SOURCE: Högel, Rolf K. “‘Ort: Eine Mittlere Stadt’: The Setting of Hebbel's Maria Magdalene.” MLN 87, no. 5 (October 1972): 763-68.

In the following essay, Högel discusses the ambiguity of the setting of Maria Magdalena.

Below the list of the dramatis personae of his Maria Magdalene (1844) Hebbel briefly states the setting of this bourgeois tragedy: “eine mittlere Stadt.” The geographical location of this town is not indicated.

In relating these facts to the text of the drama itself two questions may occur to the attentive reader and spectator as well as to the stage director engaged in performing this play: (1) Does Meister Anton's family really live in a town fitting into the category of what could be termed a German “mittlere Stadt’ at the time Hebbel was working on Maria Magdalene? (2) In what geographical area of Germany is Meister Anton's home town to be localized?

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