Chapter 2

Discourses

A theatre which is cognisant of its ethnic roots fights in the front line […] in the eternal struggle for racial and völkisch survival.¹

The key texts the Nazis constantly referred to as providing the basis of their political and cultural ideology (besides Hitler’s Mein Kampf and Rosenberg’s Der Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts, primarily Oswald Spengler’s Der Untergang des Abendlandes, Joseph Arthur Gobineau’s Essai sur l’inégalité des races humaines [Paris: Librairie de Firmin Didot Frères, 1853], Houston Stewart Chamberlain’s Die Grundlagen des 19. Jahrhunderts and Hans F. K. Günther’s Rassenkunde writings) not only stressed the superiority of the Germanic/Aryan race and the need for this race to dominate others but also emphasised that any form of cultural expression was racially determined. According to Hitler, the Aryan race was the only race on the planet which was able to establish new cultures (Kulturbegründer).² In his theories Hitler followed Spengler, who related his attempt to “predetermine history” to the one culture on earth which, according to him, at the beginning of the twentieth century “had achieved perfection, i.e. the Western European/American”, but which was now facing terminal decline.³ Chamberlain called for a “rebirth” of the German nation based on a rediscovery of her Germanic roots.⁴ Acknowledging the importance of both Spengler and Chamberlain, Günther’s studies provided the quasi-scientific basis for such claims of dominance. In a substantial oeuvre Günther asserted the superiority of the “Nordic race” – residing primarily in Germany and Scandinavia – in relation to all others (including the Western [westische] race). The Nordic man was blond with blue eyes, and taller than any other.⁵ Not surprisingly, “in medieval times German men […] were seen as the most handsome in the occident”.⁶ “Power of judgement, truthfulness and energy” were primary character traits of the Nordic race, which had, according to Günther, produced a disproportionally high number of highly gifted, pro-active and creative people.⁷ Günther related the particular courage and audaciousness he attributed to the Nordic race to aggressive expansion and conflict, too. According to his thinking, the eastward expansion of the German Ritterorden and the Hanseatic League in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, for example, and the “movement of German citizens and peasants towards the East”, where they “founded the German power over the Baltic Sea”, were entirely natural and, therefore, justified. Over the following centuries, however, a growing “Entnordung” (a process of becoming less Nordic) had taken place in the countries where the Nordic race primarily resided. This was caused and further compounded by the influence of the Slavs and other “inferior” Eastern races, although “the German people resisted the Slavic blood for a long time”.⁸ According to Günther, “Entnordung” was fatal, as the racial deterioration would be followed by a social one with effects on the general character of societies. This would result in rising crime rates and soaring costs related to caring for people with lower abilities, productivity and health.⁹ For Günther and others this challenge was all the more serious since in the past nations had always faced decline as soon as the proportion of the Nordic influence in their blood stream was reduced.¹⁰ The “Entnordung” would therefore deprive the Germans of their most important racial “ingredient” and reverse the development of the German nation from being destined to rule to being doomed to disintegrate.¹¹ Looking forward, Günther saw two linked solutions: to increase the number of children of Nordic couples and to reduce the number of children of couples with “inferior hereditary dispositions”, for example by linking their access to health care and medical treatment to a “racial hygiene” campaign, i.e. making them infertile.¹² Günther’s theories were particularly dangerous as he claimed not only that the “Nordic race” was superior over others but also that it was under growing and increasingly debilitating pressure from an aggressive inferior racial influence. The extinction of the German nation seemed a very real prospect, as Günther suggested a watershed moment in history.¹³ Germans were called on to turn this development around quickly and substantially – nothing less than the survival of Germany was at stake.¹⁴ The euthanasia programme of the late 1930s, the increasing anti-Semitic measures leading up to the Holocaust, and the military campaign for “living space” in the East can all be linked to Günther’s infamous theories of the 1920s.¹⁵

Günther’s theory of the Nordic man as both a born leader and as one who was culturally productive, idealistic and intelligent proved a fertile ground for theories of German domination in the arts, too. Directly or indirectly, the “Rasse-Günther”, as he was referred to during the Third Reich, influenced a whole generation of writers, practitioners and cultural politicians. Chamberlain dedicated a large section of his Foundations of the 19th Century to the arts (over 50 pages in the culmination of his second volume) and concluded that the Germanic man was the most musical human being on earth, and music a specifically Germanic art form.¹⁶ Similarly, Rosenberg in his Mythus dedicated half of his book to the “Character of Germanic Art” and argued for the racial determination of any form of aesthetic expression.¹⁷ Günther’s theories also influenced the way literary and theatre scholars discussed dramatists and their works. Shakespeare, for example, one of the mainstays in German repertoires, was interpreted as the archetypal Germanic, even “Aryan” playwright.¹⁸ His portrait was examined by “racial experts”, who conveniently proclaimed that this revealed “solidly Nordic features”.¹⁹ Theatre scholar Otto zur Nedden concluded in 1942 that “racially” Shakespeare “undoubtedly” belonged to the “Nordic cultural sphere”.²⁰ This and other similar comments gave legitimacy to national dramaturge Rainer Schlösser’s assertion that no other nation had a similarly justifiable claim on Shakespeare – not even Britain.²¹ Referring to Günther and linking to his theory that “race” was the determining factor in people’s character, Nazi commentators asserted that Shakespeare’s “Nordic genes” also resulted in his thinking and writing being völkisch.²² It was Günther himself who attempted to provide the textual evidence for these claims in an academic article for the prestigious Shakespeare-Jahrbuch journal in which he considered “Shakespeare’s Girls and Women” from a eugenic perspective. It was vital for the survival of a people to make sure that the “racially superior” members of the community chose similarly equipped partners in order for the race to “improve,” Günther claimed – and the behaviour of Shakespeare’s characters provided the perfect template for this.²³ A number of new Shakespearean translations appeared during the 1930s and early 1940s which reflected Günther’s racial theories, too.²⁴ In 1936, for example, Hermann Kroepelin wrote to the Propaganda Ministry detailing his “concerns” in relation to the character of Jessica in The Merchant of Venice as the 1935 Race Laws made her relationship to Lorenzo no longer “desirable”.²⁵ He suggested adding “a mere three lines” and changing the play’s ending “ever so slightly”. Another adaptation, by Heinz Sailer, which made Jessica Shylock’s foster child but not his biological daughter and eliminated all positive remarks about Jews in the play, was produced in Erfurt in 1939.²⁶

Productions across Germany began to be judged according to their “racial merit” alongside their aesthetic and artistic qualities, too. When Heinz Hilpert opened his tenure at the famous Deutsches Theater in 1934 with As You Like It, the production of this seemingly inconspicuous play was judged not only for its romantic interpretation, its playfulness and its talented cast, but also for its qualities from a racial perspective.²⁷ The reviewer for the Völkischer Beobachter, Grube, claimed that

the poet shows us […] how the wholesome race, like superior blood, wins through against oppressive forces. Oliver, heir to baronial estates, deliberately neglects his brother Orlando, aims to vilify him as a mere servant in order to enjoy the substantial inheritance himself. But he gets it wrong. Orlando’s noble blood rebels; he claims and ekes out a place beside his brother, who is eventually forced to give in and to share the inheritance with him.²⁸

It may be debatable whether Hilpert aimed for such an interpretation; the key point here is that Günther’s theories found their way into a performance discourse. The most infamous production in this sense was certainly Lothar Müthel’s The Merchant of Venice, which was produced in Vienna in 1943 with Werner Krauß as Shylock. Richard Biedrzynski praised Krauß for his ability to present Shylock as “repugnant”, “alien” and “disgusting”: “Krauß plays the Jew in a way in which the Jew himself would never be able to due to his unimaginative character”.²⁹ Reviewing the same production, and aligning it with Günther’s theories, Karl Lahm celebrated Krauß’s depiction of Shylock:

The affected way of shuffling along, the hopping and stamping about in a rage, the clawing hand gestures, the raucous or mumbling voice – all this makes up the pathological picture of the East European Jewish type in all his external and internal human dirtiness.³⁰

In turning his focus on the audience, Heinz Kindermann, professor of theatre studies at the University of Vienna, an eminent and respected scholar and Germany’s leading theatre historian, linked the theatrical experience to aspects of race and blood:

The communality of the blood along with the stirring dramatic idea and its realisation onstage, the rousing harmony of word and echo, of monologue and objection, of gesture and costume, of mask, mime and stage design, of light and colour, of rhythm and music, tantalise audiences which are of one race in equal measure for one evening, irrespective of where they came from emotionally, geographically or socially.³¹

Although not explicitly referring to Günther here, Kindermann clearly reflected Günther’s theories of racial purity, i.e. that only audiences of one single blood/ race could truly come together as one, enjoying and experiencing an evening in the theatre properly and as a communal event. This also meant that the experience of going to the theatre was removed from an aesthetic discourse and instead became almost a biological issue. Following Kindermann, Herbert Petersen asserted that witnessing a performance led to audiences experiencing their “national soul” (Seele der Volkheit), their belonging to the same national community.³² In 1943 Kindermann summed up the function of the German theatre overall as the first line of defence in the “constant struggle for the preservation of our racial and völkisch being”.³³

Theatre

The application of racial theories in a performance context was a new dimension during the Third Reich, while the lively discourse around theatre and its role in society was not. But what drove the Nazis to the theatre? What could theatre provide for the regime which other art forms could not? First of all, the Nazi leadership in general was keen to appear cultured and interested in classical architecture, music, museums, galleries, opera and theatre.³⁴ Hitler, or so Ludwig Körner, president of the Reich Theatre Chamber, claimed, was “not only Germany’s first statesman but also her first artist”.³⁵ Although this interest was certainly genuine among some Nazi politicians, it also helped to establish a particular image and recommend the party to middle class Germans not necessarily close to it. These middle class Germans went to the theatre in the millions each year, as a matter of course. Theatre was popular, it was well provided for by existing systems of funding, and it was well established through a network of modern playhouses across Germany. When the Nazis came to power, the theatre was at the heart of Germany’s cultural life, and Berlin’s vibrant theatre scene (although largely rejected by the Nazis as only producing “filth”) had turned the city into arguably the most exciting theatre capital of the world. Not surprisingly, this was an attractive proposition for the Nazis. The regime put vast amounts of money and significant effort into supporting the performing arts even further, promoting the new Germany’s image as a cultured nation and a dedicated patron of the arts.³⁶ On the occasion of the Reich Theatre Festival in Vienna in June 1938, for example, Goebbels claimed that Germany was “the mother country of world theatre” and the one nation on earth which had always provided the necessary theatrical impulses and innovations.³⁷

