The good god of Manhattan

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The Good God of Manhattan is the last radio play of Ingeborg Bachmann , which was created in 1957 and on 29 May 1958 at the NDR Hamburg, BR Munich and the SWF Baden-Baden under the direction of Fritz Schröder-Jahn with music by Peter Zwetkoff was sent . The production was awarded the prestigious war blind radio play award in 1959 . In 1958 the text had been printed by Piper in Munich.

According to Ingeborg Bachmann's intention, ecstatic love between man and woman is punished with death by capitalist society in Manhattan .

content

Form and action

The plot is spread over two levels. On the outer level, a court hearing is underway in New York City on a hot August day in the 1950s . The judge recognizes in the accused, an old man, the good God of Manhattan. Good God killed 23-year-old student Jennifer. The history of the bloody act is retold in flashbacks on the inner level. There is a constant change of level.

The good God is dissatisfied. His bomb should actually tear apart Jan, the lover of the American Jennifer. But the young European, unharmed, did not even wait for the burial of his beloved, but took his ship to Cherbourg . Jan wanted to stay and live and die with Jennifer. He had sworn that to her.

The omniscient good God appears as the reteller of the above inner plane. He does not see himself as a defendant, but as a key witness and now wants to "tell the judge how it came about":

Getting off the Boston train , Jennifer had approached the non-resident Jan at Grand Central Station , confessed to him, offered Europeans she liked and offered help. Jan said he could manage on his own. The two of them take the last free room on the ground floor of an hour hotel. Jan asks Jennifer to undress. The young lovers soon leave the inhospitable house and change hotels. It goes higher and higher. From the ground floor of the love hotel, a room on the 7th floor of the Atlantic Hotel is occupied - albeit with a view of the courtyard. Later it goes even higher, first to the 30th floor and finally to the 57th floor with a sea view. Jan wants to love Jennifer until he is old and frail. Jennifer would never have believed that love could make you swoon. Both want to have children together. Jennifer would like to stop time.

Such happiness is by no means acceptable to the good God, for whom love is worse than heresy. So the young couple has to "blow up". This God of Manhattan actually brings a bomb - wrapped as a gift - over personally. Jennifer gratefully accepts the deadly cargo. Jan accidentally jumps off certain death. He wants to stay with Jennifer forever. So he just wants to quickly return his ship ticket.

Although the judge upholds the charges, he is silent; do not condemn the good God who only spoke "the whole truth and nothing but the truth".

Testimonials

  • Christine Lubkoll quotes from Koschel / von Weidenbaum (1983) on the intention to write: The radio play negotiates a love for which there has never been a place - hence the reference “to a few of the great, old lovers who all perish”. And Ingeborg Bachmann asked: "Why?"
  • Stefanie Golisch quotes the author: "I am also certain that we have to stay in order."

reception

Christine Lubkoll quotes Horst-Günter Funke (1969): The bourgeois order triumphs cruelly over love. For Peter Beicken, the radio play is a little more: a political work in which, among other things, historical facts such as the "individual annihilation" of people are discussed.

language

According to Werner Weber, language hovers “between rapport and singing”. Golisch, on the other hand, is offended by the occasional pathos, but praises Ingeborg Bachmann's efforts to counter the sinking of the individual in a “conformist coercive community”.

Social criticism

The good God defended his murder with the argument that society could not tolerate “absolute love” precisely because it was “not subject to discipline”. Bartsch sees ecstatic love as a rejection of capitalism.

The "explosive power of love"

When Höller reads the radio play title, he is reminded of Brecht's “ Good People from Sezuan ”. The judge at Bachmann could not do otherwise; he must approve of the misdeeds of the God of Manhattan.

Cold War

The stability of society should not be threatened by such burning love. So the good God has no choice - he has to bomb in "a fully administered society"; execute the young American woman. "It was only right."

fault

It is not the defendant's fault, but his victim Jennifer. So secret killing is legal. Love is associated with a pain that is given "mythopoetic" expression and death plays along with it. "Going home" means "going to hell". Ingeborg Bachmann is bringing charges against the patriarchy .

God - seen as a criminal who lays bombs - is simply too simple for Golisch. In his melancholy and in his cynicism, the good God condemns Jan to life, while Jennifer is spared the grueling everyday life of marriage.

When Jan suddenly takes the steamer to Europe after the bomb attack, he betrays his love for Jennifer.

Höller discusses guilt in the relationship between the ego and the superego .

