PRIVATE RELIGION AS RESISTANCE IN ANNA SEGHERS’ DER PROZESS DER JEANNE D'ARC ZU ROUEN 1431 (1937) AND BERTOLT BRECHT'S 1952 STAGE ADAPTATION

Abstract

This article will examine the representation of religion in Anna Seghers’ radio play Der Prozess der Jeanne d'Arc zu Rouen 1431 (1937) and Bertolt Brecht's subsequent adaptation of this text for the stage (1952). While religiosity is central to the identity of the medieval heroine, Seghers chooses to communicate this feature to modern audiences in a ‘lacunary’ way that sees Jeanne refusing to elaborate on the details of her belief throughout the play. The protagonist's faith creates a distance from contemporary listeners and spectators as well as from characters within the text, but when absolute commitment to her private belief results in Jeanne's execution, this moves the people at large to rebel against their oppressors. Thus Seghers’ Jeanne emerges as a figure of political resistance who draws on her private faith to bring about social change. In Brecht, the voices that move Jeanne to withstand oppressive forces are revealed to be those of the people rather than an expression of the divine. For Seghers and Brecht, the twentieth-century relevance of Jeanne's characteristic religiosity, depicted differently by each author, lies in the political transformation which it can inspire both within the text and outside it.