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Οι υφαντές

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...Στους "Υφαντές" δεν υπάρχει ούτε μία λέξη πού να δίνει σε ένα ορισμένο κόμμα το δικαίωμα, να ορκίσει τον ποιητή στη σημαία του. Και δεν υπάρχει ούτε μια λέξη πού να μην προκύπτει απ ' τη βία των καταστάσεων και να μην προφέρεται μόνο απ ' το στόμα του ποιητή. Ό ποιητής εξαφανίζεται πίσω από το έργο τέχνης. Και το μόνο θέμα πού πρέπει να εξετασθεί είναι αν αυτό το έργο είναι πραγματικά ένα έργο τέχνης, ένα όραμα.
Ένα δράμα είναι ένα ποιητικό έργο πού ενεργεί στη σκηνή. Αυτή την ενέργεια την πέτυχαν οι "Υφαντές" μπροστά στο κοινό του "Γερμανικού Θεάτρου", στο μεγαλύτερο βαθμό από οποιοδήποτε άλλο έργο της νεώτερης φιλολογίας. Ένα έργο τέχνης είναι ένα έργο πού περικλείει μέσα σε μια ορισμένη μορφή έναν κόσμο. Το ότι στους "Υφαντές" περικλείεται ένας κόσμος, δεν είναι δυνατόν να διαψευσθεί. Τίθεται μόνο το ερώτημα κατά πόσο η μορφή είναι καλλιτεχνική. Μας διαφεύγει ένα κέντρο βάρους σ' αυτό το έργο κι ένας ήρωας μέσα στο κέντρο βάρους πού στην κακόμοιρη καμπούρα του να συσσωρεύονται όλα όσα ο Χάουπτμαν μοιράζει σε τόσες πολλές άλλες ράχες. Ένας τέτοιος ήρωας δεν ανταποκρίνεται στο ύφος του αντικειμένου. Η ανάγκη και η φτώχεια δεν υπάρχουν αν δε συνυπάρχουν σε πολλούς μαζί. Κι ακόμη η εξέγερση δεν είναι νοητή χωρίς τη σύμπραξη πολλών ανθρώπων πού ενοποιημένοι στο κέντρο μιας αόρατης σκέψης σπρώχνονται προς ένα και τον αυτό σκοπό. Είτε αναγνωρίσουμε αυτήν τη σκέψη στη "χρεία" πού δέρνει τους υφαντές, είτε πιο αόριστα, τη χαρακτηρίσουμε σαν φωνή λάου - αυτό το κέντρο βάρους υπάρχει: στο τραγούδι των υφαντών, πού πυρπολεί κι εξεγείρει, βρίσκει τη χειροπιαστή έκφραση του. Ο άγνωστος ποιητής αυτών των στροφών είναι, αν όχι ο ήρωας, πάντως ο κρυφός συνωμότης πού προκαλεί τη ροή των γεγονότων καί μέσα από πέντε πράξεις, οδηγεί ειρηνικούς ανθρώπους στη λεηλασία καί το αιματοκύλισμα. (Από την έκδοση)

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1892

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About the author

Gerhart Hauptmann

953 books77 followers
Gerhart Johann Robert Hauptmann was a German dramatist and novelist. He is counted among the most important promoters of literary naturalism, though he integrated other styles into his work as well. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1912.

