Tags: Austrian Anschlus

Bernhard, in three scenes, deals with the reverberations of a professor committing suicide by jumping from his apartment in Heldenplatz: the same square into which, 50 years earlier, Nazis marched to mark their takeover of Austria. Bernhard implies that Vienna is still haunted by its past. The professor’s housekeeper and brothers describe the continuing anti-Semitism in Vienna. In the final scene, at a family dinner the professor’s wife hears “Sieg Heil” coming from outside her window in the square.