But it was not only the material conditions which attracted the Nazis to the theatre but also a lively discourse around its role in society, which since the second half of the eighteenth century had taken on a decidedly political tone. According to this discourse, not only was it the theatre’s role to preserve the nation’s cultural heritage; it was also meant to contribute to establishing it in the first place in a politically divided country. Nazi commentators were fascinated by this political function and the way in which theatre was “charged” to create a truly German drama and – by doing so – to contribute to the establishment of a German nation state.³⁸ “If we witnessed the establishment of a National Theatre, we would become a nation, too”, Friedrich Schiller had stated in late eighteenth century Germany.³⁹ This development was particularly interesting for right-wing commentators as it happened against the backdrop of and in opposition to the overwhelming political and cultural influence of a foreign nation – revolutionary France.⁴⁰ Another factor which the Nazis exploited was the fact that discourses around play-going changed as well during this time. Increasingly, commentators stressed that going to and supporting the theatre went beyond a mundane need for entertainment. Instead, theatre was to become part of a philosophical and socio-political discourse, discuss the burning questions of the time and become a “temple of the muses”. Johann Christoph Gottsched, the most influential critic of his time, wrote in 1730 that “poetry was invented for superior reasons than solely to make people more sumptuous and voluptuous. To play a buffoon is no laudable craft”.⁴¹ This understanding of theatre as something elevated, sublime and superior continued in Lessing’s studies on dramaturgy and the national thea-tre, and in Schiller’s theoretical writings.⁴² The theatre, Schiller posited, was the place “where enjoyment meets with instruction, relaxation with effort, diversion and cultural education [Bildung]”.⁴³ By the mid-nineteenth century this discourse, although not necessarily reflected in theatre programmes across Germany, had entered the bourgeois mainstream. In 1831 the German politician and philosopher Paul Pfizer claimed that it was only when seeing an opera or a play that the citizen would be able to understand “the way of the world and the laws of history” and become aware of his own “moral principles and his own intellectual freedom”.⁴⁴ This deep appreciation, veneration almost, of the theatre was soon seen as something typically German. Thomas Mann in his 1907 essay “The Theatre as Temple” claimed that

a deep respect for theatre is something we Germans are born with and receive an education for. No other nation is like this. What the rest of Europe sees as a social form of entertainment we see at least as a matter of cultural education (Bildungsfaktor).⁴⁵

Although neither Thomas nor his brother, Heinrich Mann, can in any way be accused of having harboured Nazi sympathies, and indeed both were driven out of Germany after the Nazi take-over, this quote exemplifies a discourse deeply ingrained in the German middle classes by 1933. Crucially, this discourse referred not only to the leading stages in Berlin, Munich and Hamburg, but also to the countless regional theatres. In 1931 Paul Bekker defined the civic theatre as “the motor of public life”,⁴⁶ and Bochum’s long-standing theatre manager, Saladin Schmitt, declared that regular attendance at the local theatre was part of the social responsibilities of every enlightened citizen.⁴⁷ Not surprisingly, Goebbels added his voice to this discourse by praising the “holy seriousness with which theatre has always been seen in Germany, not as a playful pastime but as a moral institution”.⁴⁸

Linked to this understanding of the role of theatre in society as a means of preserving the cultural heritage and as part of an active engagement in political discourse, as food for thought and as challenging long-held aesthetic traditions, has been a rejection of theatre as a purely entertaining pastime. In the early 1930s Saladin Schmitt summed up the ultimate goal of a German theatre visit as “the wish for ethical enrichment”. The typical audience member “wants to leave the theatre uplifted and strengthened in his self-confidence” after having experienced a performance which will “stick in one’s mind, something more deeply rooted than the wish for diversion”.⁴⁹ After the take-over the regime was acutely aware of the differences in the European context and stressed the superiority of the German appreciation of serious theatre. In 1941 the journal Die Bühne discussed the programmes of London theatres and stated – with obvious gratification – that with the sole exception of Shaw’s Heartbreak House London theatres presented only “shallow” entertainment.⁵⁰ The rejection of entertainment in this discourse has been based not only on its content, however, but also on its economic imperative. In his fascinating study on Modernism Peter Jelavich argued that for the theatre artists involved this movement was not solely about new forms of artistic expression but also represented a deliberate rejection of the profit driven character of the commercial theatre. In fact, they “deplored the fact that they were compelled to submit to market demands at all”.⁵¹ Instead, commentators argued for state subsidies to the performing arts, which were eventually realised from the late nineteenth century onwards. To provide this financial help not only was necessary but was one of the key objectives of the state. Historian Frank Möller posited that it was “these subsidies which afforded theatre directors with the financial independence to approach higher artistic goals in the first place”.⁵² Subsidies were eventually fully implemented after 1918, but, again, this development can be seen as part of a discourse which originated in the late eighteenth century. If we can prove that “the theatre contributes to people’s cultural education, its position as one of the first responsibilities of the state has been decided”, Schiller had asserted in 1784.⁵³ The Nazis were keen to be seen as part of this discourse. By relating to eighteenth century commentators, by looking after and promoting the classical repertoire and by increasing funding to theatres, the new regime endorsed its cultural credentials and hoped to improve its image. The street fighting days of the late 1920s were gone, and the Nazi Party of the mid-1930s was keen to present itself as an all-embracing people’s movement with serious cultural ambitions.

As indicated above, subsidies in Germany have not primarily been seen as a means of control and censorship but rather as providing the necessary financial framework, which not only made long-term artistic planning possible but also afforded theatres the possibility for experiments without the need for a keen eye to economic profitability. With an increasing number of theatres being taken over into municipal ownership after the First World War and under the auspices of the new democratic Weimar Republic, however, city councils also became acutely aware of the possibilities their provision of funding offered.⁵⁴ Already before 1914, when most theatres were still run as business enterprises, city councils had begun to offer financial assistance in the form of rent reductions, free heating or cash, in the hope of at least some influence on proceedings. For example, council members sat on executive boards, and sometimes they even had a majority. In the 1920s, when most German theatres had become fully subsidised, civic administrations formulated certain expectations linked to ongoing funding. These “expectations” were sometimes veiled and referred to public disturbances caused by certain plays, which theatres should avoid as they would involve the police, leading to possible closures.⁵⁵ The role of the police was a crucial lever for city administrations to influence repertoire choices. When the theatre in the Westphalian city of Hagen, for example, received its licence for theatrical entertainments (Theatererlaubnisschein) in 1921, the corresponding regional body (Bezirksausschuss) in Arnsberg made it clear that this was dependent on the local police’s supervision of the theatre’s “necessary artistic and moral reliability”.⁵⁶ Theatre managements themselves were keen to show that they presented a wholesome repertoire which justified their receipt of communal funding. In any case the established system of paying and receiving subsidies allowed the Nazi regime to control the theatrical output – at least in theory, although this control was often cautiously exercised – but this power certainly added to the theatre’s attraction for them. In effect, therefore, the Nazis benefitted from the significant change the German theatre landscape had undergone after 1918. When the Nazis came to power in 1933 they found in existence a national network of subsidised municipal and state theatres which could be influenced and monitored by the new Nazi city councils. Close links between politics and arts therefore had a precedent in Germany and facilitated the control of theatres by the regime after 1933.

Apart from an existing discourse and favourable material and administrative conditions the Nazi leadership also admired theatre and opera for their aesthetic and representative possibilities. The large scale festivals in Salzburg and Bayreuth, for example, provided a stage for political representation, while new festivals in Heidelberg, Bochum and Berlin seemed to testify to the regime’s openness to new artistic trends. High profile guest performances by the leading German stage, the Prussian State Theatre under Gustaf Gründgens, in German border regions (in Elbing, Beuthen, Kattowitz and Flensburg, for example), meanwhile, stressed the regime’s commitment to these areas – and beyond.⁵⁷ Aesthetically, only the best would do – as the touring activity mentioned above suggests. At the same time, theatre was meant to reach out to all social classes after 1933, and Goebbels was at pains to stress that now for the first time in Germany’s history working men and women had found their way into the theatre. Until then, the working classes had felt that theatres, as places of high culture, had not been open to them and had been forced to accept “the most simple amusement and insipid kitsch” for their entertainment, or so Goebbels claimed.⁵⁸ The corresponding ideal of a Volkstheater truly reaching out to mass audiences also had other advantages for the Nazis. In contrast to other, more personal leisure pursuits such as reading, mass events like theatre and opera performances allowed for the kind of collective experience the Nazis were keen for the individual to get absorbed in in other areas, too (such as sports and social events or political rallies).⁵⁹ This “normed entertainment” also linked to their overarching ideology, in which the collective always took precedence over the individual and thereby offered the possibility of control. Approved performances – if successful – sometimes ran for a long time and remained in theatre repertoires for years. Programme notes offered another chance to “invite” audiences to read performances in a particular way, making sure that the theatre played its part in celebrating and sustaining the regime because, after all, “drama is poeticised politics”.⁶⁰

Dramatic theory and dramaturgy

The roots of this discourse go back to the early days of the Nazi Party and played an important part in its ideology. A wide range of theoretical writings is testament to the official interest of the party as a whole and a good number of its key players (Hitler, Goebbels, Rosenberg, Frank and others) in all matters theatrical. This interest concerned theatre history and contemporary performance practice, performance theory, dramaturgy, theatre as an institution (and its political role), repertoires, acting and theatre architecture.⁶¹ Already starting in the 1920s right-wing dramatists, politicians and scholars had called for radical changes not only in repertoires but also in frameworks of production, both theoretically (dramaturgy and dramatic theory) and architecturally. According to these discourses, theatre during the Weimar Republic had moved away from its national and völkisch function and had produced “degenerate” fare in middle class spaces which did not reflect the national Volkstheater, the theatre for and of the people, which the Nazis were agitating for. The theatre was in need of fundamental rebuilding from the bottom up. The main reason for its “downfall” during the 1920s was quickly identified as the “decadent” Weimar Republic.⁶² The theatre had been reduced to being a mere “panopticon”;⁶³ it was controlled by “the Jews”⁶⁴ and had lost touch with true German values.⁶⁵ Nazi commentators rejected Max Reinhardt’s “virtuoso star theatre” as well as “psychological” naturalism and Epic theatre, Brecht’s alienation effects, Piscator’s montages, and stage designs inspired by Oskar Schlemmer and Walter Gropius.⁶⁶ In fact, the Nazis rejected Modernism almost in its entirety as “decadent”, as “cultural Bolshevism” and as inciting a communist world revolution. The challenge for the regime was, however, that right up to its very end a bespoke Nazi dramatic theory was never found – despite heated debates and a spate of publications.

Already long before 1933 right-wing dramatists such as Paul Ernst and Dietrich Eckart had called for a theatre of “formal neoclassicism”. The concept of a tightly structured, literary, heroic, almost religious, national drama had significant influence on theorists during the Third Reich.⁶⁷ Ernst was elevated to a prophet of the völkisch drama, a “seer and harbinger in dark days, one of the spiritual pioneers of our time”.⁶⁸ Uwe-Karsten Ketelsen has usefully identified two main currents of dramaturgical concepts during the Nazi years:⁶⁹ one which aimed at producing a “symbolical reality” onstage, and another which stressed the importance of an “elevated stylisation”. According to Ketelsen, Erwin Guido Kolbenheyer, Hanns Johst, Friedrich Bethge and Friedrich Wilhelm Hymnen belonged to the first; Ernst Bacmeister, Curt Langenbeck⁷⁰ and Eberhard Wolfgang Möller to the second group.⁷¹ In the theoretical debates the second group was the more influential, but the first proved more popular on the stage. One example of these debates was the detailed discussion about whether the future of German theatre lay with the “tragedy of fate” or the “drama of character”. Attempts to “elevate” the drama into a “tragedy of fate” can be related back to Ernst’s writings and were significantly modelled on ancient Greek drama. In doing so, Ernst, Langenbeck and Möller turned against Shakespeare.⁷² Shakespeare, in turn, was the model for the “drama of character” fraction, and Shakespeare for them was the Germanic-Nordic poet par excellence. The discussion consumed considerable energies and lasted for years without arriving at any tangible resolution.⁷³ It was also from the start a more or less philosophical debate because the regime prohibited the dramatisation of a number of topics and thus heavily restricted dramatists’ choices. The “National Revolution” of 1933, for example, was a no go, Nazi uniforms could not be used either, etc.