Life Hauptmann's first drama, Before Dawn (1889) inaugurated the naturalistic movement in modern German literature. It was followed by The Reconciliation (1890), Lonely People (1891) and The Weavers (1892), a powerful drama depicting the rising of the Silesian weavers in 1844 for which he is best known outside of Germany.
Hauptmann's subsequent work includes the comedies Colleague Crampton (1892), The Beaver Coat (1893), and The Conflagration (1901), the symbolist dream play The Assumption of Hannele (1893), and an historical drama Florian Geyer (1895). He also wrote two tragedies of Silesian peasant life, Drayman Henschel (1898) and Rose Bernd (1903), and the dramatic fairy-tales The Sunken Bell (1896) and And Pippa Dances (1906).
Hauptmann's marital life was difficult and in 1904 he divorced his wife. That same year he married the actress Margarete Marschalk, who had borne him a son four years earlier. The following year he had an affair with the 17-year-old Austrian actress Ida Orloff, whom he met in Berlin when she performed in his play The Assumption of Hannele. Orloff inspired characters in several of Hauptmann's works and he later referred to her as his muse.
In 1911 he wrote The Rats. In 1912, Hauptmann was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "primarily in recognition of his fruitful, varied and outstanding production in the realm of dramatic art."
During the First World War Hauptmann was a pacifist. In this period of his career he wrote several gloomy historical-allegorical plays, such as The Bow of Odysseus (1914), The White Saviour (1912–17), and Winter Ballade (1917). After the war, his dramatic abilities appeared to diminish. He wrote two full-length plays that are similar to the early successes: Dorothea Angermann (1926) and Before Sunset (1932). He remained in Germany after Hitler's Machtergreifung and survived the bombing of Dresden. His last work was the Atriden-Tetralogie (1942–46). His works in German were published by S. Fischer Verlag.
Hauptmann died at the age of 83 at his home in Agnetendorf (now Jagniątków, Poland) in 1946. Since the Polish communist administration did not allow Hauptmann's relatives to bury him in Agnetendorf (although even the Soviet military government had recommended this), his body was transported in an old cattle wagon to occupied Germany more than a month after his death. He was buried near his cottage on Hiddensee.
Under Wilhelm II Hauptmann enjoyed the reputation of a radical writer, on the side of the poor and outcasts. During the Weimar Republic (1918–33) he enjoyed the status of the literary figurehead of the new order, and was even considered for the post of state president. Under Hitler he kept his distance from the regime, but never publicly criticized it. This, and the fact that (unlike so many writers and academics) he stayed in Germany, was strongly held against him after the war. A superb collected edition of his works appeared in the 1960s, and stimulated some impressive studies of his work (e.g. those by Peter Sprengel), but the tide of critical and public opinion remained negative. A few of his plays are still revived from time to time, but otherwise he is neglected. He was certainly an uneven writer, but at his best (as in 'The Weavers', his novel 'The Fool in Christ Emmanuel Quint', and the Novellen 'The Heretic of Soana' and 'Das Meerwunder') he can arguably rank with the best of his German contemporaries.

Source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerhart_...

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Displaying 1 - 30 of 77 reviews
Profile Image for Hend.
179 reviews925 followers
February 3, 2013
a drama about a group of poor (the weavers) and their abortive revolt
in 1844,derived by personal,political and religious motivations.

an epic in which masses of people are used as a collective hero.

old people dying of starvation,children forced to work long hours from the day they learn to walk, they cries of hunger,and are hopeless with this miserable and desperate situation.


"DREISSIGER: It was nothing serious. The boy is all right again. But all the same it's a disgrace. The child's so weak that a puff of wind would blow him over. How people, how any parents can be so thoughtless is what passes my comprehension. Loading him with two heavy pieces of fustian to carry six good miles! No one would believe it that hadn't seen it. It simply means that I shall have to make a rule that no goods brought by children will be taken over. I sincerely trust that such things will not occur again. Who gets all the blame for it? Why, of course the manufacturer. It's entirely our fault. If some poor little fellow sticks in the snow in winter and goes to sleep, a special correspondent arrives post-haste, and in two days we have a blood-curdling story served up in all the papers. Is any blame laid on the father, the parents, that send such a child? Not a bit of it. How should they be to blame? It's all the manufacturer's fault -- he's made the scapegoat. They flatter the weaver, and give the manufacturer nothing but abuse -- he's a cruel man, with a heart like a stone, a dangerous fellow, at whose calves every cur of a journalist may take a bite. He lives on the fat of the land, and pays the poor weavers starvation wages. In the flow of his eloquence the writer forgets to mention that such a man has his cares too and his sleepless nights; that he runs risks of which the workman never dreams; that he is often driven distracted by all the calculations he has to make, and all the different things he has to take into account; that he has to struggle for his very life against competition; and that no day passes without some annoyance or some loss. And think of the manufacturer's responsibilities, think of the numbers that depend on him, that look to him for their daily bread. No, No! none of you need wish yourselves in my shoes -- you would soon have enough of it. You all saw how that fellow, that scoundrel Becker, behaved. Now he'll go and spread about all sorts of tales of my hardheartedness, of how my weavers are turned off for a mere trifle, without a moment's notice. Is that true? Am I so very unmerciful?"



