Woyzeck

It begins with a sober, mundane record of events. Woyzeck, a young female soldier, has shot dead her husband. Her child is committed to the state’s care. Months previously, Woyzeck had surrendered to police in the grip of a suicidal frenzy, eventually receiving treatment by doctors. Anne Hambermahl’s text employs scenes that operate in the manner of a searchlight to explain how and why the catastrophe unfolded, often returning to Georg Büchner’s original text. She switches the sex of Woyzeck and Marie (who is now called Mario, Woyzeck’s husband), moves the events to the present day where the horrors of the 20th century continue to echo menacingly. Yet her work stays astonishingly close to the original. Although the world has changed fundamentally including its basic values, social conventions and power relations, Büchner’s question remains urgent today: What does it mean to be human?