School of the unemployed
Schule der Arbeitslosen is a dystopian novel by the German writer Joachim Zelter , published in 2006.
The novel is set in 2016. To solve the persistent problem of long-term unemployment , the Federal Employment Agency has developed a new type of training facility. "Sphericon" is the name of the fictitious action center that aims to create new people through an absurdly threatening mixture of positive thinking , animation , application training, punishments and rewards: the ideal applicant. In the sober style of a report, Zelter creates a scenario that becomes more and more threatening. Beneath the smooth surface, a brutal perspective of the unemployed develops, suggesting their physical annihilation. Reviewers associate the work with somber visions from George Orwell , Aldous Huxley and Stephen King .
content
Under constant pressure from the Federal Employment Agency , but always "voluntarily", unemployed people are transported to a school, to the Sphericon , an institution in a remote industrial area. Such transports are on the move all over Germany, buses with the slogan Federal Employment Agency. Germany moves . Anyone who gets off the journey and escapes is immediately deleted from the Federal Agency's computers, like two unemployed people from the Sphericon bus who disappear at a rest stop.
“Any further claim against the Federal Agency is forfeited. From now on they are outside of any custody. Your names and data will be released for deletion. Your suitcases will be disposed of. As if two people had jumped off a ship in the middle of the sea, into nowhere. ”(Joachim Zelter, Schule der Arbeitslosen, p. 16; in the following, quotations from the novel are quoted only with page numbers without further information)
At school, the unemployed are divided into groups and assigned to a trainer. People sleep in primitive dormitories, with women separated from men only by a few closets. Immediately the brainwashing begins , "nothing should stay as it is". Sphericon wants to be the “School of Life”, under the motto diversity , novelty , contingency , the existing is to be erased and connections to be cut. “We lived wrong. Wrong! ”Is hammered into the participants.
First of all, the students have to reinvent themselves, recreating themselves in fictitious résumés and digitally processed application photos. In three months, the unemployed are to become dynamic application professionals , ruthless fighters for the mystical position , job hunters who, even in obituaries of deceased people, smell job opportunities that sacrifice every relationship in the job search.
The reinvention of one's own life is accompanied by an omnipresent sprinkling of slogans (e.g. “Work Is Freedom”, p. 28), fictional television series (Job-Quest) , songs and speeches. In the middle of the night, applicants are roused from their sleep and attacked aggressively in one-on-one conversations with trainers and the school psychologist. A reward system is set up; depending on the performance, there are three levels of school currency bonus coins that can be bought in the canteen. Flirts are supported, couples receive the key to double rooms (weekend suite I and II) in which they can spend a night together. Promiscuity is expressly encouraged, the trainers should not give the keys to the same couple more than twice.
Two students, Roland Bergmann and Karla Meier, temporarily evade the competition and use the computer for thoughtful communication. This puts them under increasing pressure. In the weekend suite they keep a physical distance and deal with their real past. Roland finally adapts, even becomes one of the model applicants. Karla resists the pressure, ends up being isolated for days in a cellar and the classmates hate her. Contact with Roland breaks off. In the end, she too shares the fate of the others, despite careful attempts to escape.
“Karla and Roland suspect that they should qualify for the other side of society. But they lack confidence in their love. The curriculum vitae begun long before Sphericon has worn her down. The Federal Employment Agency wins: With a job advertisement, it drives the lovers apart mercilessly. "
The events escalate when a senior representative of the Federal Agency is flown in by helicopter and, as the highest praise, offers Sphericon a real additional coaching position. The position is advertised among the students and awarded in a series of application events.
The trimester ends for all course participants with a ceremonial handover of certificates. In the style of an American university, the Certificate of Professional Application is ceremoniously awarded. With the buses of the employment agency it goes back, apparently in the direction of Christmas home, with new job hopes in the luggage. But there are more and more gloomy signs: families cannot be reached by phone, employees of the Federal Agency announce that the participants of the training will be given a vacation trip. Countless other buses from training centers all over Germany head for the airport. Under police guard, the unemployed are brought into airplanes and - allegedly for a vacation trip - flown to Sierra Leone .
style
language
Zelter's sober, cool language describes the negative utopia in reportage style . Short, concise, sometimes incomplete sentences describe the events with sober precision. The dictionary of inhumanity is unobtrusively opened. The language of the Federal Agency in 2016 is the language of the administration, brutal decisions are hidden behind administrative objectivity, brisk Anglicisms and targeted disinformation . The threatening nature of the situations described is indicated in inconspicuous details, in alienated quotations, hidden allusions and comparisons. The unemployed should “see” that they have done everything wrong, such as “prisoners” or “drug addicts”. On the journey to the training center, some drivers keep a clear distance, "as if the bus were a dangerous omen". The buses clearly marked with the slogan "Germany is moving" and the logo of the "Federal Agency" serve "according to an internal guideline of the Federal Agency ... multiple demonstration purposes": In addition to "performance" and "effort", they are also "driving horror".