Dramaturgical debates were accompanied by arguments about performance practice and whether acting should be based on the mimic (Mimus) or on ethos. Critics of the mimic, which stressed the performative and individual, criticised this as profane and unable to express the classical, austere and metaphysical. They called for ethos, the only form able to portray heroic and hyper-individual ideas and ideals, they argued.⁷⁴ Proponents of ethos clearly feared the performative nature of the mimic theatre, in which a small gesture or a quick aside might question, even ridicule, grand heroic ideas.⁷⁵ Demands for ethos displayed in acting increased as Nazi Germany, after a phase of stabilisation, turned to aggressive expansion in 1938. Commentators who, following Ernst, had argued for the grand German tragedy now gained in influence. Interestingly, calls for a super-elevation of the drama were also supported by directors not normally close to the Nazi cause. Heinz Hilpert, director of the Berlin Deutsches Theater, in 1942 supported a new “religious drama”. Although he did not use the word “tragedy” and tried his best not to get involved in the theoretical debate, Hilpert’s thoughts nevertheless point towards a new national tragedy. He called for a “communal experience” linking stage and audience, a theatre of a “deeper reality” and an “eternal theatre”.⁷⁶

Overall, and as mentioned above, the theoretical discourse around theatre, performance and dramaturgy did not have any lasting effects and failed to create a genuine National Socialist dramatic theory.⁷⁷ Theorists such as Karl Künkler (writing in 1943) were frustrated that after ten years of National Socialist cultural politics and despite the fact that the “problems” had been clearly identified, these problems still persisted (Künkler referred to the lasting influence of Naturalism).⁷⁸ Dramatist Friedrich Wilhelm Hymnen lamented in 1942 that common ground had still not been found:

Concerning the dramatic form the differences are even more substantial. Some authors dissolve the form entirely using banal, sometimes ecstatic language in tattered scenes with no apparent overall structure. Others aim at the most demure severity and let the plot unwind in solemn play without interval based on the Greek tragedy. Others again […] aspire to entirely new ways and push out of the baroque picture frame stage and into open-air spaces which architecturally relate a lot better to our experience.⁷⁹

As late as 1944 commentators debated whether the present should be portrayed on the stage in the contemporary drama.⁸⁰ At the same time, the war as subject matter for tragedies was intensely discussed. Playwrights such as Möller, Langenbeck and Rehberg tried to answer these calls but received neither official recognition nor popular success.⁸¹ In the same year (1944) critic Paul Wilhelm Sucrow lamented that there were still performances in which the “type of the loose woman or girl from the degenerate metropolis is portrayed as more desirable than the full-fledged motherly girl”.⁸² Even worse for the many commentators who took part in the various debates was the fact that the performance practice hardly reflected any of the positions in theoretical discourse. Most dramatists and directors acted in “quite unprincipled” ways.⁸³

Thing plays

The one area where new approaches did play a significant role – at least for a time – was in relation to choric elements and their application in open-air performances. Although interest in a renaissance of choric elements for contemporary performance had been significant during the 1920s with respect to left-wing workers’ performances, proponents of the Thingspiel movement claimed they had come up with a genuinely new idea.⁸⁴ Linking back to ancient Greek theatre practice the Thingspiel chorus was meant to symbolise the people, the Volksgemeinschaft, for which the hero sacrificed himself.⁸⁵ In contrast to ancient Greece, however, the chorus was not meant to comment on the action or provide a context, but to be much more central to a plot in which ideas of consecration and communal experience played an important part.⁸⁶ In the mass theatre of the Thingspiel, which united thousands of spectators and practitioners, audiences gave up their individuality in favour of the collective. The spectators were meant not only to experience the collective, the Volksgemeinschaft, there and then but also to translate this experience into real life after the performance. Ideally, the Thingspiel was to become cultic theatre and represent National Socialism itself.

The spaces chosen for Thingspiel performances added to the concept of a cultic theatre. Theatres were built on “consecrated ground”, such as in Annaberg in Upper Silesia, or outside the Marienburg castle in West Prussia. Their architecture was to remind audiences not only of ancient Greek theatre spaces but also of Germanic sites where judgement was spoken “on mountains and on holy fields”.⁸⁷

The building programme for new Thing sites was ambitious. In the summer of 1935 20 sites were ready, and over 400 were planned all over Germany.⁸⁸ Commentators paid particular attention to the distinction between Thingspiel and bourgeois picture frame stages. In 1934 Wilhelm von Schramm published a catalogue of characteristics to compare the old with the new form of theatre.⁸⁹ Richard Euringer claimed that the Thingspiel had finally succeeded in replacing the outdated picture frame stage.⁹⁰ In a conscious sideswipe at the conventions of bourgeois theatre-going, Euringer stated that with the Thingspiel “there are no spectators. There are no good seats. There is only a nation and a site”.⁹¹ In the end, however, it was not the bourgeois theatre which came to an abrupt end but the Thingspiel movement itself. It was halted after only three years by Goebbels, for various reasons. Public enthusiasm for this new form of theatre had quickly evaporated. Political mass events, like the annual Nuremberg party rally or the march to the Munich Feldherrnhalle, seemed equally dramatic and used a similar aesthetic language.⁹² Apart from this, most of the Thingspiele simply lacked in quality, with a small pool of similar themes (such as Germany’s “re-awakening” or the unknown soldier of the Great War), simple and long-winded plots, slow movements with hundreds of extras, protagonists who seemed to be types rather than fully developed characters, and performances which sometimes lasted several hours and which required added stamina if the weather was not good enough. Although some contemporary commentators hoped that “for audiences the lack in dramatic tension is counterbalanced by the image of mass movement”, this did not seem to have convinced too many spectators.⁹³ By 1936 the Thingspiel movement was officially dead, and many of the commentators who had previously supported the idea now happily turned against it.

Figure 2.1 “‘Silesia’s Holy Mountain’ – a monument to thank the heroic youth”, from Hoffmann, “Annaberg”, Deutscher Osten (The German east), p. 107.

Put in a wider political context, the end of the Thingspiel movement coincided with a phase of relative consolidation after Hindenburg’s death in 1934 during which Hitler was keen to silence the more radical socialist wing of the Nazi Party and to put an end to its radical image. Instead, Hitler was now keen to present himself as the presidential statesman and leader of a movement which represented all Germans. He particularly targeted the middle classes, many of whom had been appalled by street fights between the SA (the Nazi Storm Troopers) and communists and feared a “Night of the Long Knives” targeting leading bourgeois and establishment figures in society. These changes affected the theatre, too. Plans for a radical shake-up of the German theatre landscape with a move away from traditional picture frame stages towards the open arenas discussed above alienated bourgeois theatre patrons. The official end to the Thingspiel experiment was, therefore, welcomed by middle class patrons. By the end of the 1930s, and with war looming, the debates about dramaturgy seemed petty anyway – nothing less than Germany’s entire cultural heritage was at stake now.⁹⁴

Theatre and war

The war offered new possibilities to place the arts at the heart of Nazi ideology. After all, the German theatre was “a mighty weapon in the hands of Germany’s leadership”.⁹⁵ The war had resulted in a situation where across Europe “German soldiers and German actors stood side by side”.⁹⁶ In contrast, the Allies not only had neglected the performing arts but had handed over the role of protecting Western civilisation to Germany. Already a few months into the war, for example, German newspapers gloated about the fact that whereas London and Paris theatres had been forced to close, Berlin’s playhouses were presenting opulently appointed productions.⁹⁷ Whereas British audiences suffered under blackouts and rationing and, crucially, were offered only shallow theatre productions appealing to audiences’ baser instincts rather than their intellectual capacities, Germany presented itself as a nation of culture.⁹⁸ Extended tours by Germany’s leading ensembles, lavish productions at home, rising subsidies and audience figures, and significant festivals all over the country were meant to show the world that Germany was defending Western civilisation against both the “barbarism” of the Bolsheviks and the nihilism of Anglo-American capitalism. Not surprisingly, the 1941 Mozart anniversary was turned into “the most comprehensive musical celebration to have been undertaken by the regime”.⁹⁹ The comprehensive claim on the Austrian Mozart is a good example of what the Nazis expected of the theatre, and the performing arts in general: to supply entertainment and edification both at home and in the war zones across Europe, and to create performances that could be used for propaganda purposes, even if this meant putting a spin on somebody’s nationality (Mozart, Shakespeare) or his/her work (such as the interpretation of Shaw’s work as anti-English or Hauptmann’s oeuvre as non-Naturalistic). Part of the aforementioned Mozart anniversary year, for example, was the labelling of the traditional Salzburg Festival in August 1941 as a Kriegsfestival (War Festival), with soldiers given priority attendance in tandem with more aggressively stressing Mozart’s Germanness and replacing the original Italian versions of Don Giovanni and Figaro with German ones using new libretti by Georg Schünemann.¹⁰⁰ Mozart’s strong links to Prague were exploited by the Protectorate administration both to stress Mozart’s Germanness and to establish Prague as a German city.¹⁰¹ And in Vienna Baldur von Schirach made the connection between Mozart and the present unmistakably clear when he claimed that celebrating Mozart during war was entirely fitting, as “those who draw their sword for Germany, also do it for him”.¹⁰²

Already in the mid-1930s Heinz Kindermann had argued for a greater involvement of the state in all matters theatrical, as the “possibilities” of the theatre remained underestimated. He posited that the state could and should do a lot more to use the theatre for political purposes and to “disable the academic

Figures 2.2–2.3 Pages from Mozart’s Don Giovanni (1941) – introduction, Houghton Library, Harvard University.

