Kabaret

This article focusses on the cabaret text as a form of literary expression, comparing it to other literary works sharing the same aims. A comparison with D.J. Opperman's poem “Dennebol” (Pine Cone), which deals with the destruction of Pompeii, shows that the processes of cabaret also need to be dominated by decadence (in its widest connotation) in order to achieve true meaning. In cabaret language is stripped of its dignity. In poetry crude language usually refers to unoriginal and stock phrases. Cabaret on the other hand reactivates and actually uses the cliché, abhorred as it is in poetry. In this fashion a cabaret text parodies the conventions of poetry. An analysis of Hennie Aucamp's “Prins Raka ruk en rol—in memoriam Elvis” (Prince Raka rocks and rolls—in memoriam Elvis) forms the core of the argument. This is done in order to study the various elements of the cabaret text and their interrelationships. (The Raka of the title conjures up a whole world of lasciviousness and lust, particularly so in its reference to the famous Afrikaans epic poem by N.P. van Wyk Louw.) Over the ages parody has been utilized as a way of unmasking hypocrisy in all its forms. Cabaret has basically the same function, but it uses the medium of the song (the rhyme) and the cliché to do achieve its aims. The cabaret emphasizes the erotic, for that is an area where mankind is most easily shocked, and thus tends toward the most blatant hypocrisy. As a literary expression the cabaret parodies/denies the symbol, setting up the cliché in its place. For this reason it does not tend towards/to the world of primordial order versus chaos, or beauty versus anxiety, but highlights the primitive aspects of humanity. It reduces man to his most basic urges: eroticism and violence. Because it utilizes parody and the affected world of the cliché, cabaret ambivalently enough becomes a sophisticated literature, a literature of the salon

Art · Decadence · Hypocrisy · Lament · Literature · Lust · Poetry · Rhyme · Theology · European Cultural and National Identity · Linguistic and Sociocultural Studies · Philosophy · Translation Studies and Practices

• Semiotics and interpretation

  Robert E Scholes•Semiotics and interpretation•1982

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