The spirit of revolt sweeps their souls. It gives them courage and strength to attack the rotten structure, to drive the thieves out of the temple,and to even attack the soldiers . The women, too participated and become an avenging force.

Old Hilse,a victim of religious brainwashing,
who attempts to stem the tide with his blind belief was swept over as every obstacle, every hindrance, once labor awakens to the consciousness of its solidaric power.

his view of life and how he see himself as being subjected to fate that is too powerful to be resisted at the price of prolonged and intense suffering.

"
LUISE: You an' your piety an' religion -- did they serve to keep the life in my poor children? In rags an' dirt they lay, all the four -- it didn't as much as keep 'em dry. Yes! I sets up to be a mother, that's what I do -- an' if you'd like to know it, that's why I'd send all the manufacturers to hell -- because I am a mother! Not one of the four could I keep in life! It was cryin' more than breathin' with me from the time each poor little thing came into the world till death took pity on it. The devil a bit you cared! You sat there prayin' and singin', and let me run about till my feet bled, tryin' to get one little drop o' skim milk. How many hundred nights has I lain an' racked my head to think what I could do to cheat the churchyard of my little one? What harm has a baby like that done that it must come to such a miserable end -- eh? An' over there at Dittrich's they're bathed in wine an' washed in milk. No! you may talk as you like, but if they begins here, ten horses won't hold me back. An' what's more -- if there's a rush on Dittrich's, you will see me in the forefront of it -- an' pity the man as tries to prevent me -- I've stood it long enough, so now you know it."


this revolutionary significance,refer to any pseudo-civilization built on the misery of Labor.



Profile Image for Renin.
105 reviews62 followers
December 30, 2019
James Joyce sayesinde adını duyduğum bir diğer yazar oldu Gerhart Hauptmann ve kendisine hayran oldum. Mükemmel bir oyun Dokumacılar. Gereksiz tek bir sözcük, aksayan, sakil veya yapay duran tek bir diyalog yok.
Profile Image for Orçun Güzer.
Author 1 book56 followers
April 23, 2018
1848 devrimi öncesinde Almanya’da yaşanmış benzer bir olaydan esinlenilerek yazılmış bu oyunda, sefaletin en dibine sürüklenenlerin, açlık sınırında yaşayanların, bıçak gelip kemiğe dayandığında ayaklanmaları anlatılıyor. Hauptmann, bu oyunu Schopenhauer’in merhamet üstüne fikirlerinden ve sosyal adalet düşüncesinden esinlenerek yazdığını söylemiş, ama bence oyunun etkileyici yönü, başkaldıran öfkedeki coşkuyu okura/izleyiciye aktarabiliyor olması. Backer, Jager, Wittig ve Luise unutulmaz tiplemeler olarak aklıma kazındı. İşin ilginç yanı, Hauptmann ideolojik bağı olan bir yazar değil; böyleyken, sınıf çatışmasını bu kadar başarıyla ortaya koyabilmesi takdire değer.
Kitapta, Hüseyin Salihoğlu’nun Hauptmann ve Alman Natüralizmi üstüne bilgilendirici bir yazısı ile Heinrich Heine’nin “Silezya Dokumacıları” adlı şiiri de yer alıyor. Kathe Kollwitz’in mükemmel illüstrasyonları kitapta yer almıyor ama meraklısına, web’de aramasını tavsiye ederim.
Profile Image for Bettie.
9,977 reviews5 followers
Want to read
March 6, 2014
Okay- this is going to be a bit of a rant against Goodreads, so sniff your smelling salts sufficiently to enable yourself to make a quick exit.

A couple of weeks ago I had a review deleted because a few people had flagged it as unsatisfactory, citing that it was not my own words.

When I load a book up as currently reading I tap in front quotes, dedication and opening section or sentence. I also add myriad shelves to indicate the medium of the read, geography and era.

'K

If the book is subsequently abandoned - I do not often feel the urge to wax lyrical as to why it is abandoned, however I will affix various shelf titles to clarify.

I move on to a new read.

