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Georg Kaiser

Born

in Magdeburg, Germany

November 25, 1878

Died

June 04, 1945

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Friedrich Carl Georg Kaiser, called Georg Kaiser, (November 25, 1878 – June 4, 1945) was a German dramatist.
He was highly prolific and wrote in a number of different styles. An Expressionist dramatist, he was, along with Gerhart Hauptmann, the most frequently performed playwright in the Weimar Republic. Georg Kaiser's plays include The Burghers of Calais (1913), From Morn to Midnight (1912), and a trilogy, comprising The Coral (1917), Gas (1918), Gas II (1920).
He died at Ascona, Switzerland.
The Burghers of Calais (Die Bürger von Calais), written in 1913, was not performed until 1917. It was Kaiser's first success. The play is very dense linguistically, with its dialogue comprising numerous emotive monologues influenced by the Telegramstil p Friedrich Carl Georg Kaiser, called Georg Kaiser, (November 25, 1878 – June 4, 1945) was a German dramatist.
He was highly prolific and wrote in a number of different styles. An Expressionist dramatist, he was, along with Gerhart Hauptmann, the most frequently performed playwright in the Weimar Republic. Georg Kaiser's plays include The Burghers of Calais (1913), From Morn to Midnight (1912), and a trilogy, comprising The Coral (1917), Gas (1918), Gas II (1920).
He died at Ascona, Switzerland.
The Burghers of Calais (Die Bürger von Calais), written in 1913, was not performed until 1917. It was Kaiser's first success. The play is very dense linguistically, with its dialogue comprising numerous emotive monologues influenced by the Telegramstil poetics of August Stramm. Like Kaiser's other works of the period, it bears the mark of Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy, calling upon the modern individual to transcend mediocrity through extraordinary actions; the Expressionist 'New Man' became a commonplace of the genre.
From Morning to Midnight, filmed by Karlheinz Martin in 1920, was written in 1912 and first performed in 1917. One of the most frequently performed works of German Expressionist theatre, its plot concerns a Cashier (played by Ernst Deutsch in Martin's film) in a small bank in W. (ostensibly Weimar) who is alerted to the power of money by the visit of a rich Italian lady. He embezzles 60,000 Marks and absconds to B. (Berlin) where he attempts to find transcendent experiences in sport, romance and religion, only to be ultimately frustrated.
Kaiser's classic Expressionist plays, written just before and during World War I, often called for man to make a decisive break with the past, rejuvenating contemporary society. He eschewed characterization, and particularly character psychology, instead making his protagonists and other characters archetypes, employing highly anti-naturalistic dialogue often comprising lengthy individual speeches.
Kaiser's drama Side by Side (Nebeneinander, 1923), a 'people's play' (Volksstück), premiered in Berlin on the 3rd November, 1923, directed by Berthold Viertel with design by George Grosz. With this play Kaiser moved away from the Expressionism of his previous works. Utilizing a more rounded characterization and more realistic curt, comic dialogue to tell a light-hearted story of an idealistic pawnbroker caught up in the hyperinflation afflicting Germany at the time (the currency stabilization came a fortnight after the play opened), the play inaugurated the 'new sobriety' (Neue Sachlichkeit) in the drama. "Kaiser has left the cloud that used to surround him," a review in the Weltbühne suggested, "and landed with both feet on the earth."
Kaiser's plays, particularly From Morning to Midnight, were highly influential on the German dramatists operating during the 1920s, including Iwan Goll, Ernst Toller and Bertolt Brecht, who drew on Kaiser's use of revue-type scenes and parable, which was influenced by medieval and 16th-century German mystery plays.
Kaiser collaborated with the composer Kurt Weill on his one-act operas Der Protagonist (1926) and Der Zar lässt sich photographieren (1928), also Der Silbersee (1933).
In his later years, he developed his criticism of the modern machine age that had characterised the Gas trilogy further. Imprisoned briefly in 1923 for stealing a loaf of bread during the hyper-inflationary crisis, Kaiser fled to Switzerland when the Nazis came to power in the 1930s (Kaiser went into exile in 1938), and turned to writing verse dramas on mythological themes, including Pygmalion, Amphitryon, and Bellerophon, and a pacifist drama, The Soldier Tanaka (1940). The Raft of the Medusa (1945) is a play written in verse that reverses the ethos of The Burghers of Calais in a more pessimistic direction; to avoid bad luck, thirteen children on a life-raft drown the youngest of them. ...more

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Average rating: 3.25 · 493 ratings · 47 reviews · 89 distinct works • Similar authors

	Von morgens bis mitternachts 3.07 avg rating — 278 ratings — published 1912 — 94 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Gas 3.49 avg rating — 43 ratings — published 1917 — 20 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Die Bürger von Calais 2.98 avg rating — 48 ratings — published 1914 — 26 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Gas und Gas Zweiter Teil 3.39 avg rating — 23 ratings — 5 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	George Kaiser Plays: Vol. 1 3.79 avg rating — 14 ratings — published 1982 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Gas, Vol. 2 (Classic Reprint): Schauspiel in Drei Akten 3.50 avg rating — 6 ratings — 16 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Coral: A Play In Five Acts 3.60 avg rating — 5 ratings — published 1974 — 26 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	George Kaiser Plays: Vol 2 3.67 avg rating — 3 ratings — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Koralle: Gas Pts. 1 & 2 3.33 avg rating — 3 ratings — published 2009 — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Alkiabades Saved by Georg Kaiser, Bayard Quincy Morgan 2.50 avg rating — 2 ratings — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Gas (3 books)
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Georg Kaiser

3.46 avg rating — 80 ratings

Quotes by Georg Kaiser (?)

“Das Fahrrad ist die abenteuerlichste Erfindung des menschlichen Geistes. Wie jeder großartige Einfall ist er sofort vollkommen da und duldet keine Verfeinerungen. [...] Längst bin ich zu der Überzeugung gekommen, daß der Menschheit das Fahrrad geschenkt ist als Äquivalent für alle Plagen der Technik. Erbarmungsvoll ist ihr aus dem technischen Kollektiv — da es kein seelisches gibt — ein Weg in die Isoliertheit geöffnet. Das Fahrrad inthronisiert die Privatperson. Es macht
sie unabhängig von Hilfsmitteln. Der
Radfahrer tritt zu — und distanziert sich.[...]
Sein Antipode ist der Automobilist.
Das Wesen mit der Kuppelung.
An den Motor, an die öffentliche Fahrrinne, an die Tankstelle. Vor allen Dingen : er wird
gefahren — er fährt nicht. [...]
Der Mensch muß viel erfahren haben, um klug zu werden. Da wir die Technik erleiden mußten, sind wir zweifellos zur größten Weisheit berufen. Nämlich: nichts für sich tun zu lassen, sondern alles selbst zu tun. [...] Das Wandern ist keine Lust, das Automobilfahren ist ein Laster. Zwischen
Lustlosigkeit und Laster muß es liegen. Was? Das Menschenwürdige

Der Querschnitt, Band XII, Heft 1, Ende Januar 1932, S. 30-32
.”
― Georg Kaiser

tags: automobile, bycicle

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Georg Kaiser

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