spirit once and for all”.¹⁰³ An increasingly belligerent discourse linked the arts to ethnic Germans’ “fight for survival” in hostile environments. When the Hermannstadt German theatre company performed Schiller’s Wilhelm Tell in Bucharest in early 1934, for example, a commentator praised the production as contributing to strengthening the “cultural armour” of ethnic Germans in Romania.¹⁰⁴ Just before the outbreak of war in 1939 Kindermann published an anthology of “young German poetry” from the Warthe and Weichsel regions.¹⁰⁵ In its preface he asserted that literature had played a significant part in the German resistance against the oppressive Polish state, and that the West Prussian and Warthegau regions had produced a “rich stream of poetic fighting spirit”.¹⁰⁶ Kindermann presented the chosen poetry from a one-dimensional perspective and solely as providing the mental strength for military conflict. Poems about the brave fighting during the First World War and the alleged oppression suffered at the hands of the Polish state prepared another generation for war – a war which thus appeared as a logical consequence of what these young poets wrote about. Overall, commentators developed strong links between war and culture precisely because this present struggle was not just about geographical or economic gains but about the very substance of the German people, their “creative spirit” (schöpferische Kraft). Wulf Bley claimed that “the art of war” (Kriegskunst) was closely related to Germany’s major cultural achievements as the two had always been intertwined.¹⁰⁷ On launching a brand new five volume history of German language and literature in 1941, the editors made the link between war and the arts unmistakably clear. They claimed that their publication was part of the war effort and contributed to a “spiritual reshaping” of Europe.¹⁰⁸ The regime put significant faith in the power of theatre to affect people’s political values, their courage and their belief in final victory. In the foreword to his “theatre almanac” Axel Kaun claimed in 1942 that it was the theatre first and foremost to which audiences turned in times of war, seeking uplift and an intense experience of the “drama of life”.¹⁰⁹ Matthias Wiemann in his discussion of Goethe’s Faust during the war (and relating to a successful run of the play at Hamburg in which he was performing the title role) claimed that canonical theatre and classical music played a crucial part in increasing people’s courage in times of war. Wiemann posited that sold out performances and a particular seriousness which he detected in audiences showed that they deliberately sought out these performances to become more steadfast and resilient.¹¹⁰ In occupied Norway, prestigious tours of the Hamburg State Opera and theatre were said to help build bridges between Germany and Norway and reduce anti-German sentiment in the Norwegian population. The much-publicised performances of the Berlin state opera, from its Wagner repertoire, in Hungary ahead of the German invasion of the Soviet Union in the spring of 1941 were deemed important for the German war effort (kriegswichtig) because they influenced the minds of “waverers”.¹¹¹ The presence of its world famous conductor, Wilhelm Furtwängler, could turn doubters to believers, and if the Berlin Philharmonic toured without its figure-head this could prove detrimental for the German cause – or so prominent Nazi commentators feared.¹¹²

In Eastern Europe in particular this discourse was closely linked to the acquisition of new territories (Lebensraum) for a growing German nation as commentators – sometimes with hair-splitting arguments and conclusions – attempted to argue for their “Germanness”.¹¹³ Particular attention was paid to the theatre as a spate of publications during the 1920s and 1930s stressed the crucial importance of the German influence on theatres in Eastern Europe and its significant historical roots in the region. By doing so, the authors of these publications attempted to prepare the ground for and justify the aggressive “war for living space” which was to follow soon thereafter: it returned regions into German hands which rightfully belonged to Germany anyway. Just before the start of the Polish campaign Heinz Kindermann vehemently argued in favour of Danzig’s Germanness by tracing poets through the ages to prove their interest and engagement in a German Danzig.¹¹⁴ Any attempts to claim Danzig’s “alleged Polish history” were false, as could easily be illustrated by the city’s theatre history:

In seventeenth century Danzig, many hundred theatre performances by German touring companies, tradesmen and students compare with only three Polish performances – and these were prohibited by the Danzig city council.¹¹⁵

In the interwar years, however, Danzig was still at least a predominantly German city.¹¹⁶ Other areas, for example the so-called Warthe and Weichsel regions in central Poland only featured small and decreasing German minorities. Whereas in 1910 42% of Posen’s population had been German, this figure had decreased to 2% in 1931. Similar developments appeared in Upper Silesia, with only 7% Germans in 1931, and across the entire regions of Posen and Pommerellen, albeit with a stronger decrease in urban than in rural areas.¹¹⁷ Still, commentators such as Kargel, Kindermann and others claimed their German character and history. The region breathed a “centuries-long German history”, Emil Hoffmann claimed in a profusely illustrated volume titled Neue Heimat Posen.¹¹⁸ Friedrich Lange in a book entitled Ostland kehrt heim and relating to “Memel – Danzig – Westpreußen – Wartheland und Oberschlesien” asserted that the whole geographical region was “old German homeland. The Germanic tribes already ploughed, cultivated and harvested in the East […] a thousand years before the first Pole appeared out of the Pripet marshes”.¹¹⁹ In his anthology of “young German poetry” originating from the Warthe and Weichsel regions, Kindermann gave the impression that theirs was an important presence in the region.¹²⁰ Adolf Kargel and Eduard Kneifel in 1942 strengthened these claims by positing that all major achievements of the Wartheland region (agricultural, cultural, economic, legal etc.) were entirely related to the German influence.¹²¹ Kalisch, a town with only a tiny German minority in 1939, was presented as having enjoyed considerable German influence and German ownership of land, with German peasants successfully cultivating it.¹²² In an essay for Posen’s theatre programmes Heinz Günther

Figure 2.4 “Map of the German settlement areas in Poland”, from Bierschenk, Die deutsche Volksgruppe in Polen (The German people in Poland), book cover.

Beckmann stressed the city’s Germanic roots. In the Middle Ages it had been founded on “superior German culture” and had been ready to “defend its German heritage (Deutschtum)” in conflicts about the succession to the Polish crown in the fourteenth century.¹²³ Theatre scholar Hans Knudsen reminded his readers that the history of Posen’s professional company began with Prussian rule in 1793.¹²⁴ Publications such as Bruno Satori-Neumann’s three volume history of 300 years of theatre in the small town of Elbing (now Elblag, in former West Prussia) placed the playhouse in the context of German regional theatre more generally. The scale of this publication is astonishing as Elbing was a relatively small town with only 32,000 inhabitants in the 1870s, and not all of them spoke German.¹²⁵ Overall, these were certainly surprising claims in a region with a negligible German population. The capital of what was to become the Wartheland, for example, had never been German. In internal documents even the Nazis themselves referred to Łódź as a “Russian-Polish” city.¹²⁶ This did not deter Kargel, who asserted that the region around Łódź was “old Germanic homeland”.¹²⁷ And Leo Müller neglected the significant Polish, Russian and Jewish theatre traditions to claim that the German playhouse had been the only proper theatre in Łódź. He also attempted to establish a lineage from the beginnings in the early nineteenth century to the opening of the Nazi playhouse in early 1940, the beginning of “a new heyday of German theatre”.¹²⁸ Similar claims were made with respect to theatres in the Baltic states, another sphere of German influence and a region where – here with reference to Latvia – the theatrical development over the centuries had been entirely dependent on the beneficial German influence, or so right-wing commentators posited. When, for example, in 1936 a collection of historical material relating to the theatre was “in danger” of being taken over by the Latvian government the Propaganda Ministry stepped in to provide the necessary funds to buy the collection. That way the Latvians were prevented from making this “telling material” unavailable to German researchers and denying the German pioneering role in setting up theatres across the Baltic states.¹²⁹

At the outbreak of the war it was not only German minorities in Eastern Europe, however, who were awarded increased attention. In a publication from 1940 Kindermann widened the scope considerably and discussed poetry by Germans living outside the country’s borders in general. Kindermann claimed that poetry perfectly caught the spirit of the Germans living in exile as “out there, in all the outposts in Europe and overseas, the written German word has truly turned into a helpful means of defence in a time of trials for ethnic German life”.¹³⁰ To the reader of Kindermann’s volume it must appear as if the sole purpose of writing poetry as an ethnic German was to express an allegiance to Germany and to fight for the extension of its borders to incorporate those “twenty million” who lived “just outside the gates of the German Reich”.¹³¹ Kindermann thus invited his readers not to regard these political borders as permanent, as the nation comprised all Germans, irrespective of where they happened to live.¹³² Therefore, in the current “ethnic struggle”, borders of states should be regarded as fluid; in fact, they were artificial and petty constructs imposed on Germany by largely foreign politicians. Belonging to the German people, not “arbitrary” borders, had to be the defining factor of what constituted the German nation, as Kindermann quoted Hitler in support: “the power of the common blood is stronger than borders”.¹³³ In fact, these volumes were only superficially concerned with the poets and their work. Instead, a case is being made, not for appreciating the poetry in and of itself, but only for taking it as a proxy for wider geopolitical claims and the imperative to extend the political borders of the existing Germany to incorporate the territories where these authors lived. Kindermann’s was a literary call to arms, a very real justification of the German war of expansion.

The outbreak of the Second World War therefore offered a chance to rectify an “unnatural” geopolitical situation and to take the opportunity to unite all Germans across the continent. Here the issue of the Auslandsdeutschtum (ethnic Germans living outside Germany’s current political borders) mixed with a wider discourse concerning Germany’s “suffering” after its defeat in 1918, linked to the Treaty of Versailles, which the new democratic Germany had to sign in 1919. One of the reasons for the Nazis’ electoral successes in the late 1920s and early 1930s, and one of the undercurrents in conservative discourses more widely in Germany, was a fundamental belief of having suffered great injustice at the hands of the victors of the First World War. Germany had been “crippled” politically and economically and had been forced to give up territories which had historically been German – and still were.¹³⁴ The “need” for revision of these geopolitical injustices was a centre-piece of Nazi propaganda.¹³⁵ Eastern Europe attracted the particular attention of Nazi propagandists; the whole region was declared a sphere of German influence – over and above the areas lost after 1918 – based on both earlier German settlements and an alleged cultural inferiority in need of German leadership.¹³⁶ This was not something the Nazis invented: the origins of this discourse go back much further and became increasingly fierce from the late nineteenth century onwards. In the runup to the First World War, organisations such as the Pan German Association (Alldeutscher Verband) formulated aggressive military objectives, including the significant extension of Germany’s borders much further east.¹³⁷ After 1939, with vast areas of Eastern Europe now under actual German influence, Nazi propaganda increased its efforts to justify these claims on various fronts. In order to do so, commentators turned to the migration of the peoples (Völkerwanderung) between 800 and 200 BC – corresponding to Hans F. K. Günther’s racial theories – to provide historical justification and to illustrate that vast sways of Eastern Europe had originally been populated by Germanic tribes.

After the former Germanic inhabitants had migrated westwards, less culturally “advanced” Slavs moved into these areas, which became “culturally low-grade”. Another area of particular interest for Nazi commentators was the Teutonic Order in the Middle Ages, which extended towards Eastern Europe and, for a time at least, “regained” some of the lost ground in terms of a German influence in the East. This influence particularly related to the arts, or so commentators claimed, with architecture, visual arts and literature documenting the superior German cultural influence.¹³⁸ Although the political development over the following centuries drove the Germans westwards once more, it was this cultural influence which proved lasting. In fact, in the Wartheland there “was not a single cultural achievement for which the Poles were responsible”.¹³⁹ The same was true for the Weichselland, where all cities and towns were founded “by German citizens”, irrespective of whether they dated back to the Middle Ages or were more recent foundations from the nineteenth century. Between its foundation in 1257 and 1500 Krakau had been a “purely German city”, and even Warsaw had a German core, and its most astounding buildings and palaces had been built by Germans.¹⁴⁰ the context of this history the “great German movement to the East” – as the war was euphemistically referred to by Dagobert Frey in 1944 – was justified, as the Germans were once again the bearers of a superior culture. The more advanced “German art and culture creates a culturally united area in Mid-Eastern Europe across völkisch and territorial borders”.¹⁴¹ According to this reading, the current war was not only rightful and historically inevitable but also part of a centuries-long development of cultural colonisation by German artists, whose influential work had left a lasting mark on Eastern Europe.

