortars and are said to have massed 2,000 troops north of the city. Probably the situation as a whole is not so ominous, and the Cambodians are famous for just carrying on regardless of the flak.”

Another letter, dated January 17, says that rehearsals and training in the dancing classes had been suspended because of the bombing. In all, Cravath was able to spend only three of the six months he had planned in Cambodia. He was evacuated on April 5, 1975, to Bangkok. In order to complete as much research as possible, Cravath then studied the Thai form of ballet, because it was derived from the Cambodian dance style.

Cravath says that the Cambodian style of dance is “slow, hypnotic and beautiful.” The temple at Angkor in Cambodia, says Cravath, was considered to hold the flowers of the earth and the original “heavenly dancers.” While not compelling for the fast-paced American lifestyle, it is taught in small troupes in Washington, D.C. and also Seattle. Only one major troupe – in Cambodia – remains.

After the rebels took the capital in April of 1975, some dancers escaped and fled to France; others were killed. Vietnam took over in 1979 and set up a military dictator who is still in power. Although a king is still enthroned in Cambodia, he does not have any real power but is rather a figurehead. Cravath was able to return to Cambodia in 1995, where he met Princess Buppha Devi, by then the Minister of Culture – Princess Buppha Devi was the daughter of King Sihanouk who had reigned in the 1970s. Cravath was also able to meet with a well-known teacher and singer who was his best source of information on the continuation of traditional Cambodian dance.

Cambodia in the 1970s was “a dramatic time, a dramatic subject,” says Cravath. He’s appreciative that there is interest in the book. Such an interest is an example of internationalism – recognizing that there is more to the world than the American performing arts.

Printed on 70 pound acid-free matt-coated stock, case bound and Smyth sewn, Earth in Flower was designed to last 100 years or longer. Of the 840 copies printed, 760 are in existence. The book costs $128 and includes significant documents and information that were destroyed by the Khmer Rouge. The book also contains 188 black and white photos, plus 7 color pictures.

Earth in Flower is dedicated to Her Royal Highness Princess Norodom Buppha Devi of Cambodia.

Earth in Flower is dedicated to Princess Buppha Devi, who was a prima ballerina in the royal troupe. The book is primarily being marketed to research libraries, partly due to the cost, but in large part because there is no record in any language so definitive on the history of the Royal Cambodian Ballet. Written to preserve the Cambodian people’s history, Cravath says that portions of the book are very interesting; other parts are less so, containing simple documentary lists.

While Cravath continues to reside in Hawaii – specifically Honolulu – he is usually able to spend the months of June and July in Chatfield with his family.

Cravath will be speaking in St. Charles at 7 p.m. on June 29 for the inaugural Author’s Night held at the Community Center. You can find more information about Cravath’s book at www.EarthInFlower.com.

by Sara Friedl-Putnam - © 2009 Luther College
This article appears with permission of the copyright holder. No further reproduction is permitted. Download a PDF of this article.

Paul Cravath, Class of ’66, who first discovered an interest in Asia on a Fulbright tutor grant to India, is author of Earth in Flower, a history of the Royal Ballet of Cambodia.

Some 34 years later, Paul Cravath ’66 still remembers nearly every detail of his harrowing escape from the wartorn city of Phnom Penh, Cambodia-including the military flight that carried him to safety.

Passengers hid in this bunker on the Pochentong airfield between rocket attached. Photo courtesy Air-America.net

“Because the airport was under attack from the Khmer Rouge when we arrived, we had to hide in a bunker on the tarmac,” he recalls. “When the rockets finally stopped, we rushed to board a waiting C-130, sinking into the hanging mesh webbing that served as seats as it climbed quickly to avoid ground fire and the wreckage of other planes.”

Cravath would escape with more than his life that day. With him, in the one bag he was permitted to carry, was the research on the all-female Royal Ballet of Cambodia he had spent the previous three months collecting at the request of the Cambodian Ministry of Culture.

Cambodian dancers from the Royal Cambodian Ballet troupe, circa 1969.

Nurtured by Khmer royalty for more than 1,000 years-its dancers unseen beyond the royal household for most of that time-the ballet, with its graceful move­ments and elaborate costumes, a symbol of the Cambodian people and culture, was considered by many one of the great performing art forms in Asia.

Yet anticipating (correctly) that the Khmer Rouge would try to wipe out the royal dance tradition, the Ministry of Culture had granted Cravath, then a doctoral student in Asian theatre at the University of Hawaii-Mãnoa, unprecedented access to the former royal palace (where the dancers had performed for centuries) as well as the dancers and teachers then with the troupe.

“The official U.S. policy when I arrived in Phnom Penh in January 1975 was that everything was fine even though the city was under siege,” says Cravath, whose research would form the basis of his doctoral dissertation. “It was not a good situation in which to study dance, but I was intrigued by the mystery of these women-what they did and why their reputation was so praiseworthy.”

It would ultimately take Cravath 10 years to complete, but in 1985-after stints teach­ing theatre at Tulane University, serving as an actor and director with the Hawaii Theatre Festival, and assisting the Tibetan Bud­dhist lama in Honolulu-he submitted his dissertation and received his doctorate.

Other than a single copy archived at the University of Michigan, however, the work appeared destined, as Cravath puts it, to “live under my bed” until it was discovered in 2005 by Kent Davis, a publisher and Khmer history specialist who happened upon a refer­ence to it in a journal article.

“I immediately recognized the sad historical significance of the information he had gathered,” says Davis, who soon called Cravath to inquire about the thesis and discuss the possibility of publishing it. “More than 90 percent of the royal dancers and teachers had died in the genocide that occurred after Phnom Penh fell to the Khmer Rouge.”

Initially shocked by the phone call, Cravath-a professor of drama at Leeward Community College in Honolulu-was soon spending his off-hours working with Davis to transform his 20-year-old dissertation into a piece polished enough for publication.

“We spent long hours on the phone meticulously talking through every sentence, every punctuation mark until both of us were happy,” he says.

Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama

Published in May 2008, Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cam­bodian Dance Drama has received two literary awards, and in January, it was one of three official gifts presented to the King of Cambodia by U.S. Am­bassador Carol Rodley. Described by Cravath as “a work of preservation, a descriptive and historical study,” its 680 pages cover the royal Khmer dance tradition from its origins in mythology to modern times.

“I hope Earth in Flower creates a sense for the current and future genera­tions of dancers that this is one of the great art forms of the world,” he says. “I also hope it enhances the prestige of the art form in the eyes of Cambodia and the broader world.”

Though it’s been decades since he fled Phnom Penh, Cravath says his experiences in both Cambodia and Thailand (where he conducted research for several months after leaving Cambodia) continue to inform his work at Leeward Community College, where he teaches acting and directs two plays a year.

He also says that were it not for Luther-and, more specifically, the late Earl Leland, the history professor who successfully recommended him for a Fulbright tutor grant to India-he may never have made it to Asia in the first place.

“I was reborn in New Delhi at the age of 21, and my life for the next couple of decades focused on Asia,” he says. “I’m sure I wouldn’t be where I am today had it not been for Luther.”