Der Zerrissene

Recording from the Burgtheater, 2001

Like almost all of world literature, Nestroy’s "Der Zerrissene" revolves around two central themes: money and love. Both are factors that bring happiness and could meaningfully shorten the human quest for it. Yet there is usually such a notorious shortage of both that it often plunges people into despair. Nestroy has “reversed” this scarcity, turning it into a farce: The title character, Herr von Lips, actually has too much money. And it takes an entire evening of theater for him—who admits at the beginning that he doesn’t know what he wants—to come to the realization that it might well be love. But those who, by no means poor, flock around him and hope to acquire money without working—by scheming for an inheritance or through marriage, for example—ultimately lose all hope and are left standing there as deceived deceivers. What seems to unfold so lightheartedly turns out to be a pandemonium of desires and loss of self; one plunges from this world into the next—the fall from the balcony into the raging river thus symbolizes a state of the world that threatens to go off the rails not only because of missing screws. Dreams and nightmares blend into one another, and Nestroy mocks the bourgeoisie, who are in danger of losing their footing. It is only at the end that the wealthy Mr. von Lips, having journeyed from Earth to Purgatory, is converted through his love for a country girl—though perhaps this conclusion smacks a little too much of a happy ending to be truly of this world.