In contrast to the nit-picking by nameless milk-saucered middlebrows that I was afflicted by, look at the blurb box above this item. The description is not accredited. Is it the words of the publisher, a newspaper or a Goodread's librarian. I cannot flag it!

the epic script has been saddled with the dubious honor of being called the “first socialist play”

It may help you to know that my now deleted review was a 1* abandoned Edith Wharton.

Now the penny drops, yeah? lol

Profile Image for Ferda Nihat Koksoy.
518 reviews29 followers
March 13, 2020
İlk kez okuduğum Hauptmann'ı çok sevdim; hem insani duyarlılığı hem de edebiyat gücü yüksek bir yazar.
Nefis çevirisi için teşekkürler Hüseyin Salihoğlu, teşekkürler İmge Kitabevi.

"Nobel ödüllü (1912) Hauptmann, sosyal merhamet duygusu iliklerine işlemiş, sosyal yardımı ve sosyal uyanışı canlandırmayı amaç edinmiş, naturalist bir oyun yazarı olarak tanımlanır.
Kendisi kitabı yazış nedenleri olarak merhamet ve sosyal adalet duygularını göstermiştir.
Dokumacılar (1892), 1848 öncesinde Silezya'da korkunç sözcüğünün bile anlatamayacağı sefalet içinde sömürülen dokumacıların yaşamının ve tarihi ayaklanmanın çarpıcı biçimde canlandırıldığı, dramatik yaratıcığın doruğa ulaştığı, Alman naturalist edebiyatının en güçlü eseri" (Çevirmen: Prof.Dr. Hüseyin Salihoğlu, Alman Edebiyatı ve Tiyatrosu Uzmanı).

"Sabırsızlaşan dokumacıların birçoklarının görünümü, haklarında ölüm kalım kararı verilecek insanların mahkeme önündeki ıstıraplı gerilim içinde bekleyişlerine benziyor. Öte yandan hepsinin üzerine birazcık, sadaka kabul eden ve itilip kakılan insanın ezikliği sinmiş, sadece sabretmeye ve kendini alabildiğince küçültmeye alışması gerektiği benliklerine işlemiş. Ayrıca yüzlerinde sonuç alınmayan, burgulayıcı bir düşüncenin donuk izleri okunmaktadır. Birbirlerine benziyorlar; kimi cüce, kimi okul hademesi gibi, çoklarının göğüsleri çökük; öksürüklü, fukara insanlar. Yüzleri kir içinde ve solguņ. Uzun süre tezgâh başında oturmaktan dizleri bükülmüş, dokuma tezgâhlarının yaratıkları bunlar.

Bir yerde fukaralık olmaya görsün, felaketler üst üste gelmeye başlar.
Yağ bulamazsak yavan ekmekpatates, o da olmazsa kuru kepek yiyoruz, ve kepek de bulamazsak hayvan leşleriyle yaşıyoruz.
Ne yapsan açsın dokumacı.

Siz, cehennem zebanisi zenginler,
Yersiniz fakirin malını mülkünü,
Haram olsun kazancınız
.

Yaşamak istiyoruz, başka bir şey değil, bunun için de boynumuza geçirilen ölüm urganını kesmeye geldik; insan bir defacık nefes almak istiyor."
Profile Image for Martin.
102 reviews10 followers
November 9, 2011
One mark of a great dramatist is how timeless the work feels and I'd love to see this play now, for it fits all too well with the current political discourse and social upheaval. Such a devastating and poignant portrayal.
Profile Image for Vicky Morinigo.
36 reviews3 followers
July 6, 2023
Super crudo, pero excelentemente escrito. Parece más una novela dialogada que una obra de teatro
Profile Image for Czarny Pies.
2,829 reviews1 follower
May 17, 2017
The Weavers is a very early attempt to discuss the class struggle on stage. Hauptman very effectively raises all the issues at the cost of dramatic development. There is no protagonist in this play but rather a large number of stick figures who are there to represent an aspect of the issue. There is a pastor lacking compassion designed to show that the organized religion will do nothing for the poor. There is an avaricious merchant and a servile clerk. There are hungry peasants and angry young men but none of the many members of the dramatis personnae undergo any transformations during the play. They are all there purely to illustrate a point.

