German-Sorbian Folk Theater celebrates premieres and anniversaries
With "Schierzens Hanka", the tragic story of a Catholic Sorbian woman of Jewish origin returns to the stage on Saturday. The play by Esther Undisz premiered last year in Sorbian at the theater in Bautzen. Now the German version is being released at the same venue. The author, who is also the director, has developed a completely original stage version from the literary original by Jurij Koch, announced the Deutsch-Sorbisches Volkstheater in Bautzen. At the same time as the premiere, the bilingual venue is celebrating its 60th anniversary and 75 years of Sorbian folk theater in Bautzen.
The first professional Sorbian theater was founded in the city on the Spree in October 1948, at that time as a purely touring stage without a permanent home. In 1963, it merged with the Bautzen City Theater, founded in 1796, to form the German-Sorbian Folk Theater. According to its own information, the only bicultural professional venue in Germany puts on one production per season on the main stage in Upper Sorbian, often as a world premiere - such as "Schierzens Hanka" in February 2022.
The play is based on the novella "Hana" by Jurij Koch (87). It is about the authentic fate of a girl who was born in Horka near Kamenz in 1918. The daughter of a Jewish mother, she grew up in a Sorbian household and was later baptized Catholic, but this did not save her from persecution by the National Socialists. In Horka, today a district of the municipality of Crostwitz, she is commemorated by the only stumbling stone with a Sorbian inscription to date.
At the theater in Bautzen, 11 of the 28 members of the ensemble speak the language of the smallest Slavic people. Sorbian performances are also on the program in puppetry and children's and youth theater. The ensemble also regularly travels around the region to perform in Upper Sorbian in eastern Saxony and in Lower Sorbian in southern Brandenburg.
The German-Sorbian Folk Theater will be hosting the German version of "Schierzens Hanka" at its venue in Bautzen, which is also celebrating its 60th anniversary and 75 years of Sorbian folk theater in the city. The Theater in Bautzen, with its bilingual repertoire, is known for staging one production per season on the main stage in Upper Sorbian, often as a world premiere, such as "Schierzens Hanka."
Source: www.dpa.com
