German Drama Since the 1600s

Johann Christoph Gottsched and German Drama

For German drama, the eighteenth century marks the beginning of a new era that culminates in the unprecedented achievements of Weimar classicism. Johann Christoph Gottsched, the dominant figure of the early Enlightenment when supreme faith was placed on exercising reason, must be credited with having moved literature onto this course.

Though trained as a theologian, Gottsched’s real interest was in literature and aesthetics. His productivity began early. At age twenty-four, he arrived at Leipzig, an important intellectual and cultural center. He soon involved himself in the literary and academic life of the city and became a dominant force. When he published his highly influential Versuch einer Critischen Dichtkunst vor die Deutschen (1730; attempt at a critical poesy for the Germans), it became the recognized authority for writing poetry and drama. The work, a practical guide for the aspiring author, prescribes principles of composition and discusses style elements. Its basic premise is that literature is the product of the mind acting by pre-established laws of composition. Gottsched’s primary aim was to introduce into German drama something of that beauty of form that he admired in the plays of the French tragedians Pierre Corneille and Jean Racine. To put his theories into practice, he allied with the acting company of Karoline Neuber. Together, they set out to reform German theater. This was not a simple task. The most difficult obstacle lay in bridging the gap between drama and theater, for the two stood apart at this time. High drama was rarely performed before the public. The theater was primarily vaudeville, and its itinerant performers could hardly be called actors in the modern sense. The troupe typically consisted of acrobats, jugglers, and dancers whose repertory included a theatrical production. Usually, this was a low farce with a heavy emphasis on the scatological and the erotic. To make matters worse, the actors’ nomadic lifestyle, accompanied by a reputation for easy virtue, caused the profession to be held in contempt. Indeed, actors were often forbidden entrance into a city and had to perform outside the walls.

Such was the situation when Gottsched and Neuber launched their reforms. First, they improved the quality of theatrical production. To supply the company with suitable material, Gottsched compiled a repertory consisting of classical, French, and English dramas and German pieces that corresponded to the new standards. Next, they raised the respectability of the acting profession. Henceforth, members of the company were required to live socially acceptable lives. Eventually, Gottsched succeeded in attracting many young writers to Leipzig, who accepted him as their leader. This group, now known as the Gottsched school, peaked in the 1740s.

Rebellion Against Gottsched’s Rules

Although Gottsched made important contributions to the development of theater, his theory of dramatic composition proved to have a serious flaw. He sought to reform literature externally by imposing rules on it. He had little use for imagination, which he, like many of his contemporaries, regarded as a recollective or reproductive faculty rather than a creative one. Furthermore, his efforts to create a German drama modeled on the French did not reflect the national taste. In the 1740s, his views were challenged by two Swiss theoreticians, Johann Jakob Bodmer and Johann Jakob Breitinger. Both agreed that drama needed to be reformed, but unlike their opponent, they sought to accomplish the task from within. They pointed out that great works are not the product of rules but that the rules arise from the product. Each work of art is a self-contained entity, a law unto itself. Hence, they called for more flexibility in form and more freedom in exercising the imagination. As more writers sided with Bodmer and Breitinger, Gottsched’s influence declined. His more talented disciples fell away and struck out on their own. The most gifted of them was Johann Elias Schlegel. Instead of imitating the French, he chose ancient Greek tragedy as his model. His tragedies Hermann (pb. 1743) and Canut (pb. 1746) reflect the more liberal trend in the judicious use of imagination and feeling. He also wrote two comedies, Die stumme Schönheit (pb. 1747; Silent Beauty) and Der Triumph der guten Frauen (pb. 1748; The Triumph of the Good Women), whose originality further served to weaken the Gottsched school.

Unlike Enlightenment tragedy, which was burdened by rigid criteria, the theoreticians virtually ignored comedy. Before long, authors discovered that comedy and satire were better suited than any other literary form for expressing the tenor of the age. Many satiric dramas mocked attitudes, values, and behavior inconsistent with the Enlightenment’s emphasis on reason. Using ridicule, the writers of comedy hoped to institute change. Such moral didacticism is particularly evident in the pieces of Christian Fürchtegott Gellert, the most popular figure of the Enlightenment. In Die Betschwester (pb. 1745; bed sisters), he satirizes hypocrisy, while Das Loos in der Lotterie (pb. 1746; the lottery ticket) holds up materialism to laughter. He strikes a new note with Die zärtlichen Schwestern (pb. 1747; Tender Sisters, 1805), a tragicomedy concerning the integrity of feeling. Gellert’s choice of contemporary topics and his innovative use of everyday language influenced comedy development through Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, the dominant figure of the later Enlightenment.

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

Both a dramatist and critic, Lessing had a decisive influence on the development of German drama. Lessing joined those opposing the more restrictive canons of the Gottsched school, calling for greater freedom in the choice of subject matter and greater flexibility in form. He also insisted that tragedy need not deal with kings, princes, or heroes to be tragic. He illustrated his point by writing Miss Sara Sampson (pr. 1755; English translation, 1933), a play about an aristocrat's seduction of a young woman of the middle class. The drama marks the beginning of a new genre, the bürgerliches Trauerspiel (middle-class, or bourgeois, tragedy). Here, Lessing breaks with tradition in the choice of subject matter and everyday language instead of the Alexandrines favored by the Gottsched school. He maintained this novel practice for Emilia Galotti (pr. 1772; English translation, 1786). For the rest of the century, many authors successfully exploited this genre's possibilities. Its influence is recognizable in the nineteenth century in Friedrich Hebbel’s prose tragedies, the social dramas of Henrik Ibsen and Gerhart Hauptmann, and, in modified form, in the mass-man dramas of the 1890s.

Lessing made two other lasting contributions. The first concerns his introduction of blank verse for tragedy, first employed for Nathan der Weise (pr. 1783; Nathan the Wise, 1781). Blank verse caught on quickly, and after had demonstrated its potential in Iphigenie auf Tauris (pb. 1779; Iphigenia in Tauris, 1793), it became the standard form for tragedy. Lessing’s second major contribution is to be found in the critical essays of his Hamburgische Dramaturgie (1767-1768; Hamburg Dramaturgy, 1879). Through analysis of specific plays combined with his reinterpretation of ’s De poetica (c. 334-323 BCE; Poetics, 1705), he was able to free his contemporaries from the domination of Gottsched’s theories and the rules of French tragedy while at the same time providing them with more liberal guidelines. In so doing, Lessing supplied the ammunition the next generation of writers needed to revolutionize drama.

Sturm und Drang

As with many literary movements, the Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress) movement was a revolt against the ideas and standards of the preceding generation. The young writers of this group assaulted the tyranny of reason, advocating the cultivation of emotions and imagination and calling for their expression in drama. Instinct and intuition should be trusted, they proclaimed, for humanity’s true nature is to be found in the irrational depths of the heart. Whatever the mind failed to grasp, the imagination would. Next, they rejected the Enlightenment tenet that great art results from following rules. Hence, they denounced all traditional standards of dramatic composition—standards that, in their view, suffocate the creative spirit. They called on the authority of Lessing, who had written that the creative genius is a law unto himself. As their model, they chose William Shakespeare, whose poetry and drama, they pointed out, broke every law in the book.

In the social sphere, these writers demanded equality and raised their voices against the privileges of the nobility. They believed that individuals they held have the right and the duty to realize their potential, which they can only do if they are unrestricted by the class system. On another level, they claimed that people endowed with the strength and the talent to achieve greatness are not subject to the same standards of conduct as average people, who order their lives according to the prevailing values of the day. The only guide for extraordinary individuals is their own consciences.

Technically, the Sturm und Drang began with ’s Götz von Berlichingen mit der eisernen Hand (pr. 1774; Götz von Berlichingen with the Iron Hand, 1799) and ended with ’s Die Räuber (pb. 1781; The Robbers, 1792). Typical of the period, Goethe’s play is an account of a strong, independent man who is destroyed by the plotting of courtiers. The play was an overwhelming success and served as the model for the entire movement.

Criticism of contemporary society and the celebration of the vigorous personality are also the salient features of Goethe’s contemporary, Friedrich Maximilian Klinger. His first effort, Otto (pb. 1775), resembles Götz von Berlichingen with the Iron Hand but with family strife complicating the plot. Rebellion against the law of primogeniture (the rights of the first-born son) is the subject of Die Zwillinge (pr. 1776; the twins), equality and the struggle against tyranny that of Die neue Arria (1776; The Modern Arria, 1795). Klinger’s play Sturm und Drang (pb. 1776; Storm and Stress, 1978), which gave the movement its name, is set in the United States during the Revolutionary War and celebrates the triumph of freedom over oppression.

