11-15-12
The Visit
Friedrich Durrenmatt
Topic: What were the socioeconomic, cultural, and political conditions of Central Europe Post World War 2? Throughout our analysis of the Visit we are aware that the events in the story take place somewhere in Central Europe (the exact location is purposefully left out.) The setting seems to take place sometime after WW2 and there are a number of socioeconomic, cultural, and political conditions that seem to have an effect on the writing. For socioeconomic conditions we have to look no further than the wreckage and the social psychological impact of such a devastating war. Most of the war was fought on European soil and many people were left extremely impoverished afterwards. The Guelleners exemplified the effect of such poverty as we see their morals deteriorate to the point where they kill a man just for money. After WW2’s conclusion we can also effectively see that loose morals were prevalent during, and afterwards were followed by a movement of the counterculture. For example, during the war Switzerland, although they were supposed to be neutral, took Nazi money that they expropriated from Jewish prisoners, and closed numerous ports to Jewish prisoners. A degradation of morality is apparent in the Visit and could represent the falling standard of morals in Europe in addition to Guellen. Furthermore, an interesting point could be made that Claire is, in fact, a representation of WW2. We can see this through the fact that