Falun-Mårbacka-Karlstad

After an overnight stay in Falun, our group visited its former copper mine the following morning.

Given the scrapes his hard hat suffered during a visit to a mine in the Harz Mountains, Red Baron decided not to descend into the mine with the others but to explore the Falu gruva surroundings.

The hole of the former open pit mine is impressive and depressing at the same time.

I noticed some socio-political remarks in the mine museum that ignored the unhealthy and inhumane working conditions for …

… the defender of the Lutheran faith, King Gustavus Adolphus, commented unexpectedly, "What potentate would not wish to have such a palace as I?"

… Gustav Adolf's Catholic-leaning daughter Kristina implored, "May God never let such fumes run out in my time, for the mine produced copper as never before."

… the barber stressed, "I don't just shave and cut hair. I also bandage wounds and, in the worst case, amputate legs crushed in accidents."

In the afternoon, a visit to the Selma Lagerlöf estate was on the agenda. At the entrance, the goose on which Nils Holgersson once explored Sweden was unmissable.

Lagerlöf family home at Mårbacka, Värmland (© Joel Torsson [Loejth], Wikipedia)

Selma's former home had been degraded to a museum overloaded with knickknacks. Fortunately, taking pictures was not allowed; the photos of the many individual objects would have exceeded most camera phones' storage capacity.

Selma Ottilia Lovisa Lagerlöf, born in 1858, published her first novel, Gösta Berling's Saga, at the age of 33. She was the first woman awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in the year 1909.

Selma's world-famous work is Nils Holgersson's underbara resa genom Sverige. This literally translates to Nils Holgersson's wonderful journey across Sweden. On the other hand, the adopted English title says little The Wonderful Adventures of Nils.

Towards evening our group arrived in Karlstad, a place we only saw a little of because we left early for Karlskoga the following day.

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Julius Bissier

On May 10, Red Baron was invited to Freiburg's Museum of Contemporary Art (Museum für Neue Kunst) to attend the handover of a group of 13 works by Julius Bissier. Among the newly acquired works are inks and egg oil tempera, created from 1934 until the artist died in 1965.

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Julius Bissier was born in Freiburg in 1897. After graduating from high school, he studied art and art history. The influence of a paternal friend, the sinologist Ernst Grosse, is visible in the works the museum now acquired.

Frucht unter Wasser 1924 (Fruit Under Water)

Under the Nazi regime, Bissier was one of the artists who were denied work and exhibition opportunities because of their degenerate art.

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That is why his international importance became apparent and was discovered only after the war in the late 1950s.

14.XI.56/24.XII.56 (©A.Kilian/VG Bildkunst Bonn 2023)

Until he died in 1965, Bissier played a significant role in shaping the development of abstract painting in Germany. Today his work is considered a notable example of modern art related to East Asia.

One of the wardens had simply placed his blouse.

Entering the event and exhibition room, Red Baron discovered an Art Installation.

Christine Litz, Director of the Museum für Neue Kunst, welcomes the participants.

With the help of the Kulturstiftung der Länder, the Ernst von Siemens Kunststiftung, and the City of Freiburg, the existing collection of the local artist has now been significantly expanded.

Professor Markus Hilgert

As an introduction to the handover ceremony, Professor Markus Hilgert, Secretary General of the Kulturstiftung der Länder, said, "The fact that the Museum für Neue Kunst has long collected and exhibited works of art by the internationally renowned Freiburg artist Julius Bissier was reason enough for us to have been pleased to support this acquisition."

Dr. Jutta Götzmann, Director of all Freiburg Museums,
greets the cultural gain for Freiburg with enthusiasm

And Isabel Herda, responsible for the Department of Prints and Drawings at the Museum of Contemporary Art, added, "Bissier is also interesting to us because he recognized early on that art is global."

After the ceremony, Red Baron visited The Kiss.

An eloquent flyer is available in the wall holder seen in the photo of The Kiss. 

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Die Dreigroschenoper

Last Sunday night, Red Baron was at the opera in Freiburg's Municipal Theater.