Figure 2.5 “Areas of German settlement in the East: streams of Germanic and German blood were lost here over the centuries because of a lack of systematic and purposeful ethnic politics”, from Hoffmann, “Volksraum im Osten” (Living space in the East), Deutscher Osten (The German east), p. 9.

These claims were accompanied by a spate of publications, events and exhibitions. In 1938 a major travelling exhibition on “Europe’s fatal battle in the East” and a linked publication can be seen as indicative of the regime’s increased efforts to prepare the public for aggressive expansion towards the East.¹⁴² The exhibition warned against the increased and brutal influence of communism and suggested that only under German leadership would Europe be able to withstand its expansionist agenda. The Publikationsstelle Berlin-Dahlem oversaw a number of key publications such as city guides or the series Deutschland und der Osten and Deutsche Gaue im Osten.¹⁴³ Several volumes published in the series Volksdeutsche Heimkehr dealt with issues of the “German East”. In one of them Friedrich Lange declared that it had been a disaster for the region when the Germans who had settled in the East were driven from their homeland in the late Middle Ages as the whole area “became deserted”. He went on to accuse the Polish state of “horrifying” crimes against the Germans in the Wartheland after 1919 and related this to their “ultimate goal […] to eradicate the Germans”. Lange then listed all the areas which had since 1939 “returned” to Germany and gleefully concluded that this was “an opulent booty” indeed. It seems, however, that for Lange – and others – the ultimate justification for Germany’s aggressive expansion was the fact that only Germany was in a position to “order” Europe according to “just principles”.¹⁴⁴

A profusely illustrated book entitled Deutscher Osten. Land der Zukunft (1942) particularly targeted a young professional German readership in order to convince them to lend a hand to help building and sustaining the “German East”. In his preface Goebbels urged “every young German man to dedicate at least a few years of his life to the East”.¹⁴⁵ In a lecture to an audience in Kiel, in northern Germany, Arthur Greiser urged his listeners – as German fathers and mothers – to send their children to the East to secure Germany’s future there.¹⁴⁶ And Himmler added that Europe was witnessing a “mighty migration movement” to the East and that “the best will follow this call”.¹⁴⁷ Friedrich Uebelhoer in a similar publication added that the Germans moving into the “German East” displayed a “fanatical enthusiasm” in their successful work as “cultural pioneers”.¹⁴⁸ Publications such as these proved popular with a young readership who were attracted to the prospect of becoming pioneers in vast and uncharted territories in the East and eager to better themselves socially with promises of substantial new farms, significantly increased household incomes and willing servants.

In applying these theories of superiority to the theatre it was again one scholar in particular who excelled in this discourse: Heinz Kindermann. Two key publications deserve a more detailed analysis here, his Theatre and Nation (1943) and The European Mission of the German Theatre (1944). Kindermann presented a historical panorama which illustrated Germany’s leading role in all matters theatrical over the centuries. Already in medieval times German plays had had a much larger reach than those of any other nation and had dominated the continent; in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, German travelling companies successfully toured Europe and “conquered the East for Central European high culture theatre [Kulturtheater]”; and the German idea of the National theatre in tandem with Goethe’s and Schiller’s drama spread all over Europe around 1800 to cement Germany’s leading role in the theatre.¹⁴⁹ German opera followed suit, as did the German Operette, German actors and directors – in fact, throughout the nineteenth century “German theatre retained a significant lead in the competition of the nations when it came to the theatre”.¹⁵⁰ Kindermann summarised that German theatre had established a “European mission”, and not in the form of a

Figure 2.6 Illustration from Lange, Ostland kehrt heim (The east returns), p. 75, showing how the borders in the Silesian industrial district changed after 1939.

“mediator” but that of a “leader”.¹⁵¹ This idea was clearly reflected in German occupation politics. At Lille, for example, the Nazis were keen for the theatre to work together with the Flemish stages in Ghent, Antwerp and Brussels – under German leadership, of course. Productions and staff were exchanged, technical support and training were offered, and various performance opportunities arose, for example by offering Flemish singers the possibility to perform in German operas in Lille.¹⁵² By invoking the “spirit” of the German national theatre movement of the late eighteenth century Kindermann also cleverly built on an established discourse on the theatre’s role for German nation-building since the late eighteenth century (see above). This discourse of a theatre on a mission – educational and political – was something Kindermann and others deliberately related to, not least to give added currency to their own claims. At that time the “founders of the German national theatre movement”, Kindermann claimed, had successfully fought against a “self-alienation” and a “mixing with other races” and had established a return to “German nature”: “With a jerk the stage gets lifted up […] not only to become a spiritual place, as Schiller would have it, but also an influential factor in national politics.”¹⁵³

Kindermann’s theories pointed at a German theatre which had a European mission, a mission which also went hand in hand with the Nazi war effort. Kindermann’s German theatre gave legitimacy to the creation of a Germanic super-state under German leadership, a leadership German theatre had already provided for centuries.

Although prominent, Kindermann was not alone in arguing for the preeminence of German theatre in Europe. Ernst Leopold Stahl, for example, posited that Germany – or, as he labelled it, “the spiritual Greater Germany including Austria and Switzerland” – since the early nineteenth century undoubtedly occupied the “leading role” in European theatre.¹⁵⁴ This, Stahl argued, was not only due to the quality of German playwriting but also thanks to the superior way of organising and funding the theatre, a system envied by “theatre practitioners in all cultured nations, even the ones presently at war with us”. Not surprisingly, large parts of Europe had been traditionally influenced, colonised almost (a positive notion for Stahl), by the German theatre, including countries such as Russia and Hungary. Even Shakespeare, regularly performed in Germany but almost neglected in Britain, had been “won back for England by the German stage”.¹⁵⁵ Stahl presented a German theatre which remained interested in international playwriting and fostered local traditions across Europe, a benign patron of the arts at the heart of the continent, a natural leader to which other nations understandably looked up and justly expected guidance from. Readers of Stahl’s article were meant to conclude that in terms of the theatre German leadership in Europe had already been established long before the present war, a war which translated Germany’s cultural and ideological leadership into justified territorial gains. The performing arts were, therefore, not merely following the Wehrmacht into the occupied territories; they had already prepared the spiritual ground.

Thus, by the mid-1940s a more general discourse had emerged which embedded Germany’s leadership in theatrical matters in a European perspective. The title of Kindermann’s 1944 study, The European Mission of the German Theatre, was indicative of a shift which focussed not only on Germany’s theatrical achievements in the past but also on its current European “responsibility”. Importantly, this responsibility for a whole continent was not meant to be “hampered” by artificial political borders. Instead, a pan-European movement of German theatre swept across a continent, “re-ordering” its spaces.¹⁵⁶ An article “German Theatres in Europe”, published in Das Reich in March 1943, posited that the interactions between the German “lead” culture and other national traditions were among the most fruitful outcomes of the German theatrical presence all over Europe. French theatres producing Hauptmann; orchestras featuring German and French musicians performing Egk, Pfitzner and Richard Strauss; a festival of contemporary German drama in Antwerp; Weber’s Freischütz featuring “old Serbian dances” in Belgrade; and Gluck’s Orpheus in “Herodes Atticus’ amphitheatre” in Athens were indicative of the continent’s theatrical rebirth. The article’s implicit claim was that similar collaborations had never existed before and that they were only made possible now under Germany’s guidance and spirited leadership.¹⁵⁷ Interestingly, terms like “interaction” and “collaboration” masked a rather oneway traffic which sought to increase Germany’s cultural influence and dominance rather than acknowledge artistic quality outwith Germany’s lead culture.

Following on from the discourse established by Kindermann and others, the expectations of what theatres in the occupied territories could achieve for the “German course” were substantial. The overall thrust of the publications on the role of German art and German theatre during the present war went beyond the representation of German cultural superiority and the “signal of permanence” that William Abbey and Katharina Havekamp propose.¹⁵⁸ German theatres were meant to provide the ground for these areas to truly become German. In cities which had never been German or which featured only relatively small German minorities the regime looked to theatres to be at the vanguard of a radical and lasting cultural change, a “means of national education”, which even according to Nazi commentators was a “colossal task”.¹⁵⁹ In a letter to the Propaganda Ministry in February 1940, for example, Lodsch’s acting mayor Franz Schiffer argued for a costly new theatre building. To illustrate the need for this he did not primarily highlight structural problems with the existing playhouse or the need for new facilities but pointed to the fact that the city was in desperate need of becoming truly German. As a place “which had never been under German rule […] there is a pressing need for a cultural strengthening of all things German”.¹⁶⁰ Similarly, on the occasion of the opening of the new German Staatstheater in Krakau, Generalgouverneur Hans Frank reminded the theatre of its role: “In Krakau […] the state theatre has to fulfil its particular role as an outpost of Germany’s cultural might.”¹⁶¹ Influential theatre scholar Hans Knudsen not only discussed the opening of the Posen theatre in 1941 in the context of Nazi ideology in general but specifically reminded the theatre of its “duties” concerning the establishment of a new Germanic world order. The playhouse “starts a new development today and falls in line with a new ideology, a new world order, and therefore with new duties of a National Socialist art”.¹⁶²

In a development similar to the late Middle Ages, when German artists moved towards the East, German theatre was now cultivating vast swathes of the culturally “inferior” Eastern Europe to prepare these areas for becoming part of the German empire – as “art is the most unerring and least transient witness of the range, power and beauty of the German will to live”.¹⁶³

Interestingly, Nazi hopes of changing the racial outlook of the continent did not relate solely to Eastern Europe but also to the West. In a six page dossier the German Institute of Foreign Affairs (Deutsches Auslandsinstitut), for example, disputed France’s “racial homogeneity” as almost a third of France’s population of 40 million spoke another language than French. The dossier listed a number of ethnic groups which were not French but in fact Germanic. The Flemish minority was particularly important due to its “Greater Germanic tradition”.¹⁶⁴ Official interest in the spreading of German cultural influence abroad and the role the theatre could play in this endeavour was also exemplified by significant attempts to increase the presence of German language theatre in, for example, Japan and Canada.¹⁶⁵ The new Germanic world order was in no small part being prepared by the German theatre.

Notes

1 Kindermann, Theater und Nation, p. 10.

2 See Hitler, Mein Kampf, pp. 431–432.

3 Spengler, Oswald. Der Untergang des Abendlandes. Umrisse einer Morphologie der Weltgeschichte. 53rd–59th ed. Munich: Beck, 1923. p 3.

4 Chamberlain posited that the “entry of the Germanic race on the world stage […] was nothing else than the salvation of an agonising humanity from the claws of timeless bestiality” (Chamberlain, Houston Stewart. Die Grundlagen des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts. Vol. 1. 9th ed. Munich: Bruckmann, 1909. p. 550). See also Udo Bermbach’s recently published study on Chamberlain (Houston Stewart Chamberlain. Wagners Schwiegersohn – Hitlers Vordenker. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2015).

