Elizabeth II (drama)

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Data
Title: Elisabeth II. - Not a comedy
Original language: German
Author: Thomas Bernhard
Publishing year: 1987
Premiere: 5th November 1989
Place of premiere: Schiller Theater in Berlin
people
  • Rudolph Herrenstein, industrialist
  • Viktor, his nephew
  • Richard, servant of Rudolph Herrenstein
  • 30–40 representatives of the Viennese bourgeoisie
  • u. a.

Elisabeth II. - The penultimate play by Thomas Bernhard is not a comedy . The English Queen Elisabeth II is visiting Vienna . The urban bourgeoisie would like to see this "appearance" from the balcony of the apartment of the industrialist Herrenstein. Herrenstein is warmly averse to the occasion and the visitors and scolds them and "God and the world". Finally, everyone except Herrenstein gathers on his balcony. The misfortune happens: The balcony crashes into the abyss with the whole crowd. Herrenstein and his servant Richard survive - naturally.

Due to its intricate performance history and the fact that it was no longer played during the author's lifetime, the piece achieved little response in literary research. Thomas Bernhard himself was very disappointed that it couldn't be played as soon as possible, as he already knew at this point that he didn't have much longer to live. In research it is claimed that with Elisabeth II Bernhard returns to his first play Ein Fest für Boris .

content

The industrialist Rudolph Herrenstein, 87 years old, is an arms dealer and has been dependent on a wheelchair since an accident 25 years ago. In his lordly turn-of-the-century salon on the third floor of a house on Vienna's Opernring , he reluctantly welcomes - his nephew Viktor surprised him - numerous ("thirty or forty", El.17) representatives of the Viennese bourgeoisie who attended the parade of the English Queen Elizabeth II in Want to see Vienna from the balcony of the Herrenstein apartment.

Heavily marked by a number of ailments - above all, breathing difficulties, visual impairments and digestive difficulties make his everyday life a burden - Herrenstein takes the visit of the Queen of England and the associated onslaught of onlookers as an occasion, a general settlement among other things with the Viennese upper middle class, with Vienna itself, to the country of Austria, the climatic health resorts , Catholicism and National Socialism .

In his tirades of hatred and general accounts, Herrenstein pretends to draw from a broad philosophical, literary and musical education. The works of the artists and thinkers sometimes serve Herrenstein as a yardstick and basis for his rhetoric.

Mostly - with one exception - they are people from the 18th to 20th centuries: Umberto Giordano and his opera Andrea Chénier , Johannes Brahms and Wagner are mentioned disparagingly. Whereas Hugo Wolf , Chopin for his sonatas and Mozart especially for his opera Cosi fan tutte get much approval by Mr. Stein.

Furthermore, the writers Goethe , especially his elective affinities , Flaubert , Tolstoy , Turgenew and Kleist are named.

Among the philosophers, Herrenstein first cites Schopenhauer and Nietzsche . Wittgenstein is indirectly brought into play with the title tractatus logicus-philosophicus (El. 118), which Countess Gudenus misquotes, and Guggenheim's twelve-year stay in Oxford. After all, it is Hegel and Montaigne whose works Herrenstein would take with him to the climatic health resort with Richard and his friend and neighbor Guggenheim. Finally, Herrenstein doesn't care: “if it's just something big” (El. 121).

Little by little, the guests arrive. Everyone wears mourning clothes because they intend to go to the funeral of the Viennese jeweler Heldwein afterwards. When everyone crowd on the balcony to see the Queen, Herrenstein and his servant Richard stay away from the matter. The balcony falls and kills everyone except Herrenstein and Richard to certain death.

expenditure

  • Thomas Bernhard: Elisabeth II. , Frankfurt / Main 1987 (first edition)
  • Thomas Bernhard: Elisabeth II. , In: Thomas Bernhard, Pieces 4, Frankfurt / Main 1988

Performance history

Published in 1987, Elisabeth II. - No Comedy was premiered on November 5, 1989 at the Schillertheater in Berlin, making it the author's only play that premiered after Bernhard's death. At that time, the artistic director Claus Peymann was unable to put the piece on the repertoire of the Vienna Burgtheater as soon as possible for the publication date. The author was very disappointed because, as it turned out, he rightly feared that he would not be able to see a later world premiere of his play. Thomas Bernhard died on February 12, 1989.