When Die Dreigroschenoper had its first performance on August 31, 1928, in the theater on Berlin's Schiffbauerdamm, now Bert Brecht Theater, the program leaflet read:

DIE DREIGROSCHENOPER (The Beggar‘s Opera)
A play with music in a prelude and 8 pictures after the English of John Gay.
Translation: Elisabeth Hauptmann
Adaptation: Brecht
Music: Kurt Weill

In fact, later, Bert Brecht was accused of plagiarism by some. So, you may say that the present changes in the text by the director of the play (Regietheater) are tolerable.

A strange scenery invited the spectator to watch the 3G-Oper (G standing for Groschen, which used to be a 10 Pfennig coin).

The Freiburg production had plenty of text omissions and additions. As one critic wrote, "Today's word scrap from Donald Trump's You are Fired to Christian Lindner's Risks are thorny opportunities*."
*Germany's Finance Minister

©Theater Freiburg

However, the staging was instead characterized by the funny performance of the actors clothed as Teletubbies. There was more slapstick than wit.

©Theater Freiburg

So another critic saw the characters "tripping to the music over the walkways and stairs of the blinking house." With this, the play lost some of its biting social criticism, but this further alienation of Brecht's alienation was probably intended.

Red Baron was annoyed by the burlesque acting. Luckily, they cannot change Weill's music, or I say it with Gershwin: "They Can't Take That Away from Me."

So occasionally, I closed my eyes and listened, e.g., to the three powerful ballads performed by opera singers. These songs contain the gist of the Dreigroschenoper.

Ballade über die Frage "Wovon lebt der Mensch" Macheath: Wie ihr es immer dreht, Und wie ihr's immer schiebt: Erst kommt das Fressen, Dann kommt die Moral. Jenny: Denn wovon lebt der Mensch? Macheath: Denn wovon lebt der Mensch Indem er stündlich, den Menschen Peinigt, auszieht, anfällt, abwürgt und frisst. Nur dadurch lebt der Mensch, Vergessen kann, dass er ein Mensch doch ist.

Ballad About the Question, "What Does Man Live On". Macheath: No matter how much you twist it, And how you always push it: First comes food, Then comes the moral. Jenny: For by what does man live? Macheath: For by what does man live That hourly, the human being Tortures, strips, attacks, strangles, and eats Only by this man lives Can he forget that he is a man.

Ballade von der Unzulänglichkeit menschlichen Planens Denn für dieses Leben Ist der Mensch nicht schlau genug. Niemals merkt er eben Diesen Lug und Trug. Ja, mach nur einen Plan! Sei nur ein großes Licht! Und mach dann noch’nen zweiten Plan Gehn tun sie beide nicht. Denn für dieses Leben Ist der Mensch nicht schlecht genug. Doch sein höhres Streben Ist ein schöner Zug.

Ballad about the Uselessness of Man's Ambition Because, for this life, Man is not smart enough He never notices All the tricks and lies. Yes, just make a plan! Just be a great light! And then make another plan; They both won't work. For, in this life, Man is not bad enough But his higher ambitions Are a beautiful trait.

Ballade von der sexuellen Hörigkeit Da ist nun einer schon der Satan selber Der Metzger: er! und alle andern: Kälber! Der frechste Hund! Der schlimmste Hurentreiber! Wer kocht ihn ab, der alle abkocht? Weiber! Das fragt nicht, ob er will - er ist bereit. Das ist die sexuelle Hörigkeit.

Ballad of Sexual Bondage Now, there is one already: Satan himself He is the butcher, and all the others are calves! The cheekiest dog! The worst whoremonger! Who does him in? Who does them all in? Women! Don't ask if he likes it; he's up for it That's sexual bondage.

In the last act, Tiger Brown, London's police chief, is bustling around the stage with a loaded revolver. Ultimately, he shoots Macheath ("Mack the Knife"), his buddy from army days, dead. 

What a reverse ending! 

 In John Gay's Beggar's Opera, there is a Happy End. Macheath is reprieved due to the audience's demand. All are invited to dance and celebrate his wedding to Polly. So early critics blamed Gay for glorifying the "charms of idleness and criminal pleasure."      