America

In 1955 the author took part in a seminar at the Harvard Summer School led by Henry Kissinger .

bibliography

Bareiss and Ohloff name further leading works by Michael Gäbler (1964), Wolfgang Hädecke , Hans Jürgen Baden (1971), Herbert A. Frenzel and Elisabeth Frenzel (1975), Gunilla Bergsten (1972), Otto F. Best (1971), viola Fischerová (1977), Hans Galinsky (1975), Wolfgang Gerstenlauer (1970), Bruno Heck (1959), Hans Rudolf Hesse (1969), Siegfried Kienzle (1968), Werner Klose (1977), Jana Pecharová (1969), Kurt Rothmann (1973), Wilfried F. Schoeller (1971), Albert Arnold Scholl (1959), Alfons Thome (1974), Werner Weber (1958), Wolf Wondratschek , Jürgen Becker (1970) and give 41 reviews.

interpretation

Goethe

The leitmotif of secret love "Don't tell anyone" comes from the poem "Blessed Sehnsucht" by Goethe :

Don't tell anyone but the wise
Because the crowd is mocking:
I will praise the living,
That longs for death in flames.
...
And as long as you don't have that
This: Die and become!
Are you just a dreary guest
On the dark earth.

As with Goethe, with Bachmann too, love is tied to death. But Bachmann's text lacks Goethean hope - that is, the "Die and become!"

The love couple's wish to stop time also finds its counterpart in Goethe. Jennifer's “I want to put everything down and stand as if it stayed forever” corresponded to Faust's “ Stay a while! you are so pretty! “In addition, the good God mocked Jan's luck in misery:“ He was saved. The earth had him again. ”Goethe said,“ Is saved! "And" the earth has me again! "

Productions

1. Producer: NDR, in collaboration with BR and SWF

First shipment
May 29, 1958 at NDR

Occupation:

Director: Fritz Schröder-Jahn

Award: Radio play award of the war blind 1959

Playing time: 81'50 minutes

The audio document is still available.

2nd producer: SWF, in cooperation with Radio Bremen and the RIAS , in the series of love stories

First shipment
May 29, 1958 with the SWF

Occupation:

Director: Gert Westphal

Playing time: 90'20 minutes

The audio document is still available.

3rd producer: Broadcasting of the GDR

First shipment
December 11, 1977 on the radio of the GDR

Occupation:

Director: Peter Groeger

Playing time: 107 minutes

The audio document is still available.

4. Producer: DLR Berlin (commissioned production)

First shipment
August 20, 2000 at DLR Berlin

Occupation:

Editing and direction: Giuseppe Maio and Judith Lorentz

Playing time: 53'16 minutes

The audio document is still available.

Theater and film

The radio play was adapted for stage and film.

Spoken theater
Musical theater
TV movie
  • 1972 Klaus Kirschner filmed the radio play for television. Verena Buss played Jennifer and Mathieu Carrière on Jan.

literature

Text output

Used edition
  • Christine Koschel (Ed.), Inge von Weidenbaum (Ed.), Clemens Münster (Ed.): Ingeborg Bachmann. Works. First volume: poems. Radio plays. Libretti. Translations . Piper, Munich 1978, ISBN 3-492-11701-5 , pp. 269-327. (5th edition 1993) (Volume 1701 of the Piper series)

Secondary literature

  • Horst-Günter Funke: Ingeborg Bachmann. Two radio plays. The cicadas. The good god of Manhattan. Interpretation. Oldenbourg, Munich 1969, pp. 52-72
  • Heinz Schwitzke (Hrsg.), Werner Klippert (Hrsg.): Reclams radio play guide . Reclam, Stuttgart 1969 ( RUB 10161-10168), pp. 55-56
  • Beatrice Angst-Hürlimann: In the contradiction of the impossible with the possible. On the problem of language with Ingeborg Bachmann. Juris Verlag, Zurich 1971 (Diss. Zurich 1971), pp. 53–76
  • Holger Pausch: Ingeborg Bachmann. Colloquium Verlag, Berlin 1975 (series: Heads of the 20th Century, Vol. 81), pp. 40–56
  • Otto Bareiss, Frauke Ohloff: Ingeborg Bachmann. A bibliography. With a foreword by Heinrich Böll. Piper, Munich 1978. ISBN 3-492-02366-5
  • Peter Beicken : Ingeborg Bachmann. Beck, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-406-32277-8 , pp. 113-127
  • Hans Höller : Ingeborg Bachmann. The work. From the earliest poems to the “types of death” cycle . Hain (Athenäums Programm), Frankfurt am Main 1993. ISBN 3-445-08578-1 , pp. 106-122
  • Christine Koschel (ed.), Inge von Weidenbaum (ed.): Ingeborg Bachmann. We have to find true sentences. Conversations and interviews. Piper, Munich 1983 (1994 edition), ISBN 3-492-11105-X , p. 86.
  • Werner Weber , pp. 41–43 (from: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of December 6, 1958) In: Michael Matthias Schardt (Ed.): About Ingeborg Bachmann. Reviews - Portraits - Appreciations (1952-1992). Reception documents from four decades. Igel Verlag, Paderborn 1994, ISBN 3-927104-53-1
  • Kurt Bartsch: Ingeborg Bachmann. Metzler, Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-476-12242-5 . (2nd edition, Metzler Collection. Volume 242)
  • Stefanie Golisch : Ingeborg Bachmann for an introduction . Junius, Hamburg 1997. ISBN 3-88506-941-5 , pp. 84-92
  • Hans Höller: Ingeborg Bachmann . Rowohlt, Reinbek 1999 (2002 edition), ISBN 3-499-50545-2
  • Monika Albrecht (Hrsg.), Dirk Göttsche (Hrsg.): Bachmann-Handbuch. Life - work - effect . Metzler, Stuttgart 2002, ISBN 3-476-01810-5
  • Mathias Mayer (Ed.): Interpretations. Works by Ingeborg Bachmann . Reclam, Stuttgart 2002 ( RUB 17517), ISBN 3-15-017517-8
  • Bettina von Jagow : Aesthetics of the Mythical. Poetologies of Remembrance in Ingeborg Bachmann's Work . Böhlau, Cologne 2003 (Diss. Munich 2001), ISBN 3-412-06903-5

