4.48 Psychosis (4.48 Psychose)

German by Durs Grünbein

at 4:48
in the happy hour
when clarity visits
warm darkness
which soaks my eyes

"It’s myself I have never met," writes Sarah Kane in her fifth and final play, her last take on life as a whole. 4.48 Psychosis is a poetic composition that is as associative as it is dissociative – a delicate web of voices, thoughts, numbers, and dialogues. It is an angry state between being at one and at odds with oneself, between normality and sickness, form and freedom, light and pain. The title refers to the exact moment when both poles collide. In his first work for the Deutsches Theater Berlin, director Ulrich Rasche takes this brutally honest text to delve into the border regions of the psyche and corporality, and in their interaction, explores the human desire to come into contact with one’s whole and "real" self. Based on the fundamental question of what consciousness is, he explores the vain human desire to find our complete self and to "touch [our] essential self".

Hatch opens
Stark light
the rupture begins.
I don't know where to look anymore.

Note: 4.48 Psychosis was the last play by playwright Sarah Kane, who took her own life at only 28. In the play, she relentlessly processes her own depression as well as her hospital experiences. If you yourself or someone close to you is affected by depression or suicidal thoughts, please contact the telephone counselling service: +49 800 111 0 111. The Berlin Crisis Service offers help free of charge at nine Berlin locations - 24 hours a day, anonymously if you wish: www.berliner-krisendienst.de/en/. You can also get help from the Deutsche Depressionshilfe or the Netzwerk Suizidprävention Berlin.