Abstract

The play The Man from Outside reproduces very exactly the system of relationships the playwright observed at a large factory, but that plant clearly is typical not in that regard alone, but also for the system of relationships against which the economic reform, and its very essence, is specifically aimed. These are relations based upon a chain of untruths contained in them, untruths of such a nature that, when one links up with another, it will be passed along from level to level. The ultimate goal of human activity here resolves not to working as well as possible and producing all one can, but to reporting to higher-ups most successfully about the work done, and everything is aimed at having the work evaluated precisely on the basis of that report to a given authority, and not on the basis of what was really done