Durand, a man from Lyon who became rich when he was living in Martinique, comes back to Lyon and tries to have news of his former servant, Guignol. He meets Niafron who tells him that Guignol is kept prisoner by his wife Madelon in their house, and that she beats him, insults him and forces him to do all the housework. Durand entrusts a “wonderful root” imported from the Americas (which is nothing but a stick) to Niafron, and asks him to give it to Guignol. Niafron uses a ruse to make Madelon leave her house: he invites her to the restaurant and leaves her there before dessert to meet up with Guignol. Niafron shows Guignol how to be obeyed: first, he must threatens Madelon with the stick and tell her “Woman, see Jérôme” then, if she persists, he must say “Woman, beware of Jérôme” and, finally, on the words “Woman, feel Jérôme” he must beat her. When Madelon returns, Guignol enforces the lesson taught by Niafron and makes his wife submit and obey him.

Glove-puppet

Not specified

Mourguet Laurent

France

Lyon

Printed

Argument

Household

Unhappy marriage

Emancipation of women

Comical

Farcical

La Racine merveilleuse, anonymous manuscript, collection of Léopold Dor.

French

La Racine d'Amérique; La Racine.

ou la Racine merveilleuse

Gnafron

Madelon

Dialect as a social marker

Blow-with-a-stick

Domestic scene

Fais-me voir, Jérôme

Let me see, Jérôme

Jan Klaassen meets with Langhals, whose neck inconceivably grows longer and longer. Langhals disappears when Jan Klaassen throws himself at him to break his neck. Jan Klaassen violently bangs himself. Katrijn, his wife, hears his screams and comes running: she tells him that she would have rather found him dead. Jan Klaassen wants to beat her with a stick. During their pursuit, Death appears in Katrijn’s stead. Jan Klaassen raises his stick and Death disappears. Jan Klaassen decides to go for a drink, but changes his mind at the last minute and ends the play with a song condemning alcoholism and its harmful effects.

All audiences

Netherlands

Monster

Burial

Drink

Alcohol

Spousal abuse

Dutch

Jan Klaassen

Long-neck

Death

Chase

Final song

Lengthening of a character

Langhals en de dood

Long-neck and Death

The Viennese public attends a puppet show in the Prater. The play in question features a hero who is unwillingly involved in a foursome with his lover Liesl and the Duke and Duchess of Lawin. The duel between him and the Duke is cancelled, but he loses the interest of the Duchess and the love of Liesl in the process. Death comes. The audience, which has not stopped commenting on the play, intervenes more and more loudly and the performance turns into a scandal. It is no longer clear who is a spectator, who is a puppet, until a man in a blue coat enters the stage... and cuts the strings of the puppets with a sword, thus discriminating between animate and inanimate.

String marionette

Schnitzler Arthur

Austria

Vienna

Germany

Berlin

Spectator

Unfaithfulness

Duel

Self-consciousness of puppets

Local color

Wrangle

Hanswurst

Noise

Lust

Entertainment

Burlesque

Satirical

German

Marionetten

Burleske in einem Akt

Director

Poet

Bourgeois

Daughter

Count

Soldier

Waiter

Child

Duke

Father

Husband

Raisonneur

Wrestler

Dead woman

Valet

Puppet theatre within the theatre

Metadiscourse on puppet theatre

Address to the public

Pantomime

Parody of formal language

Prologue

Versified passages

Stichomythia

Metamorphosis

Character thrown out of the scene

Zum großen Wurstel

To the big sausage

Mr. Fish pays a visit to Mrs. Bones and starts a conversation with her. Mrs. Bones uses different excuses to get angry and threaten to kill Mr. Fish. She then asks him to get divorced from his wife, while offering to get a divorce from her husband for them to marry. Mr. Fish, frightened, begs Teddy, his puppeteer, to save him from this situation. The latter pulls at the puppet’s strings to take him back to the fly loft. Then a hand comes down (the puppeteer’s) and threatens Mrs. Bones, while her strings are cut one by one. Cockatrice, Mrs. Bones’ “old friend,” wants to seduce her and take her with him, but Mrs. Bones can no longer move. Cockatrice thus sends for a girl in the audience to take the puppet, which is now merely a doll. The play ends with the appearance of the face of the Governor (the puppeteer) and with a grand finale for Mrs. Bones, who ascends to heaven, to the surprise amazement of a myriad of glove puppets watching her.

Craig Edward Gordon

Italy

Bologna

Rapallo

Divorce

Anger

Woman

Punishment

Doll

Whim

Edward Gordon Craig, drawing of the heads of Mrs Bones and Mr. Fish

English

Cockatrice

Young girl

Puppeteer

Apparition of the puppeteer

Flying machine

Comedy of language

Intervention of the audience

Ascension

Mr Fish and Mrs Bones

A theatre director has hired Polichinelle for the evening, but Polichinelle is late for the show. When he comes on, he is haunted by the ghost of his conscience, that chastises him for his very instinctive personality. Following the director’s questions concerning what is tormenting him, Polichinelle uses glove-puppets to play episodes from his childhood, when he was often punished for his misdemeanour. Once the flashback is over, Polichinelle wants to improvise some jokes, but the director forbids him from tackling political themes. As he does not know what kind of show to put on, Polichinelle keeps talking about his past – how his parents had him then abandoned him for lack of money, and his first heartbreaks. Polichinelle and the director argue. The latter summons Illness and Death, who want to take Polichinelle with them. While screaming that he is an immortal character, Polichinelle manages to drive them out – thus saving theatre and also making up with the director.