Children of the sun

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Children of the Sun ( Russian Дети солнца , Deti solnza) is a drama by the Russian writer Maxim Gorky , which was written in early 1905 and premiered on October 25 of the same year in the Petersburg Commissarshevskaya Theater. Kasimir Brawitsch played Protasov and Wera Komissarschewskaja his sister Lisa.

Victor Barnowsky presented the play to the German audience on January 25, 1906 on the stage of the Small Theater Unter den Linden . This first German production saw seventy performances. On March 7, 1906, Gorky visited one of them while passing through. The theater audience celebrated the playwright with stormy shouts.

Ilja Repin (1905): Gorky reads from his drama Children of the Sun

overview

Gorky addresses the cholera uprising in 1892 on the lower Volga . The population, held in dull ignorance by the rulers - embodied in the play especially by the locksmith Yegor - seeks the blame for the epidemic in the pursuit of possession by the medical profession and wants to kill the chemist Protasov - who allegedly makes the drugs.

history

In connection with the St. Petersburg Bloody Sunday , Gorky was incarcerated in the Peter and Paul Fortress from January 22 to the end of February , where he found time to write the play. On June 22, 1905, he read the text to friends - including the painter Repin  - in Kuokkala . In the same year the first book edition in Russian was published by JHW Dietz Nachhaben in Stuttgart . Alexander von Huhn 's translation into German was published in 1906 by J. Ladyschnikow Verlag in Berlin . Also in 1906 Jakob Gordin translated the play into Yiddish .

After the war the piece was given in Cottbus in 1961 . 1968 - on the occasion of Gorky's 100th birthday - the GDR television broadcast its own production.

In 1986 Dominique Quéhec translated the piece into French: Les Enfants du soleil .

title

With the title Gorky alludes ironically to a kind of ivory tower in which the chemist Protasov and the people around him live. The associated sun metaphor appears seven times in the piece:

Jelena - that is Protassov's wife - thinks that an artist should believe in the power of beauty, comparable to sunlight. Protassow suggests "To the Sun" as the title of his current work to the painter Wagin. And the same Protasov euphorically describes the incarnation as the crown of creation from the primordial slime - more precisely from a “lump of protein in the light of the sun”. It is this chemist who has the title of the play in his mouth: "... we humans, the children of the sun ..." The two tragic characters in the play - the veterinarian Chepurnoi and his unhappy bride Lisa, the insane sister Protasov - complain about the sun-drenched Painting: The vet asks: "... are these guys too ... are they children of the sun, too?" He means the lower class , that rude people who, in the end, almost kill Protasov. Lisa has to answer the lover's question in the negative. Beasts roam around the ivory tower mentioned above. How does the story end now? The further course of action follows from an irrefutable fact. Ivory tower dwellers are usually hard to beat when it comes to narrow-mindedness. So here too. The citizens just keep going. Wagin absolutely wants to finish the painting "Zur Sonne". Protasov has to approve of Vagin's intention, because this painter revolves around the sun and is thus “in harmony with the system ”.

Given this development of things, it is not surprising that the locksmith Yegor strangles his employer Protasov as the outstanding representative of the hated eggheads at the dramatic climax of the play .

content

Melania Kirpichova, the sister of the 40-year-old veterinarian Chepurnoy, approaches Protasov; calls him a new Pasteur , reads his book, but as a non-chemist cannot understand chemical science. Melanija married a rich old man at the age of 20, couldn't cope with the age difference and had a failed suicide. Now as a rich widow, the oats stings her. When Protasov finally notices the massive advances, he reacts irritated. He was married after all. Melanija also has oily lips.

Protasov has nothing more on his mind than his chemical experiments. His wife Jelena feels neglected and seeks a change from Protassov's school friend, the painter Wagin. Both gentlemen studied science. Wagin had gone rogue.

Jelena rejects Wagin, but she wants to leave Protasov. In the end, however, at the crucial moment - when the cholera uprising turned against Protasov - she stood by her husband. Previously, this only positive heroine in the play fearlessly cared for cholera sufferers - for example, the wife of the locksmith Yegor.

The Protasovs rented an apartment from Nasar Vygrusov. This house owner and his son Mischa want to take advantage of the prominent chemist as an employee in a well-funded company. Nasar hopes that his tenant will work soon, also because Protasov is behind with the rent payment. Protasov has no interest in commercializing chemical science. This chemist raves, for example: "... if you can only spin fibers from chemically processed wood, we will wear vests made of oak and skirts made of birch." Nasar and Misha stick with it - Protasov will be the manager of their new chemical factory.

The lovers in the piece also include - as indicated above - Lisa and Tschepurnoi. Lisa rejects Tschepurnoi. As a Ukrainian, he is persistent. Lisa's insanity does not deter him when she confesses: “… I am afraid of those who do not understand me! That is my whole illness ... "Chepurnoi recognizes:" She does not reject me because I hate her, but because she is afraid of her illness. "Her confession" ... I cannot ... I don't want any children "brings him out the concept. He wants to go to another governorate. When Lisa finally rejects him, he hangs himself "on a willow by the river". The general's daughter Lisa wants to shoot herself. In vain effort - the positive heroine Jelena wrests the murder tool from her.

revolt

Gorki's favorite topic, the revolution, should not be missing. The insane Lisa acts as one of his mouthpieces when she shakes up the members of the Russian upper class: "... the hatred among the millions grows ... One day her anger will turn against you." The insane Lisa answers the why immediately afterwards: "Because you are full and well dressed ... The hatred is blind, but you are good to see, it will find you!"

Self-testimony

  • According to Ludwig, Gorky articulates in the play his disappointment with the attitude of the intellectuals during the St. Petersburg Bloody Sunday. In this context, Gorky's statement of January 22, 1905 should be understood: "The first day of the revolution was the day of the moral collapse of the Russian intelligentsia."

Recent performances

filming

reception

German-language editions

Used edition

  • Children of the sun. German by Georg Schwarz. With an afterword and comments by Ilse Stauche. P. 341–452 in: Maxim Gorki: Dramen II. 672 pages. Vol. 21 from: Eva Kosing (Ed.), Edel Mirowa-Florin (Ed.): Maxim Gorki: Collected works in individual volumes. Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 1974

literature

  • Nadeshda Ludwig: Maxim Gorki. Life and work. Series of Contemporary Writers. People and Knowledge, Berlin 1984.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Russian Бравич, Казимир Викентьевич
  2. ↑ Stauche in the edition used, pp. 663–665
  3. ↑ Chicken, Alex. from in the German biography
  4. ↑ Edition used, p. 382, ​​19. Zvo
  5. ↑ Edition used, p. 385 middle
  6. ↑ Edition used, p. 390, 7th Zvu
  7. ↑ Edition used, p. 391, 13. Zvu
  8. ↑ Edition used, p. 396, below
  9. ↑ Edition used, p. 414, middle
  10. ↑ Edition used, p. 437, below
  11. ↑ Edition used, p. 388, 14th Zvu
  12. ↑ Edition used, p. 398, 14th Zvu
  13. ↑ Edition used, p. 403, 14. Zvo
  14. ↑ Edition used, p. 413, middle
  15. ↑ Edition used, p. 389, 14. Zvu
  16. ↑ Edition used, p. 390, 4th Zvo
  17. ↑ Ludwig, p. 109, 18. Zvo
  18. ^ Gorki, quoted in Ludwig, p. 109, 21. Zvo
  19. ↑ Performance 2014
  20. ↑ Ludwig, pp. 109–112
  21. ↑ Ludwig, p. 111, 16. Zvo