Another favorite theme of Sturm und Drang dramatists was the aristocracy’s often unscrupulous treatment of the other classes. Die Soldaten (pb. 1776; The Soldiers, 1972), by , dramatizes the seduction of the daughter of a middle-class merchant by a caddish, ruthless officer and his later abandonment of her. Heinrich Leopold Wagner’s Die Reue nach der Tat (1775; Remorse after the Deed), Schiller’s Kabale und Liebe (pr. 1784; Cabal and Love, 1795), and Goethe’s Faust: Ein Fragment (Faust: A Fragment, 1980) of 1790 all deal with different aspects of this theme.

Although many writers of the Sturm und Drang were active well into the 1790s, the vitality of the movement had spent itself by about 1780. Several factors contributed to the decline. Many playwrights went too far in scorning the laws of measure and restraint. Their taste for extravagant language and incidents surcharged with passion and violence became excessive. Most importantly, the movement’s two gifted men, Schiller and Goethe, abandoned it. Despite the relatively short life of the Sturm und Drang and its obvious deficiencies, it prepared the ground for the Romantic movement.

Classicism

The spirit of Athens and Rome that entered German drama in the late eighteenth century was the culmination of a trend in aesthetics that had its beginning in the work of Johann Joachim Winckelmann. In his influential Geschichte der Kunst des Alterthums (1764; History of the Art of Antiquity, 1849-1873), he maintained that the only way a society could achieve greatness was to imitate the Greeks. His ideas caught on quickly and served as the basis for the introduction of the Greek ideal into education and art. Through Lessing, Winckelmann’s ideas found their way into drama. Winckelmann’s often-quoted definition of the Greek ideal as “noble simplicity and quiet grandeur” also held great attraction for Schiller and Goethe, who had grown weary of the excesses of the Sturm und Drang.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

’s classical period covers the years between 1779 and 1810. His first piece of that period, Iphigenia in Tauris, underwent three revisions, in which his transition to classicism is evident. His turn from the Sturm und Drang became decisive after two years in Italy (1786-1788), where he was able to study antiquity firsthand. In Italy, he recast the prose of the first two versions of Iphigenia in Tauris into an elevated blank verse that ultimately became the standard form for German tragedy for more than a century. Inspired by and ’s Poetics, he incorporated features characteristic of Athenian tragedy. By exploiting the possibilities offered by recognition-reversal, tragic error, and catharsis, he achieved in his classical pieces a cohesiveness and economy of form unique in German drama. Goethe next wrote Torquato Tasso (pr. 1807; English translation, 1827) in the classical form. In this thinly veiled account of Goethe’s own experiences at the Weimar court, Tasso is portrayed as a gifted poet who, like Goethe, aspires to a social position to which his talent alone does not entitle him. Following his inevitable humiliation, he regains his dignity and personal integrity by striking out on his own.

Goethe’s other classical dramas are Die natürliche Tochter (pr. 1803; The Natural Daughter, 1885) and his masterpiece, Faust (1790, 1833). The latter work occupied Goethe for sixty years. First conceived in the 1770s, it went through many revisions: the 1790 Faust: A Fragment; Faust: Eine Tragödie (pb. 1808; The Tragedy of Faust, 1823); Faust: Eine Tragödie, zweiter Teil (pb. 1833; The Tragedy of Faust, Part Two, 1838). Faust has been an archetypal figure in the imagination and literature of the West since the Middle Ages. In its traditional form, the legend tells of a man who sells his soul to the devil in exchange for supernatural powers and the enjoyment of earthly pleasures. Goethe reworked the legend, making it an investigation into the human condition, with Faust serving as the representative of humanity.

In Goethe’s final version, Faust has become the object of a wager between God and Mephistopheles, the devil. The play begins with a “Prologue in Heaven” in which God praises Faust as his faithful servant and as a fine example of humankind. Mephistopheles wagers that he can easily divert Faust from the Lord’s service and induce him to give up his striving for higher things (Streben), which the Lord has identified as the fundamental force governing all existence. Subsequently, Mephistopheles visits Faust in his study, and they come to an agreement: In return for services rendered, Mephistopheles may try to get Faust to abandon his striving. For his part, Faust is uninterested in the traditional inducements of earthly pleasure. He demands nothing less than to undergo the totality of human experience. He wants to feel everything of which a human being is capable, every pain and every joy from the highest to the lowest, so that his own experience will be commensurate with that of all humankind. Even though Mephistopheles’ failure to win the bet and Faust’s salvation are clearly foreshadowed in the “Prologue in Heaven,” Goethe sustains the audience’s interest through a multitude of incidents, scenes, and characters ranging from his present back to classical Greece, involving crime, temptation, sin, and ultimately purification and salvation. The matchless lyric poetry also serves as Goethe’s contribution to the development of the German language as a means of literary expression: During the eighteenth century, there had been serious debate over whether German was an adequate vehicle for expressing lofty sentiments. Goethe laid these doubts permanently to rest.

Friedrich Schiller

An even greater contribution to German drama was made by , one of Germany’s foremost dramatists. A lyric poet in his own right, a theoretician and philosopher of renown, he brought to drama a combination of philosophical insight, poetic power, and regularity of form that has perhaps never been exceeded.

Schiller began his career as a playwright when still an unwilling cadet at the military academy founded by the unimaginative despot Karl Eugen of Württemberg. Schiller wrote his first play, The Robbers, in secret because the explosive subject matter was sure to incur the duke’s displeasure. For the same reason, he published it outside the duchy under a pseudonym. The play soon caught the attention of Wolfgang Heribert Dalberg, director of the Mannheim National Theatre in the neighboring state of Hesse. Dalberg produced the play in 1781. The premiere, attended secretly by the author, was a phenomenal success and soon brought him fame throughout Germany. When the duke, who took a personal interest in the lives of his subjects, learned of Schiller’s clandestine visits to Mannheim, he forbade him to write any more “comedies” on the pain of imprisonment. Having long since decided to live as a playwright, Schiller deserted his post as regimental surgeon and went into hiding at the country estate of an acquaintance in Thuringia. There, he completed Die Verschwörung des Fiesko zu Genua (pr. 1783; Fiesko: Or, the Genoese Conspiracy, 1796). Based loosely on Count Fiesko’s revolt against Andrea Doria in 1587, it dramatizes the transformation of an idealistic political reformer into an egotist hungry for power.

Next, Schiller wrote his only middle-class tragedy, Cabal and Love. In this play, political intrigue conflicts with basic human dignity. Schiller’s next play, Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien (pr. 1787; Don Carlos, Infante of Spain, 1798), marks the transition to his classical phase. Set in sixteenth-century Spain, it is an impassioned plea for freedom and fundamental human rights. Although the play was well received, it suffers from serious flaws in technique and organization, limitations of which Schiller was only too well aware. He abandoned drama for the next ten years. During this time, he carefully studied ancient and modern tragedy and wrote several essays on the subject. Of particular importance are Über die tragische Kunst (1790; On Tragic Art, 1844), Über das Erhabene (1801; On the Sublime, 1844), and Über das Pathetische (1793; On the Pathetic, 1845).

Schiller’s first drama after ten years of silence is the historical tragedy Wallensteins Lager (pr. 1798; The Camp of Wallenstein, 1846), generally considered to be his finest achievement. The play, a vast panorama of the Thirty Years’ War, depicts the rise and fall of one of the dominant figures of that period, Albrecht von Wallenstein. Here, Schiller explores the transitory nature of fame and achievement, the weaknesses in human nature, the fall of a great man brought low by schemers. In the manner of Athenian tragedy, he emphasizes chance and circumstance as well as individual shortcomings in motivating the hero’s fall.

Following The Camp of Wallenstein, Schiller wrote outstanding plays at the rate of one a year until his death at forty-six. In Maria Stuart (pr. 1800; Mary Stuart, 1801) and Die Jungfrau von Orleans (pr. 1801; The Maid of Orleans, 1835), he presents figures who bring about their destruction by committing a fatal error but who atone for their mistake through voluntary self-punishment. Schiller takes a different tack with Die Braut von Messina: Oder, Die feindlichen Brüder (pr. 1803; The Bride of Messina, 1837). The plot is structured along the lines of Athenian tragedy, and the action concerns the fulfillment of an ancient family curse and certain prophecies. Much like ’ play Oidipous Tyrannos (c. 429 BCE; Oedipus Tyrannus, 1715), it is precisely the effort to avoid the prophecy that causes it to be fulfilled.

Schiller’s best-known play outside Germany is Wilhelm Tell (pr. 1804; William Tell, 1841). It concerns the successful revolt of the Swiss cantons against their Austrian oppressors. The piece was topicalwritten in the shadow of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Empire. In some ways, the play also functions as his answer to certain critics who had complained that his ideas about freedom and political reform did not allow the citizen to redress grievances by force. William Tell is Schiller’s most popular play; it is still performed in Germany and Switzerland. During the Third Reich, it even had the honor of being banned as “provocative.”

