DIE DEUTSCHEN KLEINSTÄDTER

(The Small-Town Germans) by August von Kotzebue

   Premiered 1802. A merciless satire on German (and especially Prussian) provincialism, Kotzebue's action focuses on the mayor of Krähwinkel and his family. The town is fictional, but it serves as a humorous metaphor for a German stereotype: stubbornness, parochial thinking, and an overweening concern for titles after one's name. Kotzebue's central target is the mayor's wife, Frau Stahr, who finds her prospective son-in-law insufficient. She prefers Herr Sperling, whose titles include building and street inspector. The daughter's preference turns out to be the nephew of a nobleman with a list of titles of which Frau Stahr could only dream. The marriage is, after overcoming several minor bureaucratic hurdles, allowed to proceed.

   The play has been performed thousands of times and has spun off several imitations and adaptations in several languages. Johann Nepomuk Nestroy's Freiheit in Krähwinkel employed many of Kotzebue's assumptions about German provincialism.