Lulu
The importance of Frank Wedekind (1864-1918) to the history of literature and the development of drama in particular, is enormous. The influence of Strindberg on his work is conspicuous, but he filled the legacy of realism with a new content: the grotesque. With his highly individual vision and aphoristic, almost abrupt - yet always poetic language - he hastened the transition to Expressionism.
Wedekind's vision of what constituted perfect theatre was a combination of colour, music, word and gesture, forever mingling the sublime with the ridiculous. Life among the circus artistes in Paris confirmed his dictum that to bring about the rebirth of a genuine, vigorous art it was essential to portray people whose actions are dictated by the simplest animal instincts. It was the pantomime Lulu by Felicien Camsaur, which he first saw in Paris, that gave him the idea for his most important work, the Lulu plays: Earth Spirit and Pandora's Box. When the former was first performed in Leipzig in 1898 the effect was devastating. His method of advocating unfeigned sensual pleasure by ruthlessly highlighting sex and making his heroine a heartless whore caused Wedekind to be violently attacked and persecuted.
His hatred of hypocrisy where sexual matters are concerned drive the playwright to employ the most daring expedients in order to shake the complacency of the bourgeoisie. He was among the very first to portray a lesbian on the stage, the Countess Geschwitz, whom he perceived as the central tragic figure. But it is Lulu who remains the eternal symbol possessed at once of subtle sensuality and waiflike innocence.
As a dramatist Wedekind drew his characters with absolute clarity, he compressed scenes and wasted no time in establishing motivation. As a poet he delved deeply into ballad and folklore. His plays are a fascinating mixture of Morality Plays and Grand Guignol. Death & Ddevil and Castle Wetterstein, two of his other plays, are essentially extensions of and complementary to the Lulu tragedies.