Das Grosse Welttheater/The Great World Theater (9/19/1981)

Saturday, September 19, 1981

Today awoke at 4:00. Still dark as I walked the empty streets to the train station. The street cleaners near the station in their bright-orange outfits swept with push brooms and brooms made with branches (switches?).

Caught the 5:47 local to Bern, arriving 6:25, and changed to the 6:36 for Zürich. This was one of the new trains with bright orange cars. The end doors of the car opened automatically. In the vestibule there was a luggage rack. Saw a man remove his shoes and climb onto one of the luggage rack shelves and close the curtains behind him. Some of the seats in the car were taken by businessmen’s briefcases. It got lighter as the sun came up.

Arrived in Zürich at 8:00; took the commuter train to Wädenswil this time, stopping at every town on the south side of Lake Zürich. Spent quite a bit of time at one station as we waited for two express trains to pass. The person at the station’s control desk was a girl in pigtails. In Wädenswil, caught the 9:00 train to Eidsiedeln. At 9:30 in Einsiedeln, I went directly to the tourist bureau to get a ticket to the “Grosse Welt Theater/Great World Theater” play. There was a long line and when I reached the ticket lady she said she only had a few seats left. Got a 20 CHF/$10 ticket. I started making the rounds of the hotels, starting with the smaller ones. With those you inquired at the restaurant bar. No rooms available. Tried the bigger hotels, some even with a “zimmer frei/rooms available” sign. Half said they had no rooms, and the other half had no single rooms. They didn’t want to give me a double room. Finally came to the Katharinahof, a modern redecorated hotel. The reception desk was closed, so I rang the bell. The maître d' came out of the restaurant to see what I wanted. He telephoned somebody upstairs. The somebody upstairs came down and told me if I returned at noon, she would surely have something available. That was in two more hours. I tried a couple more hotels with no luck.

I followed signs to a “Panorama” and “Diorama.” The Diorama was a display of the world’s largest Crèche and the Panorama was another religious display. There was no one else around and at this time I didn’t feel like paying to see those things.

I saw a couple soldiers standing guard at a railway crossing, and later a group of soldiers repairing some wiring that continued up over my head. Back in the main part of town, I stopped at a Family-Youth Hostel which seemed to be the military headquarters of a sort. They had no room.

I went to the Klosterkirche/Abbey Church where a wedding was taking place in the Black Madonna chapel. The priest was speaking Italian. The bride was a big girl and the groom was a petite fellow, but with a large mustache. Looking at the crowd attending the wedding, it appeared all the taller heads were female. The men were all short, some petite and some wide! I sat in a pew to watch a church worker replacing candles in the side sanctuaries. Later the bridal couple went to the main altar to have photos taken. I hope the photographer’s flash was powerful enough to cover the distance between him and his subjects! At the end of the ceremony, the people crowded in to kiss the bride; no receiving line! The church worker then began shooing people back and roping off the church. I found myself roped in! I quickly ducked out and from the back I watched a chanting line of monks come in for the 12:00 Mass.

I returned to Katharinahof and the reception desk was still closed. The maître d' saw me and telephoned upstairs. A man came down to open the reception desk and took care of a lady who came in with a reservation. The maître d' showed that lady to her room while the host asked for my name, closed up the reception desk, and escorted me to the elevator and up to the 4th floor (2nd floor of rooms). He asked if I was here to see the play, and he hoped the weather improved so that it could be performed outdoors as it wasn’t as nice when performed in the abbey church. The key was in the door of room 212 and it wasn’t made up yet. He told me it would be ready in half an hour, but I said I would take the room but not come back until the evening. He was okay with that and told me to pick up the key from the board downstairs. That was it!

I walked to the train station in a light rain, and I caught the 12:40 train to Wädenswil, getting off at Biberbrugg five minutes later. Waited for the 13:30 train to Arth-Goldau. This train started out in the gently rolling hills, but the frequency and height of the mountains increased. It was cloudy and foggy in Arth-Goldau where I walked to the zoo and back before the 14:30 train to Brunnen. Heard traditional music using accordion-like instruments coming from the town’s restaurants.

In Brunnen I walked the 10 minutes to town and the docks. My day pass was valid for the excursion boat. Walked along the waterfront of Urnersee/Lake Uri which had hilly wooded banks and on the near side were cliffs where highway and railroad tunnels were carved.

Urnersee/Lake Uri

Excursion boat

It began to rain as we boarded the 15:40 boat, but I sat outside to see the Schillerstein/Schiller’s Rock, a tall pointed rock sticking out of the water at the lake’s edge. It is a memorial to Friedrich Schiller who wrote the Wilhelm Tell drama.

Schillerstein/Schiller Rock

Arrived at the Rütli dock just as a paddlewheel steamer boat left.