The Sphericon training center speaks the language of business success coaches , interspersed with English slogans and terms. The slogan “Work is Freedom” - an allusion to the gate inscription “ Arbeit macht frei ” in National Socialist concentration camps - is harmless. “Work is Freedom” is what the “house rules” say as well as numerous posters showing white water rafters, mountaineers and divers “at the moment of greatest effort and danger”. The inhumanity in dealing with the unemployed seems modern, relaxed, positive . The unemployed become “ trainees ”: “The language of Sphericons is a new beginning.” A typical rhetorical device of the slogans is the classic triple figure : “Diversity, novelty, contingency” is the school management's motto, “flexibility, elasticity, unpredictability” is a requirement to the students. In doing so, Zelter mixes everyday terms, Anglicisms and word creations to the point of complete emptying of meaning.
In the reception, Zelter's complex montage and transformation of forms of discourse is assessed differently, sometimes also massively criticized. In the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Jens-Christian Rabe acknowledges the “due severity” with which “the brutal, hostile undertone of the rhetoric of the motivational speakers who fill large halls in our time” is unmasked. Other critics such as Klaus Ungerer dislike the interlacing of the “current problems of our capitalism and our media reality with the language of the Third Reich”.
Ansgar Fest is the trainer of the Apollo application team , which is at the center of the novel. His language, composed of slogans , anglicisms and commands, calls for the ultimate cynicism when he calls on him to search the obituaries for job opportunities in a commanding tone. He aggressively tears up the self-portrayal, the self-image of the participants. He brutally reveals every tiny gap in the résumé and calls for the reinvention of a biography and self-presentation that is adapted to the system.
"Fest's language is made up of misrepresented sayings:" A successful application is like a bestseller novel. Everything autobiographical is autofictional and vice versa. Just do it! «His language shows both a discipline and neglect of thought. »Realizing one's own potential requires competent leadership from oneself. This requires you to perceive your own emotional, cognitive and physiological processes and to shape them in a way that is useful for the target. «This is any example from today's coaching language. Zelter only spins this a little further in his novel. "
A central stylistic means is the displacement and alienation of discourse elements from their context into other contexts, above all as meaningless set pieces in the language of the managed world of the employment agency and the training facilities. Thus, Kant's understanding of freedom as a duty and Hegel's formula of freedom as an insight into necessity become the insignificant insight into the regulations of the labor administration: “All the time, one relies on voluntariness - and on insight. The trainees saw the necessity from their own perspective. You yourself took the school contract home ”(p. 8f). The pressure that forces the unemployed into the measure and into the Sphericon is linguistically reinterpreted as a free rational decision. In the world of the employment agency in 2016, the idea of freedom appears completely devoid of meaning and as an “insight” into the need for measures that run diametrically against the interests of those affected. In this context it is only logical that the almost hundred-page house rules of Sphericon take on biblical meaning: “Far more than an ordinary house rule. Rather, a comprehensive order, a school and life order. If you want a philosophy of life. Hence the capitalized title> A New Life <. "(P. 25)
On four pages the novel “quotes” these house rules, a collection of aphorisms , information and instructions. The language and slogans of the Sphericon are concentrated here, a “Yale Method” is disconnected, “Zero tolerance” for “pity and self-pity”, “Dress Code” and the opening times of the cafeteria. Above all, however, is the motto “Work is Freedom”. This collection of rules, hidden threats and compulsions, as well as their trivialization, makes the situation clear in which the unemployed find themselves. Adapting to this language demands the abandonment of critical thinking and means the loss of the ability to even adequately describe one's own situation. The concept of freedom becomes the ultimate threat when, in the end, the unemployed are flown to Freetown , the capital of Sierra Leone, one of the poorest countries in the world. The posters from the beach in Sierra Leone, which were hung up in various places on the Sphericon, had already irritated the participants, pictures with “half-dried palm trees” and the stamp of the federal institute that fell out of the glossy world of the training center.
Further set pieces of the language of the novel come from the military jargon. The trainer corps wears uniform, a poster in Sphericon with the motto Careless Talk Costs Jobs (p. 30) alienates a World War II campaign that warned of espionage (“Button Your Lip; Loose Talk Can Cost Lives”).
