Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Preface
- Jewish Identities in German Popular Entertainment, 1890–1933
- Introduction: Past and Present
- I “PONIM ET CIRCENSES”: JEWISH IDENTITIES IN CIRCUS ENTERTAINMENT, 1870–1933
- II COMIC RELIEF: JEWISH IDENTITIES IN JARGON THEATER, 1890 TO THE 1920S
- Introduction: Different Varieties
- 5 Tongue in Cheek
- 6 All in the Family
- 7 A Limited Engagement
- 8 The Gravity of Laughter
- Conclusion to Part II
- III THE LONELINESS OF THE LIMELIGHT: JEWISH IDENTITIES IN REVUE THEATER, 1898–1933
- Conclusion
- Appendix
- Bibliography
- Index
7 - A Limited Engagement
from II - COMIC RELIEF: JEWISH IDENTITIES IN JARGON THEATER, 1890 TO THE 1920S
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 January 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Preface
- Jewish Identities in German Popular Entertainment, 1890–1933
- Introduction: Past and Present
- I “PONIM ET CIRCENSES”: JEWISH IDENTITIES IN CIRCUS ENTERTAINMENT, 1870–1933
- II COMIC RELIEF: JEWISH IDENTITIES IN JARGON THEATER, 1890 TO THE 1920S
- Introduction: Different Varieties
- 5 Tongue in Cheek
- 6 All in the Family
- 7 A Limited Engagement
- 8 The Gravity of Laughter
- Conclusion to Part II
- III THE LONELINESS OF THE LIMELIGHT: JEWISH IDENTITIES IN REVUE THEATER, 1898–1933
- Conclusion
- Appendix
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Anti-Semitic polemics of sorts accompanied Jargon theaters from their beginnings. Initially, anti-Semitism had only a marginal effect on the success of these theaters. Such polemics can, in fact, be read as involuntary testimonies to the growing acceptance that Jargon theater found among a broad segment of the population. The theaters would hardly have become the targets of vicious rhymes, for example, if they were not also symbols of German-Jewish confidence in Wilhelmine Germany. This was a very public confidence, not a quiet or private satisfaction from intellectual achievement and advancement. The reaction to Jargon theater from an anti-Semitic subculture was acid and crude, a response that thought of itself as a response in kind. Clearly, Jargon theaters were not only actors in but also the subject of popular culture, a culture that was not per se progressive or tolerant.
Whereas coverage of Jargon theaters in the daily press generally refrained from anti-Semitic commentary, the yellow press did not exercise the same restraint. A particularly revealing example was a poem by A. O. Weber entitled “The Herrnfeld Theater” (1905). It reflects the thrust of anti-Semitic defamations directed against the two directors Anton and Donat Herrnfeld. We are reminded that humor can be ambivalent in nature and can simultaneously foster both the inclusion and the exclusion of minorities from society at large. Weber's poem, despite its spiteful nature, was effectively inconsequential in comparison to the far-reaching campaigns against all things “foreign” that were prompted by the First World War.
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- Jewish Identities in German Popular Entertainment, 1890–1933 , pp. 160 - 175Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006