On the ground floor and first floor
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| Title: | On the ground floor and first floor |
| Original title: | On the ground floor and first floor or The Whims of Happiness |
| Genus: | Local posse with singing in three lifts |
| Original language: | German |
| Author: | Johann Nestroy |
| Music: | Adolf Müller senior |
| Publishing year: | 1835 |
| Premiere: | September 24, 1835 |
| Place of premiere: | Theater an der Wien |
| Place and time of the action: | The action takes place at the same time in the apartment of Mr. von Goldfuchs on the first floor, and in Schlucker's apartment on the ground floor in one and the same house |
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On the ground floor and first floor or Die Launen des Glücks is a local posse with singing by Johann Nestroy in three elevators. The play was written in 1835 and premiered on September 24 of this year in the Theater an der Wien .
content
In the poor apartment of the Tandler Schlucker "on the ground floor" Sepherl tries to persuade her creditors to indulge, while on the first floor the servants of the millionaire Goldfuchs prepare everything for the ball in the evening. Damian tries to keep the adventurous Monsieur Bonbon away from his lover Salerl. Above, the greedy servant Johann negotiates his profit with the suppliers.
- "Because there are scoundrels among the servants, you know,
- This can only beurtheil'n which selb'r one is. " (First Act, 3 te Scene)
The landlord of the house, Mr. Zins, asked Goldfuchs for the hand of his daughter Emilie. But he is rejected both by the man who chose Monsieur Bonbon for his daughter and by Emilie herself, because she is in love with Adolph the merchant boy. Adolph writes a love letter for Damian in Salerl's name to Monsieur Bonbon. Emilie drops a letter for Adolph on a string, but Schlucker intercepts it. Angrily, he wrote a reply letter with which he wanted to destroy the relationship.
- Adolph: "Father, could you ?!"
- Eaters: "Oh yes, I can Flegel Being." (I. Act, 13 th Scene)
A dispute ensues between Adolph and Schlucker, who angrily reveals to the young man that he is only a foster son. Due to a mix-up, Emilie receives the wrong love letter, while Bonbon gets the rough rejection. Downstairs, the merchants' family is desperately looking for something to eat, while on the first floor they celebrate with a richly set table, as Monsieur Bonbon is betrothed to her, to the horror of Emilie. On the ground floor, Zins visits Schlucker and Damian, he wants to get Adolph out of the way so that he can conquer Emilie, and the father agrees to send his foster son far away. Up there in the kitchen, Johann shares his fraud winnings with Meridon.
- "Yes, yes, consent must be, if it is to hergeh'n beym fraud Honett." (II. Act 4 th Scene)
Goldfuchs learns from wormwood that his son was in debt and that he has to pay for it. Because of a quarrel between Emilie and Bonbon, Johann learns her secret love for Adolph, which the insidious servant intends to use to his advantage.
The final preparations for the evening are made upstairs, everyone goes to bed on the ground floor. Fanny brings Adolph a message from Emilie and informs him of the events on the first floor. The lovers plan to flee the next day as they see this as their only hope. Luck comes into the house downstairs, because Sepherl learns that she has won a lottery. Above, Mr Goldfuchs is brought the news that his ship has sunk and that the investment of his money, which promises a lot of profit, has been lost. This also deprives candy of its entire fortune. While everyone is cheering on the ground floor, the mood on the first floor is deeply depressed. Johann shows his true colors when he reclaims the money he has invested with Goldfuchs and gives notice. He also informs him that Emilie has fallen in love with Adolph. Below, a civil servant tells Adolph that his biological father, who has taken care of the child as a poor man in the Schlucker family, is still alive. He had become extremely rich in East India and Adolph is his sole heir. Schlucker immediately begins to ingratiate himself with him again:
- "About the letter today, believe me, Herr von Adolph, that was a mere misunderstanding; as the audacity had I otherwise have had! " (III. Act 4 th Scene)
Meanwhile, Johann is wooing Salerl and Damian is wooing Fanny, but both are turned away. Damian remorsefully realizes his mistake and asks Salerl for forgiveness. Zins makes the Schlucker family an offer to move to the first floor, while the impoverished Goldfuchs family gets the apartment on the ground floor. Monsieur Bonbon, under house arrest because of his debts, wants to escape the guard and therefore swaps clothes with Johann. Damian, who still has a bill open for bonbon, mistakenly lets Johann beat up by two other merchants, while Bonbon is also mistakenly beaten up by the indignant servants. After Johann was arrested for his frauds, the two parties move. But Adolph goes downstairs to speak to Emilie and after Goldfuchs has found out about Adolph's wealth, he happily says yes to the wedding:
- "Let my example warn you the lesson: Fortuna's favor is changeable, arrogance grasps the capricious beauty, humble gratitude and wise mind alone, capable of binding them permanently. So receive my blessing. " (III. Act, 33 th Scene)
Factory history
A template for Nestroy's work could not be found. The piece was premiered with great success, the second for Nestroy after the Lumpazivagabundus , and saw 134 performances. Nestroy skillfully used the complicated game of simultaneity on two levels to depict a cross-section of life that is subject to the “whims of happiness”. The sensation of such a stage design was so enormous in Nestroy's time that the audience stormed the theater just to see this exciting stage solution, which was new to them. It can be assumed that the great interest in Nestroy's simultaneous piece prompted the author to write a more complicated "geometric comedy" as a theater-technical experiment, Das Haus der Temperamente , in which the four-part stage houses the four human temperaments.