Joachim Zelter addresses his linguistic concept in the novel with the words of the trainer Ansgar Fest:
“'If you were to write a book about SPHERICON, there would be no real people in it, not even figures of people, but at most fragments or figures of changing lives ... functions and products of biographical designs ... combinatorial constructs ... future job holders ... job conquerors!' And: 'Most characters don't even need names. And / even if it does, then only in order to be able to swap and change them at any time ... 'And:' The language would be the language of SPHERICON: concise and short, the language of stage directions. Movements and comments reduced to a shortage of stage directions. A language in the constant present. '"(P. 68f.)
The literary concept describes a tightrope walk. The movement away from the administered world takes place in its language, in play with its jargon, its images, its logic. Zelter does not seek a counter-world to the language of the measures , training courses and applications in the counter-image of successful human communication, but rather in the deconstruction and destruction of the connotational language of coaches , administrators and politicians. Zelter commented on the language concept of his work in an interview:
“The inaccessibility of full employment is in stark contrast to what politicians, trade unionists and churches are promoting. In the book, the contrast between language and reality is taken to extremes. It contains a criticism of an economist attitude, which is reflected in expressions such as "Children are our greatest asset" or "Human resources". "
satire
Zelter also satirically picks up on the upturn in the world caused by the “measures” of the administration , for example when he describes the departure of the Sphericon buses: “Some relatives take photos of fathers and mothers shortly before they start school.” The fixation on the perfect application leads to an absurd view of the world. A lecture on the “History of Application” starts with “Application in the Middle Ages (Minnesang)”. The communication model of sender, communication medium and recipient becomes the relationship between “application sender, application recipient” and “application media”.
Satirical passages also reduce the use of the fetish “work” ad absurdum, for example when “Sphericon” introduces the address of a “work theologian”:
"He spoke in a solemn fistulous voice: Is there such a thing as work after death? Assuming that there is no work before death, is there work after death? In the hereafter? Is a paradise imaginable without work?" (P. 181)
Delusional solution ideas of politics are presented in their absurdity when Zelter lets the head of Sphericon dream of activating the unemployed on millions of bicycle ergometers for the energy supply of the country. How close Zelter's satire is to reality is shown by the fictional series Job Quest , which is omnipresent for the participants in Sphericon, as a novel, as a television series, in the form of music titles. The slogan has long been a reality on the Internet, and Internet agencies offer their services under the title (“MEMBER OF THE CREME DE LA CREME HUMAN RESOURCES GROUP OF COMPANIES”).
subjects
unemployment
The main theme of the novel is unemployment. In an interview Zelter pointed out that his descriptions of the phenomenon are based on his own experiences. Various aspects of unemployment are addressed in the novel. First of all, unemployment appears to be the guilt of those affected. A key objective of the “training” in the Sphericon is to convey the knowledge that unemployment is a consequence of “wrong life”. If you believe the trainers at the training center, applications fail because of the applicants' lack of imagination, not the lack of jobs.
The unemployed, who are promoted to “trainees” in the Sphericon, react contradictingly. Self-doubt and hatred of refusers are one side of the coin. The vast majority tacitly adopt the perspective they are given. In view of the real misery on the job market, this attitude has strange flowers. Strange rumors emerge in the Sphericon about job offers that satirically exaggerate the hopes of the unemployed. "The rumor of so-called North Sea locations has been haunted for days." The largest German brewery operates a brewery in the North Sea on a decommissioned supertanker and is looking for employees.
One attempt at justification by the unemployed consists in speculating about unemployment figures. Zelter is targeting politically motivated juggling with unemployment statistics. In 2016 - according to the novel - there are "no official figures on this question". If at all, then there are only opaque numbers from a “mathematical institute” that “no longer calculates in human numbers”, but in a complexly constructed and multiple differentiated set of “fluctuating variables”. For the unemployed, a high number would be threatening at the same time, but also a legitimation for their failure: “Ten million! This is no longer a minority, but soon the majority. They cannot go against a majority. "
The novel unmask the brutal view of society of the future on the unemployed ever more clearly. Even if there was enough money, one wants to adhere to the fact that "unemployment is unacceptable, unnatural, antisocial and inhuman."