 In Brecht's Dreigroschenoper, Tiger Brown arrives as the deus ex machina, announcing that the queen had pardoned Macheath and even granted him a title, a castle, and a pension. So, Weill's final choir demands that wrongdoings are not punished too harshly, as life is harsh enough. 

 In both endings, the evil survives as in real life. Can somebody please explain Macheath's shooting in the present staging to me? 

No curtain. Applause and the actors are bowing …

… and are running again.

Still, Red Baron enjoyed the Freiburg performance of the Dreigroschenoper.

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Uppsala-Falun

Red Baron is getting older, so I vowed to stop flying four years ago and limit myself to rail travel in Europe.

Then came Corona and later the official trip of the city of Freiburg to our sister city in the US, Madison. So I decided to book my very last flight to Chicago, followed by the onward journey to Madison. Then it was to be the end of flying.

In early 2023, Professor Rudolf Denk told me about a cultural trip to Sweden with literature and landscape. We are both members of Freiburg's Museumsgesellschaft, and since bookings were slow at the beginning, he asked me to promote this trip on our website.

Long story short. Many members of the Museumsgesellschaft, including myself, signed up, and I may add right away that it was a very successful trip that took us to Stockholm, Uppsala, Falun, Mårbacka, Karstad, Karlskoga, Mariefred, and back to Stockholm from May 12 to 18.

My gentle readers may remember a Museumsreise, i.e., a three-day trip with the Museumsgesellschaft to central Switzerland. The highlight at that time was an open-air performance of William Tell, which impressed Elisabeth and me. Rudolf and his charming wife Christel had organized a fantastic trip then.

Will Swiss LX 1250 Zürich-Stockholm be my last flight?
The sparkling wine is from Geneva, where I spent 32 years of my professional life.

This time, too, we were not disappointed. Together with our "Scandinavian-phone" tour guide Tina, Rudolf, and Christal pulled off a program that led from one highlight to the next. The encounters we had, the information we got, and the photos we took were so dense and numerous that one blog is not enough to describe everything. Therefore, Red Baron will write a blog for each full day in Sweden, so the complete report will result in a pentalogy.

Uppsala, Cult site of the Vikings and of Knowledge

On our way to the cathedral: A house of 1666

After a first night in Uppsala, in the morning, we visited the Gothic St. Eric's Cathedral, which is the highest church building in Scandinavia at 118.7 meters.

The interior

In the center of the choir is a 1583 funerary monument to King Gustav I Wasa. He liberated the Swedish territory from the ruling Danes in 1520. The Swedish Riksdag elected Gustav Wasa hereditary king in 1523. Below the monument, he and his three not-at-the-same-time wives are buried in a crypt.

Mark 16: And when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene and Mary,
the mother of James and Salome, got spices so that they might come
 and put them on him. And very early after dawn on the first day of the week,
they arrived at the time of the coming up of the sun to the place
where the body had been put. And they were saying among themselves,
 Who will get the stone rolled away from the door for us? And looking up,
they saw that the stone was rolled back; and was of great size.
They saw a young man[sitting on the right side]
clothed in a long white garment, and they were affrighted.

The visit to the University Library Carolina Redivida was the day's highlight because we were allowed to see the Codex Argenteus, also called the Wulfila Bible.

 

©Wikipedia

On his Nordic journey, Johann Gottfried Seume was still allowed to hold the remains of the Gothic Bible in his hands during his visit to Uppsala. By the way, today, May 22, is Goth Day.

 

The Codex's itinerary

The Lord's Prayer in Gothic

A group photo

The Viking is everywhere.

Looking back to St. Eric's.

Crossing Uppsala's river the Fyrisån

Carl Linnaeus smoking the Dutch pipe seen at the Carolina Redivida

One of Linnaeus' mottos from his Philosophia Botanica:
Everything is miraculous, even the commonplace.

At the Linnaeus Museum

A look at the Orangery with a copy of the Medici Venus.

Linnaeus on the sexuality of plants

Well deserved: A brygg kaffe and a pekannöt paj
(A brewed coffee and a pecan nut pie) at the Café Linné

Café Linné

Falun, Home of the Swedish Red

Before we gained our Falun hotel, we visited the Stora Kopparberg church and its graveyard.