Heinrich von Kleist

Next to Schiller and Goethe, the other leading dramatist of the period is . Active during the classical and the Romantic periods, he does not stand in the mainstream of either, yet he displays characteristics of both. The most striking feature underlying his early pieces is the notion that humans have little power to determine their destiny. According to him, human beings are subject to the workings of mysterious rule and often malevolent forces. This feature is manifest in Die Familie Schroffenstein (pr. 1804; The Schroffenstein Family, 1916), in Penthesilea (pb. 1808; English translation, 1959), and in his two comedies Amphitryon (pb. 1807; English translation, 1962) and Der zerbrochene Krug (pr. 1808; The Broken Jug, 1930).

In his last and finest drama, Prinz Friedrich von Homburg (pr. 1821; The Prince of Homburg, 1875), he abandons the influence of external forces in favor of psychological motivation. The plot is based on a historical incident. In 1675, the Prince of Homburg defeated the Swedish army at Fehrbellin, but only by disobeying a direct order from the elector of Brandenburg to hold his forces in reserve. In Kleist’s version, Homburg is then court-martialled for insubordination and sentenced to die. At first, he is gripped by the fear of death and pleads for mercy. The elector turns a deaf ear to him and to all who intercede on his behalf, including the entire army. Eventually, the elector puts the decision into the prince’s own hands: If he thinks that his sentence is truly unjust, he may go free. This precipitates a reversal in Friedrich’s attitude. He recognizes the ethical basis of the verdict and prepares for his execution. When the elector perceives that Friedrich has understood the deeper justice of his sentence, he can pardon him.

Romanticism

The Romantic movement is best viewed as a continuation of the revolt against the Enlightenment initiated by the Sturm und Drang. The two movements are similar in that both stand in opposition to the overemphasis on reason and to the procrustean, limiting laws governing dramatic composition. Both movements advocated the cultivation of humanity’s emotional side. The difference between the two is one of degree. The Sturm und Drang frequently went too far in its categorical rejection of all rules and often carried the depiction of emotion to excess. The Romantics, by contrast, sought to strike a balance between intellect and emotion, adherence to rules, and freedom to experiment. The concept of Romantic irony was developed to curb emotional excess. The chief theoretician of the period, August Wilhelm von Schlegel, defined Romantic irony as the writer’s ability to look at his work from a distance as something outside of the writer’s self. Romantic irony assigns the intellect the task of restraining feeling and keeping the enthusiasm within limits. Properly employed, it stands for clearness of vision, presence of mind, and calm judgment while at the same time permitting the writer to express the entire range of emotions.

In their efforts to break away from what they considered the coldness of Enlightenment dramas, the Romantics concentrated on the role uncontrollable forces play in life. Whereas in classical tragedy, the hero’s misfortune usually results from his tragic error, the Romantics explored the role of fate. The Schicksalstragödie (fate tragedy), which the new genre came to be called, reached its peak with Zacharias Werner’s Der vierundzwanzigste Februar (pr. 1810; The Twenty-fourth of February 1844). The play is set in a remote Swiss valley. Long before the action begins, Kunz Kuruth had, in a moment of anger, thrown a knife at his father, who then laid a curse on his son. Later, Kunz’s own son kills his sister with the same weapon. The son leaves home, amasses a fortune, and, after many years, returns home incognito. Kunz, in serious financial trouble and tempted by the stranger’s wealth, murders his son with the same knife. All these events occur on the same day, February 24. The fate tragedy found many imitators. followed with Der neunundzwanzigste Februar (pr. 1812; The Twenty-ninth of February, 1820) and Die Schuld (pr. 1813; Guilt, 1819). contributed Die Ahnfrau (pr. 1817; The Ancestress, 1838), which is considered the finest example of the genre.

Despite the masterpieces of Schiller, Kleist, Goethe, and the accomplishments of the Romantics, the playwright who dominated the German stage from 1789 to about 1830, and who enjoyed immense popularity throughout Europe, was . He had a keen sense of what the public wanted to see: sentimental domestic dramas and light comedy, all with a happy ending. Interestingly, although he wrote nearly two hundred dramas, they are now nearly forgotten. His significance resides in his influence on the development of drama in general. The techniques, themes, moods, and effects that he introduced were major innovations for his day. Throughout Europe and the United States, his example encouraged the emergence of the sentimental drama, which has come to occupy such a conspicuous position in motion pictures, television, and on the contemporary stage.

Biedermeier and Young Germany

German drama between 1820 and 1850 was, in many ways, a drama in transition. The Romantic movement was waning, and the new approach to come, realism, was yet undefined. The two movements filling the gap were Biedermeier and the Junge Deutschland (Young Germany) movements. Both represent a specific orientation to the reactionary political climate that set in after Napoleon Bonaparte was defeated in 1815. Biedermeier, predominantly middle class, reflects the widespread acceptance of established authority. The Young Germany movement, by contrast, attacked the establishment and clamored for political reforms. It called for universal suffrage and agitated for the unification of the German states into one nation. The Biedermeier produced no dramatists of distinction. Ernst Raupach specialized in gloomy historical pieces such as Der Nibelungenhort (pr. 1834; The Nibelungen Treasure, 1847), which have long been forgotten. Other playwrights, among them Michael Beer and Eduard von Schenk, contented themselves with providing entertainment that never rose above the commonplace.

Unlike Biedermeier fare, many of the dramas of the Young Germans have outlived their time. ’s Dantons Tod (pb. 1835; Danton’s Death, 1927), set in the first years of the French Revolution, depicts Danton’s growing sense of futility in trying to translate the ideals of the Revolution into practice. He loses faith in his mission. Finally, he criticizes Maximilien Robespierre for the excesses of the Reign of Terror, which proves a fatal mistake; Robespierre engineers Danton’s downfall and execution. Büchner’s masterpiece is Woyzeck (pr. 1836; English translation, 1927), a psychological study of a simple soldier whose mind disintegrates when the woman he loves betrays him.

The most influential writer of Young Germany is Karl Ferdinand Gutzkow. His plays were well received in part because they dealt with current issues. Religious toleration underlies Uriel Acosta (pr. 1846; English translation, 1860), Prussian militarism is criticized in Zopf und Schwert (pr. 1844; Queue and Sword, 1913), and the repression of the Young Germany movement by the authorities is the topic of König Saul (pr. 1834; King Saul).

Austrian Drama of the 1800s

With the untimely death of North Germany’s most gifted dramatists—Schiller, Kleist, and Büchner—the center of dramatic activity shifted to Vienna. The capital of Austria had a dramatic tradition extending back some two hundred years. There, Italian Renaissance opera and the commedia dell’arte had flourished. The religious drama of the Jesuits had found an audience, and so had the works of the masters of the Spanish Baroque, and . The inheritor of this long tradition was Austria’s most talented dramatist, .

Grillparzer was born in Vienna and spent most of his life there. His first successful drama was The Ancestress. This fate tragedy is about a ghostly ancestress who watches over her family, the Borotins, until Jaromir, the last of the line, is executed for parricide. Another successful play takes its material from classical antiquity. Sappho (pr. 1818; English translation, 1820) retells the tragedy of the Greek poetess who loves the handsome Phaon but is not loved in return. Humiliated when he becomes infatuated with a pretty servant woman, she jumps from a cliff in despair.

After an unsuccessful trilogy on the Medea theme, Grillparzer turned to the history of his own country for the subject of König Ottokars Glück und Ende (pr. 1825; King Otakar’s Rise and Fall, 1830). It dramatizes the triumph of the rightful emperor, Rudolf von Habsburg, over his rival, King Otakar of Bohemia. Following this, Grillparzer produced two outstanding plays, Des Meeres und der Liebe Wellen (pr. 1831; Hero and Leander, 1938), a love tragedy based on the Greek poem Hero and Leander, by Musaeus Grammaticus (fifth or sixth century CE), and Der Traum ein Leben (pr. 1834; A Dream Is Life, 1946). The latter is his greatest stage success. It dramatizes the fortunes of a country lad, Rustan, who longs for a life of excitement and adventure. The night before he is to embark on his quest, he has a vivid dream, the events of which are the action of the drama. The dream begins with a crime. Rustan kills the man who saves the life of the king of Samarkand and takes the credit for himself. In a cause-and-effect relationship, the initial falsehood leads him ever further into mendacity and lawbreaking. When the truth finally emerges, he is forced to flee for his life. Just as his pursuers are about to capture him, he jumps from a bridge into a raging torrent, at which point he awakens. Sobered, Rustan renounces adventure and settles down to a life of rustic tranquillity.

Grillparzer turned next to comedy, producing the masterpiece Weh’ dem, der lügt (pr. 1838; Thou Shalt Not Lie!, 1939). The public rejected it at first, and this reaction wounded him deeply; he became so discouraged that he almost gave up writing. Over the next thirty-five years, he wrote only three plays, and even these he retained in his desk. In the 1850s, Austria finally began to recognize Grillparzer’s genius. His plays were revived, and he received honors from the crown and state and recognition from critics. Yet, on the occasion of the celebration of his eightieth birthday, he responded with the embittered “zu spät” (too late).

