The employed text for Im Irrenhaus ("In the mental home") is introduced by Kipphardt in the "März"-novel as follows: "Kofler wrote down all words relating to 'mad, lunatic asylum' that he could think of and put them together in two sentences. Writing them one beneath the other they had the structure of a poem. That could also be sung, he thought."
The variety of the arranged expressions in the poem gives an idea how far the mentally ill live apart and alienated from society. Kipphardt: "Most people have a subconscious fear of one day or other not being able to live up to the pressure of their own mental duress. Psychic abnormality, deviant and incomprehensive behaviour makes them panic. They want to get rid of the mad lunatic, preferably stick him in the mental home."
The three parts are three possibilities of musical composition of one and the same text. The material is exclusively language recording of about fifty persons and serves to denigrate our "normal" speech about 'lunatics' by alienation effects. Language appears as a place of definition for a more or less arbitrary limit. Definition, logic and regularity of spoken comments are questioned on different levels.
translation: Gunilda Wörner
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