Reflections on War, Guilt, and Responsibility: Aspects of Post-War German and Japanese Drama (1945-1970)
Harada, Hiroko
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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/87306
Description
Title
Reflections on War, Guilt, and Responsibility: Aspects of Post-War German and Japanese Drama (1945-1970)
Author(s)
Harada, Hiroko
Issue Date
1998
Doctoral Committee Chair(s)
Knust, Herbert
Department of Study
Comparative Literature
Discipline
Comparative Literature
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Keyword(s)
Literature, Germanic
Language
eng
Abstract
Formally, these plays range from expressionistic to absurdist, from realistic-documentary to grotesque, from satiric-demonstrative to loosely suggestive techniques. There seems to be a stronger didactic/moralizing element in the German examples than in their less direct, more ambiguous Japanese counterparts--partly as a result of the actual evidence brought forth, partly also because of adaptations of parabolic and allegoric constructions, and allusions to the morality tradition, imagery of hellish scenarios, the preponderance of trial and judgment scenes, and so forth. Although the greatest common feature of all of these plays is the urgency with which they evoke the memory of a burdensome past, and the necessity of activating the audience's conscience to rethink and take a stand on the issue of collective or personal responsibility (and on the related victim/victimizer complex), it appears that even in the face of open-ended strands on both sides, the German plays have, strategically, pushed the challenge towards individual acceptance of these burdens further than the Japanese plays--with the exception of the second part of Kinoshita's play, which goes considerably beyond the unresolved arguments as shown, for example, in Miyoshi's play.
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