Gravestone in the churchyard of Stora Kopparbergs kyrka: "In memory of miner Mats Israelsson, killed at work in the Falun mine, 1677." What makes this grave so particular?

The disappearance of miner Fet Mats Israelsson in the Falun mine in 1677, just before his wedding, and the finding of his corps in 1719 became a historical and literary event. His bride could identify the body almost entirely preserved in copper vitriol.

Among others, Johann Peter Hebel described the Faithful Love, "Gray and shriveled up, an old lady comes on a crutch, recognizes her bridegroom and sinks down more with joyful rapture than with pain on the beloved corpse."

View of Falun's ski jumps from my hotel window.

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Burn Books, Burn

As early as 1823, Heinrich Heine, referring to the book burning at the Wartburgfest 1817, had a vision, "Das war ein Vorspiel nur, dort wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man auch am Ende Menschen (That was a prelude only, where you burn books, you end up burning people).

May 10 is a date of shame, for 90 years ago, one of the first actions of the Nazis following their Machtergreifung (seize power) was the burning of literature undeutschen Geistes (of un-German spirit).

A list of books from Karlsruhe in the Nazi paper Der Alemanne of June 11, 1933,
with no claim to completeness, mentions Erich Kaestner (click to enlarge)

Erich Kästner was the only author to watch the burning of his books as an eyewitness on the Opernplatz in Berlin. He saw his novel Fabian fly into the flames. 

Kästner wrote twenty years later on the appearance of the zealous propaganda minister Josef Goebbels: "It was disgusting. Books flew into the fire. The tirades of the little cunning liar resounded far and wide. Here, a failed man of letters took his revenge on literature. Here, a sly politician eliminated any intellectual opposition for many years ... With such methods, one can destroy a people, not books. They only die a natural death. They die when their time is fulfilled. One cannot cut off, tear off, or sign off a minute of their thread of life. Books, we now know, cannot be burned. "

Red Baron sits in the second row (©BZ)

As part of a commemorative event at the Freiburg public library marking the 90th anniversary of the book burning in Berlin, Heiko Wegman presented his new book about the local events, "Dark Clouds over Freiburg."

Although announced on May 8 in Der Alemanne, there was probably no book burning in Freiburg on May 10, 1933. It was organized by the German student body as part of the "Wider den undeutschen Geist" ("Against the Un-German Spirit") campaign. Attempts to carry out book burnings were repeatedly scheduled. They failed because, in the early summer of 33, many "dark clouds hung over Freiburg." It rained frequently and intensively. According to Wegmann, the book's title also refers to the dark clouds of smoke produced when books are burned.

Even though book burnings were repeatedly postponed in Freiburg due to weather conditions, the author proved that there were at least eight scheduled dates. Students, Hitler Youth, the Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur (Battle Alliance for German Culture), and the University planned book burnings in shifting "coalitions."

The event that had apparently been canceled on May 10 was to be made up for as part of the 1st Cultural Combat Week of the Hitler Youth and with the participation of the schools on the evening of June 17 at a quarter past nine with a symbolic book burning in front of the Minster church.

According to the plans of the organizers, the small book bonfire in front of the central portal column with the collective singing of "Volk ans Gewehr (People to your arms)," battle shouts of the Hitler Youth, a "fire speech" by Pastor Albert from Gundelfingen, and the singing of the Horst Wessel song was to be followed by a march to the parade ground. There, a big book fire, an address of Mayor Franz Kerber, and a conclusion at a bivouac fire were planned.

The rain interfered with the planners, so they postponed the big book burning to the solstice celebration on June 21. However, the date with students and pupils also fell through.

In the end, a late book burning took place on June 24, 1933, at the university stadium, documented by the Freiburg social democratic editor and contemporary witness Käthe Fortriede, who, as a Jew, was later persecuted.

On this occasion, the new university rector, Martin Heidegger, gave an address in which he spoke of the solstice: "The days pass, they become shorter again. But our courage rises to break through the coming darkness. Never must we become blind in the struggle. Flame, announce us, shine on us, and show us the way from which there is no turning back! Flame ignite, hearts burn!"

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