In addition to Grillparzer, there are other Austrian dramatists of note in the 1800s. specialized in fairytale comedies, a subgenre that flourished during the first decades of the nineteenth century. In his talented hands, it attained literary respectability. He is at his best depicting humor laced with pain and misfortune, such as the problems of growing old in Das Mädchen aus der Feenwelt: Oder, Der Bauer als Millionär (pr. 1826; The Maid from Fairyland: Or, The Peasant as Millionaire, 1962) and generosity and ingratitude in Der Verschwender (pr. 1834; The Spendthrift, 1949).

Raimund’s contemporary and rival for the favor of the often fickle Viennese public was . A brilliant writer of farce and a master of dialogue, his pieces are appreciated for their wit and cynicism, local color, and characterization. Of his eighty-three productions, the best known and most enduring is Einen Jux will er sich machen (pr. 1842; The Matchmaker, 1957), about an elderly man who goes to Vienna to have a good time and finds himself a second wife. The play served as the basis for Thornton Wilder’s The Matchmaker (pr. 1954) and the musical comedy Hello, Dolly! (pr. 1964).

After the death of Grillparzer, the distinction as Austria’s greatest dramatist fell to . Anzengruber excelled in the representation of average people. Furthermore, because he believed that the purpose of literature is to instruct, a strong didactic vein runs through his work. This is apparent in Der Meineidbauer (pr. 1871; The Farmer Forsworn, 1914), which concerns the just retribution that is visited on a farmer who perjured himself to gain wealth. Der Pfarrer von Kirchfeld (pr. 1870; the priest of Kirchfeld) reflected the bitter controversy that erupted after the pope’s proclamation of the doctrine of infallibility. Of all his work, the most enduring is Das vierte Gebot (pr. 1877; The Fourth Commandment, 1930). In it, he contrasts the ideal relationship between parents and children based on love and confidence with its opposite: the destructive effect of tyrannical control. The play caused an uproar. The Church accused him of undermining the Fourth Commandment (“Honor thy father and thy mother”) and called down the wrath of God on him. The liberal community applauded him just as enthusiastically. This was Anzengruber’s last success. The Viennese public, long known for its capricious and sudden changes in taste and fashion, began flocking to the operettas of Jacques Offenbach and the salon plays of .

Realism

Although fiction was the preferred literary form between the 1840s and the 1880s, three eminent dramatists, , Otto Ludwig, and Richard Wagner, were active during these years. Hebbel is known for his novel conception of tragedy. He rejects the traditional idea that misfortune is the result of a specific error or moral deficiency on the part of the hero. Rather, it is the result of an individual’s exerting his or her will. Hebbel conceived of the world as governed by universal forces, which he sometimes calls the Idea, sometimes the Whole. It may manifest itself as custom, tradition, or simply the status quo. When people assert their will against the Whole, they separate themselves from it. In so doing, they withdraw a certain amount of energy. When the energy is finally consumed, the individual is reabsorbed into the Whole, a process that is invariably tragic. Hebbel saw it as his duty as a dramatist to clarify humanity’s and the world’s relation to the Whole.

In translating his ideas into practice, Hebbel often depicted the individual in conflict with tradition. This is the subject of Maria Magdalena (pr. 1844; English translation, 1935). It shows how a father’s exaggerated sense of rectitude and honor, characteristic of his generation, drives his unwed, pregnant daughter to suicide. In Agnes Bernauer (pr. 1852; English translation, 1904), on the other hand, the plot involves the conflict between the prince’s personal choice of a wife and his political obligations to the dukedom he is to inherit. Underlying the surface action of Herodes und Mariamne (pr. 1849; Herod and Mariamne, 1930) is the conflict between paganism and Christianity. In Gyges und sein Ring (pr. 1889; Gyges and His Ring, 1914), considered his finest achievement, the disaster is caused by the violation of custom. King Kandaules of Lydia is proud of the extraordinary beauty of his wife, Rhodope. Yet, her native custom mandates seclusion from any man except her husband. Wishing to hear the praise of his friend Gyges, he secretly arranges for him to watch her disrobe. Rhodope, however, learns of the deceit. To restore her lost honor, she persuades Gyges to kill Kandaules and marry her. Gyges does so, but after the wedding, she kills herself.

As a representative of the trends in German drama at this time, Hebbel’s name is usually linked with that of Ludwig. Though Ludwig is best remembered for his fiction, he wrote a powerful tragedy in the new idiom, Der Erbförster (pr. 1850; The Hereditary Forester, 1913). In the play, Christian Ulrich regards himself as the hereditary forester of a large estate and, therefore, immune to dismissal. When the new owner removes him for disobeying a direct order, Christian seeks revenge. At the climax of the play, he shoots his own daughter in error, having mistaken her for the new master’s son. Ludwig’s only other tragedy, Die Makkabäer (pr. 1853; the Maccabees), a story based on material taken from the Apocrypha, is almost forgotten, as are his four comedies.

Although Hebbel and Ludwig produced excellent work, their fame was largely restricted to Germany and Austria. The only dramatist of the period to gain worldwide renown is Wagner. Wagner’s achievement and influence reside in his creation of a new dramatic form, which he called the “music drama,” as opposed to opera, which he repudiated as too burdened by tradition. In his view, music would be an integral part of the drama. It would aid in the interpretation of the action, it would evoke the appropriate feelings, and it would enhance the understanding. These ideas find their fullest expression in the trilogy Der Ring der Nibelungen (pb. 1853; The Ring of the Nibelungs, 1877). The plot is based on the ancient Germanic Siegfried myth. The central theme is the quest for power and wealth, symbolized first by the Nibelungs’ store of gold and then by the fabulous ring into which it is transformed. On another level, Wagner anticipates problems that were soon taken up by the emerging science of psychoanalysis, such as the role of unconscious drives in the life of the individual.

In the tragedy Tristan und Isolde (pr. 1859; Tristan and Isolde, 1882), the themes range from Arthur Schopenhauer’s denunciation of life as an evil illusion to the relation between eroticism and the death wish. Wagner’s last work, Parsifal (pr. 1877; English translation, 1879), did not evoke the same enthusiasm from the public as his earlier pieces. The theme of infidelity and remorse did not reflect the prevailing intellectual climate.

Naturalism

Naturalism was, in large measure, a literary response to the social conditions of that time. When the German states were at last welded into a single nation in 1871, the new country embarked on a concerted program of rapid industrialization. An unfortunate side effect was the emergence of a proletarian underclass, whose welfare the industrial barons ignored. Safety conditions were appalling, and workers’ rights were yet to be formulated. Most people of this class lived in poverty and squalor. Several writers and intellectuals of the 1870s and 1880s addressed this problem in newspapers and pamphlets. As spokespeople for the oppressed, they denounced the incongruity between the stark realities of everyday life and a world of literature, art, and music that become detached, self-indulgent, and irrelevant by comparison. In Berlin, several of these critics organized into a group and adopted a socially conscious stance. They were determined to expose the problems that society was ignoring, namely, the plight of the impoverished masses in general and the status of women in particular. The leading figures of the Berlin circle were the brothers Heinrich and Julius Hart, , Johannes Schlaf, Hermann Conradi, Karl Henckell, and above all, .

As a dramatic movement, naturalism began with Hauptmann’s Vor Sonnenaufgang (pr. 1889; Before Dawn, 1909). This play sets the tone for the dramas that soon dominated the German stage. Its author aimed at a photographic representation of life. He wanted the audience to see, to touch, to smell, and to taste the misery of poverty. In addition, his slice-of-life depictions extend into speech. Hauptmann aimed at the phonographic reproduction of language: His characters often are inarticulate, speaking in fragmented, incoherent sentences and even mumbling and stuttering. These innovations were so radical that they caused a riot at the premiere of Before Dawn in Berlin. Nevertheless, the play established him as the undisputed leader of the movement.

Perhaps the most representative play of naturalism is Hauptmann’s Die Weber (pr. 1893; The Weavers, 1899). The subject of this famous drama, originally written in the Silesian dialect, concerns the brutal repression of an uprising of the Silesian cottage weavers in 1844. There is no hero in the traditional sense; the entire weaving population is the collective protagonist, which is represented by colorfully drawn types. There is also no plot in the usual sense; each of the five acts has a different setting that illuminates the plight of the weavers from a different viewpoint—that of the rich industrialist, of government officials, of the weavers themselves. The action is carried forward by the gradual formation of the weavers into a violent mob.