“Unemployed remains unemployed. No other word is allowed here, except unemployed! Not reading, not dreaming, not speaking - but unemployed. Not going for a walk or looking at trees or picking flowers - but unemployed. No more life or new life, but unemployed: This is a person who lacks everything essential. Like a person without a foot, without eyes, without a head. Without friends, without heart and mind. And even if he does not believe it or no longer knows, we will remind him what he is: unemployed. And what that means. Even when there is no more work. ”(P. 177)
The negative view of the labor administration, politics and trainers on the unemployed increases steadily in the novel up to openly expressed thoughts of destruction. "We could drop you anytime," said the coach Ansgar Fest in a moment of anger. "It would even be possible to live well in this country ... In some prosperity and luxury ... More or less carefree ... If one were to forego seven to eight million unemployed cases spontaneously ... Would one simply deduct these millions ... There would be no such millions" . The increasingly aggressive atmosphere also affects the training itself. Karla, who refuses to be brainwashed, is interned in the basement to protect her from the anger of the conformist participants, as it is said. Here the trainer frightens them with his punishment fantasies, his plans to redesign the lessons in the style of the Milgram experiment : "For every failure a trainee is sanctioned with a corresponding electrical output."
The Sphericon trainers see the work as indispensable for society. Unemployment is not primarily a money problem. When there is no more work, Ansgar Fest fantasizes about Karla, who is locked in the basement, that one has to invent machines that simulate work. Machines that guarantee the perfect simulation of real work, “not only visually, but also acoustically, gustatory, olfactory” For Fest, neither freedom, human dignity nor community are conceivable without work: “If you don't work, you shouldn't eat.” The powerful quote, originally attributed to the apostle Paul as part of the 2nd letter to the Thessalonians , has made its way through history as the creed of the working society. For Ansgar Fest, the only conceivable legitimation of the unemployed is that they demonstrate the value of work.
The wrong committed life
From the Sphericon's point of view, unemployment remains a wrongly committed life to be buried. The novel aims at the trepidation of the reader not through the description of particular atrocities such as Orwell's " 1984 ", but through the proximity to the reality of the administered world.
“A double-plus-bad Orwellian satire? The world one encounters in Zelter's novel seems very familiar. It is made up of well-known and shabby, small and large grievances, which - projected onto an only slightly sharpened vision of the current socio-political misery - create an overall impression that is as banal as it is dark. Nothing is spectacularly cruel and shocking. In any case, no more shocking than the daily reduction in benefits or the daily deportation detention . Human lives are dependent on computer data, as soon as individuals insist on their own identity , they become disruptions that need to be turned off: this view of the world and man, for which the novel 'Sphericon' stands, is one of the organizational principles of authorities when dealing with people . "
The downgrading of the unemployed is not only reflected in the lack of any resistance to the measures . In his review, Winfried Rust points out the lopsided movements of the unemployed: "The coupling of self-worth and work is inscribed in the unemployed 's body." It is made clear to people, step by step and from all instances, that their entire existence in view of their unemployment is to be regarded as wrong. The “famous talk show host”, the Federal President , and the brochures of the employment agency make it clear: The entire life of an unemployed person was and is a mistake, that is what we need to understand .
“Insight into one's own situation, into the untenability of misguided hopes and desires, into the impassability of a trodden path in life. If you want: insight into a life committed wrongly. ”(P. 12)
One of the first school activities is digging a grave. Participants are driven to a remote meadow where they have to dig under pressure. At the end, the course participants stand at the grave they dug together.
“Everyone should think carefully about where they stand, not without reason at a grave, and what to bury in that grave. Not just false hopes, untenable illusions or absurd dream structures. Not just individual mistakes or behavior or unsuccessful CVs. It is important to draw a line, a line, a deep trench. It is a mistake to openly confess a life that has run into dead ends - and then to bury it. "(P. 38)
It is not only the tastelessness of this action that irritates, it also reveals the deep contempt of the unemployed, hardly concealed by the entire optimism of training, whose humanity is being buried here. Zelter himself points out that his novel is not just about the phenomenon of unemployment. The accusation of "living wrongly" stands for rejection of the individual person in general: "Actors are too old, salespeople are not blond enough, manuscripts are not entertaining enough."
literature
A considerable part of the work in Sphericon is devoted to a fictional project: reinventing yourself. Embellished applicant photos, the abandonment of all ties and convictions, the creation of a new person is the central task. The focus is on the construction of new résumés. The trainers constantly challenge people to reinvent themselves regardless of reality.
“'CVs are a form of applied literature. Like a novel or a drama: exposure, rising plot, turning point, solutions ... solutions upon solutions. Nothing else is a résumé. ' And: 'A successful novelist would be a good résumé writer, a successful résumé writer would be a good novelist.' "(P. 67)
Zelter's satire not only meets the absurdity of the flexible, young and dynamic applicant life, but also sets itself apart from conventional bestseller concepts.
