Red Guards — high school and university students — wave copies of Chairman Mao Zedong's Little Red Book during a parade in June 1966 in Beijing's streets at the beginning of China's Cultural Revolution. More than 1 million people are believed to have died during the decade-long upheaval. (Jean Vincent/AFP/Getty Images)
While listening to the radio yesterday, I heard a report on China coming to terms with a bloody period in its history called the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), which was initiated by Chairman Mao Zedong and enforced by his Red Guards.
One image from the report struck me as particularly cogent to our discussion of the inverted hierarchies in Sachs' Carnival plays: students attacking teachers. What sets this image of inversion apart from the content of the Carnival plays? Why does this action come across as particularly violent and revolutionary when much of the action in Sachs' texts seems so light-hearted and humorous? How does a comedy have to present an inverted hierarchy for it to "work" within the text?
You had wondered why I used the word 'absurd' for Sachs' plays, but I think this post relates to my reasoning, and also explains a little why this type of comedy worked so well for Sachs. It was extremely funny at that time in history. For example, there was not a full blown women's movement at that point. I am not discounting the power of suggestion in these plays, but Sachs wrote about things that Germans thought 'would never happen in a million years'. China's cultural revolution in the 1960's is nothing to provoke humor. Much of the world was experiencing revolution at that time, and revolution is not funny because numerous people suffer. I do think the gap has lessened in relation to timing and making fun of current events i.e. South Park, however I think it is important to note that Sachs normally wrote about individuals, not whole societies. Also, authors would have been demonized in the 60's for using a cultural uprising as a source of entertainment. WWI and WWII were very bloody, and it changed the world's view in many different ways.
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