The Weavers also represents the naturalists’ conception of tragedy. The naturalists rejected the Aristotelian view that misery and misfortune, as depicted in drama, should be the result of some mistake, however slight, on the part of the hero. Aristotle had pointed out that the spectacle of a perfectly innocent man suffering disaster should be avoided because it violates the spectator’s sense of justice. This violation, by contrast, is exactly what the naturalists wanted to achieve. In their view, the more unjustified the misery that overtakes the hero, the greater the drama as a work of art. In The Weavers, for example, there is a figure called Old Hilse who declines to participate in the uprising. He is a good man who wins the sympathy of the audience through the humble acceptance of his fate. When the soldiers arrive to crush the rebellion, he sits impassively in his hovel. Yet, he is struck by a ricocheting bullet and killed. The audience leaves the theater with a sense of outrage at this injustice. In turn, this feeling may set social forces in motion to improve conditions.

In addition to Hauptmann, there were other notable authors of this movement. Holz and Schlaf collaborated on Die Familie Selicke (pr. 1890; the Selickes); Hermann Sudermann brought out Die Ehre (pr. 1889; Honor, 1915). Among the more conspicuous authors is Frank Wedekind. He had a taste for the grotesque and the bizarre that is most clearly seen in his “Lulu” dramas: Der Erdgeist (pb. 1895; Earth Spirit, 1914), Die Büchse der Pandora (pr. 1904; Pandora’s Box, 1918), and Hidalla: Oder, Karl Hetmann der Zwergriese (pb. 1904). The action concerns the adventures of a young woman, Lulu, an unprincipled opportunist who exploits the men who love her. Finally, she meets her fate in London at the hands of Jack the Ripper.

Shortly after the turn of the twentieth century, the naturalists discovered the limitations inherent in the movement. They realized that photographic reproduction of the external world was, in fact, a reproduction of the impression that the world made on them. Furthermore, the requirement to deal with the misery of the disadvantaged limited their subject matter. Interestingly, the most representative figure of naturalism was the first to leave it.

Neo-Romanticism and Neoclassicism

Although Hauptmann was the foremost dramatist of naturalism, he was well aware of its limitations from the outset. As early as 1893, he digressed to write a neo-Romantic drama, Hanneles Himmelfahrt (pr. 1893; The Assumption of Hannele, 1894). Hannele, the child of a drunken bricklayer, tries to drown herself. She is pulled from the water and taken to a hospice for derelicts. Dying, she has a series of hallucinations that she takes for reality. The hallucinations, which are presented to the audience, show what her life might have been in better circumstances. The play derives its power from the juxtaposition of scenes of abject poverty with dream images of an idyllic life. In a similar neo-Romantic vein is Die versunkene Glocke (pr. 1896; The Sunken Bell, 1898), an allegorical fairytale drama with an emphasis on the supernatural. After writing several more neo-Romantic pieces, Hauptmann developed an interest in the literature of classical antiquity, whereupon he entered his neoclassical period. These dramas are written in the classical form and take their subject matter from antiquity. Of note are Iphigenie in Aulis (pr. 1943), and Agamemnons Tod (pr. 1946).

Another important writer of neoclassicism is the Austrian . He wrote several short plays distinguished for their lyric quality, most notably Der Tor und der Tod (pr. 1898; Death and the Fool, 1913). He also made an attempt to rekindle interest in Greek drama with Elektra (pr. 1903; Electra, 1908) and Ödipus und die Sphinx (pr. 1906; Oedipus and the Sphinx, 1968). Another Austrian writer of this period is . His greatest talent resides in his ability to create finely chiseled dialogue and suspense, as in Liebelei (pr. 1895; Light-o’-Love, 1912), Der grüne Kakadu (pr. 1899; The Green Cockatoo, 1913), and Professor Bernhardi (pr. 1912; English translation, 1913). The other major representative of neoclassicism is (1866-1933), author of several carefully constructed dramas in the classical form, such as Canossa (pr. 1918) and Yorck (pr. 1933). The further development of neo-Romanticism and neoclassicism was cut short by World War I, which, for the first time, brought humankind face-to-face with the question of its very survival.

Expressionism

The primary concern of the expressionists was the fate of humanity in a world that has gone awry. Western society, they said, is rushing toward its destruction, and if nothing is done, it will not survive. They placed the blame for this situation on industrialization, which, in their view, transformed the individual into a faceless, machine-tending robot. In an industrial society, enjoyment is divorced from labor, means from the end, and the effort from reward. Consequently, the expressionists did not clamor for social reforms or agitate for the improvement of conditions in the workplace. They called for nothing less than a regeneration of the whole human race, a transformation and purification of character that would emancipate humanity from its evil environment. In short, they dreamed of a new society that, for its own survival, would return to preindustrial life.

Expressionism covers the years between 1910 and 1924. Notable authors are Ernst Barlach, Walter Hasenclever, Ernst Toller, and Fritz von Unruh. Among the most prominent representatives of the movement in both ideas and technique is , who rose to prominence with the phenomenal success of an early play, Die Bürger von Calais (pr. 1917; The Citizens of Calais, 1946), which premiered at Frankfurt in 1917. In presenting the sacrifice of self for the common good, he articulates the spirit and the religious fervor of the expressionists. The play that perhaps best captures the conceptions of the movement is his Gas trilogy, Die Koralle (pr. 1917; The Coral, 1929), Gas (pr. 1918; English translation, 1924), and Gas: Zweiter Teil (pr. 1920; Gas II, 1924). Set in the future, it shows what people will be like if current trends continue. In the play, machinery reigns supreme, and human beings are its faithful servants. The characters are not given names but designations such as the Father, the Daughter, Son, Worker, Secretary, Blue Figure, Yellow Figure to focus attention on the dehumanization that has occurred. The symmetry of the dramas’ structure, the parallelism, and the antithesis are designed to make the protagonists seem like machines themselves. The unreal effect is reinforced by the diction. Previously, Kaiser and several expressionists had adapted the principle of cubism to language and produced what is called the “telegrammatic style.” They had rejected as unnecessary, such parts of speech as adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and definite and indefinite articles. In the Gas trilogy, the compressed speech achieves the rhythmic pattern of a machine.

As expressionism drew to a close in the mid-1920s, an ingenious new dramatist rose to prominence, Bertolt Brecht, probably one of Germany’s most influential playwrights of the twentieth century. Although he had written a few plays of some merit in the early 1920s, his true genius did not emerge until he authored Die Dreigroschenoper (pr. 1928; The Threepenny Opera, 1949). First performed in Berlin, the production gained him international recognition. Loosely based on ’s The Beggar’s Opera (pr. 1728), Brecht’s version is a scathing satire of middle-class society from the Marxist viewpoint. Brecht invented a new form of drama for this play, which he called “epic theater”. It represents a radical break with theatrical tradition. Instead of a tightly knit plot, he presents a series of loosely connected scenes, each beginning with a didactic song or ballad.

Moral didacticism characterizes virtually all of Brecht’s dramas. For him, literature is not entertainment; it is a means for educating and improving society. For this reason, he sought to keep the audience from becoming involved with the action on the stage. The spectators should maintain a critical distance at all times so that they could reflect on the subject matter while it was presented on the stage. So, to keep the audience’s critical faculties alert, he developed his now-famous Verfremdungseffekt (alienation effect). During the course of the performance, for example, an actor might step out of character to convey to the audience an opinion of the character being portrayed. Brecht also used the technique of interrupting the action with film projections, tape-recorded material, and music—all designed to break the illusion.

Following the phenomenal success of The Threepenny Opera, Brecht’s future as a playwright seemed assured. All this changed when the National Socialist Party rose to power in 1933. Brecht, no favorite of the Nazis and, thus, fearing for his safety, was compelled to flee. After a lengthy odyssey, he came to the United States, where he settled in Hollywood, California. There, he composed his masterpieces Leben des Galilei (pr. 1943; Life of Galileo, 1947), Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (pr. 1941; Mother Courage and Her Children, 1941), Der gute Mensch von Sezuan (pr. 1943; The Good Woman of Setzuan, 1948), and Der kaukasische Kreidekreis (pr. 1948; The Caucasian Chalk Circle, 1948). After the war, he returned to East Berlin, where he established the Berliner Ensemble, an acting company that produced plays in the Brechtian idiom. Despite his disillusionment with the communist regime after Soviet tanks crushed the failed popular uprising of the East Germans in June 1953, Brecht still chose to remain in the East until his death three years later.

Blut und Boden

Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in January 1933 reversed the literary and intellectual currents in Germany within a matter of months. Literary activity was brought into line with National Socialist dogma. Many eminent writers, fearing for their lives, fled into exile. Those who remained and refused to cooperate were forbidden to publish. The few who openly defied the authorities, such as Ernst Wiechert, were sent to concentration camps. Henceforth, the only type of literature acceptable was that which promoted the Nazi viewpoint. Plays glorified German power and Aryan superiority and vilified everything Jewish. These efforts are summed up in the epithet Blut und Boden (blood and soil) in that Aryan blood and German soil were hailed as the source of the nation’s life and strength. Because nothing of lasting value was produced during this period, it is often referred to by the contemptuous contraction “Blubo” literature.

