Between Postdramatic Text and Dramatic Drama: Recent German Playwriting by Lukas Bärfuss and Katja Brunner

Since 2000 there has been a boom in playwriting in the German-speaking world. This is shaped by a creative tension between two forms of theatre-texts. On the one hand the postdramatic text that exists in a theatre marked by a parataxis of all theatrical elements, as outlined by Hans-Thies Lehmann and Gerda Poschmann; on the other, the ‘dramatic drama’ as identified by Birgit Haas that engages with dramatic representation whilst still questioning the reality being represented on the stage. In this contribution I explore these strands of contemporary playwriting in two texts written since 2000: Lukas Bärfuss’ Die sexuellen Neurosen unserer Eltern (2003) and Katja Brunner’s von den beinen zu kurz (2012). My analysis examines how both playwrights question dramatic conventions of form and character and the implications this has for audience efforts to discern meaning in the plays.