Affect, Medievalism and Temporal Drag: Oberammergau’s Passion Play Event

Abstract

Every 10 years, thousands of people from across the globe take a pilgrimage to Oberammergau. The reason for journeying to this small Bavarian town is a Passion Play, one the villagers have performed nearly every 10 years since 1634. With its cast of 2,400 actors, drawn entirely from the village’s 5,200 residents, the five-and-a-half hour play is a unique example of Christian community theatre, a tradition with roots in the Middle Ages. Although not a medieval tradition itself, Oberammergau’s Passion Play has always been marked by medievalism, which constitutes the way the Middle Ages have been used, recycled, and remade in order to serve the purposes of later periods. Medievalism operating in Oberammergau does not function solely through cultural references; crucially, it creates meaning by supplying affective encounters with an idealized medieval past. Considering medievalism as an affective force reveals that the Play event ‘works’ for many contemporary spectators, including those who travel to the village from the U.S., by satisfying certain cross-temporal and cross-geographic cultural longings. This essay traces the force of Oberammergau’s performance tradition across centuries and continents and demonstrates how other theatre events draw upon Oberammergau’s affective medievalism in order to situate themselves within a ‘felt’ legacy of authentic, devotional community. The discussion concludes by suggesting that engaging the affective trajectory supplied by certain medievalist events can also serve as a mode of historical inquiry into the ‘real’ Middle Ages.