Liturgical drama

Religious drama (even spiritual or liturgical drama play ) is a form of European medieval theater, when it was originally part of the Christian liturgy. It served since the High Middle Ages, the proclamation of salvation in dramatic form and evolved into the modern era in a number of popular genres that are maintained to the present day.

History

Formation and development

Religious drama developed from the 10th century from the sung on religious acts tropics. Therefore, its text was originally Latin. The Ostertropus who treats the course of Mary at Jesus' grave was by its antiphonal structure as the basis of the Easter play. This form has been extended to other scenes and plot elements of the biblical resurrection story, so the Easter plays up to its heyday in the 13th century grew to extensive dramas, some are already in the then popular languages. Following the example of Ostertropus the Christmas play whose plot core was the Annunciation to the shepherds in the field developed in the 11th century the Weihnachtstropus and in the 13th century. This form is maintained to the present day as a nativity play folksy frame, regionally also in the dialects. In parallel, the first Passion Play, which the Easter play about the Passion of Christ extended, and various forms of procession matches at Christian festivals emerged. Common to all forms of play that took into profane customs and scenes in the game's plot, the humanization of the saints in Christian religious context.

Under the influence of burgeoning civic culture was changing religious drama in the 14th century. For one, it broke away from the liturgical context and was - in part to command the Church - to non-church venues, often in the open air market places listed, and these performances obtained by mass scenes, elaborate costuming and equipment as well as by releasing vernacular languages religious drama popularized and brought into the vicinity of the carnival game. The design and production was incumbent on the citizenry, often the Passion brotherhoods of the cities. On the other hand changed the character of the games of the symbolic realization of salvation to realistic, often drastic to obscene depictions. Nevertheless, remained the spiritual game up in this era into liturgically bound and strictly based on the fabric templates from the Bible and legends of the saints, without allowing poetic creations and artistic freedom.

From the 15th century the religious drama came in a late phase. The length of a game was partly grown to several thousand verses. This took the performances of several days and finally looked more like folk festivals. The crowd scenes widened sharply, the public was included quasi- liturgical again through common prayer and hymn singing.

Decline

The humanistic Renaissance culture, which led to new forms of theater through the re- reception of Greek and Roman drama, and the Reformation, the religious drama rejected by Martin Luther's transfer because of its proximity to the liturgy led to the liturgical drama first in the half of the 16th century waned. It survived only in strongly influenced by Catholicism regions, eg in Spain, to the Counter-Reformation in the 16th century. A well-known example from Germany are the Oberammergau Passion Play listed since 1634.

Influences of the spiritual game have since been productive even in Protestant school drama and theater in the Latin Jesuits. Due to the change of community to Hofspielen that due to altered political and social circumstances and the new role of princely courts as a cultural medium of the absolutist era, the most naive faith openness of the Middle Ages a dualistic view of this world and the hereafter.

With the speech - oratories Johann Klajs ( resurrection of Jesus Christ, Hell, and ascension of Jesus Christ ) used the popular especially in the 17th and 18th century form of the oratorio and the oratorio Passions. In contrast, the theater censorship of religious materials on stage restricted in the 18th and 19th centuries, a strong. In the 19th century religious melodramas were common in some cities as a " proletarian " form of theater.

The experiments Zacharias Werner and other theorists, to let the spiritual game as an alternative to the drama of the 19th century resurgence, led to only sporadic ( adapted ) plants such as Hugo von Hofmannsthal's Everyman (1911) and The Salzburg Great World Theater (1922 ), in renouveau catholique Paul Claudel's Le Soulier de satin (1925 ), in musical theater finally Carl Orff's Comoedia de Christ Resurrectione (1956 ), Ludus de Nato Infante Mirificus (1960) and de temporum fine comoedia (1973 /77) as well as in Benjamin Britten's Church Parables.

Game practice

The typical form of stage for the religious plays, which were performed in a public space, was the simultaneous stage; the structures were at different points of a square, spectators and actors dressed for every scene between the stage parts back and forth. The scenes opened and closed a precursor with an introduction or moralizing summary for the spectators. Also covered are explanatory comments that were directed at the audience during the game scenes, and the calls to prayer and singing. Dramatic texts, game instructions, comments and instructions for the stage are summarized in Dirigierrollen. The game emphasized more declamation than the facial design of roles.

Characteristics in different European languages

Through the influence of the languages ​​that took the place of Latin, developed from the 14th century to "national" traditions. First approaches there had been only in the antichrist seal, for example, in Latin Ludus de Antichristo previously ( in 1160 ), and in the German world -court game. The most important late medieval genre in the German language were the Passion Play, which extended the action over the Easter event out to the entire Christian salvation history of the Old and New Testaments of the Creation and the Fall, to the resurrection of Christ.

In the English theater history resulted in a considerable cycles whose main genres Corpus Christi plays and since the mid-14th century, Morality plays ( engl. " moralities " ) were. In the center of the game's plot, the struggle of good and evil forces stood (see Vice ), the virtues and vices, or angel and devil for the soul of man. The games often also included contrasting comic elements. The cars platform was the preferred stage construction.

The development of the French games began much earlier in the 12th century with the Anglo-Norman Adam play and the play of Niklas Jean Bodel (around 1200). The characteristic shape was the mystery play, the substances were next to biblical stories, especially legends of the saints. While German and English plays were written by anonymous authors in particular, were in France for the first time shows, in particular well-known poet. Besides Bodel these were Eustache Marcadé and Simon Greban. A special role assume the pantomime mystères mimes, which were presented as early form of tableaux vivants. The productions earlier showed a tendency to effect solid and theatrical, including the stage machinery was used. Comic and serious scenes were completely separated.

Also in the Netherlands were mimes known as Stomme spelen. In addition to the allegorical Zinnespel - moralities and miracle play they were among the most important genres.

The Italian development was largely away from the major European literatures. Unlike in other countries, were the religious plays not to vernacular citizen games, but remained until the 15th century, the object of the spiritual brotherhoods. The main genera were Laude drammatice, procession play like forms that developed from the sung during processions ballads about the dialog processing to dramatic small scenes and the Worship and a form of preaching game that embodied the sermon live images and dialogue scenes. Both genres were included only in the course of the 15th century in the urban festivals and led to the Sacra rappresentazione. As in France and legends of the saints were processed alongside the Bible materials, special attention of the Italian theater was on the Baroque and its splendid furnishings, worked for the major painters and sculptors of their time.

The flowering of religious drama in Spanish literature followed relatively late in the Siglo de Oro during the 16th and 17th centuries, with Lope de Vega, Tirso de Molina and Pedro Calderón de la Barca. The main form was the car sacramental.