As we can see in the nine carnival plays, of all
the characters presented the most prevalent are peasants: the traditional class
of farmers, butcher, etc. In the Middle Age, peasants were the major class of
people and since Hans Sachs was a shoemaker he would also consider himself a
part of this class of people. These plays were written to celebrate the local
traditions with rites and dancing, it is logical to think that Hans Sachs was
emphasizing the importance of the role of peasants in the society.
I would think that the reason Hans
Sachs emphasize the character of peasants in his plays were to engage everyone
in the audience to the play since they made up the majority of the population. The
settings of the plays were also depicted as everyday situation such as the stinginess
of the miserly farmer, the cunningness of the priests, the immorality of the
doctor, etc. These situations are able to relate the audiences to the plays and
they will be able to enjoy the play whole-heartedly. In order to add to the
festive atmosphere, it is only to be expected that Sachs should treat the
farmer as a comic figure. They were given funny and ridiculous names. For
example, in The Nose-Dance, the farmers were given names such as Herman
Brainless, Kunz Small-snout etc. I believe that another purpose of these names
were also to bring out their personalities.
I think that I would enjoy these
plays being a normal/ordinary citizen at that time and will be able to
understand the humor in the plays since they were related to the life of an
ordinary class people.
I agree with you here. Just as we discussed in class, the plays bring the community together and everyone can share a common interest. People can come together and just laugh and have fun.
ReplyDeleteI agree also. It's important to engage the people that are watching and I think he did a really good job of it. I know I would feel included if I were watching.
ReplyDelete