 Context for the Text
Two outstanding
intellects of the 20th century, Hannah Arendt,
the political theorist (1906-1975), and Martin Heidegger
(1889-1976), the philosopher, met in 1924 at the University
of Marburg, Germany. They both went on to write major
contributions to 20th century thinking. Arendt is
most famous perhaps for her Origins of Totalitarianism,
and The Banality of Evil; Heidegger for his Being
and Time, among other works.
Their encounter –
and the complex, controversial relationship that was born
from that encounter – is documented by their correspondence.
Their bond continued, on and off, until Arendt died in 1975.
Heidegger followed her a mere five months later.
When they first met,
Arendt was an 18-year-old philosophy student, writing her
PhD on the concept of love in St. Augustine. Heidegger was
35, married with two young sons. His philosophy lectures
were unrivalled in popularity – he was the rising star of
philosophy at Marburg University. Many of his students went
on to became famous, influential thinkers in their own
right, such as Arendt, Hans Jonas, Karl Löwith
and Herbert Marcuse.
From their many
letters and poems it transpires how they resonated with
each other's 'being': as lovers, as teacher-student, as
colleagues, rivals and friends. Arendt and Heidegger
interconnected at many levels, over many years, in many
roles; yet they could not have come from – and depart to –
more different contexts.
As a young child,
Arendt is traumatized by the death of her father and
grandfather, and by her mother’s sudden remarriage. The
notion of death and departures, ‘being-towards-death’
resonates with her memories. She is from an assimilated,
cosmopolitan, leftist, atheist German Jewish family of
professionals. Heidegger is from a devout Catholic, peasant
background, attached to the soil and nature, originally
preparing to be a Catholic priest.
They are
irresistibly drawn to each other, and embark on a
passionate, clandestine affair. However, history and their
personal and political choices force them apart. Heidegger
chooses the path of National Socialism. He becomes – and
remains until 1945 – a card-carrying Nazi, an admirer of
Hitler and his “wonderful hands”. The anti-fascist Arendt
works for the Zionists, gets arrested by Gestapo, spends
years in France as a stateless person, almost ends up in
concentration camp before she finally escapes to the US and
become a US citizen in 1951. And yet… and yet, they
reconnect after the war and resume their bond until they
die.
The Hat investigates
the possible dynamics of the first meeting between Arendt
and Heidegger. It explores their chemistry – the spark that
generated enough intellectual, sexual, psychological,
emotional energy to last two life times.
***
CHARACTERS:
HANNAH Arendt - 18, philosophy student.
MARTIN Heidegger - 35, philosophy professor.
ANNE Mendelssohn
- 18,
philosophy student, HANNAH's close friend
PAUL McCarthy
-
28, American
philosophy professor, ANNE's husband
PLACE AND TIME:
Marburg, Germany, 1923.
SCENE 1: HANNAH'S
ATTIC ROOM.
Blackout.
Crackling of fire and ticking of clock punctuates the silent
darkness. Then soft klezmer music fades in. As the lights
come on, we see
HANNAH blowing
at the logs in the stove, resuscitating the flickering
flames. Piles of books on the table and on the floor.
ANNE stirs a pot of chocolate on the stove, dips in the
ladle, blows at it and offers it to HANNAH.
HANNAH
(slurping from the ladle) Anne, I’m telling you…
darn, it’s burning… doesn’t taste like yours.
(HANNAH ladles
some more, they both blow at it, then HANNAH offers
it to ANNE.)
ANNE
(savoring) Umm... Perhaps the milk or the cocoa is
not quite the same. It looks the same, but it’s different.
-- ( raptured) Like Paul.
HANNAH
My, aren’t we smitten by this sweet American.
ANNE
(laughing) I have a sweet tooth, remember?
HANNAH
Hot chocolate for some, hot Paul for others.
ANNE
(offers a spoonful of hot chocolate to HANNAH)
Perfect, wouldn’t you say?
HANNAH
(savoring) The real thing. Almost. How long has he
been teaching here?
ANNE
(peeling an apple) Two years. Superbly. The most
popular professor. Except for Heidegger of course.
HANNAH
Oh.
ANNE
What?
HANNAH
Not you too.
