Wolfgang Borchert The Man Outside

Wolfgang Borchert 1921-1947

• Hamburg - From Gymnasium to war

• Died of pneumonia
• served on the Eastern Front
• Life overshadowed by Stalingrad experience]Lived only 2 years after his return
• Died of TB
• Solitary Confinement (6 mos) Returned to Hamburg
• 1946 Draussen vor der Tur
• First Radio Play 1947
• had theatrical ambitions, theater guide
• accepts guilt )opposite of Böll
• BOTH STORIES HAVE LEITMOTIV OF RETURNING SOLDIERS

The Man Outside

REAL ~ SURREAL: Mostly nightmares

The Man Outside describes the hopelessness of a post-war soldier called Beckmann who
returns from Russia to find that he has lost his wife and his home, as well as his illusions and
beliefs. He finds every door he comes to closed. Even the Elbe River rejects his suicide,
washing him up on shore. The play ends with what can be assumed to be Beckmann's death.
Due to its release during the sensitive immediate postwar period, Borchert subtitled his play
"A play that no theatre wants to perform and no audience wants to see." Despite this, the first
radio broadcast (February 1947) was very successful. The first theatrical showing of The Man
Outside (at the Hamburger Kammerspiele) opened on the day after Borchert's death, 21
November 1947.
The play consists of five scenes in one act. It makes use of expressionist styling and even of
Brechtian techniques, such as the Verfremdungseffekt (defamiliarization effect) to disorient
and engage its audience.

FIRST ACCURATE DOCUMENTATION OF PTSD

• “A play which no theater will produce and no audience wishes to see.”
• depression, anxiety, hallucination, guilt
• Seen from the perspective of Stalingrad

Recurring Symbols / Leitmotiv

• respirator glasses
• Sounds (radio play) tick tock, slamming of the doors, laughter of the Elbe, wind
• truth
• responsibility

Characters

Beckmann
Wolfgang Borchert The Man Outside

• One of many, not a Nazi

• has a limp, scarecrow
• wife calls him simply Beckmann
• Hallucinations: God, One Leg, Death
• Grabs colonel’s bread and drink (alcohol)

His Wife
• who forgot him

Her Friend
• who loves her
• grins (embarrassment, discomfort

The Elbe
• stern , angry woman, feisty, motherly
• spits Beckmann out, refuses to let him drown himself

The Old Man (God)

• in whom no one believes anymore
• old wimp, senile

The Undertaker (Death)

• fat, obese, business is good
• with a case of the hiccups

Woman
• whose husband came home with one leg
• lonely (husband really never came home)
• calls him “fishman” wet & cold

One Leg
• who dreamed of her for a thousand nights ( Parallel: Beckman comes home to a man in his
house.

The Other
• whom everyone knows
• Hope:, the optimist, will to survive
• Beckman’s inner self
• Gets quieter near the end

A Colonel
• who is very merry

His Wife
• who is feeling so cold in her warm parlour
Wolfgang Borchert The Man Outside

His Daughter
• just over for dinner

Her Courageous Husband

• who is feeling so cold in her warm parlour

A Cabaret Director
• with daring goals, but less stamina
• looking for comic relief:so the people can forget

Frau Kramer
• who is just Frau Kramer, which is horrible
• took over Beckmann’s parent’s apt.
• only character with a real name
• ugliest character: totally insensitive, opportunist

Resistance was not a cohesive movement . Strong in Holland and France but in Germany they
were fighting their own government. (Protestants vs. Catholics vs. Communists, Athiests)

Prologue
The play begins with an overfed undertaker (apparently Death) with hiccups examining a
body by the river Elbe, not the first one. The body does not appear to belong to a soldier,
although he is wearing soldier's clothes. The undertaker makes the nihilistic claim that this
death changes nothing. The Old Man (apparently God) enters, crying and explaining: His
children are killing each other. Since no one believes in him anymore, he can do nothing to
stop them. Disinterested, the undertaker agrees that this is very tragic indeed.
God says that Death is the new God; people believe only in death. However, God remembers a
skinny, sickly death. Death explains that he has grown fat during the last century, due to all
the "business" from the war, and that is the cause of his hiccups. The scene ends with Death
telling God to take a rest for emotional rehabilitation.

The Dream
Beckmann awakes (after his suicidal attempt) to find himself floating in the Elbe. The river
turns out to be a rather resolute motherly figure. Once she discovers that Beckmann is bent
on suicide, she lashes out, patronizing him. She calls him faint-hearted and explains that she
will not let him kill himself. The dream ends with him washing up on the sand.

