The Grotesque and Performing Bodies of World War Ii Nazi Concentration Camp Prisoners
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“FROM HIDDEN TO (OVER-)EXPOSED”: THE GROTESQUE AND PERFORMING BODIES OF WORLD WAR II NAZI CONCENTRATION CAMP PRISONERS Jeff List A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS December 2007 Committee: Lesa Lockford, Advisor Eileen Cherry Chandler Simon Morgan Russell © 2007 Jeff List All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT Lesa Lockford, Advisor World War II continues to carry considerable “cultural weight” in the United States. Many movies, documentaries, and television mini-series about the Holocaust seem to try to make sense of what can seem like a senseless act. The field of performance studies offers another avenue by which we can examine those events and our responses to them. In this paper, I apply a construct of the grotesque body, based primarily on the work of Mikhail Bakhtin and Julia Kristeva, to the prisoners of World War II Nazi concentration camps to examine the social networks at play in current understandings of the Holocaust. In chapter one, I analyze the relationship between prisoners, guards, and prison officials by means of the grotesque body in the official and clandestine cabarets performed by the prisoners. In chapter two, I examine the role of the grotesque body in the photographs taken by Allied soldiers after constructing the premise of viewing photographs as performance. I argue that the prisoners’ bodies are integral in the maintenance of our collective memory. In chapter three, I track contemporary appropriations of one specific photograph of prisoners and the way the performance of reading the image has changed as the appropriations have become more politicized. The bodies of prisoners have gone from hidden to revealed to appropriated. iv I dedicate this to my father, who I think about and miss every day and in whom I find strength, and to my mother for her indispensable sacrifices and support. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS As I reflected on the process of writing this study and the years of schooling that preceded it, I began to add up all of the people who have aided me in this journey. I know I can not acknowledge everyone on whom I relied at one point or another; however, I will try to give credit to as many as space and memory will allow. First, I need to thank my advisor, Lesa Lockford. I know I am a considerably better scholar today than I was when I began writing the thesis and she is responsible for much of that growth. She provided wonderful guidance, direction, and support, even though, from time to time, I may have resisted it. Similarly, I want to thank my committee member, Eileen Cherry Chandler and Simon Morgan-Russell for sharing their expertise and insight during this process. I have also received advice and counseling from other remarkable academicians. Both Jonathan Chambers and Jane Barnette have given me valuable insight into the “academy” and helped me clarify my values with regard to professionalism. I have sought their help on numerous occasions and am deeply thankful for the advice they offered. Also, I can trace where I am and what I have achieved to the encouragement of two other professors, Mary Jo Lodge and Julie Rae Pratt. At times, the personal support I received from people was just as valuable as the academic advice. Rob, Jesi, April, and Taylor Connick gave me a second (or third?) home. They have such a wonderful family and I was privileged enough to have occasionally felt like a member. Fellow students Steve Balsomico, Vanessa Baker, Stephen Harrick, Diane Sullivan, Colin Rust, Maya Santandrea, and Christine Blain ran the gauntlet with me and I deeply value my relationships with each of them. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page INTRODUCTION..... ............................................................................................................ 1 CHAPTER ONE: HIDDEN PERFORMANCES – CABARET PERFORMANCES IN NAZI CONCENTRATION CAMPS AS GROTESQUE.................................... 15 Cabaret in the Camps................................................................................................. 16 Cabarets as Grotesque................................................................................................ 20 Fusion ............................................................................................................ 21 Filth ............................................................................................................ 25 Excess ............................................................................................................ 28 The Jew.......................................................................................................... 31 Official Cabarets........................................................................................................ 34 Semi-official Cabarets............................................................................................... 41 Clandestine Cabarets.................................................................................................. 41 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 44 CHAPTER TWO: REVELATORY PERFORMANCES – PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE BODIES OF CONCENTRATION CAMP PRISONERS AS GROTESQUE.......... 47 The Atrocity Photographs.......................................................................................... 48 Photographs as Performance...................................................................................... 50 The Grotesque Body.................................................................................................. 57 The Interval ............................................................................................................ 60 The Grotesque in Mourning....................................................................................... 65 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 70 vii CHAPTER THREE: OVER-EXPOSED PERFORMANCES – CONTEMPORARY PERFORMANCES OF GROTESQUE BODIES CONTAINED IN PRISONER PHOTOGRAPHS...................................................................................................... 72 Photographs as Emblems........................................................................................... 73 Postmemory ............................................................................................................ 77 Typology of Recontextualization............................................................................... 79 Text-driven Recontextualizations: The United States Army and libertarian.nl......... 81 Parallel Recontextualization: Cabaret........................................................................ 84 Substitutional Recontextualization: Kerryfest........................................................... 89 Attribution ............................................................................................................ 91 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 92 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................ 97 WORKS CITED ............................................................................................................ 102 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1 Fifteenth century German woodcut by an unknown artist 31 2 Salome Receiving the Head of John the Baptist, Bernardino Luini, sixteenth century 32 3 Corpses Lie in One of the Open Railcars of the Dachau Death Train 49 4 Corpses in a Mass Grave in the So-called “American Cemetery” at Mauthausen 53 5 Three Emaciated Survivors in a Barracks in the Newly Liberated Buchenwald Concentration Camp 58 6 An Emaciated Female Jewish Survivor of a Death March Lies in Bed at an American Military Field Hospital in Volary, Czechoslovakia 64 7 Sick and Emaciated Survivors of the Dachau Concentration Camp are Evacuated on the Back of a Truck to a Hospital 68 8 Former Concentration Camp Prisoners Headed to a Hospital for Medical Attention 72 9 “Young Singers Spread Racist Hate: Duo Considered the Olsen Twins of the White Nationalist Movement” poster 84 1 INTRODUCTION When I began work as the dramaturg for a production of the musical Cabaret, I did not have an adequate appreciation for living conditions in World War II Nazi concentration camps. During my research, I learned of, among other things, prisoner cabaret performances in these unimaginable circumstances. I also, of course, encountered pictures of the emaciated bodies of prisoners. I had no words to describe my reaction. Upon reflection, my response captured my interest. My failure to find language to articulate my experience adequately was a by-product of the grotesque moment I had already been studying. I wanted to know how such a profoundly visceral response functions. This study stems from my interest in the function of the grotesque in performance. In it, I will analyze the concentration camp cabaret performances and the photographic images of the bodies of World War II prisoners from the perspective of the grotesque, as I define it below. In using the grotesque to examine these performances and photographs of prisoners, I will examine how people experience phenomena that make them recoil. The grotesque body functions differently in different performative contexts: the prisoners in concentration camps performed in occluded bodies to create an identity