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The play The Good Soldier Schweik was one of the groundbreaking productions of director Erwin Piscator that moved him away from lifeless political figures in the direction of strong literary and satiric types. Piscator' s success was in great part due to the strong visual interpretation of the text by painter George Grosz. Both Piscator and Grosz had experienced World War II first-hand and both wanted to make a strong political statement about the degradations of war. It was this powerful combination of talent that led Schweik to be ranked as one of the top ten productions of the Republic.
My drawings expressed my despair, hate and disillusionment. I had utter contempt for mankind in general. . . . I drew soldiers without noses; war cripples with crustacean-like steel arms; . . . a medical orderly emptying into a pit a pail filled with various parts of the human body. I drew a skeleton dressed as a recruit being examined for military duty. (Grosz, Little 147)1
While confined to a military asylum for the insane and shell-shocked during World War I, graphic artist George Grosz was filled with despair and developed a rage against war that was expressed in his macabre drawings of mutilated soldiers. One of his most antimilitaristic depictions, described in his autobiography A Little Yes and a Big No, was his drawing The Faith Healers, 1916-17. Inspired by the black humor of the popular saying, "they're digging up the dead to go to war," Grosz's wormy skeleton is pronounced fit for military service-a symbol of the exploitation and dehumanization of the common soldier.2
In looking back at the social atmosphere of World War I, which inspired the creation of such biting, satirical images, it is not official policy that stands out but rather what the people believed those policies were or ought to have been. During the crisis preceding the mobilization to invade Belgium and the declaration of war against Russia and France only two days later, the gulf between political intention and public knowledge was striking. When the populace was asked to vote for war credits on 4 August, the day following the invasion, the matter was already determined. The entire German population, for the sake of national survival...