Das Naturtheater von Oklahoma

Franz Kafka’s great, uncompleted novel Amerika tells the story of 16-year old Karl Rossman’s journey to America, the story of his work, life and suffering in foreign lands – and was considered by the poet to be particularly hopeful and “light”.  Karl Rossman’s odyssey takes him from the great city of New York through the wide expanse that is America and into ever-changing working and learning situations, into helplessness, forsakenness, and loneliness.  In the fragment that is the last chapter entitled Das Naturtheater von Oklahoma, Kafka describes the young man entering an “almost boundless” theatre in which, as if by some paradisiacal magic, he will find his calling, freedom, support, in fact even his homeland and his parents.  Until the last he remains undecided what this Theatre of Oklahoma is about.  Only one thing is certain, that the theatre calls “just today, just once” and that absolutely everyone who enquires is welcome.  Those in charge of the theatre take in people looking for work and for a future in a benevolent, friendly and open way – in the service of a higher “Theatre Directorate” that nevertheless remains hidden and unattainable.

Das Naturtheater von Oklahoma is at the heart of a reading of texts by Franz Kafka, dedicated to such determining themes as quest and salvation.

A Ruhrtriennale production.