August Friedrich Ferdinand Von Kotzebue (1761-1819)

THE STRANGE CASE OF HERR VON K: FURTHER REFLECTIONS ON THE RECEPTION OF KOTZEBUE’S THEATRE IN BRITAIN CARLOTTA FARESE August Friedrich Ferdinand von Kotzebue (1761-1819) was one of the most intriguing and complex playwrights of his time, and the history of the reception of his work both in his own country, Germany, and abroad is at once surprisingly contradictory and rather schizophrenic. The strange case of Kotzebue was and still is characterized by the controversial interpretation of his political attitude and of the dramatic episode of his death, and by the contradictions between the immense success his plays enjoyed in Germany and all over Europe, and the very harsh criticism to which his literary works were subjected by the greatest writers and intellectuals of his native country: Goethe, Schiller and the Schlegel brothers.1 He wrote more than 230 plays – sentimental melodramas, comedies, exotic tragedies – and was also the author of historical and autobiographical texts. His great achievement lies particularly in his competence and skill in interpreting the interests and desires of his audience who, according to him, preferred to be amused and entertained rather than instructed and educated. In opposition to the more complex and morally demanding theatre produced by the great German dramatists of his time, Kotzebue aimed at pleasing his public and filling the theatres, without worrying excessively about the impact that this choice would have on his contemporary or future critical reception. The easy and undemanding themes of his plays, based on a constant appraisal of the middle class and a moral criticism of the aristocracy, were the reason for his 1 On the relationships between Kotzebue and his contemporaries, see the interesting memorial given by his son: W. von Kotzebue, August von Kotzebue: Urtheile der Zeitgenossen und der Gegenwart, Dresden: Wilhelm Baensch Verlagshandlung, 1881. 72 Carlotta Farese extraordinary celebrity, although he managed to be appreciated by both classes, because he never really took a definite position and because he often used the artifice of showing on stage aristocrats who embodied the ideals of the bourgeoisie.2 Kotzebue’s fame was undoubtedly acknowledged by contemporary authors: suffice it to say that even in Weimar, during Goethe’s direction of the theatre between 1791 and 1817, more than 650 performances of Kotzebue’s plays took place, compared to 330 performances of Schiller’s and 148 of Goethe’s.3 However, his work was openly and ruthlessly criticised not only by Goethe, Schiller and the Schlegel brothers, but also by other names of the Frühromantik like Ludwig Tieck and Clemens Brentano. In their view, he embodied an undemanding and frivolous idea of theatre, always aimed at meeting the expectations and desires of the public, while avoiding the philosophical and literary complexity that they were trying to achieve. His reaction to this explicit hostility was the publication in 1799 of a satirical comedy called Der hyperboräische Esel oder die heutige Bildung – Ein drastisches Drama und philosophisches Lustspiel für Jünglinge, in which he derided Friedrich Schlegel’s Athenäum- Fragmente and his novel Lucinde. August Wilhelm Schlegel responded to this attack with a very violent pamphlet in which he included a bilingual sonnet addressed to Shakespeare’s fellow countrymen, scolding them for paying so much tribute to an iniquitous playwright: On, Britons, ye, the brutal Brutus’ brood! Awake, and save your poet Kotzebue! Him you may claim as yours, he is your due, He still does cheer your porterthicken’d blood. With mighty fleets divide the Ocean’s flood, Nor cease, till Paul him renders, to pursue; Say: One Britannia lives, one Czar like you, One Kotzebue, all great alike and good. If the grand Czar doth nobly him unloose: Rule, Kotzebue, then, and Britannia rule! Then let your worth enjoy its well-won fruits. With morals spice the pastry of his muse, 2 See Doris Maurer, August von Kotzebue: Ursachen seines Erfolges. Konstante Elemente der unterhaltende Dramatik, Bonn: Bouvier, 1979, 303. 3 Ibid., 228..

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