Oskar Eberle (1902-1956)

Oskar Eberle, theatre scholar, dramatist, director and advocate for the professionalisation of the domestic theatre sector, decisively shaped theatre discourse in Switzerland in the 20th century. He founded the Gesellschaft für Innerschweizer Theaterkultur (today the Schweizerische Gesellschaft für Theaterkultur) and served as its managing director, editor and publicist.

Because the extensive Eberle estate held at the Swiss Archive of the Performing Arts had not previously been processed, there was a lack of foundational research on the concrete living and working conditions of the most important Swiss exponent of theatre in the interwar and wartime period.

Thanks to the project Oskar Eberle (1902-1956): Identitätsdiskurs, Theaterpolitik und Laienspielreform, this glaring research gap in Switzerland’s theatre history has been closed. At the beginning of 2024, the publication Theaterpionier aus Leidenschaft - Oskar Eberle (1902-1956) by Heidy Greco-Kaufmann and Tobias Hoffmann was published by Chronos Verlag.