“'A successful application is like a bestseller novel: attractive, thrilling, captivating ... From the first to the last line. A forward movement ... A continuous route ... A road to success ... An epic motorway ... '”(p. 67)
They are essential characteristics of classical literature which, according to Zelter, become the medium of lies today if they only construct characters so that they comply with the logic of action of the 'epic highways'. It is the shining heroes of the Hollywood productions and the books for the television series who, on the one hand, satisfy the need for entertainment and, on the other hand, sacrifice the 'inner life' of the heroes to the excited 'outer life'.
Character masks
The unemployed as well as their trainers and administrators are reduced to character masks, only occasional traces of personality flash. The actors are absorbed in their externally defined roles with almost no residue. Zelter breaks this principle above all with the brief encounter between Karla Meier and Roland Bergmann. It is here that human feelings and thoughts are most clearly developed in the novel, which, even in their most harmless aspects, are diametrically opposed to the Sphericon system. Resistance does not develop from erotic needs in the sterile administrative world, but rather from quiet thoughtfulness. Karla and Roland also find no starting point to oppose the system of soft total control with real resistance. Even Karla, who refuses to integrate into the beautiful new world of applicants until the end of the novel, fails to break out.
This lack of realistically drawn human figures is at the same time the main criticism of reception in the feature pages .
“Some reading time goes on, past figural schemes, propaganda phrases, humiliation routines - until the narrator finally introduces two individuals who, obeying the requirements of the genre, go into opposition. Karla and Roland are thrown down as carriers of biographical elements, of childhood memories, of interpersonal interest; they break the rules by entering into a spiritual rather than the desired sexual relationship. "
In the guise of the school psychologist Dr. Lichtenstein, Zelter sketches a picture of a science of humans that searches for the personal guilt of the unemployed, for the " psychogenesis of the long-term unemployed". Psychology has given up its humanistic perspective and appears as an organizational science. Sexuality appears as a practice area for applications. Karla sums it up after a nocturnal appointment with Lichtenstein: "Like humans used to be in religion: everything against people, everything in favor of the world and its gods." (P. 89)
The loss of identity of the characters in the novel develops in part from the situation in the Sphericon. Applicants from different regions were consciously brought together in groups. You don't know each other, you don't have a common history. Unemployment also means that the job is no longer a source of identity. There is also the specific pressure to give up the previous identity. “Forget everything you have learned so far,” it is said again and again in speeches and lessons. Some of the newly arrived unemployed therefore only whisper their names to each other, only one woman holds on to her professional identity as a florist and even wears a blouse embroidered with flowers to underline her will to persevere.
The training begins with digging a grave. The Apollo team has to dig a hole to gather at the next day. Ansgar Fest calls on the students to bury their previous life as a mistake, to forget their illusions and dreams. “It is a mistaken, dead-end life to openly confess - and then to be buried.” The loss of identity becomes the program.
reception
Zelter's novel received mostly positive reviews. The praise goes first of all to Zelter's precise language.
“The School of the Unemployed is a bitter satire with a great deal of topicality. Joachim Zelter loves the language - and the language loves him. "
The realism of the novel is also positively highlighted. Zelter's negative utopia, unlike Orwell's gloomy vision of the future, remains close to the reality of managed unemployment. Contrary to the premonition of brutal control by totalitarian systems, Zelter's novel aims more at reality.
"George Orwell's" 1984 "shimmers through the lines as a pale memory. The bitter satire on the totalitarianism of the 20th century has, however, become obsolete. And Aldous Huxley's horror vision of a pure consumer world no longer corresponds to the social horror images of the present. At Zelter there is still the loneliness of people in a thoroughly rationalized world, but neither truth management nor consumer frenzy play the predominant role for the 44-year-old. Zelter's Big Brother is called the "Federal Employment Agency". And she no longer wants to control all people. Anyone who has become superfluous just needs to be disposed of. "
“The book comes to an end with the coldest possible attack on the myth of full employment, a kind of silent escalation of the scenario. The freestyle for a new coach is just the beginning. As for the bitter punch line, which of course should not be revealed, the only thing that is more consistent is the question of what to do with the human debris that the structural unemployment in the late information capitalism produced on a massive scale; this question has not been answered more consistently in literary terms . "
“In his novel, Joachim Zelter exaggerates well-known phenomena of the current employment crisis, for example the devaluation of the unemployed or the dogged application training. The result is a new economy dictatorship in which the »search work« becomes the meaning of life. The unemployed Roland Bergmann is devalued as a person despite high social and professional skills. "
Criticism of the novel is primarily directed against the lack of real people, even if this fully corresponds to the concept of the novel. The unemployed disappear as characters almost completely behind their applicant masks, their individuality is extinguished largely without resistance.
