Knight play

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Knight plays are a theatrical genre that had its heyday at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century in the German-speaking area. There can be no clear definition because stage writers used not only self-invented material and motifs from folk tradition (devil's alliance, enemy brothers, etc.) but also novels from the Goethe era as sources. The boundaries between the genres of chivalric novels, ghost novels, robber novels and secret society novels are fluid, which sometimes makes it difficult to categorize knight spectacles. Typical motifs of the Goethe era, which appear in literary works with one's own present as the action time, can also be found in knight plays: women in men's clothes, hostile brothers, the search for a father, etc. The emergence, development and reception at court theaters, national theaters and traveling theaters took place differently than in rural ones Regions, although similar style elements can be recognized by the common sources.

Knight plays in courtly and city theaters as well as traveling stages

At the end of the 18th century the chivalric novel emerged as a modern genre of entertainment literature (the chivalric novel of the Goethe era has no material or stylistic references or similarities to the high medieval knight episodes and novels such as Amadis de Gaulle ). The knight play subsequently became very fashionable. The action time is almost always the Middle Ages, whereby historical truthfulness was neither realized by the authors nor demanded by the audience. The actions include family feuds, lovers from warring sexes, hidden family relationships, intrigues, power struggles, crusades with clashes between Christians and Muslims, murders and duels in a class society. The dramatic patterns worked up to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ( Götz von Berlichingen , 1774) and Heinrich von Kleist , who enriched the genre with an otherwise unusual psychological depth effect in his "great historical knight play" The Käthchen von Heilbronn . Influences of the knight play also have an effect on early romantic opera, e.g. B. Undine by ETA Hoffmann and Euryanthe by Carl Maria von Weber (text book by Helmina von Chézy ). From around 1840 interest in this dramatic genre waned, while it was still alive in music theater (e.g. The Nibelungs by Heinrich Dorn , 1854).

Authors of knight plays were z. B. Elise Bürger ( Adelheid, Countess von Teck , 1800), Andreas Josef von Guttenberg ( Jakobine von Baiern, Countess of Holland , 1800), Heinrich Amann ( Der Bruderhass ), and Christian Heinrich Spiess ( Clara von Hoheneichen , 1791), the with his novel Das Petermännchen provided the material for the play with music by Karl Friedrich Hensler and the knight play Rudolf von Westerburg by Josef Georg Schmalz . The Ritterschauspiele were characterized by a direct and intensive language design with pathetic upsurges, which resulted in stereotypical phrases that made this genre very suitable for parodies. Apart from the dramas by Goethe and Kleist, no knight plays are staged at subsidized theaters.

Knight shows in rural areas

In the course of secularization , amateur actors in many villages were banned by the authorities from performing Passion and sacred plays, which were also sponsored by Jesuit brotherhoods. This ban left a gap in dramatically usable situations for amateur ensembles .

The rural knight play also emerged from the imitation of knight play performances by traveling theater groups, and replaced the sacred games. As early as the 18th century, acts of saints were expanded to include secular characters and conflict situations, so the transition to knight drama was fluid. The authors took over stories from chivalric novels and also used materials from German folk books and sagas . Famous and influential were e.g. B. different dramatic variants of the Genofeva saga.

Employment-oriented authors used all possible means to increase the tension and overwhelm their audience, while lay authors like Josef Georg Schmalz rely on a linear structure with firmly structured action patterns. The avoidance of erotic or strongly passionate twists and a strict black and white drawing of the stage characters differentiates the rural from the knight drama for professional ensembles. Adaptations from chivalric novels of Goethe's time directly from the printed editions or from transcripts and other communication channels were only made if the plot could be adapted to the dualistic poetic system of the folk drama.

Rural knight spectacles were never published in print when they were made, but only in handwriting and transcripts. In rural areas, the knight play lasted longer than in professional theaters, around 1900. From around 1900 amateur games had similar patterns of action. Up until around 1900, rural knight plays were performed primarily at village theaters in Bavaria and Tyrol (Flintsbach, Endorf, Brixlegg, Kufstein, etc.). The Kiefersfelden Ritterschauspiele play a rural knightly play every summer.

The imperial knighthood, which existed until 1806, as an inspiring reminiscence

The imperial knighthood , which existed as a recognized corporation from 1495 to 1806 , which had been divided into the three knight circles of Swabia , Franconia and Rhineland since 1577 and to which the knighthood in Lower Alsace also belonged until 1680 , promoted the literarily inspiring reminiscence of the knighthood even after the end the actual knighthood, for which Emperor Maximilian I (HRR) stood as the "last knight". Heilbronn am Neckar, which until 1803 was a free imperial city and until 1806 the seat of the knight's canton Kraichgau of the Swabian knightly circle of the imperial knighthood, is an example of a setting where the memory of the knighthood through dramas such as Goethe's 1773 work Götz von Berlichingen with the iron hand . A play and Kleist's work Das Käthchen von Heilbronn or the Trial by Fire, a great historical knight drama , published in 1810, was kept alive literarily and - at least terminologically - also by reality.

literature

  • JW appeal: The knight, robber and horror romance. On the history of German entertainment literature . Published by Wilhelm Engelmann, Leipzig 1859
  • Leopold Schmidt: The German Volksschauspiel. A manual . Erich Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1962
  • Hans Moser: People's play in the mirror of archival materials. A contribution to the cultural history of old Bavaria . (Bavarian writings on folklore published by the Commission for Bavarian State History / Bavarian Academy of Sciences / Institute for Folklore), Munich 1991
  • Festschrift der Ritterschauspiele Kiefersfelden 2011: Ezzelin the Cruel or The Shepherd's Flute . Texts by Roland Dippel. Theatergesellschaft Kiefersfelden, Kiefersfelden 2011
  • Festschrift der Ritterschauspiele Kiefersfelden 2012: Helena, daughter of the mighty Emperor Antonius of Greece . Texts by Roland Dippel. Theatergesellschaft Kiefersfelden, Kiefersfelden 2012
  • Festschrift of the knight shows Kiefersfelden 2013: Rudolf von Westerburg or Das Pettermännchen , freely based on Christian Heinrich Spieß (Theatergesellschaft Kiefersfelden - texts by Roland Dippel)
  • Festschrift of the knight drama Kiefersfelden 2014: Valentinus and Ursinus (Theatergesellschaft Kiefersfelden - texts by Roland Dippel)
  • Festschrift of the Ritterschauspiele Kiefersfelden 2015: Weinhard and Adelise, designed by Andreas Grottner (Theatergesellschaft Kiefersfelden - texts by Roland Dippel)
  • Festschrift der Ritterschauspiele Kiefersfelden 2016: Saint Sebastian or: From the general to the martyr (Theatergesellschaft Kiefersfelden - texts by Roland Dippel)
  • Roland H. Dippel: Fantastic anniversary and historical gaps: Kiefersfeldens Ritterschauspiele, an undeveloped sacral play substitute in Schönere Heimat, 105th year, 2016, issue 3, pp. 201–210 (publisher: Bayerischer Landesverein für Heimatpflege eV, Munich, ISSN 0177-4492)