As in life as in a dream

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As in life as in a dream is a piece by Tankred Dorst from 1989, the text of which was published by Suhrkamp in 1990. In 1995 no stage had yet taken on the production.

content

Richard Hecht, a bald man, pretends to be a philosophy student with the young Katharina Schöfle and shows a newspaper article in which Katharina is presented as a phenomenon. Katharina burst a lightbulb in her employer's shop - by virtue of her own intellectual potency - and was therefore dismissed. Now she is looking for a new job. Katharina just found it, claims Hecht after Katharina whispered to him that she had telekinesis sent her own father to the afterlife. Papa had repeatedly spanked her for her magical powers. As a punishment, Katharina had driven her father's truck with father into a ravine from the living room at home. In Hecht's newly founded “Institute”, Katharina appears as a “magical person”. The company deals with two customers in the play. Both Mr. Kammholtz and the aged, bald-headed Lena Schrimpf - called Bérénice - would each like to communicate with a certain beloved dead person. Both customers openly doubt the visionary abilities of the magical person Katharina, who acts mysteriously in the blue kimono. For example, Mr. Kammholtz cannot contact his dead son Hannes - a suicide - nor does the former dancer Bérénice meet the deceased " Minotaur " Jonathan Hope Randall in the séances in her apartment . The clairvoyant Katharina has at least "success" with the suicide. The dead Hannes Kammholtz appears to her and is however upside down. Hannes even asks Katharina to jump out of the window: “Come with me!” But the “medium” isn't that stupid either. When Hannes makes his second appearance at the end of the play - this time he wants to drag the cheerful, capable young woman into the afterlife with a big iron hook - the attacked defends herself successfully.

Hecht peeps his employees under the covers at night and pulls her shirt up to her neck. Even during the day, the boss has a firm grip on Katharina in all situations. There are occasional slaps in the face. The chastised woman endures the torture in silence. In addition, two young troublemakers intervene in the spiritualistic sessions - Katharina's current friend Jossi and Hecht's fat 15-year-old son Leo. Tankred Dorst lists the 22-year-old Jossi as a student under “People”, but Katharina introduces him to her new boss as an actor. Jossi denies that on the spot, but then he has the prospect of a film role. The audience can believe that, because Katharina's lover sometimes plays the “ Striker Jew ” on the street . If Jossi believes that an anti-Semite is facing him, he doesn't calm down until the "Jews out!" Leo's interest in Katharina does not go unnoticed by Bérénice either. The lustful old woman comments that he runs after Katharina "with a stiff tail". What Bérénice doesn't know - Leo calls Jossi gay several times before Katharina . Katharina ignores this as a remark from a stupid boy. When Leo became interested in the upper thigh areas of his father's colleague, the approaching Katharina lifted the skirt a little for the pubescent . Jossi and Leo have one thing in common with their two customers - a strong aversion to spiritualism. Another storyline is touched in this context. Tankred Dorst has built in a small criminal case. However, he remains quite a long way from its solution. Bérénice has money and a Chinese jewelry box with gold, rough diamonds and four solitaires in it. The robber duo Hecht and Katharina cannot get hold of the treasures. They flee from Bérénice's burning apartment. The householder accidentally started the fire. Tankred Dorst makes a leap forward of four weeks. Hecht has hung up the necromancy and is plowing a whole new field of business. The entrepreneur and Kathi - as he tastes his employee in loving moments - are now making porn . Again a newspaper clipping gets the action rolling. This time it is not Hecht who shows the scrap of paper, but his son Leo. The " Brillies " are gone and the police are looking for the robbery murderer Bérénices. Although Hecht does not appear to be the culprit, as a man who has already been in prison, he has powerful respect for the law enforcement agency and runs away. During his lifetime, Bérénice called the refugee a “puddle of milk”.

Tankred Dorst doesn't offer a happy ending. Katharina can still demonstrate her magical power to the audience in her big appearance with Jossi. As she adores her lover, the light bulb bursts in the lamp above the couple. Katharina has bad cards despite her apparent "mental strength". Jossi needs "being alone" and Kathi is there once again solo.

Quote

  • "A man is a man as long as he can, but a woman is a woman forever."

reception

  • For this " satyr game with myths " Hensel finds the analogy to a game of "deception, bluff and mystery", the cards of which are turned over. But then stop the game. Description of the world dominates before explanation.

literature

expenditure

Secondary literature

  • Tankred Dorst: The Shadow Line and Other Pieces. Collaboration with Ursula Ehler. Edition 6 (content: Parzival. Fernando Krapp wrote this letter to me. Mr. Paul. To Jerusalem. The shadow line. The history of the arrows). Epilogue: Günther Erken. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1995 (1st edition), without ISBN, 375 pages.
  • Gero von Wilpert : Lexicon of world literature . German Authors A-Z . Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-520-83704-8 , p. 126, left column

Remarks

  1. ↑ See the edition used under “Literature” in this article.
  2. ↑ The entrepreneurial Hecht was already a real estate agent, “special-effect man” in the film industry and sold car tires.
  3. ↑ For the expression “Stürmerjude” see, for example, the entry “ Philipp Rupprecht ” in the Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie ( ADB ) under “Life”.
  4. ↑ for example: A man is a man as long as he can, but a woman remains a woman.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Edition used, p. 442, 11. Zvu
  2. ↑ Recognition in the afterword of work edition 6, p. 361, 3rd Zvo
  3. ↑ Edition used, p. 385, 21. Zvo
  4. ↑ Edition used, p. 413, 7th Zvu
  5. ↑ Edition used, p. 381, 11. Zvo
  6. ↑ Edition used, p. 381, 11. Zvo
  7. ↑ Edition used, p. 381, 20. Zvo
  8. ↑ Edition used, p. 411, 10. Zvo
  9. ↑ Edition used, p. 368, 1. Zvu
  10. ↑ Edition used, p. 412, 19. Zvo
  11. ↑ Hensel in the afterword of the edition used, pp. 442–444
  12. ↑ see also Eisenhans (film)