“Another problem is that the unemployed are not portrayed as agents but as victims. There are no living and contradicting figures. Clare is idealized, while Fest appears as the new work regime personified. The plot is bumpy at times. Karla's internment, for example, happens suddenly. The trainer's regime in the novel alludes to fascism in some places. There are surprising nocturnal interviews, a poster with the slogan: "Careless talk costs jobs", a deportation metaphor, the slogan "Work is Freedom", which is reminiscent of the Nazi slogan "Arbeit macht frei". The analogies between fascism and the Sphericon ideology are not deepened. The novel is successful in its sober form, which continues today's mentality and language of the working society. Joachim Zelter gives the unease about a neoliberal-authoritarian regime of measures a coherent shape. "
In the FAZ, Klaus Ungerer formulated fundamental criticism of the novel . In the sense of a traditional novel conception, he criticizes the lack of “ identification offers ”, the lack of “exciting plot” and “condensed, individual language”.
“The» School of the Unemployed «is above all an accomplished game of rhetoric. But that the book reacts too tightly and too astutely to our today - well, one has to ask. It is too cheap to interweave the current problems of our capitalism and our media reality with the language of the Third Reich - the depth of analysis remains rather shallow. In the real world there would be enough to find and describe about the cynicism that unemployed people have to deal with today, about the absurdity of actually existing nonsense training and pseudo-occupations, which lose their most effective sounding board here due to the shift to a dystopian future. There is a lot to be said about the rhetoric of debate, which is used to distract television-wide attention from the malfunctions of our political economy; The tragicomic monster of the Federal Employment Agency also deserves literary attention. But the fact that a fat, helpless, quietly proliferating authority could become a tightly organized, totalitarian institution within a few years - everything that is right is really not the greatest fear of our days. "
Dramatization
The novel has now also been implemented for the theater. Zelter himself developed two stage versions. Initially, the “Polittbüro Kabarett GbR” brought the novel to the stage as a staged reading in April 2007, followed at the same time in December 2007 by performances in the Neue Bühne Senftenberg and the Stadttheater Osnabrück. On February 1, 2008, a production by the United City Theaters of Krefeld and Mönchengladbach followed , directed by Christian von Treskow , the future director of the Wuppertal Theater.
The Osnabrück Theater , which has been recognized for its commitment to contemporary drama, developed its own scenes from the novel in collaboration with unemployed people. The press rated Nina Gühlsdorff's directorial work differently. Sometimes it is criticized that the staging relies too much on shallow laughter and does not convey the sharpness of the novel.
“Where Zelter's text builds up disparities, where he sets an overwhelming machine with a grinning face in motion, Nina Gühlstorff in Osnabrück only presents a jovial togetherness. The ranks of the unemployed are always good for a brisk statement, while the SPHERICON trainers (Anjorka Strechel, Laurenz Leky, Steffen Gangloff), recognizable by their green satin suits and proudly swollen chest, lack the bite. Instead of looking at the mocking cynicism of their mania for flexibility, we get garish disco interludes with rasta backs and bast skirts. As with "children's birthday", it is said. How true."
Thorsten Stegemann rated the directorial work more positively in the taz . The fact that Nina Gühlstorff allowed "reports from career counselors and Hartz IV recipients, but also spontaneous inspiration from her actors and amateur actors to flow into the rehearsals" significantly enhanced the literary model. Stegmann also rates the recording of video sequences and music positively. In this context, the cooperation between the Osnabrück Theater and the vocational school center on Westerberg is also remarkable. The topic of unemployment was dealt with within the German and political classes, and students designed an exhibition on the drama. There were u. a. He wrote fictional résumés, designed flyers for the Sphericon training center and designed drawings on the subject of unemployment. Some of the works created in class were exhibited in the theater foyer.
The production in Senftenberg in Niederlausitz by artistic director Sewan Latchinian met with national interest . Hartmut Krug praised the acting performance of Inga Wolff as Karla and the dense design of the studio stage (set design by Tobias Wartenberg) on Deutschlandradio Kultur . Only the final scenes after Bergmann's success and Karla's resignation ran "a bit tough and tensionless to their menaceous end."
