Oberammergau : the passion play and its audiences from the enlightenment to the Nazis /
"This book traces the Oberammergau passion play's rise from local curiosity to global celebrity between the eighteenth century and the 1930s. Beginning in 1770, when the play's survival was threatened by a government ban, the book traces Oberammergau's story across the next centu...
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| Format: | eBook |
| Language: | English |
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Oxford :
Oxford University Press,
[2025]
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| Online Access: | Connect to the full text of this electronic book |
| Summary: | "This book traces the Oberammergau passion play's rise from local curiosity to global celebrity between the eighteenth century and the 1930s. Beginning in 1770, when the play's survival was threatened by a government ban, the book traces Oberammergau's story across the next century and a half, ending with the Nazi government's sponsorship of the tercentenary season in 1934. The book shows how the passion play's success hinged on the way its performers channelled the turbulence of modern European history and the shifting fascinations of their international audiences during the long nineteenth century. Not simply a religious relic serving devout spectators a dose of Catholic kitsch, the Oberammergau passion evolved in close connection with shifts in European culture. As the village transformed into an international destination, a diverse and growing crowd of artists, writers, actors, journalists, politicians, musicians, tourists, and pilgrims from across Europe and America took their experiences at Oberammergau back home to intervene in pressing debates of the time. Admirers used Oberammergau to think about unity in a divided Germany, the role of theatre in society, and the waning of religious belief; critics saw an example of commercialization, cultural decline, and prejudice. This book shows that to explain the extraordinary prominence of Oberammergau in nineteenth- and twentieth-century European and American culture, we need to understand the vast array of meanings that viewers drew from the play's content and survival, and recognize that these extended far beyond the religious."-- |
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| Physical Description: | 1 online resource : illustrations |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| ISBN: | 9780192886620 0192886622 9780191981630 019198163X |