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Spring’s Awakening. Frank Wedekind. Théophile Steinle n , 1896. “Lulu” plays: Earth Spirit (1895), Pandora’s Box (1904). Symbolism Alexandre Benois ’ set for Stravinsky’s Petruschka (1911). Futurism Costumes by Fortunato Depero for Machine of 3000 ( 1924).
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Spring’s Awakening Frank Wedekind
Symbolism AlexandreBenois’ set for Stravinsky’s Petruschka (1911)
Futurism Costumes by FortunatoDeperofor Machine of 3000(1924)
Act One: mostly outdoors; children dominate Melchior beats Wendla Act Two: mostly indoors; move towards monologues Mortiz’s suicide Act Three: mostly institutions; adults dominate Melchior’s encounter with The Man in the Mask
MELCHIOR. I’ll tell you everything. – I got it partly from books, partly from pictures, partly from observing nature. You’ll be surprised: it made an atheist of me for a time. (Act 1, Scene 2)
“What my plays cannot stand is a naturalistic approach, with hands in pockets and the words sloppily mumbled so that nobody can catch them. And please spare me your psychological subtleties: there is no such thing as ‘psychological’ style – the psychological dimension goes without saying and will emerge of its own accord if my characters are presented consistently.” Wedekind, quoted in Peter N. Skrine, Hauptmann, Wedekind and Schnitzler(Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1989), 72.
“I wasn’t allowed to attend [rehearsals] until the tenth day… What I found in preparation was a veritable tragedy in the grand dramatic style, without a trace of humour. I did my best to give the comedy its due, and tried to enhance the playful, intellectual elements and dampen the passionate elements, notable in the last scene in the cemetery. I believe the play is more moving the more harmlessly, sunnily and light-heartedly it is performed. If passion and tragedy are brought to the fore, I believe this play can seem slightly repellent.” Wedekind, quoted in Julian and Margaret Forsyth, trans. and ed., Spring Awakening (London: Nick Hern), xxxi.
“I began writing without any plan, intending to write what gave me pleasure. The plan came into being after the third scene and consisted of my own experiences or those of my school fellows. Almost every scene corresponds to an actual incident.” Wedekind, quoted Eric Bentley, trans. and ed., Spring Awakening (New York: Applause), xxi.
“The most vicious aspect of the German educational and bureaucratic system… is its impersonality. Every administrator, teacher, and student becomes part of a vast, impersonal apparatus. Each day students are herded into pedagogical barracks and disciplined by state pedants. No attempt is made to understand the nature and needs of young people.” Sterling Fishman, “Suicide, Sex, and the Discovery of the German Adolescent,” History of Education Quarterly (1970), 10.2: 170.
WENDLA. Why have you made my dress so long, Mother? (Act 1, Scene 1)
“More boldly than any other dramatist Frank Wedekind has laid bare the shams of morality in reference to sex, especially attacking the ignorance surrounding the sex life of the child and its resultant tragedies. … Never was a more powerful indictment hurled against society, which out of sheer hypocrisy and cowardice persists that boys and girls must grow up in ignorance of their sex functions, that they must be sacrificed on the altar of stupidity and convention which taboo the enlightenment of the child in questions of such elemental importance to health and well-being.” Emma Goldman, The Social Significance of Modern Drama (Boston: Richard G. Badger)
“The Awakening of Spring is laid in three acts and fourteen scenes, consisting almost entirely of dialogues among the children. … Melchior, the innocent father of Wendla’s unborn baby, is a gifted boy whose thirst for knowledge leads him to inquire into the riddle of life, and to share his observations with his school chums. … Wendla and Melchior, overtaken by a storm, seek shelter in a haystack, and are drawn by what Melchior calls the ‘first emotion of manhood’ and curiosity into each other’s arms.” Emma Goldman, The Social Significance of Modern Drama (Boston: Richard G. Badger)
“The seduction scene is well managed at the Kammerspielhaus. We are not shown the room, but a curtain slightly divided allows the voices of the youthful lovers to be overheard. A truly moving effect is thereby produced.” James Hunecker, Ivory Apes and Peacocks(Fairford: Echo Library, 1915), 63.
“The inner thoughts of both the boy and girl are outspoken with a frankness positively embarrassing in a public place, and in the end the girl dies in childbirth, while the boy passes on triumphantly into life.” Austin Harrison, The Observer, 23 June 1907.
Yeah, you’re fucked all right and all for spite You can kiss your sorry ass goodbye Totally fucked, will they mess you up? Well, you know they're gonna try Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah… Totally fucked!
“Many of the young people in Spring Awakening are already like their elders. … All these boys will go to the trenches and die with the same obedience they learned at school and were rewarded for with exam passes.” Edward Bond, trans. and ed., Spring Awakening (London: Methuen, 1980), xxvii.
“…both sexes are induced to feel guilt or shame. … The boys project their guilt on the object which arouses sexual desire – Melchior beating Satan out of Wendla – while the girls helplessly accept their own guilt as grounds for punishment.” Elizabeth Boa, The Sexual Circus: Wedekind’s Theatre of Subversion (Oxford: Blackwell, 1987), 41.
