SOURCE: “Weh dem, der lügt: Grillparzer and the Avoidance of Tragedy,” in Modern Language Review, Vol. 66, No. 2, April, 1971, pp. 355-64.

In the following essay, Angress compares Weh dem, der lügt to Ein treuer Diener seines Herrn and Das goldene Vließ in order to “shed new light on the theme, structure and aesthetic intention of Weh dem, der lügt.”

Grillparzer's comedy has gone through a variety of vicissitudes since its disastrous first performance in 1838, which notoriously caused its author never to write for the stage again. Perhaps no less notoriously, it was later labelled one of ‘the three great German comedies’, and as such became subject to largely unfavourable comparisons with Minna von Barnhelm and Der zerbrochene Krug. Because of its clear and graceful structure and the apparent harmlessness of its content, it became a favourite text in German high schools, even more so in Austrian...