5 Günther, Hans F.K. Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes. 16th ed. Munich: Lehmann, 1933. pp. 418–420.

6 Günther, Hans F.K. Adel und Rasse. 2nd rev. ed. Munich: Lehmann, 1927. p. 83.

7 Günther, Hans F.K. Rassenkunde Europas. 2nd rev. ed. Munich: Lehmann, 1926. pp. 51–54. This claim was echoed by Hitler in Mein Kampf, p. 433.

8 Günther, Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes, pp. 402, 405.

9 See Günther, Rassenkunde Europas, pp. 198–199.

10 Günther, Rassenkunde Europas, p. 54. On pages 51–60 Günther summarised the main characteristics of the European races, relating not merely to their physiognomy but also their character traces (two aspects which for him are inextricably linked).

11 Space limitations do not allow for a greater discussion of Günther’s theories here. Suffice to say he also relates to the “Jewish race” and characterises its influence as “highly dangerous” (Günther, Rassenkunde Europas, p. 72).

12 Günther, Rassenkunde Europas, p. 201.

13 See Günther, Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes, p. 471.

14 This claim was echoed by Hitler on many occasions, of course (see, for example, Hitler, Mein Kampf, p. 432). Similarly Rosenberg, Alfred. Der Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts. Eine Wertung der seelisch-geistigen Gestaltenkämpfe unserer Zeit. 53rd–54th ed. Munich: Eher, 1935. pp. 81–82.

15 Günther was, of course, part of a wider discourse and in his studies seemed keen to link his theories to a much wider field of Rassenkunde scholars.

16 Chamberlain, Grundlagen des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts, vol. 2, pp. 1143, 1145.

17 See Rosenberg, Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts (for example, p. 277).

18 As claimed by the Gauleiter (the regional party head) of Southern Westphalia (Wagner, Joseph. “Was ist uns Shakespeare?” Shakespeare-Jahrbuch 74 [1938]: 13–14). For an account of the history of the German Shakespeare society during the Third Reich, see the corresponding chapter in Hausmann, Frank-Rutger. Anglistik und Amerikanistik im ‘Dritten Reich’. Frankfurt: Klostermann, 2003.

19 See Strobl, Gerwin. “Shakespeare and the Nazis.” History Today 47, May 1997: 19.

20 Nedden, Otto zur. Drama und Dramaturgie im 20. Jahrhundert. Abhandlungen zum Theater und zur Theaterwissenschaft der Gegenwart. 2nd rev. ed. Würzburg: Triltsch, 1943. p. 11.

21 See Schlösser, Rainer. “Der deutsche Shakespeare.” Shakespeare-Jahrbuch 74 (1938): 22–24. Gerhart Hauptmann had famously already put forward this claim in 1915 (Hauptmann, Gerhart. “Deutschland und Shakespeare.” Jahrbuch der Deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft 51 [1915]: xii).

22 See Braumüller, Wolf. “Shakespeare – der Dramatiker der politischen Totalität.” Stadttheater und Kammerspiele 14 (1937–1938). Programme no. 15.

23 Günther, Hans F.K. “Shakespeares Mädchen und Frauen. Ein Vortrag vor der Deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft.” Shakespeare-Jahrbuch 73 (1937): 85–86. This speech is discussed in detail in Strobl, Gerwin. “The Bard of Eugenics: Shakespeare and Racial Activism in the Third Reich.” Journal of Contemporary History 34 (1999): 323–336.

24 For a more detailed discussion of this, see Heinrich, Nazi Claims on Shakespearean Drama, pp. 230–242.

25 See letter from Kroepelin to Sigmund Graff at the Propaganda Ministry, dated 7 October 1936 (BArch, R55/20218, dossier on pp. 88–93).

26 See BArch, R55/20194, p. 283.

27 See Akademie der Künste Berlin, Heinz-Hilpert-Archiv 1.1 Regie/Sprechtheater, 1284.

28 Völkischer Beobachter, 13 September 1934.

29 Biedrzynski, Richard. Schauspieler – Regisseure – Intendanten. Heidelberg: Hüthig, 1944. p. 35.

30 Lahm, Karl. “Shylock der Ostjude.” Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, 19 May 1943.

31 Kindermann, Theater und Nation, pp. 9–10.

32 Petersen, Herbert. “Was wir uns erwarten.” Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen(1941/2): 63 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23).

33 Kindermann, Theater und Nation, p. 10.

34 See Petropoulos, Jonathan. Art as Politics in the Third Reich. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996. p. 14.

35 See BArch, R43/II 1252, p. 82.

36 See Klapper, John. Nonconformist Writing in Nazi Germany: The Literary Inner Emigration. New York: Camden House, 2015. p. 31.

37 See press release by the Deutsches Nachrichtenbüro dated 13 June 1938 (BArch, R43/II 1252, p. 77).

38 See, for example, Sosulski, Michael J. Theater and Nation in Eighteenth-Century Germany. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007. See also Holdsworth, Nadine. Theatre and Nation. Houndmills: Palgrave, 2010. pp. 28–30; Kruger, Loren. The National Stage: Theatre and Cultural Legitimation in England, France, and America. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. pp. 85–86.

39 Schiller, Friedrich. “Was kann eine gute stehende Schaubühne eigentlich wirken?” Schiller, Friedrich, ed. Sämtliche Werke. Vol. 5. 9th rev. ed. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1993. p. 830.

40 See, for example, Kindermann, Theater und Nation, p. 21.

41 Gottsched, Johann Christoph. Versuch einer Critischen Dichtkunst. Leipzig 1751. Reprint. 5th ed. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1962. p. 445.

42 See Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim. Hamburgische Dramaturgie. Stuttgart: Reclam, 1999.

43 Schiller, Schaubühne, p. 831.

44 Qtd. in Kaschuba, Wolfgang. “Deutsche Bürgerlichkeit nach 1800. Kultur als symbolische Praxis.” Kocka, Jürgen, ed. Bürgertum im 19. Jahrhundert. Deutschland im europäischen Vergleich. Eine Auswahl. Vol. 2. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995. p. 116.

45 Detering, Heinrich, ed. Thomas Mann: Essays I. 1893–1914. 2nd ed. Frankfurt: Fischer, 2002. p. 117. See also Mann’s essay “Versuch über das Theater” in the same volume (pp. 123–168). Similarly, Bab, Julius. Das Theater im Lichte der Soziologie. Leipzig: Hirschfeld, 1931. p. 168.

46 Bekker, Paul. “Das Theater und sein Publikum.” Der Neue Weg 60 (1931): 466.

47 Schmitt, Saladin. “Stadttheater und Publikum.” Bochumer Anzeiger, 8 September 1927.

48 Goebbels on the occasion of the 1938 Vienna Reich Theatre Festival (BArch, R43/II 1252, pp. 77–78).

49 Only grudgingly did Schmitt admit that “sometimes our audiences also delight in pieces of entertainment” (Bochumer Anzeiger, 26 July 1933).

50 See Schmidt, Dietmar. “Europäische Theater in Berlin.” Die Bühne 3.4 (20 February 1944). A reading of entertainment as not “worthy” of serious attention has survived until today. In her study on commercial theatre in Berlin around 1900, Ruth Freydank described the fare they offered as “popular mass entertainment”, which was hardly worth our attention as “theatre is no place for making money” (see Freydank, Ruth, ed. Theater als Geschäft. Berlin und seine Privattheater um die Jahrhundertwende. Berlin: Hentrich, 1995. pp. 11, 17).

51 Jelavich, Peter. Munich and Theatrical Modernism: Politics, Playwriting and Performance, 1890–1914. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996. p. 8. For similar contemporary comments see, for example, Tschuppik, Walter. “Theater, Geschäft und Dramaturgie.” Schluderpacher, Carl, ed. Prager Theaterbuch. Gesammelte Aufsätze über deutsche Bühnenkunst. Prague: Fanta, 1924. pp. 143–146; or Bab, Das Theater im Lichte der Soziologie, pp. 158–162.

52 Möller, Frank. “Zwischen Kunst und Kommerz. Bürgertheater im 19. Jahrhundert.” Hein, Dieter and Andreas Schulz, eds. Bürgerkultur im 19. Jahrhundert. Bildung, Kunst und Lebenswelt. Munich: Beck, 1996. p. 30.

53 Schiller, Schaubühne, p. 819. Germany’s focus on or infatuation with theatre has been commented on in international scholarship, too. Richard Foulkes, for example, summarised the different approaches to tackling social problems in Germany and Britain during the nineteenth century thus: “Whereas in Germany the establishment’s response might well have been to build a theatre, in England it was to create an Anglican diocese.” (Foulkes, Richard. Performing Shakespeare in the Age of Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. p. 84).

54 After the republic was established in 1919, most of the former aristocratic as well as almost all commercial theatres were taken over by the newly elected democratic authorities and turned into fully funded municipal or state theatres. The same happened in Austria in 1920 following a decree by the new democratic government.

55 “Disturbances” largely related to left-wing or anti-war plays and those which “violated” Christian beliefs. For a convincing account of the conservative tastes in the Weimar theatre and the “forces of tradition which also characterized it”, see Führer, Karl Christian. “High Brow and Low Brow Culture.” McElligott, Anthony, ed. Weimar Germany. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. p. 260.

56 See letter dated 17 March 1921 (Hagen City Archives [Stadtarchiv Hagen], Ha1/9230).

57 As noted by Goebbels in a speech at the Reich Theatre Festival in Vienna in June 1938 (see press release by the Deutsches Nachrichtenbüro dated 13 June 1938 [BArch, R43/II 1252, p. 78]).

58 See ibid. Interestingly, but also typically, Goebbels kept quiet about the substantial attempts of the Social Democrats and the trade unions close to them who after the First World War fought, largely successfully, for the opening of the bourgeois thea-tres to working class audiences through visitors’ organisations, affordable season tickets and block bookings, and reduced ticket prices for particular performances (see Heinrich, Anselm. Theater in der Region. Westfalen und Yorkshire 1918–1945. Paderborn: Schöningh, 2012. p. 113).

59 See, for example, Lehnstaedt, Stephan. Okkupation im Osten: Besatzeralltag in Warschau und Minsk 1939–1944. Munich: Oldenbourg, 2010. p. 126.

60 Gerlach-Bernau, Kurt. Drama und Nation. Ein Beitrag zur Wegbereitung des nation-alsozialistischen Dramas. Breslau: Hirt, 1934. p. 21.

61 Before the First World War Hitler had worked on drawings for new theatre buildings. Important aspects in his thinking were that even theatres in smaller towns should be able to accommodate “the masses”. With low ticket prices they should be owned by the people themselves and be accessible for everyone (see Backes, Klaus. Hitler und die bildenden Künste. Kulturverständnis und Kulturpolitik im Dritten Reich. Cologne: DuMont, 1988. pp. 181–185).