The surprising thing is how well it works. I can easily imagine the intellectuals and bourgeois theatre lovers at the opening night of the play on 24 September 1894 in Berlin being delighted a the end of the performance and determined to discuss the play for several hours at some nearby café. The atmosphere would the same in other words as in London after the opening night of a Shaw play.

I cannot imagine how this play could possibly be staged to make it enjoyable for an audience today. However, in its time it clearly made an excellent contribution to socio-political debate that had been raging since the French Revolution and which would continue for another 100 years.
117 reviews3 followers
September 6, 2016
This play is exceptional. There's not a single, cohesive plot running through it - it is five acts - but it is about a weaver's uprising. It gets surprisingly violent at the end. The mill owners all complain that the weavers just don't know how to properly spend money, and that a mill owner has a lot of problems too, etc etc etc. Meanwhile the weavers starve, the mill owners all have huge houses, etc. If the protagonists weren't weavers and you weren't regularly reminded of the old technology in the play it would be a drama set right now. It was a somewhat easy to read play, and I like the idea of revisiting this play with very minor reworkings to reflect modern times.
Profile Image for Michael.
982 reviews175 followers
August 31, 2018
This book features a work of Gerhardt Hauptmann, a leading “naturalist” writer and contributor to future trends in German Expressionism. “The Weavers” is a play about working class people who revolt against their employers in a strike that turns into a suppressed revolution in Silesia in the 1840s. The play is interesting in that it has no protagonist, just a series of characters who see events through a variety of perspectives, but disappear from the stage as new ones emerge. It also uses a good deal of Silesian dialect, making it a bit of a challenge for German-as-second-language readers. Fortunately, the vocabulary is relatively simple, reflecting the uneducated nature of most of the characters, so this isn’t too hard to navigate.

The play itself is relatively short, but this volume includes a fair amount of supporting documentation, including historical information about the conditions of weavers in Silesia during the 1840s, and the events on which the drama is placed, reviews at the time of its initial performances (mostly from Socialist newspapers), and government records of censorship decisions and debates regarding that censorship. Although this play is today considered one of Hauptmann’s most important works, and although he received a Nobel Prize as a writer, it appears that it was only rarely, and briefly, allowed to be shown on German stages. This end-matter is extensive and somewhat tedious at times, but also adds a considerable amount to reading the play itself.
Profile Image for Emre.
290 reviews41 followers
Read
November 7, 2022
Yaşam Kaya | Natüralizme Bile Başkaldıran Bir Yazar...

https://www.mimesis-dergi.org/2010/08...



Sabırsızlaşan dokumacıların birçoklarının görünümü, haklarında ölüm kalım kararı verilecek insanların mahkeme önündeki ıstıraplı gerilim içinde bekleyişlerine benziyor. Öte yandan hepsinin üzerine birazcık, sadaka kabul eden ve itilip kakılan insanın ezikliği sinmiş, sadece sabretmeye ve kendini alabildiğince küçültmeye alışması gerektiği benliklerine işlemiş. Ayrıca yüzlerinde sonuç alınmayan, burgulayıcı bir düşüncenin donuk izleri okunmaktadır. Sf:12

Fabrikatörlerimiz iyi insanlar olsa, biz de kötü devirde yaşamazdık. Sf:49

Hayatım boyunca namuslu insan oldum, şimdi halime bakın! Ne kazandım bundan? Neye benziyorum? Ne hale getirdiler beni? Sf:54

İnsan... Herkesin başına üşüşüp zıkkımlandığı leş. Sf:70

Konfeksiyon taciriyim. Fabrikatörle ortak çalışıyorum. Ne kadar çok dokumacı aç kalırsa, o kadar çok yağlı yerim. Sefalet ne kadar büyük olursa, ekmeğim de o kadar büyük oluyor. Sf:74

Bu fani dünyada insan geriye ne bırakır ki? Köhne bir vücut için kimse ağlayacak değil ya. Tanrı korkusu ve eziyet var burada, buna yaşamak deniyor, bunu insan seve seve bırakır. Fakat ondan sonra Gottlieb! Ondan sonra bi'şey var ve insan onu da kaybederse, işte o zaman her şey bitti demektir. Sf:124

Bize kimse acımadı, ne Tanrı ne de insan. Şimdi kendi kendimize hak yaratacağız. Sf:127



Profile Image for Gertrud Soone.
64 reviews2 followers
March 9, 2022
“On põrgu oma hingeväravad avanud ja kurgu pärani lahti ajanud, et seal alla sõidaksid kõik, kes vaeste õigusi vääravad ja viletsate suhtes vägivalda tarvitavad.”
9 reviews
March 20, 2025
Yay Gewerkschaft!!!!

