Casperl gets drunk with the hunter Thomerl and Thomerl offers to put Casperl’s wife Grethl to the test: Casperl has to fake an illness that will lead to his death, and Thomerl, disguised as a doctor, will come and certify the death. As soon as Casperl is pronounced dead, Grethl tries to console herself in the arms of Lieutenant Pulvermann. The fake dead man is resurrected, a fight ensues in which Pulvermann is killed and the corpse is taken backstage. A police officer comes to seize Casperl, but husband and wife join forces against the impetuous man, who is forced to give in to the violence. To celebrate their reconciliation, Casperl and Grethl go to the inn, where they also meet with Thomerl.

Not specified

Pocci Franz von

Germany

Munich

Printed

Marriage

Household

Philosophy

Beer

Wine

Gluttony

Doctor

Drunkenness

Clyster

Medicine

Grief

Chamber pot

Slap

Reconciliation

Tavern

Comical

Farcical

German

Ein beispielloses Spektakelstück

Kasperl

Thomerl

Madame Kasperl

Lieutenant

Police officer

Monologue

Macaronism

Word for another

Song

Spying scene

Parody of formal language

Aside

Fake death

Disguise

Dream

Brawl

Murder on stage

Dance

Die Prüfung

The test

On the advice of his companion Bluteck, the cruel knight Barbe-Bleue (Blaubart) decides to remarry for the seventh time and kidnaps Bertha, the eldest daughter of the rich Geldsack. The next day, Barbe-Bleue leaves the castle and gives Bertha all the keys, including the one to the secret cabinet, which he nevertheless forbids her to enter. But Bertha disobeys him and discovers the decapitated bodies of his previous wives. To punish her for her curiosity, Barbe-Bleue sentences her to death. She is saved by her former suitor Hugo von Hohenfels, who, with the help of the servant Kasperl, enters the castle and kills Barbe-Bleue.

Young audiences

Cruelty

Bear

Hunting

Romanticism

Novel

Knighthood

Young girl

Deafness

Curiosity

Kidnapping

Women's condition

Murder

Dramatic

Parodistic

Barbe-Bleue

Knight

Ecuyer

Dialogue of the deaf

Devil's apparition

Blaubart

Bluebeard

The old streets of Madrid sing, then comes the Mayor who announces the opening of a new street. The old streets protest and pretend to be the more beautiful ones, but the Mayor calms them down. Three thieves appear and vanish as they see a Guard with a cage. The Mayor comes again and suggest to go to the sea-shore, where sailors sing a serenade, then he invites everyone to go to the official opening of the new street. The performance ends with a final song.

Glove-puppet

Nino Pozzo (Matteo Pozzo)

Italy

Verona

Typing with handwritten annotations

Zarzuela

Madrid

Official opening

City

Spain

Nino Pozzo, La Gran Via (Cover page).

Italian

Thief

Mayor

Choir

Street

Prison guard

Prosopopoeia

Aria

Avista

Final song

Allegory

La Gran Via

The Main Road

In Bavaria, Kaspar learns that Professor Johann Christoph Gottsched is conspiring against him. He goes to Leipzig to work as a servant, under a false name, in the house of Gottsched and his friend, the actress and theatre director Caroline Neuber. During a performance, Caroline Neuber symbolically banishes Kaspar’s character from the stage and dismisses the actor who successfully played him, Silvio. But Gottsched's ward, Lucinde, is in love with the actor: the two young people defy Gottsched's dismissal and marry in secret. In search of a new actor to play the comic role in a play by the student Gotthold Ephraim, Caroline Neuber offers the position to Kaspar, who declines and then reveals his true identity. The actress breaks up with Gottsched and hires Silvio again, as well as Lucinde. Kaspar is arrested by the Bavarian policeman Stadelmann, who has set out after him, but is finally released by Gotthold Ephraim and is praised by the entire audience.

Schmidt-Ziegler Tilla

Leipzig

Conspiring

Bavaria

Professor

Hanswurst

Dialect

Literature

Literary criticism

Theatre

Reformation

Forbidden love

Humour

Rationality

Pigtail

Puppenkomödie aus dem alten Leipzig

Policeman

Johann Christoph Gottsched

Neuberin

Cook

Pasteur

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

Off-stage voices

Metatheatre

Love story

Versified passages

Philosophical dialogue

Kaspar stirbt nicht!

Kaspar does not die!

After singing and dancing, Pulcinella goes under Teresina’s balcony and calls to her. The building’s watchman arrives and asks Pulcinella what he is doing. The watchman, who is Teresina’s father, demands that Pulcinella speak with her. Teresina arrives and Pulcinella tells her that he wants to marry her. She agrees, on condition that he gets permission from her brother Nicola, who is very suspicious and jealous. Nicola rejects Pulcinella’s request as he doesn’t want his sister to marry such an ugly, unpleasant and weird man. The pair fight with sticks and Pulcinella kills Nicola. The story continues like any classic guarattelle show with other scenes where Pulcinella faces Death or is arrested and sentenced to hang.

Marotte

All audiences

Zampella Nunzio

Naples

Printed summary

Wedding prevented

Jealous brother

Engagement

Neapolitan

Pulcinella

Guardiano

Le père

Teresina

Frère

Gouape

Swazzle

Blow-with-a-stick

Syntactic parallelism

National language as a social marker

Il fidanzamento di Pulcinella

Pulcinella's Engagement

The wanderer Nabíh tells a child, Hassan, how the merchant Abdul found on a dead man’s body a bottle from which emerges a genie. This genie, in turn, tells the story of the dead man, a fallen king, father of Fatima, a princess who is said to have taken refuge among the desert dwellers because of the fratricidal war. The king's supporters are looking for Fatima to offer her the throne, and discover that she is Laïla, Hassan's mother. However, she renounces the throne to become the princess of the desert. Other stories are added to this main plot.