Cabaret Nation: The Jewish Foundations of Kabaret Literacki, 1920–1939
Beth  Holmgren duke.academia.edu
Cabaret Nation: The Jewish Foundations of Kabaret Literacki, 1920–1939
the history of the Weimar period, and in particular the history of the Weimar Berlin cabaret era (1918-1933), one is left with two seemingly opposing views on the subject. On one hand, we have the rather dry, academic approach, sans of all fl avor and colorful description, and at best is only a historical outline of the established theatres, revues, cabarets, composers and performers presenting conventional entertainment. This view tends to leave out the sub-cultural infl uences, the gritty underworld climate of the cellars and dark pubs where many of the intelligentsia and artists gathered. In the other view of the period, we have a romanticized longing for the torrid dark cellars of Berlin, fi lled with opium smoke, transvestite chorus girls, hot jazz and barons with suspect incomes and perverse tastes. This ignores the wider cultural scope. I am rather inclined to believe that the climate of Weimar Berlin’s cabarets was somewhere in between -and more. Much, much more. To even beg...

This article shows what we can learn from Vienna Jewish cabaret, so called Jar-gontheater 'jargon theater' and the language situation of Vienna Jews at the end of the 19th century. By analyzing one of the most popular plays of this genre, we can see how structures from Yiddish dialect fused with Viennese German and what may have caused the 'Vienna Jewish speech,' a Judeo-German city variety in the First Austrian Republic (1920s and 1930s).

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