HANNAH
I’m up to here with odes to the ‘greatest professor on
earth’, Professor Heidegger. I don’t fall for this sporty
philosopher image. (Beat.) Imagine, taking his skis
to class!
ANNE
Why not? Paul skied with him many times. Brilliant skier,
apparently. Loves giving ski lessons – not just
philosophy...
HANNAH
Brilliant skier, brilliant teacher, brilliant philosopher
– anything else?
(Energetic knock
at the door while she speaks.
ANNE bolts out
of the chair, hurries to answer it.
(PAUL tumbles
in with a wicker basket, laughing.)
PAUL
Heidegger, Heidegger, Heidegger.
PAUL
( kisses ANNE’s forehead tenderly, then hugs
HANNAH. To ANNE) You’ve been telling Hannah
about the greatest star of modern philosophy, my love?
HANNAH
Yes, we talked mostly about you, Paul. Did you get cinnamon
and cream?
PAUL
In the basket, with the challah.
(He puts the
shopping on the table by a piles of books and slaps on
HANNAH’s HAT. He picks up some of the books – Greek
titles, Goethe, a book on Beethoven.)
PAUL
(looking through the books) Aristotle... Goethe...
Thomas Mann... Beethoven... St Augustine... Kant. Hannah, is
there anything at all you haven’t read?
(ANNE
snatches the HAT, slaps it on HANNAH, PAUL
lurches after her, but she throws it back to
ANNE. Finally PAUL snatches it back and slaps it on
himself. Actors ad lib the playful chase.
(ANNE embraces
him from behind and snuggles her chin into his neck.
HANNAH ladles the steaming chocolate into the mugs.)
ANNE
(sniffing
PAUL’s
neck) Hmm. Delicious. You smell so--
HANNAH
--sweet?
ANNE
(kissing his shivering neck) Let me warm you up.
(ANNE
buries her face in PAUL’s back and blows air into
his jumper, resurfacing only to take another deep breath.
Watching them, HANNAH whips the cream energetically,
walking towards them.)
HANNAH
Careful, Anne. He’ll melt.
(Elated by
ANNE’s ‘heating operations’, PAUL tilts his cheek
up against ANNE’s, and intertwines his arms with hers.
HANNAH continues to whip the cream energetically.)
PAUL
(sitting down, ANNE snugly nestling in his lap)
Seriously, Hannah, you too should have a taste of the
‘little magician of Messkirch’. Heidegger really is--
ANNE
(feeding PAUL a slice of apple)
-- mesmerizing.
HANNAH
(poking her fingers into the cream, then licking them)
I much prefer hot chocolate to magic potions. Mm…
superb.
PAUL
Students would kill to get into his class. (tightening
his arms around ANNE, caressing her thigh)
Totally hooked, everybody. (kissing ANNE)
--One of his students committed suicide.
ANNE
(feeding PAUL) She got entangled in one of his
puzzles --apparently.
(HANNAH
stops whipping.)
HANNAH
(lighting a cigarette) The magic potion…
(sarcastically) hm, deadly after all.
ANNE
It may just be hearsay, you know. (kissing PAUL
tenderly) Accusation.
PAUL
Malicious gossip. (kissing her arm) Quite possibly.
You see--
HANNAH
(to ANNE) --A pinch of cinnamon?
HANNAH
Mm. That’ll
do. Well, I’m here to learn. --To think. (dishing dollops
of cream into the mugs while dragging on her cigarette as
she speaks) For myself. Not to get hooked on anything.
Or anybody.
ANNE
(savoring the drink, offering it to HANNAH)
He is a taste worth acquiring though. You’d--
HANNAH
(slurping) --Appalling! Can’t you see? Can't you see?
Everybody is taken in by Heidegger. Everybody. (slamming
the mug on the table, spilling chocolate on her books.)
Darn. (cleaning the books, mopping up the mess) I’ve
already had enough of him. Not to mention... that he
teaches at the crack of dawn. (She snatches the HAT
from Paul’s head, puts it on, looks at her small pocket
mirror.) Out of the question.
Blackout. Klezmer
music fades in.
