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| | Spring Awakening: A Play | | | Music Style : | | European | | Record Label : | | Faber & Faber | | Release Date : | | 2007-09-04 | | Store Price : | | $13.00 | | Artistopia's Price: $9.36 | | Usually ships in 24 hours | | |
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Customer Reviews of This Album/CD |
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 actable translation
Submitted on: 2009-10-02 |
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| fine translation of a classic expressionistic piece----beautifully phrased and imagisitically florid. very clear in charaterization and in progression of time and events, albeit realities alternate between fantasy, imagnation and reality. Great for theatre teachers and studio acting teachers. For scene work, Wedekind is a wonderful writer. The division of scenes makes each sequence an event in itself. |
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From Outrage to Hilarity ...
Submitted on: 2009-05-18 |
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... in just one century! There's little doubt in my reading mind that Benjamin Franklin Wedekind (conceived in San Francisco, born in Germany, miseducated in Switzerland) meant to shock the socks off the bourgeois public when he wrote 'Frühlings Erwachen' in 1891. It's a play about teenagers -- yes, Virginia, there were teenagers in 1891 -- doing things that even adults couldn't do on a conventional stage; there are explicit scenes of rape, suicide, homos*xuality, and mast*rbation. One teenage girl is a debauched artists' model, and a childish playmate! One 14-year-old girl is beaten and abused by her father, and another envies her for it. The latter pesters her mother for the 'secrets of reproduction', finds herself incomprehensibly pregnant after the rape, and dies in an ab*rtion.
"Spring Awakening" was first staged in Germany in 1906, in a heavily censored version. It played in New York for one day in 1917 but was condemned as obscenity. I wonder, would an audience in 2009 find this play horribly shocking, or would we smugly guffaw at the 19th Century moralities that it mocks. I have a feeling that the world has been so thoroughly Wedekinderized since 1891 that we'd need real blood and nudity on stage to be sufficiently shaken up. When the central character, the boy Melchior, is sent to the reformatory, for instance, he joins a circle of boys competing for a coin by trying to be the first to spurt s*men on it. That might startle even a New York audience toughened up by David Mamet.
Gnarly stuff, eh? Nevertheless, Wedekind meant his play to be uproariously funny, and it is. The scenes in which the adults - parents and teachers - reveal their utter hapless in consequentiality are fresh and witty still. The unexpected appearance of a ghost, the boy Moritz who'd blown his head off, in the final scene is a brilliant absurdity. This translation, by Jonathan Franzen, seems to me to catch the sardonic tone of Wedekind's original German very effectively. Even if you may never see a decent production of Spring Awakening, it's well worth reading, as the first vernal flower of the modern theater.
There is another listing on amazon of exactly the same book, available for a normal price. |
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From Outrageous to Hilarious ...
Submitted on: 2009-05-17 |
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... in just a century! There's little doubt in my reading mind that Benjamin Franklin Wedekind (conceived in San Francisco, born in Germany, miseducated in Switzerland) meant to shock the socks off the bourgeois public when he wrote 'Frühlings Erwachen' in 1891. It's a play about teenagers -- yes, Virginia, there were teenagers in 1891 -- doing things that even adults couldn't do on a conventional stage; there are explicit scenes of rape, suicide, homosexuality, and masturbation. One teenage girl is a debauched artists' model, and a childish playmate! One 14-year-old girl is beaten and abused by her father, and another envies her for it. The latter pesters her mother for the 'secrets of reproduction', finds herself incomprehensibly pregnant after the rape, and dies in an abortion.
"Spring Awakening" was first staged in Germany in 1906, in a heavily censored version. It played in New York for one day in 1917 but was condemned as obscenity. I wonder, would an audience in 2009 find this play horribly shocking, or would we smugly guffaw at the 19th Century moralities that it mocks. I have a feeling that the world has been so thoroughly Wedekinderized since 1891 that we'd need real blood and nudity on stage to be sufficiently shaken up. When the central character, the boy Melchior, is sent to the reformatory, for instance, he joins a circle of boys competing for a coin by trying to be the first to spurt semen on it. That might startle even a New York audience today.
Gnarly stuff, eh? Nevertheless, Wedekind meant his play to be uproariously funny, and it is. The scenes in which the adults - parents and teachers - reveal their utter hapless in consequentiality are fresh and witty still. The unexpected appearance of a ghost, the boy Moritz who'd blown his head off, in the final scene is a brilliant absurdity. This translation, by Jonathan Franzen, seems to me to catch the sardonic tone of Wedekind's original German very effectively. Even if you may never see a decent production of Spring Awakening, it's well worth reading, as the first vernal flower of the modern theater. |
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 Director's Discretion
Submitted on: 2009-04-26 |
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Jonathan Franzen's translation of the Frank Wedekind play, SPRING AWAKENING, will give you an honest taste of what the playwright truly wrote so many years ago. Opinions of it will probably be influenced by each reader's history. Are you reading it after seeing the play? Are you reading it after seeing the musical? Are you reading it -- as I did -- without having seen any stage production? I picked it up due to all the hype in the press about the recent productions -- both musical and straight up.
In the introduction to this edition, Franzen is extremely critical of the musical and the liberties taken with Wedekind's work. I'm not surprised, however. Although the play does include stage directions, many scenes seem a bit confusing. For instance, when Melchior rapes Martha in the hayloft, readers of this play would never know it -- at least initially. All we get is Martha saying "Oh -- oh -- oh!" repeatedly (sounding somewhat like an old Dick and Jane primer from way back).
So yes, all those teen topics are here, just in early 20th century muted tones. If you know the play already, it'll all make perfect sense. If not, act like a director and direct your imaginary actors as you read. It will make up for any gaps and give the comic lines some extra pizazz. Apparently, "director discretion" is the thing with this interesting play.
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Great Buy
Submitted on: 2009-03-27 |
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| I read the whole play in one day. It isn't quite as good as the musical, but anyone who likes the music will enjoy the play as well. |
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