The Hermannsschlacht (Grabbe)
The Hermannsschlacht is the title of a historical drama by Christian Dietrich Grabbe , which deals with the historical battle between the Cheruscan prince Arminius (Hermann) and the Roman army under Varus in the year 9 AD.
With the work of his Lippe homeland , created between 1835 and 1836, Grabbe wanted to set a monument and at the same time provide a realistic historical picture of the legendary battle. He chose a different starting point than Heinrich von Kleist , who in 1808 portrayed the conflict between Teutons and Romans as a reflection of the anti-Napoleonic resistance in Germany in his thematically similar drama of the same name . Grabbe, on the other hand, conceives the conflict as a clash between the rigid, technical military apparatus of the Romans and the natural, original nationality of the Germanic peoples, whereby both sides are afflicted with negative and positive characteristics. The legally questionable, cold jurisprudence of the Romans is opposed to the natural sense of justice of the Germanic peoples, the civilizationally superior, uniform Roman culture is a heterogeneous people from several tribes that has grown together with nature.
Hermann is a border crosser who serves in the Roman army and yet unites the tribes of the Germanic tribes behind him in order to shake off the Roman yoke. In the skirmishes that followed, the Romans see themselves threatened not only by the Teutons, but also by the alien and threatening nature of the Teutoburg Forest , and are subject to the Teutons. Hermann, who thinks more farsighted because of his Roman military training, wants to persuade his followers after the victory to now dare to storm Rome . However, he fails because of the obstinacy and historical shortsightedness of the tribal princes and is suspected of striving for autocratic rule. Here you can find echoes of the real situation in Germany after the Congress of Vienna , when the fragmented former empire was threatened by the hegemony of Prussia .
reception
Despite the interesting and differentiated contrast between Romans and Teutons, the Hermannschlacht is considered a weaker work by Grabbe, which already tells of his physical and mental decline during the last years of his life. Above all, the last scene, which takes place in the Roman imperial palace and in which the birth of Jesus is announced as a new turning point in history, is viewed by literary scholars as a failure. The nationalistic tones of the drama, on the other hand, were very well received during National Socialism , so that The Hermannsschlacht was premiered during this time (1934 in the Nettelstedt open-air theater ) and celebrated great successes in numerous productions during the Nazi era.
On September 23, 1936 - announced nationwide - the successful stage premiere of Die Hermannsschlacht premiered in an adaptation by Walter Bruno Iltz and under his own direction . Iltz created a new, shortened collage from set pieces from the three-day event at Grabbe. In Dusseldorf the play came on stage as a “Führerdrama”, which was openly and appellatively used to update current politics. After this staging, Gauamtsleiter Walter Steinecke made 12 etchings, which were given to Adolf Hitler in book form in January 1937. The production was shown on October 2, 1936 as a festival performance within a Grabbe Week organized by the Grabbe Society in Detmold and was unanimously acclaimed by the press. Rainer Schlösser , President of the Reichstheaterkammer , congratulated Iltz on “conquering a great piece for the German theater world”.
Since then, the piece has been frowned upon and was initially not played after 1945.
It was not until 1995 that the Chemnitz Theater took on the play again and showed a revue-like arrangement. On the occasion of the 2000th anniversary of the Varus Battle, the Detmold Landestheater presented an adaptation of Grabbe's last play interspersed with texts from Andreas Gryphius to Heiner Müller. In the same year, Philip Tiedemann also staged the entire historical drama at the Osnabrück Theater , which was considered unplayable.
The Neue Bühne Senftenberg also attempted to realize the drama in 2009. As part of the so-called 6th GlückAufFestes Grab (b) e! In addition to Grabbe's plays Napoleon , Hannibal , Scherz, Satire, Irony and Deeper Meaning , The Hermann Battle, directed by Sewan Latchinian, was staged and played 15 times. The critic Martin Linzer rated the production in Theater der Zeit 11/09 as a rehabilitation of the play.
expenditure
- Christian Dietrich Grabbe: The Hermann Battle. Düsseldorf 1838 ( digital copy from LLB Detmold ).
- Christian Dietrich Grabbe: The Hermann Battle. In: Rudolf Gottschall (Ed.): Christian Dietrich Grabbe's all works. Second volume. First complete edition. Leipzig 1870 ( digitized from Bielefeld University Library ).
- Christian Dietrich Grabbe, Walter Bruno Iltz : The Hermann battle. Volkschaft-Verlag for books, theater and film, Berlin 1936.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Grabbes Hermannsschlacht. Theater materials in stock. In: Lippische Landesbibliothek Detmold: Lippisches Literaturarchiv. Retrieved May 24, 2013 .
- ↑ Julia Freifrau Hiller von Gaertringen: The only völkisch visionary of his time. Grabbes "Hermannsschlacht" in the theater. In: 2000 Years of the Varus Battle - Myth. Volume 3, Theiss, Stuttgart 2009, ISBN 978-3-8062-2280-7 , pp. 201-209.
- ↑ From the Hermannsschlacht. Lemgo, undr. (1937). Fol. With 12 mont. Orig. Wheel by Walter Steinecke. 20 text sheets Olwd. with gold stamp. - Bergmann 1954 (indicates 13 wheels)
- ^ Central State Archives Potsdam , Reich Ministry for Propaganda and Public Enlightenment, Volume 141.
- ^ Letter from October 8, 1936, Federal Archives, Berlin Office , former Central State Archives, holdings: Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, Volume 141.