Victor or The Children in Power
Victor or The Children in Power is a surrealist play by Roger Vitrac . It was premiered in 1928 under the original title "Victor ou les Enfants au pouvoir".
roll
- Emilie Paumelle: Victor's mother
- Charles Paumelle: Victor's father
- Victor Paumelle: A child prodigy
- Thérèse Magneau: Esther's mother / lover
- Antoine Magneau: Esther's father / cuckold
- Esther Magneau: cuckoo child
- General Etienne Lonsegur: friend of the Paumelle family
- Ida Totemar: A visitor
- Lili: The girl
- A grande dame
- A doctor
content
Victor is a "terribly intelligent" boy who drives his father Charles to despair at the celebration of his ninth birthday by discovering the relationship between his father and her mother Therése together with his six-year-old friend Esther. Even the housemaid Lili, who is the first to notice Victor's sneaky manner, is said to have a liaison with his father. The victim of this exposed situation is especially Victor's mother Emelie, who has to watch almost idly as her apparently intact family world is destroyed. Crazy, but perhaps the only one who can see through, is Therese's husband Antoine, who describes himself as a cuckold and thus clearly recognizes the prevailing situation. But not only the parents are victims. The good-natured general and old friend of the house, Etienne Lonsegur, is also mocked and demoted to the delight of Victor. Likewise, the seemingly absurd visitor Ida Totemar succumbs to Victor's childish charm, until Victor humiliates her in front of the audience. Only the pantomime role of the grande dame and the doctor who accompanies the last few minutes of Victor's life are spared.
Background of the piece
Vitrac's surrealistic piece is a parody of the staid salon pieces of its time. You can find the typical staff here. But Vitrac turns the roles. Victor, who was two meters tall on his 9th birthday, destroys the idyllic world of adults and brings down its construct of lies. Roger Vitrac takes up sensitive issues for the French. The focus is on the Franco-German War of 1870/71. Antoine Magneau, who lost his mind due to the war, indicts Marshal François-Achille Bazaine and reports his life story amid the celebrations. The decisive defeat of Napoléon III. in Sedan is the subject of his speeches. So the madness of the war invades the celebrations again and again. This is of course a hit for the general, because he wants to turn Victor into a cuirassier . Church criticism can also be read from the play. Charles makes it clear, emotionally very agitated, that his son will never become a "priest". He justified this with the fact that he came from a family that had been Republicans for generations. In addition to descriptive names (e.g. French paumelle : door hinge; on magneau, see agneau : lamb) Vitrac also uses puns; the name of Marshal Bazaine reminds us that the battle of Sedan was decided in the battle for Bazeilles , and there is a fear in the play that Esther will fall into the basin .
Productions (selection)
- 1928: First performance by Antonin Artaud
- 1962: Jean Anouilh at the Théâtre de l'Ambigu-Comique , Paris
- 1977: Hans Neuenfels at the Burgtheater Vienna
- 1987: Rolf Winkelgrund at the Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin
- 2016: Moritz Sostmann at the Schauspiel Köln
expenditure
- Victor ou les enfants au pouvoir . Paris: Gallimard, 1988 ISBN 2-07-070061-5
- German translation at VDB
Individual evidence
- ↑ Neues Deutschland, December 23, 1987, p. 6
- ↑ Martin Krumbholz: Joke without a bottom . Critique, in: Süddeutsche Zeitung , April 4, 2016, p. 18