SCENE 2: MARTIN'S
OFFICE
Music fades out
as the lights come on. Large piles of books on the floor,
the desk and the chairs. There's a large painting of a tree
on the wall, and a pair of skis by the door. A wooden
ladder by the shelves. MARTIN
is sorting his piles of books, putting them on the shelf,
occasionally stepping on the chair or the ladder to reach a
higher shelf.
Hesitant knock on
the door. Pause. Then a more assertive knock.
MARTIN steps
off the ladder, opens the door and admires his visitor
standing in the door for a while, finally inviting her in.
As
HANNAH walks
in her long black coat, elegant HAT pulled over her
face, her books under her arm, she bumps into his SKIS.
HANNAH trips, the skis fall, hitting MARTIN
on the head as he tries to protect her from falling – but
can’t. HANNAH's books fall, her HAT flies off
her head. )
HANNAH
(shaking his helping hand, kneeling from the fall)
Oh, I'm so sorry... Professor Heidegger… em… Sorry for being
late. I’m... em... Hannah Arendt. I… I was wondering—
MARTIN
(extending one hand to help her up, while feeling a bump on
his head with the other)
Hm. Always a good
sign.
(They pick up the
skis and lean them up against the wall.
MARTIN turns
around and penetrates HANNAH with his glance.
HANNAH is taking off her coat while…)
MARTIN
(is picking up the HAT and twirling it) For
Kant, yes, every experience is first and foremost a human
experience. When we look at this hat, we cannot deny that
we look at it in a peculiarly human way. (sizing her up)
Can we know what that hat is like – apart from our
experience of it? No. Because we filter it through
ourselves – like all our experience. We interpret it.
Through ourselves. Through Time and Space. (Beat.)
Time and Space.
(Some of HANNAH's
books fall down, cluttering the silence)
MARTIN
(anger rising) If our perception of this hat – just
like our conception of the world – is confined by our own
experience – (looking at yet another book falling,
angry) which in turn is confined by Time and Space
(to HANNAH) – how are we to make moral choices?
HANNAH
(hardly audible, picking up her books) On the basis
of --the Categorical Imperative.
(Keeping his gaze
to himself,
MARTIN waits
in silence for her to elaborate.)
HANNAH
We must… we
must act as if the principle we follow were to become a law
which everyone had to follow.
MARTIN
(
sarcastically)
Take the example of coming late.
HANNAH
(trying to explain) Professor Heidegger, I…
MARTIN
(harshly)
In Kantian terms, we can see the far-reaching implications
of any choice -- a choice like --coming late. (Turning
his back on her, he starts pacing up and down.) Now.
Back to the mystery of existence. The oldest mystery on
earth. Let’s see some of the solutions to it. (He
continues sorting his books. He stands on one side of the
ladder, motioning HANNAH to hand certain books to him, then
places them on the shelf while putting her on the spot
mercilessly. She climbs higher and higher on the other side
of the ladder as they talk.) How did Plato see it?
HANNAH
(tentatively, handing over a book) The world is...
but a copy . A copy of a perfect realm.
MARTIN
And Pythagoras?
HANNAH
Mathematical. For him, the world is mathematics.
MARTIN
Descartes?
HANNAH
Cogito ergo sum. The world is the result of our
thinking.
MARTIN
Kant?
HANNAH
The world is the product of our mental structures.
MARTIN
Nietzsche?
HANNAH
Will to power. A game of chaos and power.
MARTIN
Husserl?
HANNAH
The world is a phenomenon of our existence.
MARTIN
(softening) Phenomenal. (stepping down from the
ladder, helping HANNAH down) And of course what
they ALL forget... What they all forget to even consider is
the fundamental mystery. (Beat.) The fundamental
mystery... that something... exists. Rather than nothing.
(Beat.) That the world IS.
(As he scribbles
‘Being’ and ‘being’ on the blackboard)
BEING is the
primordial condition for beings to exist. (He turns off
the light. Silent darkness except for the fire crackling,
and the clock ticking.) Without light... we can't see.
(He switches on the light.)
HANNAH
Without light, we can't see. Without BEING, beings can't be.
MARTIN
(taking in the mesmerized
HANNAH)
And that’s where Time comes in. As opposed to Being, each
being - each of us - is temporal. We are time. We all go
from Being to Nothingness.
