“It’s not possible that the issue should be that my voice expresses a historical truth! No, these voices must be heard for other reasons. Because they are there! Because they shape reality.”
We could continue to pretend that other lives touch us ... But the question is, where exactly do they touch us, interface with our lives, I mean from a political point of view, and not always just there where we are forced to pretend that there is a pattern of our commonalities. Like, for example, a truth in Man that we should all share. The meaning of freedom could be not having to be true.
“Where do we interact with others? There is a sentimental kind of socialism that always tries to answer this question by saying that all we have to do is become better people.” (Dietmar Dath). But we are already good enough. Indifference and lack of interest may be a legitimate defence against notions of commonalities which nonetheless primarily divide us. Perhaps it is a good thing not to be interested in one another, perhaps that is no loss but only a neglect or disregard of those points at which we make contact only on a moral and psychological basis, without looking at where our lives really interact. Perhaps Meinhof is right when she says: “Women who do not have a wife to bring up their children have a hard time, an incredibly hard time.” She looks for the junction where women are not supposed always to have to hang around some guy just because he started a family with them. “In any event, the guy never listens anyway”. Nor does she speak of an interface with the children. Where do our lives really interface, and not always just in the silly melodrama we have to tell ourselves?
René Pollesch stages “The Valley of the Flying Knives, A Ruhr Trilogy, Part 1“ in Bert Neumann’s sets, or, rather, in Cosmo Vitelli’s CRAZY HORSE night club.
With: Inga Busch, Christine Groß, Nina Kronjäger, Martin Laberenz, Trystan Pütter and Volker Spengler
Director: René Pollesch
Stage Designer: Bert Neumann
Costumes: Nina von Mechow
Video: Ute Schall
Dramaturgy: Aenne Quiñones
A co-production of the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz Berlin with the Ringlokschuppen Mülheim an der Ruhr and the European Culture Capital RUHR.2010, in collaboration with the Project Agency Kultur an der Ruhr (Mülheim City Jubilee) and the Theatre Department of the Mülheim an der Ruhr Cultural Agency, with the kind support of the NRW Art Foundation.
