Wilhelm Pevny
Wilhelm Pevny (born June 15, 1944 in Wallersdorf , Lower Bavaria ) is an Austrian writer and screenwriter .
life and work
Wilhelm Pevny was born in his mother's hometown in Lower Bavaria; When the father returned from American captivity in 1947, he brought his wife and son to bombed-out post-war Vienna. Pevny grew up in Brigittenau , a Viennese working-class district.
In his pamphlet “The Forgotten Goals - Do the 68ers want to steal away?” He wrote in 1988: “I believe I can say that my parents lived a so-called model marriage, not by appearance, but - as far as I could tell - really, that is, you could feel that they liked each other and were nice to me. Nevertheless, at the age of twenty, when I leave the parental home, I am one of the bitterest opponents of the nuclear family ... When I read Wilhelm Reich's mass psychology of fascism , in which Reich describes the connection between the nuclear family and the aggressive adaptability that erupts in epochs. "
Pevny first studied theater studies and German studies in Vienna , then went to Paris in 1967 , where he worked as a teacher at the Berlitz language school until 1969 and became “from a liberal humanist to an angry leftist” through the bloody police violence in the streets of Paris.
During short stays in Vienna to finish his studies, his play Flipper was performed on the occasion of the establishment of the café theater ( brought to life by Götz Fritsch , Hilde Berger and Dieter Haspel ) in 1968, followed in 1969 by Oedip remembrance . Ellen Stewart , director of the La Mama Theater New York , saw the play in Vienna and engaged Pevny and Fritsch to New York, where Pevny's experimental play Sprintorgasmics premiered. The actors, trained in the tradition of the body-hugging Living Theater , acted naked on stage in New York; At the same time, "Sprintorgasmics" was reminiscent of ancient Greek theater thanks to its rhythmic chorus.
When the play was performed in 1971 at the Vienna Volkstheater under the direction of Gustav Manker in a double premiere with Peter Turrinis Rozznjogd , also under the direction of Götz Fritsch, public and press reactions were divided. With the exception of Arthur West in the Volksstimme and that of Fitz Walden in the Arbeiter-Zeitung, press votes were largely negative.
In 1972 Pevny made a guest appearance at the Mickery Theater in Amsterdam with the play Rais , the life story of Gilles de Rais , a colleague of Joan of Arc , who believed he could win gold from children's blood , on nine stages .
Between 1973 and 1980, in collaboration with Peter Turrini, he wrote the scripts for the six-part television series Alpensaga , directed by Dieter Berner, and the television film Der Bauer und der Millionär , directed by Axel Corti . In working on the Alpensaga scripts, Pevny explicitly intended to present history and historiography from the perspective of the population, in contrast to the previous historiography from the perspective of the rulers, for him a balancing act between political responsibility and artistic claim.
Pevny went to Bali for several months after finishing work . In 1979, after Johann Nestroy, The Two Night Walkers or the Necessary and the Superfluous, the piece The Dream of Happiness was created . The revolutionary spirit of 1848 is spun on here with the experiences of 1968.
Pevny's work is initially divided into an experimental phase and a political one, which culminates in the documentary film Safari - The Journey , which critically illuminates South Africa in the apartheid regime , filmed in Mozambique in 1985 , premiered in 1987 in the Votive Cinema in Vienna . The day after the film was presented in Mozambique in 1988 , an attack was carried out on the activist of the ANC ( African National Congress ) Albie Sachs , who is involved in Safari - The Journey . Albie Sachs survived seriously injured, lost an arm and an eye. Pevny's massive efforts to make this public in the Austrian press failed. In 1991 the film was broadcast by ORF . Pevny, who had previously taken a political stance in glosses and feature pages, withdrew from the public by means of a press release to the APA .
After years of silence, he decided to start a theater production again ( Bouvard & Pécuchet , stage version based on the novel by Gustave Flaubert ) in the suburban theater echoraum . Then came the radio play One Hour World - A Disruption .
Pevny subsequently wrote several radio plays for Austrian and Bavarian radio; the novel Trance was published in 1999 by edition echoraum . In 2008 Wieser Verlag added Roman Palmenland to its program and in 2009 the volume of stories Luft . With Palmenland , Pevny returned to experimentation and artistic expression while maintaining his political background.
In 2014 he received the City of Vienna Prize for Literature .
Work overview
- Flipper first performance in 1968 in the Cafétheater Wien (today Ensemble Theater Wien )
- News are based on TV film. with Herbert Brödl
- Sprintorgasmics premiered in 1969 at La Mama Theater in New York
- Sprintorgasmic German premiere in 1971 at the Vienna Volkstheater
- Rais premiered in 1972 at the Mickery Theater Amsterdam
- Alpensaga TV series. 1973–1980 with Peter Turrini
- The Farmer and the Millionaire TV movie. 1975. Directed by Axel Corti
- Young people need love film. 1976. with Käthe Kratz
- The Dream of Happiness First performance in 1978 at the Akademietheater (Vienna)
- Safari - The Journey Movie. 1985. Written and directed by Wilhelm Pevny
- Have a nice weekend. First performance in 1986 at the Ensemble Theater Vienna
- The man who couldn't love stories. 1986 Edition S ( Austrian State Printing Office )
- The African Journey Tanzania Illustrated literary book. 1987. Text Wilhelm Pevny, photos Hubert Schatzl
- The forgotten goals. Do the 68ers want to steal away? Another speech about Austria. 1988. European publishing house Vienna-Zurich
- Winner loser tales. 1988. European publishing house Vienna-Zurich
- Take it easy First performance in 1989 at the Ensemble Theater Vienna
- Bouvard & Pécuchet adaptation of the novel of the same name by Gustave Flaubert. First performance in 1997 in the echoraum Vienna
- The Banquet Theater adaptation of the short story The Dead by James Joyce . 1999. World premiere in the echoraum Vienna
- Trance novel. 1999 edition echoraum ISBN 3901941010
- Palm Country Roman. 2008. Wieser Verlag ISBN 9783851296778
- Air narratives. 2009. Wieser Verlag ISBN 9783851298352
Radio plays
- Wilhelm Pevny: One Hour World. Director: Nikolaus Scholz , Contributors: Günter Einbrodt , Joe Remick , Gordon Catlin , Martin Engler , Bjarne Mädel , 60 min., ORF / WDR 1999.
Web links
- Literature by and about Wilhelm Pevny in the catalog of the German National Library
- Diploma thesis by Elisabeth Winkelhofer on the website of the University of Vienna univie.ac.at
- Review of air by Klaus Ebner in the literary magazine Etcetera
personal data | |
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SURNAME | Pevny, Wilhelm |
BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Austrian writer, screenwriter |
DATE OF BIRTH | June 15, 1944 |
PLACE OF BIRTH | Wallersdorf , Lower Bavaria |