“The only question that remains is: How could we live like this? Why didn’t we do anything about it?” Falk Richter

In the midst of the crisis, attacked by representatives of the New Right, Falk Richter takes a stand in Disconnected: he sharply analyses the distortions that neoliberal capitalism and the rise of the so-called New Right impose on individuals in Western societies. He vividly and vehemently describes and defends his understanding of theatre as a place for the analysis of language and ideology, as a place of polyphony, as a protected space in which people can think, discuss and try things out undisturbed.

In Disconnected, Falk Richter, the “Director of the Year” 2018 (Theater heute) and one of the most important, internationally influential contemporary German-speaking theatre makers, explains his model of theatre for the first time in detail and with the help of numerous excerpts from his plays, which combines dance, text and music to create an always highly political Gesamtkunstwerk with an unmistakable theatrical language.

Disconnected is an analysis of life in times of permanent excessive demands and exhaustion, the disintegration of certainties, rupture and an uncertain future, as well as the possibilities of theatre to make us aware of the individual’s conditioning and to seek ways to counter the threats to an open, democratic society.

The starting point for this book are three public lectures given by Falk Richter as part of the 5th Saarbrücken Poetry Lectureship for Drama.

Language: German

Saarbrücker Poetikdozentur für Dramatik
Alexander Verlag Berlin
ISBN 978-3-89581-460-0
180 pages, paperback