<p>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.</p>

String marionette

Glove-puppet

Not specified

Schnitzler Arthur

Austria

Vienna

Germany

Berlin

Printed

Spectator

Unfaithfulness

Duel

Self-consciousness of puppets

Local color

Argument

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

Death

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

<p>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.</p>

Nordmann Jean-Gabriel

France

Meung-sur-Loire

Childhood

Remembrance

Illness

Unrequited love

Love

Parents

Grotesque

Comical

French

Fable théâtrale pour comédiens et marionnettes

Polichinelle

Mother

Nurse

Schoolteacher

Devil

Scene fragment

Song

Blow-with-a-stick

Allusion to current political events

Seduction scene

Analepsis (Flash-back)

Fight

Sous le masque tu es mortel pauvre orphelin !

Behind the mask you are mortal poor orphan!