Three Plays (The Weavers, Hannele, and The Beaver Coat)

In English translation. Three plays representative of an important period in twentieth-century drama! A good part of modern drama owes its techniques and its intense awareness of social and psychological problems to the German playwright who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1912. Hauptmann’s achievements had great influence on many outstanding writers, among them Eugene O’Neill, who felt a special indebtedness to the European master. These three plays are superb examples of Hauptmann’s wide range and offer students an opportunity to become acquainted with the work of a supremely accomplished writer. The Weavers, perhaps his most famous play, reveals the bitter lives of the wretched handweavers of the 1840s and their abortive rebellion. Hannele centers on an abused, motherless child, abandoned to a poorhouse, who creates her own fantasy world of dreams and legends. The Beaver Coat is a delightful satire about a washerwoman who quickly learns that she cannot advance very far through honest labor alone, and proceeds accordingly.