Nestroy in the role of Johann was once arrested for five days because he was extemporating , because he alluded to his enemy, the critic Franz Wiest, during the performance and deviated from the textbook submitted:
- " Whist is played on the table - it's strange that the most ingenious game invented in England has the same name as the stupidest person in Vienna."
The audience reacted partly with frenetic applause, partly with signs of disapproval. Even the foreign press, such as the Dresdner Abend-Zeitung of October 20, 1835, reported on it and took a stand on behalf of the offended journalist.
Johann Nestroy played the servant Johann, Wenzel Scholz the tandler Damian, Friedrich Hopp the tandler Schlucker, Ignaz Stahl the landlord Zins, Franz Gämmerler the Adolph, Nestroy's partner Marie Weiler the chambermaid Fanny, director Carl Carl himself directed.
In the theater manuscript of the Carltheater there is an alternative ending - presumably a result of pressure from the censors : Because of the holiday, remorseful Johann is forgiven and he gets his fanny; the Schlucker family returns to the lower apartment, Goldfuchs with Adolph and Emilie, as well as Johann and Fanny move back upstairs - the old order is restored.
The original Nestroy manuscript - without title page and list of persons - comprises 43 sheets with glued-in additional notes. Places suspected of censorship are already marked in advance by the poet. The original score by Adolf Müller has also been preserved.
The role characters
In characterizing the roles, Nestroy was decidedly better at characterizing the characters from the common people. Monsieur Sweet is the stereotypical representative of the family of Riccaut de la Marlinière from Lessing's Minna von Barnhelm , lord of golden chestnut is caricatured as a rich man, Emilie remains rather colorless, and Adolph belongs to the duct after more likely to be "superior" than to his family.
Ms. Sepherl, on the other hand, is a lovingly drawn mother who takes care of her own children and the foster son, Schlucker is the very contemporary, strict father with some bad traits, the modest Salerl, the self-confident landlord Georg Michael Zins; dispensable for the plot, but as comic characters nonetheless indispensable are the impertinent and senseless servant Johann and the simple-minded unlucky Damian.
Contemporary reception
Apart from the personal animosities of two reviewers, the reviews in the Viennese theater newspapers were consistently very positive.
The Viennese magazine for art, literature, theater and fashion of October 1, 1834 (No. 118, p. 955) wrote:
- “We have often found ourselves in a position to criticize Mr. Nestroy's work. It is with all the greater pleasure that we take advantage of the opportunity offered by his latest piece of doing full justice to the latter and the talent of the author. It is true that the idea is new neither in terms of content nor in terms of the double theater. But the execution is so excellent, in part really ingenious, that we can safely count the novelty among the best that the last few years have brought us and prefer it to all previous Nestroy products without comparison. "
In the Nestroy mostly well-meaning Viennese theater newspaper by Adolf Bäuerle of September 26th, there was an almost enthusiastic description:
- “You cannot believe it, my kind reader, what a pleasant surprise it is for a reviewer to meet such surprisingly happy work in a theater that he was otherwise only used to enter with fear and to go to under all the torture of bad production . Nestroy has finally found a more beautiful, purer sphere of activity for his rich talent, he has risen from the smoke of the tobacco shops and from the hiding places of plebeian profligacy and has created a humorous painting, for which the title 'Lokalposse' in our contemporary and artistic conditions is chosen almost too modestly. "
In the same magazine, Moritz Gottlieb Saphir wrote a review on September 30th, which was somewhat positive, but which did not conceal this critic's aversion to Nestroy. In the collector of October 3, Nestroy's second opponent Franz Wiest could not bring himself to unequivocal praise either, whose convulsive joke was, however, corrected in the same sheet on October 13 by a more serious review by another reviewer who unreservedly recognized Nestroy's performance.
Later interpretations
Otto Rommel notes that both the audience and the critics sensed that one of the most important motifs of Nestroy's folk piece had been picked up very skilfully, namely the irreconcilable contrast between rich and poor. It would be typical for the time of the Vormärz , however, that any connection between the poverty of the one and the wealth of the other a causal connection could exist, was negated. The contrasts are seen as natural, Goldfuchs does not even notice the residents of the ground floor, they in turn look up with envy but without thoughts of overthrowing. Only luck is responsible for the current situation as well as for every change. There is no trace of a “social question” in this work by Nestroy. Even the very traditional love story Emilie-Adolf and Monsieur Bonbon's attempts at manipulation have nothing to do with social contradictions, but are common components of the farce of this time.