HANNAH
We all depart.
MARTIN
Consequently... consequently...
HANNAH
We must... We must face up to the... departures. To
Nothingness. (Beat.) To death.
MARTIN
We're
going to die – so might as well take responsibility for the
life we're going to live. No one else is
accountable for your life. Except you. Now. --
HANNAH
--If you live in the knowledge that your own being has to…
depart one day from Being into Nothingness--
MARTIN
--if you live as a being-towards-death – then you make the
most of your possibilities.
HANNAH
We must.
MARTIN
Then, and only then, you live an authentic life. Then you
CARE. Then you start CARING about your world.
HANNAH
The
key to authentic existence then is taking responsibility for
our life. --For our actions.
MARTIN
(smiling)
For
being late.
(Softened for a
second, his hands shoot into the air to speak with renewed
energy. She puts on her
HAT, he helps
her with her coat. The coat brushes against the skis, they
fall again, hitting both MARTIN and HANNAH
this time. Laughing, they pick up the skis together and
lean them up against the wall, both nursing their own bumps
on their head with one hand, and holding a ski with the
other.)
HANNAH
(squishing the hat)
Professor
Heidegger... My... My doctoral thesis is on the concept of
... love in St Augustine. I was wondering… would you...
would you supervise me?
(Blackout.
Ticking of clock, then Klezmer music.)
SCENE 3: HANNAH'S
ATTIC ROOM
The sound of
relentless
STORM outside,
then the lights come on.
PAUL is
studying the chessboard, HANNAH is trying to coax a
mouse out of its hole in the wall, ANNE is making
tea.
HANNAH
Peek-a-boo… peek-a-boo…What got into her? I haven’t seen her
all day today.
PAUL
(wrapped up in deciding his next move) Hannah.
Please. It’s just a mouse.
ANNE
(pouring PAUL tea) Just a mouse… Because you
choose to frame it so, remember? Hannah used to care for a
little mouse in her grandfather’s tea warehouse. What was
her name? She was a marzipan-addict, right, Hannah?
HANNAH
(nodding
distractedly and making a move on the chessboard)
Where’s my hat?
PAUL
(sipping his tea) You are off? It’s pouring out
there. The heavens opened big time.
(Sound of thunder
and lighting, rain pouring. Stars and music (Bartók’s
“Divertimento”) flood the room, the shadow of tree leaves
sprinkle them. A sense of magic, surreal fairy tale, time
suspended.
ANNE and
PAUL dance slowly in each other's arms in the
background.)
HANNAH
(in storytelling mode) And then the dwarf looked in
the puddle. And what did she see?
ANNE
(playing
along) The rainbow? The clouds?
PAUL
The trees? The leaves?
HANNAH
Herself.
PAUL
And she liked what she saw?
HANNAH
(nodding)
ANNE
And then? What happened?
HANNAH
Days, months, years went by. Then one night the sky opened
wide and flooded the forest.
PAUL
Hey, and the dwarf? What happened with her?
HANNAH
She looked at
the rainbow, and said “Peek-a-boo, rainbow, will you take
me?” (Beat) But the rainbow said no.
ANNE
The rainbow said no?
PAUL
It didn’t care? Why not?
HANNAH
“Oh dear me, what big nose you have. I don’t know you.”
(PAUL
and ANNE stop dancing.)
PAUL
And the trees? Did they take her?
HANNAH She looked at them. They
looked at her… and said “My, my, what big nose you have. I
don’t know you.” The dwarf leaned over the puddle,
her nose poked into the muddy water. Pitter-patter...
pitter-patter... pitter-patter... the raindrops flopped in
her mirror... and disappeared in the sea of tears. Still,
she could see herself ... and the gray sky gazing right back
at her from the puddle.... She stomped her feet and leaped
off the ground. She flew through the leaves, the branches,
through the lace of treetops, past the rainbow. Higher and
higher. Then… suddenly… a thunder roared by her ears, a
lightening twisted and twirled her body, and plopped her
panting on the clouds. (panting) "Peek-a-boo, Clouds…
will you take me? Will you?!" The clouds huddled together,
and looked away: "Peek-a-boo, peek-a-boo. We don't know
you."
