It is much more costly today to go to the theatre than buy a bible, although in Shakespeare’s time the opposite was true. Publishing has benefited from technological progress; the theatre has not. When Shakespeare’s works were first performed, there were on average 50 major plays produced each season and 25 “afterpieces” between the seasons. The costumes, the number of actors, and the set designs were far more dazzling than those of today.
How is this possible? Don’t technological progress and productivity allow everything to be cheaper than in Shakespeare’s day? Isn’t it easier now to light stages, sew costumes, and transport actors? Certainly, but these advances lead to the same result: things cost less and less, but humans became expensive.
In 1771, the Covent Garden Theatre had to earn £157 per production. In 1963, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre had to advance £2,139 per production, representing an increase nearly twice the average inflation rate. In 1960, 80 percent of the operating costs of the theatre came from receipts and 20 percent from subsidies. Today, the proportions are reversed. Still this has not hindered things from running their natural course.
Why is a world in which machines are subjugated to humans so unfriendly to activities in which humans are the live resource? The answer is simple: Technology appears to eliminate humans, and indeed it does limit their usefulness. But this economic principle causes an irresistible increase in the price of humans in comparison with objects. We are given to think that the economy will allow the completion of a truly human scheme in which activities such as flute playing and storytelling will regain their rightful places. This has not happened, and this is where the disappointment comes in.
The foregoing was taken from the chapter Sad Tales of the Death of Kings, from Our Modern Times, by Daniel Cohen.
I want to add a few comments of my own. Technology, in the form of the movies, TV, videos and audio recordings has made live artists obsolete. I used to be addicted to classical music, and I had the latest music system and stacks of records. Even when I lived in Manhattan, I would rather listen to my recordings than get dressed up and go to Lincoln Center. By contrast, I much preferred the live theatre to the movies. But the cost of theatre tickets were much less then. Everything was much cheaper; you could have a wonderful time for nothing. I could not afford to live in Manhattan now.
The situation in poor countries is much worse. People are cheap, but things (like food) are expensive. It was not always this way. India before colonization, for example, had an abundance of arts of all kinds; it was one of the world’s great cultural centers. There are no world cultures anymore. Everybody looks at the same TV screen.
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