Schnitzler, Arthur (1862–1931), Austrian dramatist, a doctor by profession, who brought to his plays something of the dispassionate attitude of the consulting-room. His first work for the theatre was
Anatol (1893), a series of sketches depicting the adventures of a young Viennese philanderer. This was followed by
Liebelei (1896), in which a working-class girl kills herself on learning of the death of the young aristocrat who had been merely trifling with her affections. It was staged at the
National Theatre in London in 1986 as
Dalliance, adapted by
Stoppard.
Der grüne Kakadu (
The Green Cockatoo, 1899) is a one-act play on an incident of the French Revolution in which Schnitzler handles with a sure touch the change from irresponsible make-believe to grim reality.
Reigen (
The Round Dance) was performed in Magyar in Budapest in 1912 and in the original German in Berlin and Vienna in 1921. The case brought against this linked sequence of 10 loveless sexual encounters on the grounds of obscenity was unsuccessful. Schnitzler however forbade all performances and it became well known only through a French film,
La Ronde (1950). Immediately on the expiry of
copyright the play was given a number of productions, notably by the
RSC in London in 1982. Among Schnitzler's later plays are
Der einsame Weg (
The Lonely Road, 1904), a sensitive play of delicate half-lights staged at the
Old Vic in 1985; Das weite Land (1911), seen at the National Theatre in 1979 as
Undiscovered Country, again adapted by Stoppard;
Der Ruf des Lebens (
The Call of Life, 1906); and
Professor Bernhardi (1912), Schnitzler's only problem-play, in which he views from all angles the repercussions of an anti—Semitic incident in a Viennese hospital. Schnitzler's world vanished in the First World War, and the plays he wrote after 1918—
Komödie der Verführung (
A Comedy of Seduction, 1924) and
Der Gang zum Weiher (
The Walk to the Lake, 1925) are little more than nostalgic echoes of the past.
