The Performative Strategy of Language in Cloud-cuckoo-land: On an Adaptation of Aristophanes' Birds by Karl Kraus

Abstract

The satirical comedy Cloud-cuckoo-land by Karl Kraus, known as the Viennese satirist since the Fin de siècle, is an adaptation of the old Attic comedy The Birds, which Aristophanes wrote to mock Athens. The story in which two Athenians in exile provoke the birds to found their own state and win the primacy over Athens as their ruler, is here modified for the purpose of supporting the Austrian First Republic under the leadership of the Social Democratic Party.

One key feature of Kraus' comedy is his reinterpretation of the two Athenians as swindlers. Another is his strong consciousness of word force in his rewriting of Emil Schinck's translation of The Birds, amplifying the caricatural effect of the swindlers' statements as well as their support by other characters, such as unprincipled journalists. In this regard, the language of this drama carries out the act of ridiculing and punishing the potential enemies of the Republic. With Cloud-cuckoo-land, it can therefore be argued that Kraus developed a performative strategy of language.

In the end, it turns out that the birds are a metaphor, fulfilling the condition of Kraus' so-called “poetic freedom”, and their existence is also a metaphor for the fictitious community in which the enlightenment of the value of such language works. This drama can be viewed as that fantastically comical sequel to “The Last Days of Mankind”, Kraus's representative drama, whose present-day timeliness seems highly notable and recognizable in this age of fake news.