(The tree
leaves and the music fade out, the magic is gone. Silence,
except for the thunder and lighting, and the clock ticking.
ANNE
puts her hands on HANNAH’s shoulders, she reaches
for her hand and stands up)
PAUL
(makes a move on the chessboard, then, victoriously)
Checkmate, Hannah.
(He sits down,
ANNE stands behind him. He reaches up with his hands for her
hands. Their hands play with each other as they speak.)
HANNAH
(putting her HAT on, and putting on some makeup)
Heidegger has agreed to supervise me.
PAUL
He took you? My! When did this happen?
ANNE
And? And? What did he say?
HANNAH
(getting ready to leave) Hmm. Nothing. Nothing much.
ANNE
(slapping PAUL’s hands impatiently) Hannah!
Hannah!
HANNAH
(licking her finger, smoothing out her eyebrows in the
mirror)
You are right.
Yes, thinking has come to life again. There
exists a teacher; one can perhaps learn to think...
PAUL
Well, what did he say?
HANNAH
You see, passionate thinking-- (glancing at watch)
Oh, I’m late again!
HANNAH pulls
the HAT over her face, closes St Augustine’s
Confessions with a BANG .
(Blackout.
Klezmer music fading in, then fading into the sounds of a
violent storm.)
SCENE 4: MARTIN'S
OFFICE
Violent storm rages outside.
MARTIN is flipping through St Augustine’s Confessions,
glancing up at HANNAH furtively. She is stretching her arms
for warmth towards the fire, glances back at him. Their
glance interconnect. He closes the book with a BANG.
He slowly unwraps
her from her long, black coat as if he was undressing her.
Shivering in her green dress,
HANNAH leans
towards the stove.
MARTIN
stretches out his hand for her HAT too, but she
insists on keeping it on, pulling it further down, over her
face. He kneels beside her and stokes the fire.)
MARTIN
(blowing at the embers) Tea?
(HANNAH
nods, still panting from running in the storm. Her face is
dripping with rain. MARTIN blows at the fire
vigorously, looks up at her, stands up, wraps his own scarf
around her neck and walks to the table, offers her several
tea boxes with their lid off.)
MARTIN
(handing her his scarf) Well?
HANNAH
(drying her face with the scarf, sniffing the teas but
looking at him) Hmm... Difficult choice.
(After some
hesitation, she picks one of them.
MARTIN takes
off his jacket and wraps her in it as he talks.)
MARTIN
We are so
self-centered, aren't we all? Human-centered philosophy,
along with the history of mankind, is an egotistical
affair. (motioning her to sit down) Let's think about
it for a moment. (pouring her tea) Is there any other
being which believes other beings exist for it?
HANNAH
That all of Being exists for it?
MARTIN
Remember Descartes?
HANNAH
Cogito ergo sum.
MARTIN
It's ME. It's me, me, me! I— (they say ‘I’ at the same
time, then she finishes his sentence)
HANNAH
‘I’ am the ultimate point of reference.
MARTIN
(Looking
at a tree in a painting on the wall, then sorting books.)
Take
the tree. How do we think of the tree?
HANNAH
Well… Air... Oxygen... Its leaves transform carbon-dioxide
into oxygen--
MARTIN
(crouching at the fire)--so that we can breathe. And
hence, live.
HANNAH
And the roots... the roots prevent erosion--
MARTIN
--to hold the soil in place. So that we can inhabit it.
HANNAH
(the burning logs, looking down at him, flirting)
Keeps us warm.
MARTIN
(looking up, slowly standing up) And paper.
Phenomenally... (admiring her) wonderful.
(She almost
moves away. )
Couldn't possibly
live without it.
HANNAH
We can take a rest in its shade.
MARTIN
(offering her an APPLE) Your hat can take a
rest on its branch.
HANNAH
(biting in
the apple)
It
feeds us…
MARTIN
Yes, yes,
yes... All very useful. That is, if you take the
technological attitude to life. (Beat.
talking to
himself as eating the apple)
Alarmingly useful. We only see the tree as... standing
reserve. It's homogenous stock, existing--
HANNAH
–for us. Us, the thinking things.
