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Judgment Day
"A melodrama in three acts" inspired by the trial of those accused of setting the Reichstag fire in Germany that helped the nazis seize power. The play doesn't directly refer to the Recihstag. Instead it's set in a fictional country in Southeastern Europe & the trial is of people accused of attempting to assassinate the "Minister-President" of the "National Party".
201 pages, hardback
First published January 1, 1934
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About the author
Elmer Rice
67 books11 followersExpressionist plays of noted American playwright Elmer Leopold Rice include
The Adding Machine
(1923) and
Street Scene
(1929).
He authored novels.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmer_Rice
He authored novels.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmer_Rice
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January 11, 2008
It's interesting that so many bks that I add to my bkshelves here can't be found in the already existing database. This particular play is important as a commentary on the political machinations invoking "patriotism" for the destruction of civil liberties. Given that it's inspired by the nazi rise to power thru civil-liberties-curtailing after the burning of the Reichstag (German Parliament) bldg in Germany in the early 1930s & that it was written when that subject was topical, it's educational to compare it to the parallel curtailing of civil liberties in the USA after the mayhem of September 11, 2001.
Anyway, 2 days after writing that intro, I just finished this bk. Because it's in a fictional context, it becomes more generally applicable to any time & not dependent on topicality. Do you ever wonder when the US government & the people of the US became aware of the concentration camps? This play was performed in New York City, at the Belasco Theater on September 12, 1934. One of the main protaganists, when denouncing the dictator, proclaims: "I charge him with the murder of the thousands of innocent men and women who have perished on the scaffold, in the torture chamber, and in the concentration camps." It seems to me that I was raised w/ the vague notion that the US didn't really know about the concentration camps (or the extent of them) until they were liberated in 1945. Makes a feller wonder, eh?
Anyway, 2 days after writing that intro, I just finished this bk. Because it's in a fictional context, it becomes more generally applicable to any time & not dependent on topicality. Do you ever wonder when the US government & the people of the US became aware of the concentration camps? This play was performed in New York City, at the Belasco Theater on September 12, 1934. One of the main protaganists, when denouncing the dictator, proclaims: "I charge him with the murder of the thousands of innocent men and women who have perished on the scaffold, in the torture chamber, and in the concentration camps." It seems to me that I was raised w/ the vague notion that the US didn't really know about the concentration camps (or the extent of them) until they were liberated in 1945. Makes a feller wonder, eh?
Displaying 1 of 1 review