Britta Weddeling praised the Senftenberg production even more clearly in the Tagesspiegel . She points to the clear references to high unemployment in the region. After the GDR open-cast lignite mine was closed, every fourth person there is unemployed. "Because Hartz IV charges 1.50 euros per day for" culture "and there is no theater ticket to buy, the unemployed have free entry to all dress rehearsals."
“There are no swimming pools, oversized video projections, no blend arias, Wagner choirs or animals on stage. Here everything is concentrated on the play of the actors, which encroaches on the auditorium with an oppressive intensity. When it works in the childlike face of trainee Bergmann (Christian Mark), whose biology studies are scornfully dismissed as a "waste of time". When the application coach fest in the white tracksuit and green doctor's coat of the unemployed florist Anne (Juschka Spitzer) brutally throws "You are too old!" In the face. "Sphericon", as author Zelter calls the fictitious job creation program of the Federal Employment Agency, mercilessly destroys all pride. "
The Senftenberg staging - so Weddeling - gives courage with the means of the grotesque , courage to laugh at the "seemingly omnipotent job brokers".
In the Krefeld production, von Treskow assembled prose passages with dialogue sequences. Despite the lack of a figure to identify with, the theater criticism has succeeded in combining these elements with tension. The stage set (Sandra Linde) initially presented the Sphericon as an internment camp. In the second part, von Treskow implemented the absurd increase in events as a confrontation between the trainers as evil clowns and the unemployed as sad Pierrots . In the Westdeutsche Zeitung , Klaus M. Schmidt praised the production's satirical attacks, including against the “unfortunate TV selection shows”.
text
- Joachim Zelter: School of the unemployed . Klöpfer & Meyer, Tübingen 2006, 205 pages, ISBN 3-937667-71-7
- also as a play under the same title, published by Whale Songs Communications Verlagsgesellschaft mbh & Co. Hamburg (previously performed by Polittbüro Kabarett GbR, Städtische Bühnen Osnabrück GmbH, Neue Bühne Senftenberg, Vereinigte Städtische Bühnen Krefeld and Mönchengladbach, Stadttheater Lindau)
- Translation into French: Zelter, Joachim: Chômeurs Academy. Translated by Leïla Pellissier. - Editions Autrement.
literature
- Cornelia Geissler: Brave New World. Joachim Zelter's novel “School of the Unemployed” as a scenario for the next ten years. In: Berliner Zeitung. April 18, 2006 Brave New World - Joachim Zelter's novel "School of the Unemployed" as a scenario for the next ten years ( Memento from March 14, 2008 in the Internet Archive ).
- Sigrid Lehmann-Wacker: “Representing the complete irrationality of the Federal Agency”, conversation with Joachim Zelter on the occasion of the premiere of the play in Osnabrück. In: young world. December 1, 2007, Feuilleton, p. 13 December 1, 2007: "Representing the complete irrationality of the Federal Agency" ( Memento of December 3, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) (or subject to a fee).
- Jens-Christian Rabe: You screw yourself here. Silent escalation: Joachim Zelter's “School of the Unemployed”. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung. July 21, 2006
- Klaus Ungerer: Bad, fat world. Unemployment settlement: Joachim Zelter talks about the misery. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. No. 67, March 20, 2007, p. 34.
- Britta Weddeling: The 28-hour day, theatrical high in Niederlausitz: How the New Stage Senftenberg encourages the unemployed. In: Der Tagesspiegel. Culture, December 6, 2007 ( tagesspiegel.de ).
Web links
- Dorothea Dieckmann: Brainwashing for the unemployed, Joachim Zelter describes horror scenarios full of reality. Deutschlandfunk book market from June 2, 2006
- Hartmut Krug: A merciless grotesque, Sewan Latchinian stages “The School of the Unemployed”. Deutschlandradio, KULTUR HEUTE from December 2, 2007 (for the production in Senftenberg in Niederlausitz)
- Christian Rakow: In the doll's house of disciplinary measures, school of the unemployed - ring premiere of the novel by Joachim Zelter. Osnabrück, December 1, 2007, nachtkritik.de
- Frank Schorneck: Agenda 2016., The school of the unemployed is a bitter satire with a great deal of topicality. In: Cover culture magazine . December 25, 2006
- Review notes at perlentaucher.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ The term goes back to a strange geometric figure, the Sphericon, also called "Torkler" in German.
- ↑ a b School of the Unemployed. P. 21
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 52 ff.
- ↑ a b Nathalie Wozniak: George Orwell sends his regards: Joachim Zelter's bitterly angry satire on the new capitalism. In: Märkische Allgemeine. March 10, 2007.