The most popular plays during the Third Reich were historical dramas dealing either with events from the Middle Ages or with the ascendancy of Prussia from the reign of the Great Elector to that of Frederick the Great. The cycle of five plays by Hans Rehberg on this subject is representative. Another playwright who gained the favor of the authorities was Eberhard Wolfgang Möller. He earned approval with his anti-Semitic Rothschild siegt bei Waterloo (pr. 1934; Rothschild wins at Waterloo). Knowing of the battle in advance, the conniving Jewish banker enriches himself on the London stock exchange at the expense of the French and his own English countrymen. Hanns Johst dedicated his play Schlageter (pr. 1933) to Hitler. It is a romanticized version of the life and death of Albert Leo Schlageter, a National Socialist “martyr” fighting the French to his death during their occupation of Germany’s Rhineland. Yet, another type of play popular at the time was the crude farce. Typical is August Hinrichs’s Krach um Jolanthe (pr. 1931; row about Jolanthe), which features a hog in the title role. That this piece was extremely popular and enjoyed a long run says something about the prevailing taste. Theatrical production in Germany ceased in late 1944 when all theaters that had survived the firebombing of German cities were closed because of the war.

The Immediate Postwar Era

The collapse of the Third Reich was accompanied by the permanent eclipse of most of the playwrights who had cast their lot with it. Although many lived on for years, they all found it difficult, if not impossible, to make the transition to the postwar climate. Of the older generation that had fled into exile, a significant few lived to return. Chief among those who did were and Carl Zuckmayer. When Zuckmayer arrived in 1946, he brought a new play, Des Teufels General (pr. 1946; The Devil’s General, 1962). Set in Germany during the early years of World War II, it dramatizes the life and suicide crash of the Luftwaffe test pilot Erich Udet, called “Harras” in the play. It examines the question of collective guilt with the object of demonstrating that there are no simple answers if everyone is implicated in the crimes. In part because of the play’s topicality, it was an overwhelming success.

Plays dealing with various aspects of the Nazi past have been consistently present on the postwar German stage. Of particular note is Wolfgang Borchert. Returning from the Russian front fatally ill, he completed only one play before his death at age twenty-six, Draussen vor der Tür (pr. 1947; The Man Outside, 1952). This play, which portrays a young soldier who returns from the war and finds that he is unable to adjust, that he is unwanted and a misfit, is filled with the despair characteristic of the immediate postwar period. Another drama that attracted considerable attention is Der Stellvertreter: EinChristliches Trauerspiel (pr. 1963; The Representative, 1963; also known as The Deputy) by . The play implicates Pius XII in the extermination of the Jews. In the play, the pope, instead of bringing the moral authority of the Church to bear on the Nazis, chose to remain silent because he did not want to weaken Germany’s efforts to destroy the communists. Hochhuth’s play involved Germany in a major controversy about the Nazi past.

Swiss Playwrights

While Germany was coming to terms with its past, two Swiss dramatists of considerable talent emerged, and Friedrich Dürrenmatt, the first playwrights from that country ever to achieve international fame. Both authors have viewed the theater as a didactic institution, a vantage point from which to approach political and social problems. In their view, the purposes of theater are to expose and to educate. Perhaps both profited from the influx of German theatrical talent to Switzerland during the Nazi years. With its German-speaking audience, the Zürich Schauspielhaus provided a rare haven for non-Nazi plays to be produced, and exiled Germans found a creative outlet there.

Although Frisch had written plays of some merit in the 1940s, it was not until Biedermann und die Brandstifter (pr. 1958; The Firebugs, 1961), which was first produced in 1953 as a radio play, that he rose to international prominence. A morality play, it shows the inevitable results of man’s preference to compromise with evil rather than to oppose it. His next drama, Andorra (pr. 1961; English translation, 1963), is a parable about the evils of anti-Semitism. After devoting several years to fiction, he returned to playwriting with Triptychon: Drei szenische Bilder (pb. 1978; Triptych, 1981), a grim statement about the problematic nature of human relationships and the repetitiveness of life. In the play, the protagonists have died and find themselves in an afterlife, not Heaven, not Hell, not Purgatory, but in the same surroundings familiar to them in life. There is no hope, no fear, nothing new, no future. There is nothing but infinite sameness. The men and women are strictly bound to the patterns established when alive and no change is permitted. A criminal, for example, tries to develop a relationship with his victim, who is unaware of his efforts because he had never known him in life and cannot now. Frisch’s message to the reader is to lead life more fully and more thoughtfully because the life one lives will be waiting to be lived again in the hereafter.

In 1989, Frisch adapted his polemic essay, Schweiz ohne Armee? Ein Palaver (1989; Switzerland without an army? A discussion), for the stage as Jonas und sein Veteran (pr. 1989; Jonas and his veteran). The essay and play were written on the occasion of a controversial people’s referendum to abolish the Swiss army. Frisch’s support for the referendum, which was ultimately rejected by a wide margin, once again made him enter the political arena as a dramatist. Performed to an appreciative, if critical, audience at the Zürich Schauspielhaus, the play offers an iconoclastic attack on Swiss pride in its popular army, which is seen as an irrelevant relict in the age of nuclear warfare.

Unlike Frisch’s straightforward approach to problems, Dürrenmatt preferred satire. His first play, Es steht geschrieben (pr. 1947; The Anabaptists, 1967), concerns the rise and fall of the Anabaptists in Münster during Germany’s Thirty Years’ War. The theme is characteristic for Dürrenmatt in that it concerns the subversion of lofty ideals to personal gain. Romulus der Grosse (pr. 1949; Romulus the Great, 1961) centers on the final days of Rome’s last emperor. In this play, Romulus is not presented as the traditional heroic figure. Instead, Dürrenmatt portrays a man totally indifferent to current events who, ironically, prefers to look after his chicken farm than to worry about the fall of an empire, which he realizes is inevitable. In accepting his fate and the fate of Rome as inevitable, he maintains his personal integrity.

The idea that a person can transcend his fate by accepting it is a theme in many of Dürrenmatt’s plays, for example, in Der Besuch der alten Dame (pr. 1956; The Visit, 1958), a play that secured him worldwide recognition. The drama is a step-by-step demonstration of how greed leads to the moral disintegration of an entire town. The plot concerns the fabulously wealthy Claire Zachanassian, now an old woman, who returns to her impoverished native village, Güllen, to seek revenge for a past wrong: In her youth, she had loved Alfred Ill and had become pregnant by him. When he refused to marry her, she brought him to court. Ill bribed two men to swear that they, too, had been Claire’s lovers. She lost the case and, humiliated, was forced to leave town. Impoverished, she became a prostitute. After a few years, she married a billionaire and later inherited his wealth. At this point, she returns to Güllen and promises the citizens a billion dollars on the condition that they kill her former lover, Alfred. The offer is refused at first, but the prospect of virtually unlimited funds begins to erode the citizens’ moral scruples until they carry out the deed. Thus, her dual revenge involves destroying Ill and the honesty of the town. The only person who retains his integrity throughout the ordeal is, strangely, Ill. As events unfold, he recognizes his culpability and accepts the inevitability of his fate. In so doing, he transcends it.

In addition to The Visit, Dürrenmatt has authored several outstanding plays. Notable is Die Physiker (pr. 1962; The Physicists, 1963), which explores the moral responsibility of nuclear scientists. In Porträt eines Planeten (pr. 1970; Portrait of a Planet, 1973), he makes a statement about the indifference of the godhead to the existence of humankind. One of his most frequently performed plays is Play Strindberg: Totentanz nach August Strindberg (pr. 1969; Play Strindberg: The Dance of Death, 1971). Its effectiveness is as much a result of the theatrical innovations as of the subject matter. Dürrenmatt’s concern in the play is, to paraphrase his own words, to see what happens when certain ideas collide with people. To this end, he dispenses with the traditional stage: There are no sets, only an empty area lit from above by a battery of lights, like a boxing ring. Instead of scenes, there are twelve “rounds,” each beginning with a gong. The play ends when the people and the ideas have been “knocked out.”

Dürrenmatt’s Der Mittmacher (pr. 1973; The Conformer, 1975), a deeply sarcastic play about lethal corruption among public officials from the bottom to the top of the social hierarchy, met with widespread Swiss popular rejection. His last drama, Achterloo IV (pr. 1983), is a play within a play staged in a mental hospital. It is full of absurdities and chronicles the full range of the follies of human existence.

1960s: Documentary Drama

In the 1960s, there emerged a generation of German playwrights relatively unburdened by the Nazi past and deeply involved in the political and social issues of the day. Their favorite genre became the documentary drama, which strove to dramatize real-life conflicts. Their political attitudes tended to lean toward the Left. Of note is Heiner Kipphardt, whose most important work is In der Sache J. Robert Oppenheimer (pr. 1964; In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer, 1967). The play examines the events leading up to the cancellation of J. Robert Oppenheimer’s security clearance because he was suspected of harboring communist sympathies.

