Is it not fair to conclude that it was something I was doing (…), that was the cause of the problem ?" - F.M Alexander
Frederick Matthias Alexander was born in 1869 in the north-west of the Australian island of Tasmania. Educated by a village schoolmaster who saw his potential, he developed a passion for Shakespeare, a passion that fuelled his desire to become an actor.
At the age of seventeen, he left home to work as an accountant in a mining project, but the fragile health that had always afflicted him often prevented him from working. Nevertheless, once he had accumulated enough money, he moved to Melbourne to study acting, elocution and the violin. Unfortunately, after a while, he began to suffer from recurrent hoarseness and voice lapses that threatened what seemed to be a very promising career. His doctors and advisers couldn't find anything wrong with him, but they weren't able to solve his problem either. So he decided to find out for himself what was wrong. His first instinct was that the problem was something he was doing to himself.
Alexander embarked on a long and patient journey of self-observation that resulted in the complete recovery of his voice and a remarkable improvement in his general state of health́
Moreover, by solving what he initially saw as a personal problem, Alexander came to an understanding of what might be called a mechanism of well-being. It is this that forms the basis of the practical technique he developed to teach others about his discoveries. Faced with a growing demand from people wanting to understand how he had achieved such results, he began teaching in Melbourne and then Sydney, until this became his main activity. This was around 1894, and he was only 25 years old at the time. His particular ability to free up the respiratory processes earned him the title of ‘the breathing man’. Doctors also began to take an interest in his work, sending him patients suffering from asthma, bronchitis and other ailments.
The most influential of them, the internationally renowned W.J. Stewart McKay, eventually convinced Alexander to travel to London to spread his technique more widely. He arrived in London in 1904 with letters of introduction addressed to a number of well-known doctors. In London, his practice became increasingly popular as the profound benefits of his Technique became widely known. Contemporaries who attested to the accuracy of his work and who publicly defended the Alexander Technique included the writer George Bernard Shaw, the philosopher John Dewey, the writer Aldous Huxley and the physician and scientist Sir Charles Sherrington.
In 1910, Alexander published his first book, Man's Supreme Inheritance. This was followed by three other books that deepened and explained his method: Constructive Conscious Control of the Individual, 1923; The Use of the Self, 1932; and The Universal Constant in Living, 1941. "The Use of the Self" would become a standard work for those interested in his principles.
Between 1914 and 1924, Alexander divided his time between London and New York, consolidating his international reputation. It was during these trips that he met the American philosopher and psychologist John Dewey, an influential figure in the educational movement. Greatly impressed by his work, Dewey played a key role in bringing it to the attention of the educational and scientific community, helping to disseminate it. (deepl)
In 1924, two of his assistants, Ethel Webb and Irene Tasker, both trained in Montessori pedagogy, set up what came to be known as ‘the little school’ in London. At this school, Alexander's method became an essential part of the daily curriculum, introducing its principles to a wider audience, including teachers and pupils.
In 1931, Alexander went a step further by setting up the first Teachers' Training Course in London, a training course for future teachers of the Alexander Technique. This initiative made it possible to train a new generation of practitioners and thus to continue the transmission of his work.
Until his death in 1955, Alexander continued to evolve and refine his skills. At the age of 87, just two weeks before his death, he continued to give up to eight lessons a day, demonstrating the passion and commitment he had for his method right up to the last moment of his life.