Greek Chorus and the Vaterland: The Ideology of Choral Performance in Inter-war Germany

The chapter focuses on the use of the ‘Speaking Chorus’ [Sprechchor] in various theatrical and political contexts in Germany during the 1920s and 1930s. The performances of the proletarian movement introduced choral speaking and movement as an ideal representation of an imagined future community. The chorus became a key element in the official dramaturgy of the Thingspiel developed by the Nazis, while public manifestations of the Third Reich also featured Sprechchor performances. Although the various kinds of choral
performance referred back to ancient Greek theatre, their turn to antiquity entailed the emergence of a new theatrical form rather than direct engagement with the Greek texts themselves.

Within this framework, the semi-amateur productions of Aeschylus’ plays
directed by Wilhelm Leyhausen with student groups in Cologne and Berlin in this period illustrate an actual encounter between Sprechchor and Greek tragedy. The chapter discusses the treatment of the chorus in these productions vis-à-vis the overtly ideological uses of Sprechchor, arguing that notwithstanding Leyhausen’s emphasis on the purely aesthetic significance of Sprechchor, his productions can help to disentangle major ideological strands in Germany before WWII. These performances are viewed as a proto-fascist example of appropriation of ancient Greece. Sprechchor is deployed as a means to retrieve the so-called eternal poetic essence of the classical text; and the ahistorical image of antiquity seems to deny historical progress in the name of eternal aesthetic value embodied by the charismatic community. Yet, in Leyhausen’s stagings of Greek tragedy the power of the chorus succumbs to the indisputable supremacy of the individual protagonist. The chapter argues that the obvious analogies with political expression in 1930s Germany were deliberate and would not have gone unnoticed in the original context of the productions.