Der Mensch erscheint im Holozän

Play by Max Frisch

What weather! What weather! It’s been pouring rain for weeks. The mountain valley in Ticino where Mr. Geiser is spending his retirement has been cut off from civilization by a landslide. The power is out, the hot plate remains cold, and all contact with the outside world has been cut off. Is nature out of control? What if the mountain gives way and buries the house, the village, and the valley forever?

But Mr. Geiser refuses to let the looming doom get him down. Armed with knowledge and order, the Swiss retiree fights against oblivion. Meticulously, he collects, organizes, and records fragments of human knowledge from encyclopedias, history books, and the Bible. Soon, however, doubts set in: What knowledge is worth saving? And can one preserve one’s own identity by archiving it? 

Finally, Mr. Geiser makes a bold decision: He packs his backpack and ventures to flee across the mountains, but the path soon vanishes into the white haze. What now? Is it fog—or does forgetting already begin here?

In our present day, as the effects of climate change become increasingly palpable, Max Frisch’s 1979 story*Man Appears in the Holocene*strikes us as hauntingly prescient. What does it do to us—to our self-image and our identity—when familiar places disappear? When entire landscapes are destroyed and become uninhabitable? When certainties begin to crumble and memories lose their footing?

Czech director and costume designer Kamila Polívková explores the fragile interconnection between humans, identity, and the environment through her precise visual language, staging Max Frisch’s final short story as a poetic and musical theatrical storm on the main stage. 

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