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GENDER AS RITUAL AND ‘POETIC RITUALITY’ IN CONTEMPORARY ‘BIOSCIENCE DRAMA’ this final phase of aggregation the sons have the power to eliminate the father as a scientist. From the perspective of a critical gender reading, it can thus be said that by means of its poetic rituality, Bauersima’s futur de luxe traces the construction of the subject in the process of signification by ironically exposing the idea of the human clone as the most recent remake of the dream of male self-creation through abjecting the “Other”.*’ Interestingly enough, the origin ofthe whole ado is a gender-specific change of the religious ritual which is not only physically performed on stage but also — as part of the fictitious story — frames the dramatic plot: USCHI: I am visiting my parents. My brothers are coming, too. [...] Soon it will be night and Sabbath begins. I am sure my father is laying the table right now. Some time ago, we changed the Sabbath ritual at ours. My mother got fed up with playing the servant all the time. She made Dad lay the table on the Sabbath. It’s not exactly orthodox, but I find it’s quite okay actually. It keeps my father moving. [...] And Mum is dressing herself up.** BIBLIOGRAPHY BAUERSIMA, Igor: futur de luxe, in norway.today. 3 Theaterstücke, Frankfurt am Main, Fischer, 2003. BRAUNGART, Wolfgang: Ritual und Literatur, Tübingen, Niemeyer, 1996. BRECHT, Bertolt: Der kaukasische Kreidekreis [1949, 1954], in W. Hecht — J. Knopf - W. Mittenzwei — K.-D. Müller (eds.): Bertolt Brecht, Werke. Große kommentierte Berliner und Frankfurter Ausgabe, Vol. 8, Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp, 1992. BRECHT, Bertolt: The Caucasian Chalk Circle, trans. Eric Bentley, Minneapolis, Minnesota University Press, 1999. BUTLER, Judith: Bodies That Matter. On the Discursive Limits of “Sex”, London, Routledge, 1993. CHURCHILL, Caryl: A number, London, Royal Court Theatre, 2002. ” On the cultural history of imaginings of the artificial human and male (self-)procreation without sexuality and insemination see Rudolf Drux (ed.): Frankenstein oder der Mythos vom künstlichen Menschen und seinem Schöpfer, in Der Frankenstein-Komplex: Kulturgeschichtliche Aspekte des Traums vom künstlichen Menschen, Frankfurt a. M., Suhrkamp, 1999, 26-47. % [Ich geh zu meinen Eltern. Meine Brüder kommen auch. [...] Bald ist Abend, und der Schabbath beginnt. Mein Vater deckt bestimmt gerade den Tisch. Wir haben das Schabbathritual geändert, irgendwann, bei uns zu Hause. Meine Mutter hatte es satt, immer das Dienstmädchen machen zu müssen. Sie hat Vater dazu gebracht, dass am Schabbath immer er den Tisch deckt. Das ist zwar nicht sehr orthodox, aber ich finde es ganz okay, wenn mein Vater ein wenig in Bewegung bleibt. [...] Und Mutter macht sich schön.] Bauersima: Ibid., 65-66, trans. Birte Giesler. e 187 "
