SOURCE: “The Dramaturgy of Bahnwärter Thiel,” in Mosaic, Vol. IX, No. 3, Spring, 1976, pp. 97-116.

In the following essay, Hodge interprets Bahnwärter Thiel as “a prose drama, patterned on classical Greek tragedy and influenced by a demonic, Dionysian concept of tragedy similar to that propounded by Nietzsche.”

The symbolism ubiquitous in Hauptmann's novelle Bahnwärter Thiel (1888) has been interpreted from various perspectives. The trains and the weather have been interpreted by Professor Benno von Wiese¹ and by Professor Karl Guthke² as the expression of demonic forces. Professor Guthke specifically designates the demonic forces in Bahnwärter Thiel as “natural and technological.” Some of the other symbols, such as the two stags and the two squirrels, have been interpreted by Marianne Ordon³ as animal symbols for Thiel and Tobias.

Further interpretations of Bahnwärter Thiel should identify and explain the demonic power which underlies the technological and meteorological...