62 For a typical Nazi discussion of the arts during the Weimar years, see an essay by Curt Langenbeck, one of the celebrated and officially supported dramatists after 1933 (Langenbeck, Curt. “Wiedergeburt des Dramas aus dem Geist der Zeit.” Das Innere Reich 6 [1939–1940]: 923–957). We have to note, however, that a working definition of “Weimar culture” was never coined; rather, it functioned as a symbol under which everything “un-German” could be subsumed. Right-wing commentators were united, however, in their claim that within the arts the theatre had been particularly affected by the “Weimar atmosphere” (see, for example, Hitler, Mein Kampf, p. 284; Rosenberg, Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts, p. 447). For a detailed discussion of the various theoretical positions, see Ketelsen, Uwe-Karsten. Heroisches Theater. Untersuchungen zur Dramentheorie des Dritten Reichs. Bonn: Bouvier, 1968. pp. 127–208.

63 See Hitler, Mein Kampf, p. 284.

64 Rosenberg claimed that “to suppress everything that was true and honestly struggling the money lords [Geldfürsten] entered into a cartel with the Jewish theatre directors and press people. They endorsed everything that was brazen, gnawing, artificial, impotent, crippled, and they fought against […] any true change in the world” (Rosenberg, Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts, p. 445).

65 See Hitler, Mein Kampf, pp. 284–285. Rosenberg claimed, “That is the true spirit of today’s intellectuality; that is the modern drama, the modern theatre, the modern music! A smell of death emanates from Paris, Vienna, Moscow, and New York. The foetor judaicus mixes with the world’s trash. Bastards are the heroes of our time, the revues of whores and naked dancers were the art form of the November democracy (Rosenberg, Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts, p. 447).

66 Brecht was constantly attacked by conservative and right-wing commentators. His Three-Penny Opera “clearly illustrates the Jewish decay” (Künkler, Karl. “Es sind immer dieselben!” Deutsche Dramaturgie 3 [1944]: 65). Similarly, see Hymnen, Friedrich Wilhelm. “Um ein neues Drama.” Das Innere Reich 6 (1939): 465. Langenbeck posited that Naturalism was nothing more than a “constant lament over its lack of form” (Langenbeck, Wiedergeburt des Dramas, p. 952). And Gerhart Hauptmann was “dead inside” and part of a literary circle whose “impotent” members were contributing “to the decay of a time to which they really belonged themselves” (Rosenberg, Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts, p. 444).

67 An article from 1920, re-published in 1935, is representative of Ernst’s theoretical writings. In it Ernst condemned the whole nineteenth century as having been “completely at a loss concerning the foundations of human existence”. The main reason for “today’s catastrophe” was the fact that people had no rulers to lead them anymore. Ernst expressed his vision of the dawn of a new age, which would find expression first and foremost in the theatre. Subsequently, it would lead (“under blood and tears”) to the “regeneration of humanity” (Ernst, Paul. “Das Drama in der Zeitenwende.” Das Innere Reich 2 [1935]: 528).

68 Langer, Norbert. Die Deutsche Dichtung seit dem Weltkrieg. Von Paul Ernst bis Hans Baumann. Leipzig: Kraft, 1941. p. 14.

69 See Ketelsen, Heroisches Theater.

70 Langenbeck discussed his ideas at length in his article on “dramatic rebirth” (“Wiedergeburt des Dramas aus dem Geist der Zeit”; see above). The central idea in this essay was “destiny”.

71 A similar distinction was already being proposed at the time, for example by Robert Stumpfl in 1938 (Stumpfl, Robert. “Vom neuen deutschen Drama.” Das Innere Reich 4 [1937–1938]: 955).

72 For a detailed discussion see Langenbeck, Wiedergeburt des Dramas, pp. 936–954. See also theatre scholar Carl Niessen, who as late as 1940 testified to the ongoing and fruitless debates by claiming that the future drama will either develop following “Shakespeare’s great character drama or the monumental theatre of destiny by the Greeks. It is an either – or” (Niessen, Carl. Deutsches Theater und Immermanns Vermächtnis. Neue Papierfenster eines Eremiten. Emsdetten: Lechte, 1940. p. 86).

73 See Ketelsen, Heroisches Theater, pp. 153–162.

74 Friedrich Bethge claimed that the dramatic ethos had been experienced by a generation of dramatists who had fought in the Great War, such as himself. He also counted the “manly and fighting” Aischylos, Lessing, Schiller, Kleist and Hebbel among this group (Bethge, Friedrich. “Rede bei der Theatertagung der H.J. in Bochum.” Das Innere Reich 4 [1937]: 350–351).

75 See Rühle, Günther. Diktatur und Exil 1933–1945 (Zeit und Theater, vol. 3). Berlin: Ullstein, 1974. pp. 51–52.

76 See Hilpert, Heinz. “Formen des Theaters.” Kaun, Axel, ed. Berliner Theater- Almanach 1942, Berlin: Neff, 1942 pp. 135–160, particularly 141–142, 143, 160.

77 Recent research has shown that the Nazis were similarly uncertain about what constituted “the Nazi literary canon” and which writers should be promoted (see Klapper, Nonconformist Writing in Nazi Germany, p. 22).

78 Künkler, Karl. “Inszenierungs- und Darstellungsfragen der Gegenwart.” Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen (1942/3): 81 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23).

79 Hymnen, Friedrich Wilhelm. “Das Drama in unserer Zeit.” Kaun, Axel, ed. Berliner Theater-Almanach 1942. Berlin: Neff, 1942. p. 189.

80 See Pagel, Karsten. “Gegenwart als Dramenstoff.” Deutsche Dramaturgie 3 (1944): pp. 15–16.

81 Navigating the political situation was a key issue for playwrights. Being too close to real events was tricky, but keeping things too general and abstract attracted criticism as well (see also Rühle, Günther. Theater in Deutschland 1887–1945. Seine Ereignisse – seine Menschen. Frankfurt: Fischer, 2007. pp. 928–932).

82 Sucrow, Paul Wilhelm. “Das Theater in biologischer Schau.” Deutsche Dramaturgie 3/4 (1944): p. 26.

83 See Ketelsen, Uwe-Karsten. Von heroischem Sein und völkischem Tod. Zur Dramatik des Dritten Reiches. Bonn: Bouvier, 1970. p. 9.

84 See Schönlank, Bruno. “Schafft Sprechchöre.” Junge Menschen 6 (1925): 159–160. See also Rossol, Nadine. Performing the Nation in Interwar Germany: Sport, Spectacle and Political Symbolism 1926–1936. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2010.

85 See Langenbeck, Curt. “Dürfen wir uns bei dem jetzigen hohen Stand der Schauspielbühne beruhigen?” Das Innere Reich 3 (1936): 768.

86 One of the recurring motifs was “redemption”. In Richard Euringer’s German Passion 1933, for example, one of the most successful Thing plays in the Third Reich, the hero (“the unknown soldier”) was portrayed with a crown of thorns and as ascending to Heaven – a less than subtle reference to Christian depictions of Jesus (see Brenner, Hildegard. Die Kunstpolitik des Nationalsozialismus. Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1963. p. 100).

87 Emmel, Felix. Theater aus deutschem Wesen. Berlin: Stilke, 1937. pp. 92–93.

88 See Braumüller, Wolf. Freilicht- und Thingspiel. Rückschau und Forderungen. Berlin: Volkschaft-Verlag, 1935. pp. 27–28.

89 Schramm, Wilhelm von. Neubau des deutschen Theaters. Ergebnisse und Forderungen. Berlin: Schlieffen, 1934. pp. 42–43.

90 See Euringer, Richard. “Thingspielthesen I und II.” Euringer, Richard, ed. Chronik einer deutschen Wandlung 1925–1935. Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1936. pp. 232–233, 236–238.

91 Euringer, Chronik einer deutschen Wandlung, p. 237.

92 See Stumpfl, Vom neuen deutschen Drama, 956. See also Niven, William. “The Birth of Nazi Drama? Thing Plays.” London, Theatre under the Nazis, pp. 54–95.

93 Riecke, Heinz. “Freizeitgestaltung und Spiele der Gegenwart.” Die Neue Literatur 37 (1936): 31.

94 One of the many examples of how the ground for war, and particularly the aggressive expansion in the East, was prepared in 1930s Germany was the exhibition Europas Schicksalskampf im Osten, which accompanied the 1938 Nazi party congress in Nuremberg and subsequently travelled throughout Germany (see below).

95 Ludwig Körner in his editorial to the Bühnenjahrbuch 1940 (Präsident der Reichstheaterkammer, ed. Deutsches Bühnenjahrbuch 1940. Berlin: Reichstheaterkammer, 1940. p. 1).

96 Kindermann, Heinz. Die europäische Sendung des deutschen Theaters (Wiener Wissenschaftliche Vorträge und Reden, vol. 10). Vienna: Rohrer, 1944. p. 51.

97 See the photo series entitled “Die Szene des größten Erfolgs”.

98 A similar discourse had already been deployed during the First World War (see Bremm, Klaus-Jürgen. Propaganda im Ersten Weltkrieg. Darmstadt: Theiss, 2013. pp. 26–28).

99 Levi, Erik. Mozart and the Nazis: How the Third Reich Abused a Cultural Icon. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010. p. 153.

100 Schünemann’s “adaptation” of Mozart’s Don Giovanni, for example, was published entirely in German with only small Italian “subtitles” (see W.A. Mozart: Don Giovanni. Oper in zwei Akten, dt. Bearbeitung nach der Überlieferung und dem Urtext von Georg Schünemann unter Mitarbeit von Kurt Soldan [1941]. Houghton Library Theatre Collection, Harvard Depository M1500.M84 D6 1941).

101 See Levi, Mozart and the Nazis, pp. 192–205.

102 Schirach, quoted in Levi, Mozart and the Nazis, p. 171.

103 Heinz Kindermann, at that time still professor in Danzig, writing for the theatre programme note on 4 May 1935 (qtd. in Wolting, Stephan. “Verwicklungen und Verwirrungen. Spielplan- und Personalpolitik am Danziger Theater am Kohlenmarkt zwischen 1919 und 1944.” Pelka, Artur and Karolina Prykowska-Michalak, eds. Migrationen/Standortwechsel. Deutsches Theater in Polen. Łódź/Tübingen: University of Łódź Press, 2007. p. 72).

104 See Fassel, Horst. Die feldgrauen Musen. Deutsche Kultureinrichtungen im besetzten Rumänien (1916–1918). Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitara Clujeana, 2016. p. 126.

105 Kindermann, Heinz. Du stehst in großer Schar. Junge deutsche Dichtung aus dem Warthe- und Weichselland. Breslau: Hirt, 1939.

106 Kindermann, Du stehst in großer Schar, pp. 5, 10. Not surprisingly, the poetry presented in this small volume relates almost entirely to a small number of issues: Blood and Soil topics, First World War remembrance and the oppression of Germans by the Poles.

107 See Bley, Wulf, comp. Mit Mann und Roß und Wagen … Funkberichte aus dem polnischen Feldzug. Leipzig: Hase und Koehler, 1939. p. 7.

108 Editorial by Franz Koch to volume 1 (Fricke, Gerhard, Franz Koch, and Klemens Lugowski, eds. Von Deutscher Art in Sprache und Dichtung. 5 vols. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1941. p. v).