In Franz H. Mautner you can read that the idea of presenting contrasting events simultaneously on a horizontally split stage apparently came from Nestroy himself. The poet doubled this two years later in his play Das Haus der Temperamente (1837) and installed a stage divided into four. Because of the philanthropic, albeit somewhat pale, style, the criticism was positive and did not want to classify the work exclusively under the antics or even local antics, but instead declared it - provided it was "cleaned" of local expressions - as suitable for all stages in Germany . In his review, Mautner is somewhat astonished that one of the poet's rather weaker pieces has received such high praise and tries to explain this by saying “that the time was not ripe for Nestroy's best style.” (Quote)
text
- Complete text on nestroy.at/nestroy-stuecke/29 ebenererde (accessed on June 30, 2014)
literature
- Helmut Ahrens : I'm not auctioning myself off to the laurel. Johann Nestroy, his life. Societäts-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1982, ISBN 3-7973-0389-0 .
- Fritz Brukner / Otto Rommel : Johann Nestroy, Complete Works. Historical-critical complete edition, sixth volume, published by Anton Schroll & Co., Vienna 1926; Pp. 1-138 (text).
- Fritz Brukner / Otto Rommel: Johann Nestroy, Complete Works. Historical-critical complete edition, eighth volume, published by Anton Schroll & Co., Vienna 1926; Pp. 131-167 (Notes).
- Johann Hüttner : Johann Nestroy; Pieces 9 / II. In: Jürgen Hein / Johann Hüttner / Walter Obermaier / W. Edgar Yates : Johann Nestroy, Complete Works, Historical-Critical Edition. Deuticke, Vienna 2003, ISBN 3-216-30716-6 .
- Franz H. Mautner (Ed.): Johann Nestroys Komödien. Edition in 6 volumes, Insel Verlag , Frankfurt am Main 1979, 2nd edition 1981, second volume. OCLC 7871586
- Otto Rommel: Nestroys Works. Selection in two parts, Golden Classics Library, German publishing house Bong & Co., Berlin / Leipzig / Vienna / Stuttgart 1908.
Web links
- Table of contents on www.nestroy.at/nestroy-stuecke/29_ebenererde (accessed on June 30, 2014)
- Content, personal description and background on WebLit / Biedermeier (accessed June 30, 2014)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Nestroy writes Act throughout the text
- ↑ here in the sense of " poor swallower ", poor person
- ↑ Tandler = Bavarian / Austrian for a small or traveling trader, see trinkets
- ↑ Stutz (e) l = old Viennese for small fat figure, allusion to the figure of Wenzel Scholz
- ↑ Salerl = short, diminutive for Rosalia
- ↑ the first names were chosen according to the interest dates: Georgi = George's day (April 23), Michaeli = Michael’s day (September 29)
- ↑ Plutzerkern = pumpkin seed
- ↑ Greißler = Viennese for grocer
- ↑ Zuwag ' = Viennese for adding bones to meat
- ↑ Aufhackknecht = butcher's assistant
- ↑ see aspic
- ^ Johann Hüttner: Johann Nestroy; Pieces 9 / II. , P. 14.
- ^ Johann Hüttner: Johann Nestroy; Pieces 9 / II. , P. 32.
- ↑ honett = from the French honnête , honest, righteous
- ^ Johann Hüttner: Johann Nestroy; Pieces 9 / II. , P. 47.
- ^ Johann Hüttner: Johann Nestroy; Pieces 9 / II. , P. 93.
- ^ Johann Hüttner: Johann Nestroy; Pieces 9 / II. , P. 119.
- ↑ Helmut Ahrens: I am not auctioning myself off to the laurel. P. 176.
- ↑ Facsimile of the theater slip in Johann Hüttner: Johann Nestroy; Pieces 9 / II. , P. 399.
- ^ Otto Rommel: Nestroys works. P. 356.
- ↑ Manuscript collection of the Vienna library in the town hall , call number IN 36.449.
- ↑ Music collection of the Vienna library in the town hall , signature MH. 701
- ^ Otto Rommel: Nestroys works. Pp. 66-67. (for the entire chapter on role characters )
- ^ Brukner / Rommel: Johann Nestroy, Complete Works. 8th Volume, pp. 150-162. (for the entire chapter on contemporary reception )
- ↑ Article in: Wiener Zeitschrift für Kunst, Literatur, Theater und Mode , October 2, 1834, p. 955 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ Otto Rommel: Nestroys works. P. 65.
- ^ Franz H. Mautner: Johann Nestroys Komedien. P. 265.