High Treason and Low Comedy is the first in-depth treatment in English of E. E. Kisch's work as
a playwright a phase of his life to which he devoted considerable effort during the years
1920-1925.The translations of his two most successful works for the cabaret stages of Germany
Austria and Czechoslovakia form the basis of discussions that fit them into several
intersecting streams: biographical historical and cultural. The plays are Die Hetzjagd which
describes the last day on earth of the infamous traitor Colonel Alfred Redl and Die
Himmelfahrt der Tonka Sibenice (Galgentoni) which presents the comical coarse and at times
pathetic efforts of a Prague prostitute to argue her way into heaven. The plays are a portal
into the world of Kisch's youth as an enterprising journalist and into his thinking and writing
just before he became the raging reporter and the star of international reportage. While they
reflect the Prague milieu of his youth during the twilight yearsof the Austro-Hungarian Empire
they also illustrate Kisch's lifelong critical attitude toward the conservative authorities of
society their derelictions of duty and their indifference to the welfare of the common man
and woman.The book also examines the long afterlife of both of these stories as they were
re-created by artists in stage film novelistic and television adaptations illustrating the
theme of what happens when historical materials are transformed into art.
