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THE DRAMA OF INCOMPLETENESS DECLARED TO BE COMPLETE (demonstrated by the inmates, and the nose of the director of the asylum continuously rubbed in it) to the holders of power in the 1960s. Yet Marat’s question, “why is it such a terrible crime to demand 500 guilty heads if we save the lives of 500,000 innocent people?”,°° was a hidden question of the period of consolidation after 1956 in Janos Kadar’s regime. The play’s basic question, “what can we say about the Revolution under the Emperor, and how?”°® could also have given rise to a way of understanding not intended yet possible in the light of the current political establishment. Although the National Theatre’s production did not necessarily have the simplistic approach stressed by the press, it did not reinforce any readings of rebuke or lamentation either, so it cannot be considered as an antecedent of the legendary 1981 production in Kaposvar, and it did not overstep the boundaries of officiality. DRAMATIC TEXT, DRAMATURGY Contemporary criticism provided detailed guidance for the “correct comprehension” of the play’s interpretation concretized in the production, extracting Weiss’ debate drama (discussed in longer columns than the show itself) into a thesis drama. With the exception of Uj Ember and Vigilia, all periodicals called the play one of “the strangest and most significant” dramas of the century,°™ which belonged to the family of “great dramatic poems, like Faust and The Tragedy of Man”.®*® The parallels with The Tragedy of Man*°® were also relevant from the point of view of the National’s repertory, since Imre Madach’s famous play, directed by Major with leather clothes on actors, had its premiere a year and a half earlier, and Adam, Eve and Lucifer were played by the same actors as de Sade, Corday and Marat. Critics were keen to recognize that The Death of Marat was an unconventional historical 502 Quoted in (zs.i.): Szinielöadäs az elmegyögyintezetben, Esti Hírlap, Vol. 11, No. 23, 28" January, 1966, 2. Geszti: Charentoni szinjaték, 8. 5% Ibid. 505 F.: Marat halála és A helytartó, Fejér Megyei Hírlap, Vol. 22, No. 49, 27 February, 1966, 7. 506 This parallel was echoed by some critics simply following the leitmotifs of the era, while others sought to deepen it. Cf. “[The Death of Marat also] interrogates the purpose and meaning of human progress deeply and responsibly, ponders the value of social change, asks about the prospects of mankind, but already on the basis of the historical dilemma of socialism and the imperialist bourgeois world, the reality of today”. Ibid. — “The play resembles The Tragedy of Man [...] because its framework has a dramatic influence on the scenes in it. The framework and the inner scenes are tightly interconnected, with a back-andforth effect. Adam is dreaming, but his vision is not valid objectively because he is dreaming what Lucifer makes him dream. Likewise, for Weiss, the history of the French revolution is not entirely valid, for the Marquis sees it as such.” Molnar Gal: Rendelkezéproba, 145-146. 503 + 108 +