Remarks

  1. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff (Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 22, entry 62) give different information about the pressure. Accordingly, the radio play was only published by Piper in 1961 within the selection by Hansjörg Schmitthenner (ed.): Thirteen European radio plays (pp. 207–249). In 1958, however, the text came to the Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt Stuttgart within Rudolf de Le Roi (Ed.), Ludwig Grote (Ed.), Joachim Moras (Ed.), Hermann Rinn (Ed.): 1. Jahresring 58/59 ( Vol. 5). Contributions to German literature and contemporary art (pp. 96–138).
  2. ↑ Bachmann names Orpheus and Eurydice , Tristan and Isolde , Romeo and Juliet , Abälard and Héloïse as well as Francesca and Paolo (edition used, p. 294, 14th Zvo).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ von Jagow, p. 74, 3. Zvo
  2. ↑ Edition used, p. 661, last entry
  3. ↑ von Jagow, p. 76, 7. Zvo
  4. ↑ Edition used, p. 275, 15. Zvo
  5. ↑ Edition used, p. 318, 14th Zvu
  6. ↑ Edition used, p. 318, 6th Zvu
  7. ↑ Edition used, p. 275, 16. Zvo
  8. ↑ Lubkoll in Mayer, S. 133, down
  9. ↑ Golisch, p. 89, 3. Zvo
  10. ↑ Lubkoll in Mayer, S. 123, 5. ZVO
  11. ↑ Beicken, p. 126, 14th Zvu
  12. ^ Weber in Schardt, p. 41, 6. Zvo
  13. ↑ Golisch, p. 89, 6. Zvu and p. 91, 2. Zvu
  14. ↑ Beicken, p. 116, 8th Zvu
  15. ↑ Golisch, p. 92
  16. ↑ Bartsch, p. 82, 21. Zvo
  17. ↑ Bartsch, p. 83, 7. Zvo
  18. ↑ Bartsch, p. 83, 21. Zvo
  19. ↑ Höller 2002, p. 114, 11. Zvo
  20. ↑ Höller 2002, p. 114, 10th Zvu
  21. ^ Sara Lennox in Albrecht / Göttsche, pp. 92–94
  22. ↑ Edition used, p. 306, 4th Zvo
  23. ↑ von Jagow, pp. 74-82
  24. ↑ von Jagow, p. 75, 11. Zvu
  25. ↑ von Jagow, p. 76, 1st Zvu
  26. ↑ von Jagow, p. 82, 9. Zvo
  27. ↑ Edition used, p. 296, 9. Zvo
  28. ↑ von Jagow, p. 81, 7. Zvo
  29. ↑ Golisch, p. 86 bottom - p. 87 middle
  30. ↑ Golisch, p. 86, 10. Zvo
  31. ↑ Golisch, p. 88
  32. ↑ Höller 1993, p. 120 below
  33. ^ Sara Lennox in Albrecht / Göttsche, p. 92, right column, center
  34. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 110, entry 520
  35. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 110, entry 521
  36. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 122, entry 544
  37. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 127, entry 583
  38. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 267, entry 1907
  39. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 267, entry 1908
  40. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1908a
  41. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1910
  42. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1911
  43. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1912
  44. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1913
  45. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1914
  46. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1915
  47. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 268, entry 1916
  48. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 270, entry 1917
  49. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 270, entry 1918
  50. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 270, entry 1919
  51. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 270, entry 1920
  52. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 270, entry 764
  53. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, p. 270, entry 1921
  54. ↑ Bareiss and Ohloff, pp. 194–198, entries 1219-1259
  55. ↑ Edition used, p. 279, 4. Zvo, p. 282, 19. Zvo, p. 292, 14. Zvo, p. 308, 1. Zvu, p. 321, 1. Zvu and p. 324, 7. Zvo
  56. ^ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: Blessed longing in the Gutenberg-DE project
  57. ↑ Edition used, p. 314, 7th Zvo
  58. ↑ Edition used, p. 327, 14. Zvo