Criticism > Drama Criticism > Handke, Peter - Nicholas Hern (essay date 1971)
Handke, Peter - Nicholas Hern (essay date 1971)
Nicholas Hern (essay date 1971)
SOURCE: Hern, Nicholas. “Kaspar.” In Peter Handke: Theatre and Anti-Theatre, pp. 59-74. London: Oswald Wolff, 1971.
[In the following essay, Hern discuses Kaspar, comparing it to The Living Theatre's production of Frankenstein, as well as to The Bald Prima Donna by Eugene Ionesco.]
Even the title of Handke's first full-length play [Kaspar] signals a new development. Kaspar is after all a name, the name of the central figure, and no figure with a name has hitherto appeared in Handke's plays. More than this, Kaspar represents an actual historical personage, Kaspar Hauser, who mysteriously turned up from nowhere in Nuremberg in 1828, aged 16, but with the mind of a child. Ernst Jandl's short poem ‘16 years’, chosen by Handke to preface his play, can be seen as referring obliquely to Hauser and his limited powers of speech, as it asks lispingly: ‘what thall/he do/the...
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- Introduction
- Principal Works
- Criticism: General Commentary
- Criticism: Publikumsbeschimpfung (Offending The Audience)
- Criticism: Kaspar
- Criticism: Der Ritt üEber Den Bodensee (The Ride Across Lake Constance)
- Criticism: Die UnvernüNftigen Sterben Aus (They Are Dying Out)
- Criticism: Das Spiel Vom Fragen Oder (Voyage To The Sonorous Land)
- Criticism: Die Stunde Da Wir Nichts Voneinander Der WuβTen: (The Hour We Knew Nothing Of Each Other)
- Criticism: Die Fahrt Im Einbaum Oder Das Stuck Zum Film Vom Krieg (The Canoe Trip Or The Play Of The Film Of The War)
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