109 Kaun, Axel. “Vorbemerkung.” Berliner Theater-Almanach 1942, pp. 9–10.

110 See Wiemann, Matthias. “Faust im Kriege.” Berliner Theater-Almanach 1942, p. 253.

111 Qtd. in Drewniak, Theater im NS-Staat, p. 128.

112 In 1943 the Berlin Philharmonic performed in Budapest and Bucharest (and other cities in the Balkans) but was not conducted by Furtwängler. This, the SD (the German security service) concluded, led many people to believe their countries were treated as second best (as qtd. in Drewniak, Theater im NS-Staat, pp. 128–129).

113 The “East” had always been a loaded term in Germany’s political discourse and had acquired an almost mythical status (see Liulevicius, Vejas. The German Myth of the East: 1800 to Present. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009; see also, by the same author, War Land on the Eastern Front, particularly the chapter “The Mindscape of the East” on pp. 151–175). More generally, on the role of “places” for cultural memory, see Assmann, Aleida. Cultural Memory and Western Civilization: Functions, Media, Archives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. pp. 281–324.

114 See for this and the following Kindermann, Heinz. “Danzigs Dichter bezeugen Danzigs Deutschtum.” Danziger Heimatdienst, ed. Danziger Fragen und Ereignisse. Kurze Darstellungen. No. 10. Danzig: 1939, no pagination.

115 Ibid. See also Krause, Waldemar. Das Danziger Theater und sein Erbauer Carl Samuel Held. Danzig: Kafemann, 1936. See also Kindermann, Theater und Nation, p. 14.

116 Although different figures circulate in the literature, it seems that the Polish minority never exceeded 10%–12% of the overall population during the 1920s and 1930s. Following the 1919 Treaty of Versailles the city did not formally belong to Germany anymore and was afforded the status of a “free city”. The Nazis declared its annexation (or “liberation”, as German propaganda would have it) on 1 September 1939.

117 Bromberg had featured 75% Germans in 1910 but only 8.5% in 1931. In Thorn the relevant figure decreased from 66% to 4%, and in Graudenz from 85% to 7.5% (see Krekeler, Norbert. “Die deutsche Minderheit in Polen 1919–1933.” Benz, Wolfgang, ed. Die Vertreibung der Deutschen aus dem Osten. Ursachen, Ereignisse, Folgen. 5th rev. ed. Frankfurt: Fischer, 2000. pp. 26–27). For Upper Silesia see Drewniak, Boguslaw. Polen und Deutschland 1919–1939. Wege und Irrwege kultureller Zusammenarbeit. Düsseldorf: Droste, 1999. p. 188.

118 Hoffmann, Emil. Neue Heimat Posen (Volksdeutsche Heimkehr, vol. 3). Berlin: Nibelungen, 1940. p. 9. There were almost 70 pages of photographs of Posen and the surrounding region in his book.

119 Lange, Friedrich. Ostland kehrt heim (Volksdeutsche Heimkehr, vol. 5). Berlin: Nibelungen, 1940. p. 7.

120 Kindermann, Du stehst in großer Schar (see above).

121 See, for example, in relation to arts, an article by Adolf Kargel, “Bildende Künstler aus Litzmannstadt”, which portrayed artists working in and around Łódź (in Kargel, Adolf and Eduard Kneifel. Deutschtum im Aufbruch. Vom Volkstumskampf der Deutschen im östlichen Wartheland. Leipzig: Hirzel, 1942. pp. 228–233).

122 See Reiser, Dietrich. Lebensraum der Deutschen im Kalischer Land. Leipzig: Hirzel, 1941.

123 Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen (1941/2): 11–12 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23).

124 See Knudsen, Hans. “Die Entwicklung der deutschen Theaterkunst in Posen.” Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen (1941/2): 27–55 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23).

125 Satori-Neumann, Bruno. Dreihundert Jahre berufsständisches Theater in Elbing: die Geschichte einer ostdeutschen Provinzialbühne. 1846–1888. Marburg: Elwert, 1962. This is the second volume; the first was published in 1936, and the third was never completed due to the author’s death in an air raid in 1943 (so this second volume was published posthumously).

126 Letter from Litzmannstadt’s mayor to the Propaganda Ministry dated 10 July 1940 in relation to proposed subsidies (BArch, R55/20389, p. 47).

127 Kargel in Gissibl, Fritz, ed. Der Osten des Warthelandes. Stuttgart: Stähle und Friedel, 1941. pp. 30–35.

128 Müller, Leo. “Das deutsche Theater in Lodsch.” Kargel/Kneifel, Deutschtum im Aufbruch, p. 215.

129 A professor named Petersen, who was based in Riga, made the Germans aware of the collection and the fact that it needed “saving”. Up until 1938, and after numerous letters back and forth, he received more than RM 1,000 in total to “rescue” it (see BArch, R55/20533, pp. 281, 289, 297).

130 Kindermann, Heinz. Die Weltkriegsdichtung der Deutschen im Ausland. Berlin: Volk und Reich, 1940. p. 7. See also an earlier, similarly extensive publication (Kindermann, Heinz. Rufe über Grenzen. Antlitz und Lebensraum der Grenz- und Auslanddeutschen in ihrer Dichtung. Berlin: Junge Generation, 1938), which has 1100 pages on the subject. This volume proved so popular that it was re-published in a shorter edition for educational purposes (Kindermann, Heinz. Rufe über Grenzen. Dichtung und Lebenskampf der Deutschen im Ausland. 2nd rev. ed. Berlin: Junge Generation, 1938).

131 Kindermann, Weltkriegsdichtung, p. 9.

132 This discourse more or less deliberately harked back to poet and author Ernst Moritz Arndt, who in 1813 had composed a famous song (“Wo ist den Deutschen Vaterland?” – “Where is a German’s Fatherland?”) in which he concluded that Germany was wherever the German language was spoken. See also Hitler, Mein Kampf, p. 740.

133 See Kindermann, Rufe über Grenzen. Dichtung und Lebenskampf, pp. 10, 13. Hitler and Kindermann drew on a discourse which had gained ground towards the end of the nineteenth century. Ernst Hasse, for example, had posited in 1897 that “nations lasted longer than states”. The people (in the sense of their ethnicity or nationality) were the only fixed factor in the context of political systems which were constantly in flux (Hasse, Ernst. “Deutsche Weltpolitik.” Alldeutsche Flugschriften 5 [1897]. See also Hasse’s contribution to Deutsche Politik 1 [1905]: 50).

134 Friedrich Lange claimed that the Treaty of Versailles had brutally destroyed “all those invaluable German cultural treasures and economic assets in Eastern Europe” (Lange, Ostland kehrt heim, p. 15). See also Mazower, Hitler’s Empire, pp. 40–45.

135 A number of historians have argued that the Versailles Treaty had not provided a workable solution but had already contained the seed for another military conflict (see, for example, Grevelhörster, Ludger. Der Erste Weltkrieg und das Ende des Kaiserreichs. Geschichte und Wirkung. 3rd rev. ed. Münster: Aschendorff, 2014. p. 148).

136 For a useful, if somewhat short, discussion of the origins of this discourse see Pryt, Karina. Befohlene Freundschaft. Die deutsch-polnischen Kulturbeziehungen 1934– 1939. Osnabrück: Fibre, 2010. pp. 465–466.

137 The Alldeutscher Verein für die Ostmark in Austria demanded in 1913 that the most important goal in a future war had to be “the establishment of a fully independent state comprising all Germans in Central Europe based on their Aryan descent” (qtd. in Arendt, Hannah. Elemente und Ursprünge totaler Herrschaft. Antisemitismus, Imperialismus, totale Herrschaft. 12th ed. Munich: Piper, 2008. p. 484).

138 See, for example, Barthel, Gustav. Die Ausstrahlungen der Kunst des Veit Stoss im Osten. Munich: Bruckmann, 1944. This book was part of a multi-volume publication project on the influences of German art in Eastern Europe.

139 Hoffmann, Heinrich, ed. Deutscher Osten. Land der Zukunft. Munich: Hoffmann, 1942. p. 61.

140 Ibid., p. 140. See also Gollert, Friedrich. Warschau unter deutscher Herrschaft. Deutsche Aufbauarbeit im Distrikt Warschau. Krakau: Burgverlag, 1942. pp. 34–52.

141 Frey, Dagobert. “Preface.” Barthel, Veit Stoss im Osten, pp. 7–8.

142 See Europas Schicksalskampf im Osten. Ausstellung zum Reichsparteitag 1938 unter Schirmherrschaft des Stellvertreters des Führers Rudolf Heß. [n.p., n.p.], 1938.

143 See BArch, R153/630 and R153/300. The “publication office” had been founded in 1931 and was concerned with research into various Eastern European aspects.

144 See Lange, Ostland kehrt heim, pp. 8, 55, 70–71, 73. For similar claims concerning Kattowitz and the whole region of Upper Silesia (“German for centuries”), see Kauder, Viktor. Das Deutschtum in Polen. Ein Bildband. Leipzig: Hirzel, 1939. Kauder asserted that all the monuments of culture and industry in the region had been “created by German diligence and efficiency (p. 7). See also Gissibl, Osten des Warthelandes.

145 Hoffmann, Deutscher Osten, p. 4.

146 See Greiser, Arthur. Der Aufbau im Osten (Kieler Vorträge 68). Jena: Fischer, 1942. p. 20.

147 Himmler, Heinrich. “Ein neuer Abschnitt deutscher Volks- und Ostgeschichte.” Ibid., p. 57.

148 Preface to Gissibl, Osten des Warthelandes, p. 11.

149 See Kindermann, Die europäische Sendung des deutschen Theaters, pp. 12, 33.

150 See ibid., p. 49.

151 See ibid., p. 44.

152 See Abbey/Havekamp, German Theatre in Lille, pp. 283–284.

153 Kindermann, Theater und Nation, pp. 20–21.

154 Stahl, Ernst Leopold. “Deutsches Theater – Europäisches Theater.” Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen (1942/3): 122 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23). Please also compare the following with this article (pp. 122–127).

155 This was a point picked up by Kindermann, too, who claimed that the German translations of Shakespeare by Schlegel/Tieck had paved the way for a rediscovery of the Bard’s work across Europe – this was a German success story, not a British one (see Kindermann, Die europäische Sendung des deutschen Theaters, p. 45).

156 See Kindermann, Theater und Nation, p. 60.

157 See “Deutsche Theater in Europa. Von Drontheim bis Athen, von Paris bis Lublin.” Das Reich, 7 March 1943. See, similarly, Kindermann, Die europäische Sendung des deutschen Theaters, pp. 51–55.

158 See Abbey/Havekamp, German Theatre in Lille, p. 263.

159 Petersen, Was wir uns erwarten, Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen (1941/2): 64 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23).

160 Letter dated 16 February 1940 (BArch, R55/20389, pp. 25–26).

161 Qtd. in Drewniak, Theater im NS-Staat, p. 102.

162 Knudsen, Entwicklung der deutschen Theaterkunst in Posen, Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen (1941/2): 55 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23).

163 Barthel, Veit Stoss im Osten, p. 12.

164 BArch, R57/4925, no pagination in file.

165 Two archival collections are testament to these endeavours (see BArch, R55/20558 and R55/20562).