A ritual recitation of Sacher-Masoch and Ignatius von Loyola for one female and one male speaker, a chorus of speakers, and two mute actors. Featuring: Gerhard Rühm, Monika Lichtenfeld, and Collegium Musicum Baden-Baden. In cooperation with the radio station SWR 2.

When the sexual pathologist Richard von Krafft-Ebing coined the term »masochism« in 1890, he was referring to the preferred literary topic and the lived obsessions of the Austrian writer Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. With the help of biographical highlights based on various documentary material, Gerhard Rühm has developed a type of anecdotal psychogram of Sacher-Masoch’s personality. In this process, »a parallel counterpart crystallized almost inevitably: the figure of Ignatius von Loyola, for whom the obscure inner compulsion of total subjugation« Rühm says »manifested itself from seemingly contrary motivations–the eradication rather than stimulation of the flesh.«
Gerhard Rühm [*1930 in Vienna] began to compose after his musical studies and first arrived at other literary genres through sound poetry [1952]. Cofounder of the »Wiener Gruppe«, Karl-Sczuka-Preis 1977, Hörspielpreis der Kriegsblinden [Radio Theater Prize of the Blind War Veterans] 1983, Großer Österreichischer Staatspreis [Austrian Grand Prize] 1991.

Organization / Institution

ZKM