Robert Wilson
Robert Wilson
An American author, philosopher, psychologist, and essayist, he co-authored The Illuminatus! Trilogy with Robert Shea. His other popular works include Schrodinger's Cat (a novel) and Wilhelm Reich in Hell (a play).
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth18 January 1932
CityBrooklyn, NY
CountryUnited States of America
brothers business college gave great grown insurance loved mother poor secretary time type worked
My mother was a great typist. She said she loved to type because it gave her time to think. She was a secretary for an insurance company. She was a poor girl; she'd grown up in an orphanage, and she went to a business college - and then worked to put her brothers through school.
based work
My work is formal, not based on psychology.
downtown illusion movement theatrical work wrong york
At the end of the 1960s, I was part of the downtown theatrical movement in New York that was making work in alleyways, garages, gyms, churches, non-traditional spaces. The idea was to get away from the illusion of the conventional theatre. But then I thought, what's wrong with illusion?
artists people understand
Most artists don't understand what they do, and I don't think we have to. Other people do that better - they understand what I do better than I do!
compelling man performance says sit though visual
Usually in theater, the visual repeats the verbal. The visual dwindles into decoration. But I think with my eyes. For me, the visual is not an afterthought, not an illustration of the text. If it says the same thing as the words, why look? The visual must be so compelling that a deaf man would sit though the performance fascinated.
art
When we look back at the Mayans or ancient Egypt, we look at their art.
I never studied theatre; I learned it by doing it. If I had studied theatre, I would not be making the kind of theatre I am making.
hear mean
If you see the sunset, does it have to mean something? If you hear the birds singing does it have to have a message?
fast life theater
My theater is slow and calm, yet my life is fast and hectic, going in all directions.
work
My work has always dealt with a kind of space that allows one to daydream.
notice seen slow
If you slow things down, you notice things you hadn't seen before.
attracted music patterns
I've always been attracted to classic patterns in architecture, music and drama.
variations
I've always thought abstractly - through theme and variations rather than narrative.
shakespeare work
Christopher Knowles, Buechner, Heiner Mueller, Burroughs, Chekhov, Shakespeare - it's all one body of work.