MACMILLAN MODERN DRAMATISTS Macmillan Modern Dramatists Series Editors: Bruce King and Adele King Published titles Eugene Benson, J. M. Synge Renate Benson, German Expressionist Drama Normand Berlin, Eugene O'Neill Denis Calandra, New German Dramatists Neil Carson, Arthur Miller Ruby Cohn, New American Dramatists, 1960-1980 Bernard F. Dukore, Harold Pinter Arthur Ganz, George Bernard Shaw Frances Gray, John Arden Julian Hilton, Georg Buchner Charles Lyons, Samuel Beckett Susan Bassnett-McGuire, Luigi Pirandello Leonard C. Pronko, Eugene Labiche and Georges Feydeau Jeannette L. Savona, Jean Genet Theodore Shank, American Alternative Theatre James Simmons, Sean O'Casey David Thomas, Henrik Ibsen Thomas Whitaker, Tom Stoppard Nick Worrall, Nikolai Gogol and Ivan Turgenev Katharine Worth, Oscar Wilde Further titles in preparation MACMILLAN MODERN DRAMATISTS BEBMAl\T EXPBESSIOl\TIS~ DBAMA Ernst and Georg Kaiser ~oUer Renate Benson Associate Professor of German University of Guelph, Canada M MACMILLAN PRESS LONDON © Renate Benson 1984 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1s t edition 1984 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without permission. First published 1984 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD London and Basingstoke Companies and representatives throughout the world ISBN 978-0-333-30586-7 ISBN 978-1-349-17363-1 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-17363-1 Typeset by Wessex Typesetters Ltd Frome, Somerset For Eugene Contents List of Plates IX Editors' Preface xi Abbreviations and Conventions xii 1 Expressionism 1 2 Ernst Toller: Art and Politics 10 3 The New Man: Birth and Crucifixion 22 Die Wandlung (Transfiguration) 22 Masse Mensch (Masses and Man) 38 Die Maschinensturmer (The Machine- Wreckers) 49 4 Man versus Society 61 Hinkemann 61 Hoppla, wir leben! (Hoppla! Such is Life!) 71 Pastor Hall 86 5 Georg Kaiser: Life and Art 92 6 The New Man: Apotheosis and Decline 106 Von morgens bis mitternachts (From Morning to Midnight) 106 Die Burger von Calais (The Burghers of Calais) 116 Der gerettete Alkibiades (Alkibiades Saved) 126 vii 7 Technology and Armageddon 137 Die Koralle (The Coral) 137 Gas I 144 Gas II 153 Das Floss der Medusa (The Raft of the Medusa) 159 Notes and References 166 Selected Bibliography 171 Index 173 viii List of Plates 1. Ernst Toller in 1927 2. Georg Kaiser in 1922 3. Toller's Transfiguration produced in 1919 by Karlheinz Martin and Robert Neppach at the Tribiine Theatre, Berlin 4. Kaiser's From Morning to Midnight produced by Viktor Barnowsky in 1921 in Berlin. The snow field sketch by Cesar Klein 5. Kaiser's Hell, Way, Earth produced by Viktor Bar nowsky at the Lessing Theatre, Berlin, in 1920. Sketch by Cesar Klein 6. Mary Dietrich in Toller's Masses and Man produced by Jiirgen Fehling at the Berlin Volksbiihne in 1921 7. Profile of Erwin Piscator with model of the scaffold for Toller's Hoppla! Such is Life, first produced in 1927 in Berlin 8. Sketch by Otto Reigbert for Brecht's Drums in the Night produced by Otto Falckenburg in 1922 9. Paul Shelving's design of the English production of Kaiser's Gas, in 1923 at the Repertory Theatre, Bir mingham The author and publishers are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce plates: Akademie der Kiinste, Berlin, for Plates 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8. Motley Books Ltd for Plate 5. The Mander and Mitchenson Collection for Plate 9. ix Editors' Preface The Macmillan Modern Dramatists is an international series of introductions to major and significant nineteenth and twentieth-century dramatists, movements and new forms of drama in Europe, Great Britain, America and new nations such as Nigeria and Trinidad. Besides new studies of great and influential dramatists of the past, the series includes volumes on contemporary authors, recent trends in the theatre and on many dramatists, such as writers of farce, who have created theatre 'classics' while being neglected by literary criticism. The volumes in the series devoted to individual dramatists include a biography, a survey of the plays, and detaileq analysis of the most significant plays, along with discussion, where relevant, of the political, social, historical and theatrical context. The authors of the volumes, who are involved with theatre as playwrights, directors, actors, teachers and critics, are concerned with the plays as theatre and discuss such matters as performance, character interpretation and staging, along with themes and contexts. BRUCE KING ADELE KING xi