Due to the performance and publication prohibition for Austria that he himself expressly issued in his will (two days before his death) and that affected the entire work, the piece could not be played there initially. However, the Burgtheater succeeded in staging Elisabeth II as a guest performance in Bratislava four times as early as the summer of 1990 as part of the Wiener Festwochen . However, it was not until the establishment of the Thomas Bernhard Private Foundation in Gmunden and the associated reorganization of the estate that the Austrian premiere could take place on May 30, 2002 at the Burgtheater.

Due to this work and performance history, which is complicated in comparison to most of Bernhard's other pieces and texts, Elisabeth II has so far triggered a rather restrained response in literary research.

Reviews

premiere

Austrian premiere

recording

Elisabeth II. Not a Comedy By Thomas Bernhard, Austrian premiere, DVD - edition BURGTHEATER 06, December 2008

Director: Thomas Langhoff , set: Roland Gassmann, lighting: Friedrich Rom, dramaturgy: Ursula Voss With: Annemarie Düringer , Ulli Fessl , Maresa Hörbiger , Libgart Schwarz , Bibiana Zeller , Wolfgang Gasser , Ignaz Kirchner , Rudolf Melichar , Gert Voss , Paul Wolff -Plottegg , Heinz Zuber and many more

radio play

The play served Ulrich Gerhardt as a template for a radio play Editing and -Inszenierung that the North German Radio and Austrian Radio was produced in the year of 2004. Speakers were Wolfgang Gasser (Herrenstein), Irm Hermann (Fräulein Zallinger), Peter Matić (Richard), Peter Simonischek (Doktor Guggenheim), Helmut Berger (Director Holzinger), Bibiana Zeller (Countess Gudenus), Joseph Lorenz (Viktor), Vera Borek (The Lady with the Red Hat), Monika Tajmar (The One Lady), Hella Ferstl-Reichmann (The Other Lady) and Michael König as speakers.

Web links

References and comments

  1. ↑ Throughout the play there is talk of the "English Queen". This designation is to be understood fictionally. It is not the official title of the Queen of Great Britain.
  2. ↑ a b Manfred Mittermayer: Thomas Bernhard , Frankfurt / Main 2006, p. 71
  3. ↑ Thomas Bernhard: Elisabeth II. , Frankfurt / Main 1987 (first edition)
  4. ^ Elisabeth II., Thomas Bernhard, world premiere, staging: Niels-Peter Rudolph, Berlin November 5, 1989, in: Issue / Staatliche Schauspielbühnen Berlin; 93
  5. ↑ Manfred Mittermayer: Thomas Bernhard , Frankfurt / Main 2006, p. 71f
  6. ↑ Manfred Mittermayer: Thomas Bernhard , Frankfurt / Main 2006, p. 74
  7. ↑ Joachim Hoell: Thomas Bernhard , Munich 2000, p. 148
  8. ↑ Martin Schierbaum: “no writer has described reality as it really is, that's the terrible thing” - literature and politics in Thomas Bernhard using the example of extinction and Heldenplatz , in: An den Randen der Moral , Ulrich Kinzel (ed.) , Hamburg 2004. (pp. 150-171) pp. 165f.
  9. ↑ thomasbernhard.at site
  10. ↑ Archive of the website thomasbernhard.at ( Memento of the original from June 4, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.thomasbernhard.at
  11. ↑ Thomas Bernhard: Elisabeth II. In: ARD radio play database. Retrieved December 23, 2018 .