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SUMMARY
The plot
is located
in Germany,
in the year
1523, while the
political-religious
struggle
the
engaged
reformers,
led by
Luther.
Hans (son
of a peasant
like
Martin
Luther)
postulates
that year
under
King Bacchus.
For seven days,
he holds
absolute power
over all
administration
and the powerful,
in a town
near the borders
of
Switzerland.
His candidacy
is supported by
the Duke's
daughter, Christine, who
one day on
manhunt,
has taken
pity
(we
soon can guess
the true reason for her feelings) to
the peasant,
stalked and
bullied
as a beast,
helpless
by his fellow
festivities,
the
son of
nobles
wishing to
exercise
their
tyranny
over the peasants.
Since then,
Hans
pretended to be
the village idiot,
and finds in
this masquerade
the only way to
be a free man.
On the eve of
the feast of
harvest,
the grand jury
meets to
agree
on the
candidate for
Bacchus.
Thus,
the Duke,
the Bishop,
the provost,
the trustee and
the
Cardinal
are willing to
listen to the
request of
Christine,
for
her
"candidate"
Hans
puts on the
dress of
the
King
for seven days.
The farmer,
after passing the
entrance
examination,
is assigned
the role
of his life.
Hans
calls for a
good society,
he
empties
the prisons,
punishes
merchants
who
charm the
rich at the
expense of
the gullible
and removes
the tithe
he
considers
unfair. The
masquerade
of Bacchus
is wrong
yet
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