The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, is using a high-security Blackberry.
European lawmakers are calling for an E.U. Internet grid free of U.S. surveillance.
In this new Cold War age of widespread spying, themes of surveillance and free will are seeping into the cultural dialogue in Germany.
A compelling example is Oper Stuttgart’s production of Tristan and Isolde, Richard Wagner’s 1865 opera. In this version, which debuted in July, the star-crossed lovers spend a passionate night in a panopticon, an 18th century prison of total control.
The English philosopher Jeremy Bentham devised the panopticon in 1791 as a “model prison’’ to let guards constantly monitor prisoners from a hidden central watchtower.
The wheel-and-spoke design of Bentham’s building allowed authorities to see each prisoner, but prisoners could never know if they were actually being watched or not.
In the 20th century, the French sociologist Michel Foucault used the panopticon as a symbol of state surveillance. Mr. Foucault’s analysis of the levers of state control became a standard text for sociology students and forms the basis of the Stuttgart Tristan and Isolde production staged by Sergio Morabito, its German co-director.
Mr. Morabito, in an interview with Handelsblatt Global Edition, said the uncertainty of not knowing whether one is under surveillance is a part of the modern dilemma. But it is also a theme in Wagner’s schizophrenic character Tristan, who leads a double life as Tristan and as Tantris, his alter ego.
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