Jagdgesellschaft

Recording from the Burgtheater, 1974

In a hunting lodge, far from the city, in the midst of a managed forest of gigantic proportions, the General’s wife and the writer await the General’s arrival: a proud Stalingrad veteran, a large landowner, a hunter, and a high-ranking politician at the height of his power. It is snowing, and the servant Asamer stokes the fire to ward off the winter cold. The General’s wife’s conversation with the poet revolves around the final state in which the old General and his world actually find themselves, contrary to appearances. The forest has been ravaged by bark beetles and must be cleared; an incurable disease rages within the General’s body; and his eyesight is being attacked by cataracts—blindness is only a matter of time. The general does not foresee this inevitable, twofold downfall: his wife tries by every means to hide the incurable diseases afflicting both the forest and his body from him. When the general finally arrives at the hunting lodge with his entourage of ministers, the prince, and the princess and prepares to go hunting, he has no inkling that this might be his last hunt.