"Without an element of cruelty at the root of every spectacle," he writes, "the theatre is not possible. In our present state of degeneration it is through the skin that
metaphysics must be made to re-enter our minds." By "
cruelty," Artaud referred not to
sadism or causing pain, but rather a violent, austere, physical determination to shatter the false
reality that, he wrote, "lies like a shroud over our
perceptions."