Seite - 94 - in Entangled Entertainers - Jews and Popular Culture in Fin-de-Siècle Vienna

94 | Entangled Entertainers In addition, another source of concern was the “cultural vulgarization” (Verpö- belung) that was often associated with the foreignness of America. Th e Jewish writer Richard Guttmann (1884–1920) saw a connection between this cultural degeneration and vaudeville. Th e variety, he writes, bristles with splendor. Everything is gorgeous, great, phenomenal, overwhelming. . . . Provincials with their prurient women and overripe daughters, . . . peasants dressed up in city clothes, . . . habitual poverty alongside sudden prosperity. . . . Th e idea of an inner vulgarity connects them all. . . . Th is audacity belongs to the biology of the mob. A lack of culture, all impossibility at development is transformed into the act of watching. . . . Boredom is expelled chiefl y by satisfi ed curiosity. . . . Th ere, one per- former eats nails and shards of glass, another one pierces his cheek. Th ere, a Chinese acrobat dangles by his own braid, a fakir lets his eye hang out, a Negro bites through a snake, and a white man walks across a horizontal ladder with his head turned down. In anxious anticipation, the audience awaits the moment when he shatters his own skull. . . . Animals and humans are no longer enough to satisfy the mob. Voluntary suff ering, as a sacrifi ce and a feast of curiosity, becomes an end in itself.71 But despite the concerns about the new forms of entertainment, people showed increasing enthusiasm for the variety shows and, of course, the cinema. Th e Volkssänger had to fi ght harder than they ever had before for their audience and found themselves in a veritable crisis. We must understand their wavering popularity as another important factor that fueled their hostility toward the Hun- garian ensembles and ultimately also a reason contributing to the Volkssänger war. Confl ict Becomes “War” At the end of the meeting on 27 October 1902, the Volkssänger decided to submit a petition for their profession to be recognized as a licensed trade. Th ey decided that they did not want to fundamentally modernize their profession and allow greater competition from unlicensed performers. Th e submission of the petition was entrusted to a committee that included, among others, Recher, Rötzer, and Hirsch.72 Th ey also had the task of formulating any additional reforms. To discuss them, another meeting took place on 13 December 1902 at Café Polzhofer, a coff ee house that Volkssänger frequented. Reichsrat delegate Alois Heilinger (1851–1921) chaired this meeting. Hei- linger’s participation shows that the Volkssänger situation was increasingly becom- ing a political agenda. Rötzer and Hirsch held the primary speeches at the meet- ing. Both reaffi rmed the need to grant Volkssänger licenses for life. However, the authorities were to continue to have the ability to revoke the licenses of ensemble managers who failed to employ their members for the entire year. In addition, they discussed founding a cooperative for Volkssänger. Th e idea was that when someone applied for a license, the authorities would contact the cooperative prior This open access edition has been made available under a CC BY 4.0 license thanks to the support of Knowledge Unlatched.