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SASKIA FISCHER new combinations of symbols, are tried out, to be discarded or accepted.”” Poetic rituality, in my understanding, describes the liminality of a dramatic and theatrical performance in which the references to ritual practices and ritual forms and structures are set in motion and through which new characteristics as well as aspects of rituality arise. Poetic rituality, therefore, can be seen as a dynamic process that is constantly in progress. In this sense, poetic rituality produces a new aesthetic that adopts characteristics ofritual practices and allows them to become explicit or emphasizes the similarity of ritual to drama or theater itself. That is why I speak of poetic rituality, which refers to the Greek term poiésis (Greek: moinotc, English: “to do” or “to make”). Poetic rituality leads to a fundamentally performative aesthetic, which, although ina very artistic and poetic manner, is still deeply related to rituals and their way to derive their meaningfulness through the performance itself.** Likewise, in Brecht’s play Die Mafsnahme, ritual and rituality are not only a rigid and fixed pattern but, in the aesthetic performance of the dramatic text, gain an openness and self-reflexivity that would not be possible with a ritual performed in a religious context. The aesthetic form of the play is deeply connected to ritual practices and, at the same time, differs from them. Creating a poetic or dynamic rituality, this play is essentially connected to performativity, which is so fundamental for rituals, as Victor Turner said; but Die Mafsnahme adapts this quality of the ritual in a self-reflexive way. The play implements characteristics of ritual practice, exposes the similarity to a ritual of the dramatic genre itself, and makes rituality visible in its ambivalence and in its problematic potential but also emphasizes the aesthetic innovation that can arise by referring to rituals. Thus, poetic rituality in Brecht’s didactic play is constituted as an art form that is constantly in process, and produces a new dramatic form.”° BERTOLT BRECHT’S DIE MASSNAHME — POLITICAL AGITPROP? Die Mafsnahme follows the tradition of representations of sacrifices as they were widely used on European stages at the beginning of the twentieth century. 23 Turner: Variations, 40. 24 Fischer: Ibid., 95-99. » Wolfgang Braungart also uses the term ‘poetic rituality’ to describe the poems of Stefan George. He mainly uses the term to describe the ritual elements occurring in George’s poems. (Wolfgang Braungart: Asthetischer Katholizismus. Stefan Georges Rituale der Literatur, Tübingen, Niemeyer, 1997.) The concept of ‘poetic rituality’ developed here tries to make a further contribution, as poetic rituality not only demands one or more ritual elements but claims that an extensive use of ritual forms and elements generates the form of the entire artwork and, through this, creates anew understanding of what art is, how it deals with reality and incorporates but also appropriates cultural practices such as rituals. + 38 +