Ein Werk so naturalistisch, dass man nicht nur die Armut sondern auch den Dialekt der Figuren mitleiden muss.

4/5, Dialektfassung nur für Leute die Dialekt verstehen zu empfehlen
7 reviews
June 16, 2025
Unmenschliche Profitmaximierung kann zu überproportional großen Verlusten führen, wobei der moralische Gewinn (das Gewissen könnte einem vor Gott niemals hierfür verteidigen) und die Frömmigkeit (welche des Charakters und des Heils Gewinn ist) bereits davor verlustig gegangen sind.
Profile Image for Tohuwabohus.
25 reviews1 follower
February 3, 2015
"Luise übermannt von leidenschaftlicher Aufregung, heftig: Ja, ja, Gottlieb, kaffer du dich hinter a Owen, in de Helle, nimm d'r an Kochleffel in de Hand und 'ne Schissel voll Puttermilch uf de Knie, zieh d'r a Reckel an und sprich Gebetl, so bist'n Vater recht. -Und das will a Mann sein?
Lacher der Leute im "Hause".
Der alte Hilse bebend, mit unterdrückter Wut: Und du willst 'ne richtige Frau sein, hä? Da wer ich dirsch amal orntlich sagen. Du willst 'ne Mutter sein und hast so a meschantes Maulwerk dahier? Du willst dein'n Mädel Lehren geben und hetzt dein'n Mann uf zu Verbrechen und Ruchlosigkeiten?! (S. 87)"
Profile Image for Yani Daniele.
555 reviews40 followers
November 16, 2015
Una obra de teatro ambienta en 1840 que a pesar de antiguedad el tema planteado sigue siendo vigente, el enriquecimiento de algunos a costa de otros, la explotación, la humillación. Todo esto se representa maravillosamente desde el punto de vista de los tejedores quienes viven en la miseria, trabajando día y noche y ni siquiera tienen dinero para sobrevivir.
Profile Image for Joy.
209 reviews7 followers
March 7, 2016
Nobel prize winning playwright. Really interesting history/context surrounding this play. It's not really performed any longer. Large cast, no hero. Very little character development. Very dark. School of naturalism. Our lives and fates are set in motion long before we are born and we will never be able to control them.

The ending is incredibly haunting.
Profile Image for Roqaiah Al-Fareed.
80 reviews15 followers
March 18, 2015
مسرحية رائعة تتناول ثورة النساجين اربعينيات القرن التاسع عشر في ألمانيا ضد استغلال أصحاب المصانع لهم.

أستطاع هاوبتمن ايصال فكرة أن النشيد الثوري يخرج الظالم من عنجهيته وجبروته

هذه الثورة كانت محدودة وتفتقر للتنظيم والقيادة مما خلفت قتلى وجرحى من هؤلاء النساجين والمستضعفين بعد اخماد ثورتهم.
Profile Image for Zweifel.
75 reviews9 followers
October 26, 2023
Dritter alter Weber erhebt sich, vom Geiste getrieben, und fängt an, mit »Zungen« zu reden, den Finger drohend erhoben. Es ist ein Gericht in der Luft! Gesellet euch nicht zu den Reichen und Vornehmen! Es ist ein Gericht in der Luft! Der Herr Zebaoth . . .
Profile Image for Mohammad Abu.
16 reviews11 followers
April 21, 2014
في كتب في الحياة بعد ما تخلص منها بتسأل حالك ليش ما بعرف هالكتاب من زمان ؟
مسرحية رائعة ممتعة ، انصح بها كل عدو و صديق
Profile Image for Anoosha.
138 reviews37 followers
November 28, 2016
نمایشنامه بافندگان یکی از آثار مهم ناتورالیسم است. داستان انقلاب طبقه کارگر برای گرفتن حقوقشان.
Profile Image for Aithne.
201 reviews37 followers
April 3, 2021
Einerseits ist es ein interessantes Buch, dank dessen ein kleiner Abschnitt der Geschichte für mich ein bisschen näher, realer und lebendiger geworden ist. Andererseits, es ist ja ein Theaterstück - also bin ich mir nicht sicher, wie sinnvoll es ist, es in solch einer "trockenen" Buchform kennenzulernen. Mit allen diesen Didaskalien, sehr genauen Beschreibungen... Es war klar für die Bühne geschrieben und ich fürchte, dass es vermutlich als Buch einen ganz anderen Eindruck hinterlässt als ursprunglich beabsichtigt. Eine richtige Aufführung davon würde ich mir auf jeden Fall gerne anschauen!

