Jens Harzer © Sepp Dreissinger
Sandra Hüller © Kirsten Becken
Jens Harzer / Sandra Hüller
Heinrich von Kleist: Penthesilea
Monday
6
November
2023
19:30
Mozart-Saal
Performers
Jens Harzer, Lesung
Sandra Hüller, Lesung
Programme
Heinrich von Kleist
Penthesilea. Ein Trauerspiel
Strichfassung: Vasco Boehnisch
Note
Medienpartner Ö1 Club
Subscription series
Literatur im Konzerthaus
Presented by
Wiener Konzerthausgesellschaft
Kleist's »Radikaldramatik«: Penthesilea, the Amazon Queen
Heinrich von Kleist's tragedy »Penthesilea« would in itself have offered a truly cinematic material: The Amazon queen Penthesilea, bound by the »law of women«, rules over her womenfolk and goes to war with them. However, the law of the Amazons does not foresee that a battle-hardened Amazon queen falls in love with the hero Achilles of all people ... The blank verse drama with its »radical drama« was considered by Kleist's contemporaries to be an absolute taboo-breaker: both in terms of its content and its formal design. For a long time, the play had the reputation of being unperformable. Kleist's intensive use of dramaturgical means such as the messenger's report and the Teichoscopie (wall show) called into question the archetype of the theatrical, a visible stage action, and left many events solely to the inner eye of the reader - not least in order to conceal the horrific deed of the raging Penthesilea from the sense of sight. A reading of the drama of the soul in the shadowy realm of love and madness is provided by Sandra Hüller and Iffland Ring bearer Jens Harzer.
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