The Gottfried Children

In this rubric we present various perspectives on theatre – historical and contemporary, intercultural and culture-specific, unexpectedly weird, unusually suspenseful, disturbedly gripping, fascinatingly enigmatic … With a sound reminiscent of military barracks, the desk lids fired upwards in salute as Gold Specs introduced Marc. The cisalpine school spirit already had a hold over the young Southerners. Three times, the principal gave exactly the same speech and ended with a compulsory suggestion: “I know, none of you will disappoint the new teacher.” Marc stood in front of his first students, his throat tight, and found himself unable to utter a word. He felt sorry for the boys and girls. Instead of a room with a big table, where talents and interests would emerge, where age levels would mingle, where students would assist each other, there were only oak benches, crammed closely together and bolted to the floor, the kind which force one to step in sideways. Everything was aligned towards the teacher; it was impossible to create a space free of hierarchy here. From his coat pocket, Marc pulled Peter Petersen’s “Jena Plan,”1 as he had presented it to the New Education Fellowship in Locarno in 1927. He pressed it into ...