Festspiel in deutschen Reimen

• Authors: Henryk Jurkowski

Title variants

DE

Festspiel in deutschen Reimen

• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

In June of 1913, Max Reinhardt put on the play Das Festspiel in deutschen Reimen commissioned from Gerhart Hauptman by the Breslau city council to commemorate the centenary of the “liberation war” waged against Napoleon’s army by King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia. Occasional plays had a rich tradition, inherited from the Renaissance and the Baroque. Goethe wrote them; playwrights in other countries wrote them as well. And Poland was no exception. Occasional spectacles of the 19th century promoted the cult of Napoleon. Hauptmann accepted the commission with some qualms. He disliked shows of patriotism laced with militarism. He took inspiration from the satirical tradition of ancient mimes which ridiculed pompous individuals. After a few attempts of script writing (one of them being Napoleonic Mime), he composed Festspiel, based on a metaphor taken from puppet theatre: the rulers, politicians and generals were just marionettes on the stage of the world. The manager of the theatre was to show his heroes as marionettes and then, with actors help, present a chronicle of events starting with the French Revolution and ending with the defeat of Zeus-Napoleon after his retreat from Moscow at Leipzig, and then culminating with complete symbolic liberation of the Germans with help of their poets and philosophers. The allegorical character of Germania predicted a new happy life despite the intentions of Marshall Blücher, always ready to fight another war. Luckily, the theatre manager sent him back to a box for marionettes. Reinhardt produced the spectacle with great panache, for several thousand spectators, with excellent actors. The public received it well, but German nationalists raised protests. The heir to the throne, Friedrich Wilhelm Victor threatened that he would take back his patronage over the celebrations, and the city council took the play off after just eleven shows. The German experience is of universal value. War over symbols and allegories is being fought constantly in many countries. It is a part of the political culture of our times.

Keywords

EN

Gerhart Hauptmann; Max Reinhardt; theatre studies; theatre history

• Publisher: Polska Akademia Nauk. Instytut Sztuki PAN
• Journal: Pamiętnik Teatralny
• Year: 2012
• Volume: 61
• Issue: 1-2(241-242)
• Pages: 89-118

Contributors

author

Henryk Jurkowski

• Akademia Teatralna im. Aleksandra Zelwerowicza w Warszawie

References

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