One of the few playwrights of the 1960s to attract international attention was , with his Die Verfolgung und Ermordung Jean-Paul Marats, dargestellt durch die Schauspielgruppe des Hospizes zu Charenton unter der Anleitung des Herrn de Sade (pr. 1964; The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Immates of the Asylum of Charenton under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade, 1965); this lengthy title is usually contracted to Marat/Sade. Though set during the Napoleonic era, it deals with political issues of the 1960s. In contrasting the socialist-revolutionary ideas of Marat with the uncompromising individualism of de Sade, Weiss draws parallels between Marxism and democracy, favoring the former. Weiss died before the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. In spite of his politics, he remains one of the most influential dramatists of the 1960s.

Later Twentieth Century

The author whose pieces were most often performed during the 1970s and 1980s was , who believes that the world’s basic problems can be comprehended and presented on the stage to bring about social improvement. Taking as his subject people from society’s substratum, or underclass, Kroetz has contrasted their attitude to that of traditional morality on such matters as murder, infanticide, abortion, and rape. The matter-of-fact manner in which these deeds are staged makes them appear as part of life’s routine, no more worthy of note than eating and drinking. In this way, the author can illuminate how the pressures of modern society erode traditional values. Representative of his view are Stallerhof (pr. 1972; Farmyard, 1976) and Geisterbahn (pr. 1975; ghost train). In other plays, such as Die Wahl fürs Leben (pr. 1980, first produced in 1973 as a radio play), the playwright encourages people to cultivate pacifism. In it, a young man with a degree in engineering refuses a job in a munitions factory because it would mean contributing to the arms race. His working-class parents try to change his mind at first, but in the end, they recognize the truth of his argument and acquiesce.

Kroetz’s political antics have, at times, alienated him from some German audiences. In 1972, he joined the West German Communist Party. For a time, his plays suffered from overt political propaganda, which reduced his characters to mere mouthpieces for political slogans. After leaving the Communist Party in 1982, Kroetz continued to write plays critical of German democracy. Furcht und Hoffnung der BRD (pr. 1984, co-written with Alexandra Weinert-Purucker; Fear and Hope of the FRG) features dramatic monologues by unemployed workers and artists seeking a way out of a situation described as hopeless. Bauern sterben (pr. 1985; farmers die) is a play reminiscent of expressionism in its rejection of modern technology and ironically echoes the National Socialist glorification of German farmers. Even after the reunification of Germany in 1989, Kroetz remained critical of German society. His play Ich bin das Volk (pr. 1994; I am the people) satirizes the revolutionary slogan of the East Germans driving out their communist rulers, chanting “We Are the People.” By 2002, Kroetz, though widely respected in dramatic circles, generally remained alienated from mainstream Germany.

The name most frequently associated with the analysis of language is that of Austrian Peter Handke, the postwar playwright with controversial theories. He rose to fame with Publikumsbeschimpfung und andere Sprechstücke (pr. 1966; Offending the Audience, 1969). Offending the Audience is a play true to its title: It consists of long tirades harassing the audience with profane expletives directed at their presumed stupidity, theoretically breaking down the theater’s fourth wall by directly involving a startled audience. Kaspar (pr. 1968; English translation, 1972) and Der Ritt über den Bodensee (pr. 1971; The Ride Across Lake Constance, 1972) call attention to how set patterns of speech are, in fact, set patterns of thinking and, in turn, set patterns of action. Language, Handke says, is a form of brainwashing in that linguistic conformity ensures automatic obedience. Handke has also written on many other social and political issues. In Über die Dörfer (pr. 1982; Among the Villages, 1984), for example, he examines the eroding effect of social and economic pressures on the creative individual.

In his native Austria, Handke’s plays opened to generally favorable audiences in the 1990s. Die Stunde da wir nichts voneinander wussten (pr. 1992; The Hour We Knew Nothing of Each Other, 1996) is a completely silent play, taking to its logical endpoint Handke’s suspicion of language. Zurüstungen zur Unsterblichkeit: Ein Königsdrama (pr. 1997; preparations for immortality) offers a dark vision of humanity. Die Fahrt im Einbaum: Oder, Das Stück zum Film vom Krieg (pr. 1999; Journey in the Dug-out Canoe) offers a postmodern journey into the dark recesses of the human soul. In 1999, Handke stirred public controversy when he returned his 1973 Georg Büchner Prize and left the Catholic Church in protest of the Allied bombing of Belgrade as a means to end Serbian oppression of Kosovo’s Albanians.

East Germany 1945-1990

When the victorious Red Army occupied East Germany at the end of World War II, the Soviet Union mandated the establishment of a Marxist theater. Playwrights and directors who were willing to work under this regime were welcome to return, and theaters were quickly rebuilt to house revivals of Socialist Realist productions and plays agreeable to the Soviet agenda. Brecht and his wife, actress Helene Weigel, whom contemporary critics credit with much previously unacknowledged creative help for her husband’s plays, founded the Berliner Ensemble in 1949. Led by Weigel after Brecht’s death in 1956, it became the most influential East German theater in the 1950s and 1960s.

After the foundation of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) in 1949, which lasted until its dissolution on October 3, 1990, playwrights in East Germany struggled between the demands for Soviet-style, Stalinist Socialist Realist plays and a desire for more modern, artistically advanced forms. The crushed 1953 popular uprising brought with it ensuing repression and censorship. The late 1950s saw a careful reemergence of plays somewhat critical of the state. After the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, the communist regime felt a bit more secure and allowed the production of critical plays that could be interpreted as being constructive and dedicated to the betterment of socialist society.

began as a proletarian playwright attempting to rectify existing problems in his society through a renewed commitment to the ideals of socialism. His Die Kipper (pr. 1972; the tippers) exemplifies the need of the workers to be involved in top-level management decisions if production methods are to be improved. Later, he became somewhat disillusioned with his society. His play Die Übergangsgesellschaft (pr. 1987; the transitory society) incorporates criticism of the GDR’s environmental record and voices doubts that history has to develop with Marxist laws predicting the eventual victory of a classless society. Troubled by the end of the GDR tenure, Braun’s Iphigenie in Freiheit (pr. 1992; Iphigenia in Freedom) muses on what has been lost and what has been won after the demise of East Germany.

In contrast to Braun, whose nostalgia for socialism had alienated him from the critical young East German audiences by the 1970s and 1980s, Ulrich Plenzdorf was one of the rare popular playwrights whose poignant criticism was allowed to be performed, in turn winning him widespread acclaim. Most notably, Die neuen Leiden des jungen W. (pr. 1972; The New Sorrows of the Young W.) reimagined Goethe’s novel about a troubled young man in love with an older married woman he finally commits suicide. The play, which captured the authentic slang of East German teenagers of the time, was widely successful in East and West Germany. As one of the few East German dramatists who managed to keep a successful career after 1990, Plenzdorf became a famous writer of television plays. Vater Mutter Mörderkind (pr. 1993; father, mother, child of a murderer) was first staged in the eastern town of Halle. It deals with the conflicts faced by the adoptive child of a West German terrorist who escaped to the East, where he lived quietly until the fall of the Berlin Wall. Arrested for his terrorist activities, the father leaves his child wondering about the new future. Based on the reality of former West German terrorists living quiet lives in the East, the play again touched a nerve with audiences in reunified Germany.

was one of the most critical of East Germany’s playwrights. His plays were often banned and could not be performed until after 1989. Müller was also a formalist and theoretical innovator. His Hamletmaschine (pr. 1979; Hamletmachine, 1984) won international acclaim for its stark musings on global human misery and humanity’s capacity for destruction. Müller’s plays won almost every literary prize in East and West Germany. His focus on the dark aspects of German history, from Prussia to Hitler to the East German uprising of 1953, characterized his plays until the end. Germania 3: Gespenster am toten Mann (pr. 1995; Germania 3: Ghosts Around the Dead Man) represents a reckoning with the East German party bureaucracy, whom Müller blamed for the betrayal of true socialism.

Political Drama after Reunification

The mid-1990s saw the powerful emergence of new playwrights whose dramas were explicitly about Germany. Klaus Pohl’s Die schöne Fremde (pr. 1991; The Beautiful Stranger, 1996) deals with the issue of xenophobia. In the play, after witnessing the racially motivated murder of a Polish man and suffering a sexual assault herself in a small town in the middle of Germany, a Jewish American woman, the beautiful stranger of the play, returns to exact her revenge. Pohl’s Wartesaal Deutschland: Stimmenreich (pr. 1995; Waiting Room Germany, 1997) is a play manufactured entirely out of the real-life conversations overheard by the playwright while traveling through reunified Germany on an unrelated journalistic engagement.