MARTIN
You see... We ‘frame’ the tree. We frame it. We frame it for
our use.
(They both
chew on the apple in unison, thinking in silence.)
HANNAH
(hardly audible, biting in the apple) Well, how
about--
MARTIN
(cutting her off) Mere putty. The world is but
putty in our hands.
(Silence except
for the ticking of the clock. They chew their apple in
unison.)
HANNAH
(shy but determined) How about its... beauty?
Inspires us to create. Paintings. Poetry. Music.
MARTIN
(staring at her hat) --From a technological
viewpoint, this is just an object. (harshly) Just
‘stuff’. (Backing her into the fire. Matter-of-factly:)
It can be measured, torn apart, made into something else. Or
given a monetary value.
(MARTIN's
hands reach towards HANNAH’s face. She steps back; he
steps closer. They continue this dance across the stage
until HANNAH backs into the stove.)
HANNAH
(burnt by the stove)
OOOOOH!!!
(MARTIN steps
closer to check if she is all right. His hands reach
towards her face again, hesitate around her cheek, then
reach for her HAT. The erotic tension between the two
is palpable.)
MARTIN
(holding the rim of the HAT on her head,
dispassionately) Hmm… Let’s see. Size 12? Say, 35cm in
diameter, the brim an extra 10. Well-worn but I could get,
say, four marks out of it.
(MARTIN
takes off the HAT as if in slow motion. HANNAH
shakes her hair.)
MARTIN
Or I could tear off the rim and throw that in the rubbish.
HANNAH
Herr Professor…
MARTIN
Or I could use it as a curtain tieback.
HANNAH
(she
throws off his jacket)
Professor Heidegger…
MARTIN
(caressing the hat on his chest) Or... as a tie of
sorts.
(Turning the hat
upside down, he fills it with index cards.)
The rest could
serve me… as a container for my index cards. (He takes
out the cards. As he puts the HAT back on her head,
slowly and tenderly:) But for me this... hat
is different. (while putting the hat on her head gently)
I can see it in its context.
HANNAH It's not just an object.
It's part of someone’s world.
MARTIN (His face almost
softens as he admires hers.) Your
world.
(HANNAH
adjusts her hat.)
MARTIN
(taking her hand into his hands, kissing it) It has
your history, Fraulein Arendt.
HANNAH
By 'Caring’, Professor Heidegger --
MARTIN
(taking her other hand, kissing her fingers tenderly)
Each speck of dust... every little dimple and wrinkle... on
your hat... is an evidence of your whole existence.
HANNAH
By ‘Caring’
you mean--
MARTIN
(framing her head in his palms) I mean--
HANNAH
--seeing everything... in its context.
MARTIN
(whispering, leaning towards her) With its...
historical significance.
(HANNAH
pulls back. In silence, they are locked in each other’s
eyes. Clock ticking. Then HANNAH takes off her
HAT, shakes her hair and tilts her head, nesting it back
into his palms. His fingers buried in her tousled hair. )
HANNAH
(leaning
towards him)
Caring--
MARTIN
(brushing his cheeks against hers) Caring--
HANNAH
(turning her other cheek) --is to experience--
MARTIN
(kissing her) --how everything is--
HANNAH
(kissing
back)
--interconnected.
The two are
fused in a passionate kiss. Clock ticking, rain falling. As
HANNAH
embraces him, the HAT falls from her grip to the
ground. Blackout. Klezmer music fades in.
THE END
Zsuzsanna Ardó (www.ardo.org)
is a writer, photographer, editor and
translator. Her books include How to Be a European,
Love Blues:
Hungarian Rhapsodies, and Culture Shock! Hungary.
She has translated
over a hundred films. Allegro Barbaro, the film she
wrote and directed
to Béla Bartók's music, is featured at the Summerfest
festival by the
Danube in August to celebrate the 125th Bartók anniversary
this year. As
the founding chairman, she runs the Hampstead Authors’
Society
(www.hasweb.org) in
London. The Hat: Arendt Meets Heidegger, her play,
was premiered at Harvard. Its illustrated edition can be
viewed here:
http://www.zsu.f2s.com/thehatbook. This summer she
has been invited back for a second term as the Photographer
in Residence at the André Kertész Museum.
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