Aus der Nicht-Muttersprachlerin-Perspektive kann ich noch dazu sagen: die Sprache, die in diesem Buch benutz wird, ist ein absoluter Albtraum. Die Hauptpersonen - also die Weber - sind einfache, ungebildete Leute aus der Provinz, die einen eigenen, sehr spezifischen Dialekt benutzen - und der Autor tut alles, um dies in Schriftform wiederzugeben. Im Endeffekt ist gut die Hälfte des Buches sehr schwer verständlich, und nur wenn die "Bösewichte" auftreten kann man sich beim Lesen ein wenig entspannen. Man gewöhnt sich zwar im Laufe der Zeit an manche Sonderbarkeiten (z.B. dass "a" für "er" oder "der" steht, "ooch" für "auch", "ihrsch" einfach für "ihr" etc.), aber ein Albtraum bleibt es sowieso. Ohne volle Konzentration geht es nicht.
Profile Image for Michael Haase.
355 reviews11 followers
March 9, 2018
Fascinating and provocative for it's tone and proximity to the commoners' plight, although no where as insightful or moving as major realist authors such as Dickens or Zola, the play is a representation of Marx's claims in his Communist Manifesto. It's a story about the suffering and eventual revolt of the working class.

The most noteworthy thing about the play is Hauptmann's use of Silesian dialect in it. He attempts to capture the idiosyncrasies of the characters through their speech, portraying them as he supposed would be most realistic. But this unconventional depiction makes the script almost unintelligible to any non-Silesian. I might compare their speech to something like Ebonics, such as in Uncle Tom's Cabin.

I don't think this is in any way the best depiction of the worker's plight in literature. At best, it serves as a sort of cathartic experience, giving viewers the thrill of just war and the downfall of oppression. It satisfies the audience's craving for violent retribution. It's an emotional experience more than it is a philosophical one.
Profile Image for Tom.
573 reviews15 followers
February 4, 2020
On the surface, this play's subject matter of working class revolt in the face of industrialisation is as unoriginal as it gets. But as I read further I became intrigued by its structure: its five scenes travel to five different settings and focus on (largely) different characters each time. There is a continuity, but no central protagonists - the viewpoint is in a constant state of flux.

The weavers feel abandoned by their country and by their god, as they slowly waste away in the face of the changing economy. The play implies that realistically there is no place for the old ways of the craftsmen in the modern world, but is also ambivalent about communism and how its ideals are corrupted my mob mentality. It doesn't offer answers, but asks what society's responsibility is towards the poor.
Profile Image for Ali Nazifpour.
387 reviews18 followers
August 9, 2024
Gerhart Hauptmann's naturalistic style which focuses on poverty and is overtly political and didactic is not really to my taste, so it's impressive that he ultimately managed to sway me over and me like him. I'm going to assume if someone who's not interested in the genre likes him, then he should be much appreciated by people who are into it.

The Weavers (1892) is Hauptmann's masterpiece in my opinion. It doesn't have a main character and follows a group of laborers who demand better conditions through protests. The sense of camaraderie and solidarity with the workers is reinforced by the fact that the entire cast rather than any individual feels to be the main focus of the play so it feels like it's making a political statement not by empty slogans but through an innovative artistic forms which makes it much more impactful. Hauptmann also doesn't portray the workers in a simplistic way and that also prevents it from becoming a bad piece of propaganda.
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