Indicative of plays with a topical political focus, Dea Loher’s Fremdes Haus (pr. 1995; Stranger’s House, 1997) enacts the struggle of Yanne, a Macedonian refugee in Germany, who marries a German woman whom he does not love to get a permanent residency permit. The play transcends its political concerns with the civil war in the Balkans and the influx of refugees to countries like Germany while offering a multidimensional portrayal of jealousy, erotic tension, and betrayal.

Topical politics also concern many of the new plays by Anna Langhoff, the granddaughter of Wolfgang Langhoff, director of East Berlin’s Deutsches Theater from 1946 to 1963. Her Transit Heimat: Der gedeckte Tisch (pr. 1994; The Table Laid, 1997) takes place in the kitchen of a German shelter for Eastern European asylum seekers. People from the various countries distrust each other and, most of all, the German bureaucracy represented by the social worker, Frau Mertel. In the original German and the first British production of the play, cast members playing the refugee families cooked an actual ethnic meal on the stage, trying to involve the audience’s senses of smell and taste.

The Private, the Psychological, and the International

The 1990s and early twenty-first-century German drama encompassed more than political drama. Tankred Dorst, who, as a teenager, got kicked out of a Hitler Youth Camp for reading drama while on guard duty, started as a puppeteer and always disdained documentary or political drama. Politics enters as an outside force in the richly imagined and detailed private lives of his characters. Beginning in 1972, he and his dramatist wife, Ursula Ehler, wrote many well-received plays examining the intricate inner worlds of an amazing variety of imagined people. The question of what constitutes truth is a recurrent theme in Dorst and Ehler’s plays. Their witty Fernando Krapp hat mir diesen Brief geschrieben: Ein Versuch über die Wahrheit (pr. 1992; Fernando Krapp Wrote Me This Letter: An Assaying of Truth, 1996) showcases a con artist who tries to use his imagination to shape the world and the lives of his friends according to his wishes. Yet, he ends up destroying everything in the course of his adventure. Wegen Reichtum geschlossen: Eine metaphysische Komödie (pr. 1998; closed due to wealth: a metaphysical comedy) is Dorst and Ehler’s funny treatment of the old fallacy that material wealth will bring automatic happiness.

The lasting popularity and influence of Austrian playwright Elfriede Jelinek is based on her ability to create psychologically complex and deep characters. Even though Jelinek was a member of Austria’s Communist Party from 1974 until 1991 (when she left the party in disgust), politics remains secondary to her exploration of the inner mindscape of her richly envisioned characters. Her dark Totenauberg (pr. 1992; Death/Valley/Summit, 1996) imagines a fictional meeting of the real-life German philosophers and lovers Hannah Arendt and at Heidegger’s mountain retreat in the Black Forest. Through intricate wordplay and wild punning, the characters try to assess their differences as a Jewish woman exiled from Nazi Germany and a German man interested in the philosophy of the self. The production also includes short film scenes, ideally shot by the play’s director in an amateur fashion, to further examine the interplay of mixed media and memory. Jelinek received the Berlin Theaterpreis (theater prize) in 2002 while working on a cycle of plays called Der Tod und das Mädchen (Death and the Maiden). Two of these related plays, Der Tod und das Mädchen IV: Jackie (Part IV: Jackie) and Der Tod und das Mädchen V: Die Wand (Part V: The Wall), were performed in 2002.

The German-language plays of Japan-born playwright Yoko Tawada represent the growing internationalism of German drama. Tawada moved to Hamburg in 1982. Her plays live from their dual grounding in German and Japanese dramatic traditions. Her haunting Die Kranichmaske, die bei Nacht strahlt (pr. 1993; the crane mask that beams at night) is a surreal wake for a dead woman, whose body on the stage is covered by large, cut-out letters of the alphabet that form her shroud. She is mourned by four characters, Sister, Brother, Translator, and Neighbor, who themselves rise out of the four coffins at the beginning of the play and to which they return at its end. Their fragmentary dialogue reflects their relationship with the dead woman and contains an intellectual discourse on the dramatic theories of German playwright Heiner Müller and musings about Japanese Nō theater by (1363-1432). Tawada’s third play, Till (pr. 1998), features a contemporary group of Japanese tourists who happen upon a German town inhabited by people who resemble characters out of the life of the medieval joker Till Eulenspiegel. With its juxtaposition of Japanese language spoken by the tourists and the German of the townsfolk, the play challenges a monolingual audience to overcome language barriers by focusing on the performance of the cast instead of on language alone.

German Drama Since 2000

In the early twenty-first century, contemporary German playwrights faced certain difficulties in producing their plays. Of all the plays put on the regular stage, half are foreign translations, and only a fraction of major productions are by original playwrights from Germany, Austria, or German-speaking Switzerland. There is also the temptation to write plays for television or for experimental, nonmainstream outlets like university, amateur, or prison productions. Cutbacks of once very generous budgets for local theaters further challenge dramatists to create plays that can draw audiences and carry a serious message.

Among the established dramatists, is considered one of reunified Germany’s foremost playwrights. With twenty plays to his credit by 2002, he is one of the most produced authors. Strauss, who in 2001 won the Lessing Prize, bestowed every four years to a German intellectual dedicated to the ideas of the Enlightenment, exemplifies the theater of a newly reconstituted Germany looking into the new millennium. Der Kuss des Vergessens (pr. 1998; The Kiss of Forgetting) and Die Ähnlichen (pr. 1998; The Similar Ones) both share an interest in the psychological makeup of characters drawn from society. Der Narr und seine Frau heute abend in Pancomedia (pr., pb. 2001; The Fool and his Wife Tonight at Pancomedia) is a postmodern comedy encompassing nearly one hundred different characters set in the Hotel Confidence. Against a backdrop of real, surreal, and bizarre characters—ranging from a man impersonating a bellhop to ghosts, angels, and clowns—there is the tender love story of the writer Sylvia Kessel and the small-time publisher Zacharias Werner. Perhaps indicative of the trend in German drama to produce plays that examine the very act of writing and performing, the professions of the lovers ground them in the literary scene. Unerwartete Rückkehr (pr. 2002; unexpected return) is another of Strauss’s popular plays combining psychology, postmodernism, and a keen sense of theater. Another successful German theater director, René Pollesch (1962-2024), developed Die Stadt als Beute (2016; The City as Booty); Insourcing des Zuhause: Menschen in Scheisshotels (2002; Insourcing the Home), and Sex (2001). On average, he published two works each year, totaling over one hundred and fifty works in twenty years. Pollesch’s successful and extensive career led some to dub him the pioneer of discourse theatre. Christoph Schlingensief (1960–2010), another influential German playwright, incorporated modern politics and activism into theatre. His final work before succumbing to lung cancer was an opera village project in Burkina Faso, Remdoogo (2010).

Since 1945, German playwrights have been imbued with the necessity of being directly involved with the pressing political and social issues of the day and writing personal, psychologically sophisticated plays. They often see it as their mission to describe and change the world. In their efforts to expose, instruct, and enlighten, these authors have created a rich and diverse body of drama. In the early twenty-first century, the German stage attempted to regain the international respect that it enjoyed before 1933.

Bibliography

Brandt, George W., ed. German and Dutch Theatre, 1600-1848. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1993.

Case, Sue-Ellen, ed. The Divided Home/Land: Contemporary German Women’s Plays. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1992.

Cicora, Mary A. Wagner’s Ring and German Drama. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1999.

Dodgson, Elyse, ed. German Plays: Plays from a Changing Country. London: Nick Hern Books, 1997.

Glatthorn, Austin. Music Theatre and the Holy Roman Empire: The German Musical Stage at the Turn of the Nineteenth Century. Cambridge University Press, 2022.

Goldmann, A. J. “René Pollesch, Provocative Force in German Theater, Dies at 61.” The New York Times, 29 Feb. 2024, www.nytimes.com/2024/02/29/theater/rene-pollesch-dead.html. Accessed 20 July 2024.

James, Dorothy, and Sylvia Ranawake, eds. Patterns of Change: German Drama and the European Tradition. New York: Peter Lang, 1990.

Lederer, Herbert. Handbook of East German Drama, 1945-1985. New York: Peter Lang, 1991.

Pan, Caterina. Popular Theatre in Early Modern England, Germany and Italy (1570-1640): A Study in Intercultural Theatricality with an Analysis of" Engelische Comedien und Tragedien" (1620). Universitätsverlag Winter, 2023.

Rigby, Catherine E. Transgressions of the Feminine: Tragedy, Enlightenment and the Figure of Woman in Classical German Drama. Heidelberg, Germany: Winter Verlag, 1996.

Sieg, Katrin. Exiles, Eccentrics, Activists: Women in Contemporary German Theater. Ann Arbor: Michigan University Press, 1994.

Waeber, Jacqueline. The Cambridge Companion to Seventeenth-Century Opera. Cambridge University Press, 2023.

Wellbery, David E. and Judith Ryan, eds. A New History of German Literature. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2004.