Paddlewheeler

The Rütli dock building had the interesting wood carvings under the eaves that I have often noted in Switzerland. I and several passengers disembarked and began our climb up the hill. A dog and I forged ahead of the others, but then I began to tire. Only the dog kept on running! I reached a shady wooded section with a sign stating “Dreiländer Quelle/Source or well of three countries.” There was a rocky outcrop with several round holes through which water trickled, and at least three channels the water had carved in the rock. The water disappeared into holes in the ground.

Dreiländer Quelle/Source or well of three countries

I put on my raincoat as I continued up the hill, passing a restaurant, a barn, and a Swiss flag. I was in a small uneven field with small rock outcroppings. It was pouring rain and people were taking refuge under a clump of trees with benches overlooking this area. I assumed this was the famous Rütliweise/meadow where legend claims the representatives from the original three Cantons met to swear an oath to fight for liberty against the feudal lords. It was the beginning of the Swiss confederacy.

Rütliweise/meadow

Farmhouse near Rütliweise/meadow

I returned to the restaurant to buy postcards and write one out to send from here. I then followed a roundabout trail to the Rütliweise that followed the edge of the lake. Often there was a straight drop into the water. I returned to the boat dock, and since it was mostly downhill, my knee began to act up. Got the 17:00 boat back to Brunnen, and ended up on the 17:36 train to Zürich which was 10 minutes late. Changed trains in Arth-Goldau, then again in Biberbrugg to Einsiedeln. In Einsiedeln there were only high clouds and it seemed likely it would not rain.

I walked to Katharinahof and the reception desk was closed as usual. The key for Room 212 was not on the board, so I took the elevator up to find the key in the door to the room. I entered to find a tiny, but neat and cheerful room with wall-to-wall carpeting, a colorful quilt on the single bed, a sink, a shower stall, a wardrobe and a desk. Opened the door in the corner to discover the toilet. There was a cross on the wall and stationery on the desk. I was able to lock up my things in the wardrobe.

I left the hotel at 20:00 and saw that others were taking their room keys with them, as did I. The souvenir shops and bakeries were still open. There were crowds of people at the ticket window, I suppose to pick up reserved tickets. One could also purchase programs for 3 CHF/$1.50 which I did, and a published text of the play, which I didn’t.

Ticket

Program cover

I went into the grandstand and thought there was general seating for me in Parterre Links/left, but closer inspection of the seats revealed numbers. A closer inspection of my ticket revealed that what I thought was the serial number (No. 00039 O) was my seat number! After wiping the rain water off my seat, I went to take a look in the Klosterkirche/Abbey Church which was to close at 20:15. Boys were taking the votive candles off the stands, pouring the wax into buckets, and tossing the containers into boxes. I decided to return to my room to read the program. There was information on the playwright/poet Don Pedro Calderón de la Barca of Spain and on the current director, Hans Gerd Kübel. The program explained this year there is a new interpretation where they applied the story to today’s times; in other words, they made it generalized (e.g., instead of the king, they had a figure representing power, and instead of a beggar, they had figure representing misery). There were very short synopses in English, French, and Italian, but the lines of the poem within the synopsis were all quoted in German. I had seen an article in the June 16th issue of Das Gelbe Heft/The Yellow Magazine about this play which highlighted the fact that locals play the parts in the play. It was first performed in 1924, and after 1925 was performed every 5 years, more or less. They stopped performing in 1970, but on this, the 300th anniversary of the death of Calderón de la Barca, they resumed the tradition.

I returned to my seat at 21:00 and the play began at 21:15 after the church bells stopped ringing. During the play the bells did not ring the hours, but rang at appropriate times as part of the play. The lights of the Klosterkirche were turned on to supplement the play and the main portal was the entrance to heaven at the end. The story is that God wants to see a play, and the world is the stage and mankind the players. As people are born, God gives them a role to play, either of power/authority, humility, beauty, abundance, drudgery, or misery. The world gives them costumes and props. Power are the rulers, judges, and military. Humility gets a nun’s habit and crosses. Beauty gets fine clothes and mirrors. Abundance gets jewels, money, and food. Drudgery gets farm tools. Misery gets nothing except fellow players who are old and crippled. They are to play their roles no matter which role they receive. Depending on how they play their role, they could be invited to eat at God’s table after death. The players wander about, coming into contact with each other, and one by one are called to death. They have to give up their props. God decides humility and misery played their parts well and could join him. Power, beauty and drudgery are questionable and were put in limbo to wait for someone to vouch for them. Abundance, however, was banished to burn forever.

The play was pretty good, although I missed a couple punchlines due to the language. It began to drizzle on and off throughout the play, but it seemed no one took notice. At one point a player slipped on the wet stage, but maybe that was planned?

Back at the room I discovered I had left my alarm clock set on for 9:00. If it went off at 21:00, I hope everyone was at the play and no one was disturbed by the beeps.