- ↑ "Equal to the insight of prisoners or drug addicts: We lived wrongly. Not correct! ", P. 21
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 13
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 12
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 16
- ↑ At the same time an allusion to Orwell's "Freedom is slavery"
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 29.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 8
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 22; also doubled: “Criticism. Self-criticism and external criticism. Initial review, intermediate review and final review. ", P. 33.
- ↑ "In this action center, the flaccid unemployed should become dynamic" applicants "within three months, or better still: fearless application professionals. “Work is Freedom” or “Just do it” are the motto. These dark allusions might not have been needed, they hardly add anything to the matter. The brutal, hostile undertone of the rhetoric of the motivational speakers who fill large halls in our time is perhaps only unmasked with the severity it deserves. "; Jens-Christian Rabe, you are screwing yourself here, Süddeutsche Zeitung, July 21, 2006
- ↑ “The» School of the Unemployed «is above all an accomplished game of rhetoric. But that the book reacts too tightly and too astutely to our today - well, one has to ask. It is too cheap to combine the current problems of our capitalism and our media reality with the language of the Third Reich - the depth of analysis remains quite shallow. "; Klaus Ungerer, Bad, fat world, unemployment settlement: Joachim Zelter tells of misery. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 67, March 20, 2007, page 34
- ↑ Jens-Christian Rabe, you tease yourself here, Silent Escalation: Joachim Zelter's “School of the Unemployed”, Süddeutsche Zeitung, July 21, 2006
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 26 ff.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 74.
- ↑ poster view ; "Careless Talk Costs Lives" from 1940 poster series 1940
- ↑ Sigrid Lehmann-Wacker, "Representing the complete irrationality of the Federal Agency", conversation with Joachim Zelter on the occasion of the premiere of the play in Osnabrück, Junge Welt , December 1, 2007.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 11.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 47.
- ↑ Job Quest Greece or Job Quest Australia
- ↑ a b Sigrid Lehmann-Wacker, "Representing the complete irrationality of the Federal Agency", conversation with Joachim Zelter on the occasion of the premiere of the play in Osnabrück, Junge Welt, December 1, 2007, features section, p. 13.
- ↑ a b School of the Unemployed. P. 75.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 76.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 187; In the criticism on Deutschlandfunk, Dorothea Dieckmann speaks of the fact that the novel “condenses our worst worries: not being worth anything if one is no longer a multifunctional part of the long outdated working society”; Dorothea Dieckmann, brainwashing for the unemployed, Joachim Zelter describes horror scenarios full of reality, Deutschlandfunk Büchermarkt from June 2, 2006.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 166, ellipses taken from original text.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 184.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 187.
-
↑ Uses of the quote: Franz Müntefering as Minister of Labor in the wording: "Only those who work should also eat"; Die Zeit from May 10, 2006 ( zeit.de ); “Socialism agrees with the Bible when it says: 'He who doesn't work shouldn't eat either.'”;
August Bebel : Women and Socialism. 1883 ( taz.de ). - ^ School for the unemployed. P. 188.
- ^ Brita Hempel: Careless talk costs jobs. Joachim Zelter sends his readers to the "School of the Unemployed". literaturkritik.de, No. 7, July 2006 (section: German-language literature).
- ↑ Winfried Rust: Give up the wrong life! jungle-world, No. 38, September 20, 2006 ( review ).
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 12 f.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 67 f.
- ↑ Klaus Ungerer, Bad, fat world, unemployment settlement: Joachim Zelter tells of misery. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 67, March 20, 2007, page 34
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 33
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 24.
- ^ School for the unemployed. P. 38
- ↑ a b Thorsten Stegemann: Applicants with an optimized CV. In: The daily newspaper. December 3, 2007 (for the performance in Osnabrück, taz.de ).
- ↑ a b Hartmut Krug, A merciless grotesque, Sewan Latchinian stages "The School of the Unemployed", Deutschlandradio, KULTUR HEUTE from December 2, 2007
- ↑ a b Britta Weddeling, The 28-hour day, theater high in Niederlausitz: How the New Stage Senftenberg encourages the unemployed, Der Tagesspiegel, Culture, December 6, 2007
- ↑ Klaus M. Schmidt: Theater premiere in Krefeld: Interned and deported, Joachim Zelter creates an evil utopia in “School of the Unemployed”. The piece celebrated its premiere in Krefeld. In: Westdeutsche Zeitung. February 4, 2008 ( wz-newsline.de ).
- ↑ Source: whalesongs.de
