Welcome aboard!
Sebastian Brandt's Narrenschiff, published in Basel in 1494, was translated into five languages and was a bestseller throughout Europe.
In 115 chapters, people who act stupidly or deviate from the norm, who are embarrassing, rude, greedy, cruel, envious, pleasure-seeking, selfless, soft-hearted, vain, lazy, stubborn, talkative, unteachable, mortal, who have too many feelings,fall in love with the wrong people and drink too much, who can't get their act together, procrastinate,show too little respect for authority – and who also just love to dance.
A panopticon in which we encounter ourselves and then again we don't.
It shows us what we have long since overcome, at least for the most part (keywords: table manners, owning women, believing in hell), and what has now changed sides—from sanctioned behavior to the new cheerful norm. From shame to joy, from morality to freedom.
And what we still can't get our act together on: money and poverty. Above all, however, this idea of the fool persists with such painful tenacity, this idea of the other, the deviant, the notion of someone or something that should be locked out, shipped away, just gone.
It's a utopia, but tonight we're all in the same boat.
Cast off!
Olivia Stahn
