,Wunderbare‘ Schau-Spiele

Abstract The article discusses in which ways Carlo Gozzi stages in his fiaba cinese teatrale tragicomica Turandot marvelous spectacles by contrasting cultural spaces – Venice and China – and semantics as well as different dramatic traditions. Therefore, he uses a specific technique of imitation, i.e. the superposition, which allows him to stratify different dramatic models, the family-comedy, the love-tragedy, and the tragicomedy and to combine them with the oriental fairy-tale of the Mille et un jours . He establishes to such an extend a meta-theatre that questions the meanings of realism and marvelous. By doings this, Gozzis fiaba teatrale focuses on the multiple relations between subject and power in order to reflect the question what makes a monarch a good and ideal sovereign.