Scene I
The Other introduces himself to Beckmann. He describes himself as the "yea-sayer". Annoyed,
Beckmann tells him to leave. Thereafter, a girl turns up offering to help Beckmann, by giving
him dry clothing and some warmth. She explains that she's only helping him because he's so
wet and cold; later, she will admit having helped him because he looked so sad and innocent.

Scene II
Wolfgang Borchert The Man Outside

Beckmann follows the girl to her house, where he finds out that her husband had been a
soldier, like Beckmann. The girl laughs at Beckmann's gas mask goggles, which he continues
to wear, because it allows him to see the world as grey and blurry. But, her husband comes
home, on crutches. It turns out this is due to a military command of sergeant Beckmann that
he lost his leg.

Beckmann attempts to go back to the Elbe for another try to die, but the Other convinces him
not to. Instead he is going to visit the man, who had given the commands to him.

Scene III
The third scene marks the emotional climax of the play. Beckmann appears at his former
Colonel's house, just in time for dinner. He immediately blames the Colonel, telling him that
for 3 years he ate caviar while the men suffered. He tells the Colonel about his nightmare.
In that dream, a fat man (Death again) plays a Military March on a very large xylophone made
from human bones. The man is running back and forth, sweating blood. The blood gives him
red stripes down the side of his trousers (like that of a General in the German Army.) All the
dead from throughout history are there, and Beckmann is forced to stand there among them,
under a sickly, discolored moon. And they are all chanting "Beckmann! Sergeant Beckmann!"

Beckmann tells the Colonel that he has returned to hand back to the Colonel the
responsibility for the eleven men lost under his command. If he were able to sleep with those
thousands killed in action under his command, eleven more will not change anything for him.
The Colonel finds this whole idea very strange declaring it to be a joke out of place. Beckmann
ought turn to the stages with it. Beckmann fetches a bottle and some bread from the dinner
table, and leaves.

Scene IV
The scene opens with a monologue from the Direktor (i.e. owner and producer of an off-off
theatre) about the importance of Truth in art. Someone outspoken, new, and young should be
looked for.

Beckmann arrives and expresses his ideas. The director tells him he would be better off to
change his mind. Nevertheless, the director agrees to give a hearing to his odd visitor.
Beckmann gives a couplet, turning up to be a morose summary of the play up to this point,
the melody taken from a popular war time song, Tapfere kleine Soldatenfrau ("brave little
soldier’s wife"). To the director it is all too dark and foreboding. People in these times want
something encouraging, the director says. To Beckmann, that is not Truth. The director
replies: "Truth has nothing to do with art." Beckmann reproaches him, and leaves the theatre.
Once again, Beckmann takes up an argument with the Other, who gives him the idea to return
to his parents. Beckmann expresses some enthusiasm for the first (and only) time in the play.

Scene V
Upon arriving at his parent's house, a woman he has never seen (Frau Kramer) answers the
door. He finds out that his parents are to be found in their graves, having killed themselves
during the post-war denazification. Beckmann leaves, once again eager to kill himself.
Wolfgang Borchert The Man Outside

The Other follows him, and the longest dialogue of the play ensues. The nihilistic point of the
play comes across during this dialog: There is always suffering in the world; one cannot do
anything to change that; the world will not care if you are suffering As evidence for this,
Beckmann outlines a hypothetical play:

1st Act: Grey skies. A man is suffering.

2nd Act: Grey skies. The man continues to be pained.
3rd Act: It is getting dark and it is raining.
4th Act: It is darker. The man sees a door.
5th Act: It is night, deep night, and the door is closed. The man is standing outside. Outside
on the doorstep.

The man is standing on a riverside, be it the Elbe, the Seine, the Volga, or the Mississippi. The
man stands there crazed, frozen, hungry, and damn tired. And then there is a splash, and the
ripples make neat little circles, and then the curtain drops.

The Other counters that while there is always suffering in the world, there is always hope, and
there is always happiness. Dwelling on the suffering cannot accomplish anything; you can
make things better by focusing on the good; as he says, "Do you fear the darkness between
two lamp-posts?"

One by one, each of the characters returns to defend himself. Despite their good intentions,
they cannot help. Between these visits, the dialog between Beckmann and the Other goes on.
There is little change in the content of their arguments; however, both of them become
increasingly desperate. Finally, after the girl and her one-legged husband have left, a
desperate Beckmann begins a long monologue, at the end of which he demands an answer
from the Other; who is fading away. There is no reply, and Beckman realizes he is all alone.
Presumably, he has drowned himself.