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Hungarian Empress Maria Theresa. Oversize puppets
adorned many of the Soviet Union’s parades on May Day
and anniversaries of the Revolution.
Governments have also commandeered puppets to
serve specific agendas. From the start of Russia’s Bolshevik
regime, constructed actors disseminated the official line,
and puppeteers were required to fight against bourgeois
decadence of “formalist” art by toeing the aesthetic line of
simple realism.
Puppets performed partisan work for the Allies in
World War II as well. In England, Punch raised his
bludgeon to fight for the Union Jack. The puppeteer
Percy Press made Punch an English soldier, and the
hangman he hanged was Hitler.
After WWII, many puppets either returned to their
old government jobs or got new government jobs. In the
Soviet Union, they again promoted the Bolshevik
program, including socialist realism. Leaders in the newly
independent Indonesia used shadow puppets to promote
a national confederation and teach citizens how to
participate in this new kind of government.
For puppeteers in post-war Communist China,
government service was de rigeur. During the Cultural
Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, puppets not directly
performing as indoctrination tools were destroyed. A rare vintage political hand puppet of
Puppets have generally been less likely to serve the Ronald Reagan signed by puppet maker
mighty than to skewer them. Political satire has long been P. Chiari selling for $69.99 on eBay
a specialty of the small stage. In 9th-century China,
anti-government sentiment was as much a part of popular
puppetry that one insurgent reportedly traveled around At right: One of a few famed Christ puppets was this
arranging puppet shows to gauge unrest and recruit local 15th-century Rood of Grace once housed at a now
malcontents. One of the constructed actors’ assets as ruined abbey in the town of Boxley in Kent. A number
protest performers is that authorities frequently cut them of miraculous abilities were attributed to this figure,
some slack. Even performing out in the open, dissident which was attacked (literally) by Protestant Reformers as
puppet theaters often have something like a court jester’s an example of Catholic chicanery. We hear of its between fantasy and reality is
license to criticize. All this said, throughout history unseemly end and an equally unseemly ballad by which porous and can blur the distinc-
authorities have tried to censor and squelch puppet Cromwell’s men mocked the figure in bawdy verse. tion between what is sentient
shows either because they considered the performers’ and what is inert. As performers,
puppets offer children guided
excursions into imagination. As toys, they let youngsters try out
different identities and behaviors without real-life consequences.
But child care is just one dimension of puppets’ social service
work. They have routinely participated in education, health care,
commerce, and even law enforcement. Plus, they have helped to
transmit and conserve culture. Language instruction is one of their
specialties. For at least a half-century, puppetry has been included as
a tool in teacher-training courses for adult literacy and immigrant
language instruction around the world.

COMING ATTRACTIONS
Sometimes, instead of puppets pretending to be alive, live
actors pretend to be puppets. This peculiar role reversal has come in
various guises.
Live performers may cash in on certain puppet stars’ popularity
by playing live versions of them. Or artists may take well-known
puppet personae as raw material for their own live-actor works.
At a toy museum in Munich there is a display of antique wooden puppets. Sometimes live performers do not merely play characters originated
photo: Thomas Quine by puppets, but actually pretend to be puppets.
This may be the ultimate, ironic genius of puppets. Time and
nogoodniks or because the shows were challenging those in power. again, inert actors have breathed new life into the live actor theater.
And so, puppeteers have resorted to various sorts of stealth. Puppets So great is the power of puppets to show ourselves to ourselves that
living under foreign occupation often use local dialects and slang to even flesh-and-blood actors, who would seem to have the advantage
shout defiance at the unsuspecting butts of their opposition. in imitating real people, have taken cues from constructed beings.
Dissident puppets have also camouflaged their messages within Finally, all art – in fact, everything human beings design – both
plays that authorities would not likely flag and monitor as potentially reflects and helps to shape our sense of who we are. Puppets, with
subversive. Polish players began to include patriotic material in their their peculiar ability to make us believe they are us, are surely among
nativity stages in the mid-19th century in defiance of the Austro- the canniest, and uncanniest, of human creation.
Hungarian and Russian occupation regimes.

OTHER PUBLIC SERVICE Originally published in the December, 2005 issue of the Journal of
Almost universally, puppets have participated in child-rearing. Antiques and Collectibles
Puppets have a unique rapport with very young people. The border
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