Don Juan comes from the war

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Production by Andreas Kriegenburg , Salzburg Festival 2014 Photo: Christian Michelides
Data
Title: Don Juan comes from the war
Genus: Piece in three acts (23 images)
Original language: German
Author: Ödön from Horváth
Premiere: November 12, 1952
Place of premiere: Theater der Courage , Vienna
Place and time of the action: Late autumn 1918 and then relatively not long; the scene may only be indicated
people
  • Don juan
  • Two elderly soubrettes
  • Three women
  • grandmother
  • Maid
  • Two loose girls
  • Matron
  • sister
  • widow
  • Two craftswomen
  • Waitress
  • mother
  • Your two daughters
  • Four ladies
  • A lady from Bern
  • The fat
  • The blonde
  • The dark
  • neighbor
  • A mask
  • Two old women
  • Two village girls
  • landlady
  • Two little girls

Don Juan from the war is a play Odon von Horvath from the year 1936. It is a classical station Drama is at war describes the disorientation of a war returnee, his love for the deceased lover and his death on the grave. The play was premiered on a small stage in Vienna in 1952 and has only slowly established itself on the repertoire of German-speaking stages.

Preface by Ödön von Horváth

“It is not known whether don Juan ever lived as a historical person. What is certain is that the Don Juan type once existed, and consequently it is clear that it still exists today and will always be. So I took the liberty of portraying a don Juan of our time because our own time is ever closer to us. Apparently this Don Juan is already a thing of the past, because he died during the great inflation of 1919-23, that is, at a time in which all values ​​have shifted, even in the most banal sense of the word. But, as I said, it is only a seemingly past time, because from a somewhat higher point of view we are still living in inflation and there is no telling when it will end. It is typical of our days how much each individual changes in his innermost being as a result of the catastrophes that affect the general public. Don Juan comes out of the war and imagines that he has become a different person. However, he remains who he is. He can't help it. He will not escape the ladies.

The riddle of Don Juan has been tried in many ways, for hundreds of years, but the riddle is unsolvable. The figure has undergone the most varied of changes, from the primitively seen adulterer, murderer and blasphemer to the psychologically dissected, tired cavalier. He lives in tradition and legend as a mighty criminal who, like a force of nature, runs a storm against morals and law. He is the great seducer who is seduced by women over and over again. Everyone succumbs to him, but - and this should be the decisive factor: nobody really loves him. (That's why this piece doesn't have a single love scene either.)

So what drives women to don Juan? It is not only male sexuality, of which he is undoubtedly the strongest representative, but it is the particularly intimate and exclusively pronounced metaphysical bond of this sexuality, the effect of which women cannot escape. Don Juan always seeks perfection, something that does not exist on earth. And women want to prove to him, and also to themselves, time and again that he can find everything he is looking for on earth. The misfortune of women is that they have an earthly horizon - only when they suspect with a shudder that he is not looking for life but longing for death do they shrink from him. Don Juan's tragic guilt is that he repeatedly forgets or even mocks his longing, and so he becomes a cynical victim of his effects, but not without grief. "

- Ödön von Horváth : Foreword to Don Juan comes from the war , 1936

Characters of the act

Don Juan and thirty-five women.

Ödön von Horváth: “These thirty-five women can not only, but also have to be portrayed by far fewer actresses, so that almost every actress has to play several roles. Let this be stated not only with regard to the performance of this play, but as the result of an old insight: there are no thirty-five kinds of women, but significantly fewer. The same basic types keep recurring and should therefore also be represented on stage by the same women. Nevertheless, it was of course absolutely necessary to bring thirty-five women to show how the individual basic types can develop. "

Horváth also gives precise instructions to the director as to which roles can be summarized and how - "with regard to the basic type (in brackets the respective act of your performances)":

  • First role : first elderly soubrette (I), matron (I II), mother (II III), first old woman (III)
  • Second role : Second elderly soubrette (I), widow (II), first lady (II III)
  • Third role : first woman (I), neighbor (II), second old woman (III), landlady (III)
  • Fourth role : grandmother (I III)
  • Fifth role : maid (I III), second lady (II III), mask (III)
  • Sixth role : First loose girl (I), waitress (II), third lady (II), second village girl (III)
  • Seventh role : Second loose girl (I), second daughter (II III), first village girl (III)
  • Eighth role : Sister (I), First Craftsman (II), First Daughter (II III), Fourth Lady (II)
  • Ninth role : Second craftswoman (II), lady from Bern (II), second village girl (III)

The remaining roles are all very small:

  • Second and third wife (I)
  • The thickness (II)
  • The blonde (II)
  • The Dark One (II)
  • First and second little girl (III).

Stage directions

The instructions - regarding time and location - are also clear and precise: “The play begins in late autumn 1918 and then doesn't last long. It has three nudes and twenty-three pictures. Of course, these are not pictures in the strict sense of the word, but almost always only small scenes that occur in the smallest of spaces. ”Furthermore:“ The scene may only be indicated, not only to be able to play through the individual acts without a break, but also to to do justice to the language. "

Overview of the scenes

Act one: the war is over

  • Front theater
  • Street
  • Grandmother's room
  • Street corner
  • Second loose girl's room
  • hospital
  • Grandmother's room
  

Second act: in the frenzy of inflation

  • hospital
  • Coffee shop
  • Room with the mother
  • In the apartment of an inflation professor
  • Balcony box in the great opera
  • On the ice rink
  • Atelier of the two craftspeople
  • Room with the mother
  

Third act: the snowman

  • Stairwell
  • Room with the mother
  • In the apartment of the inflation profiteer
  • In the snow-covered forest
  • The Snowman
  • Public house
  • In front of the grandmother's house
  • graveyard

premiere

The premiere took place fourteen years after Ödön von Horváth's death on November 12, 1952 under the title Don Juan comes back in the Theater der Courage in Vienna. Directed by Edwin Zbonek . “The reviews of the premiere were largely negative, which was attributed less to the direction and much more to the text. Don Juan comes out of the war was described as a rather weak Horváth piece. "

Further productions (selection)

Don Juan comes out of the war 9126 Michelides.jpg
Direction and stage: Andreas Kriegenburg
Don Juan comes out of the war 9168 Michelides.jpg
Perner Island, Hallein
Don Juan comes out of the war 0039 Michelides.jpg
Traute Hoess , Sabine Haupt
Don Juan comes out of the war 0071 Michelides.jpg
Max Simonischek as Don Juan

Dubbing

Film adaptations (incomplete)

Printouts (incomplete)

  • 1961: The first print was published by Traugott Krischke at Rowohlt .
  • 2010: Ödön von Horváth: Don Juan comes out of the war. Edited by Nicole Streitler with the collaboration of Julia Hamminger and Martin Vejvar. Vol. 9 of the Vienna edition of all works. Historical-critical edition, edited by Klaus Kastberger at the literary archive of the Austrian National Library. Berlin / New York: Walter de Gruyter 2010. ISBN 978-3-11-022627-0 . 516 p

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ E-Journal for Scientific Reviews , accessed December 8, 2014