Lonely Lives

play by Hauptmann

Also known as: “Einsame Menschen”

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June 30, 2026

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Lonely Lives (Einsame Menschen) is a 1891 drama by German playwright Gerhart Hauptmann. The play explores the tragic end of an unhappy intellectual who is torn between his wife and a young woman with whom he can share his thoughts. This work is characteristic of Hauptmann's early naturalistic themes, which often focused on heredity, the plight of the poor, and the conflict between personal desires and societal restrictions. Hauptmann, a Nobel Prize recipient, was a significant figure in German naturalism, known for his realistic portrayal of social issues and common speech in his dramas.12

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Gerhart Hauptmann
…family, while Einsame Menschen (1891; Lonely Lives) describes the tragic end of an unhappy intellectual torn between his wife and a young woman (patterned after the writer Lou Andreas-Salomé) with whom he can share his thoughts.
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…family, while Einsame Menschen (1891; Lonely Lives) describes the tragic end of an unhappy intellectual torn between his wife and a young woman (patterned after the writer Lou Andreas-Salomé) with whom he can share his thoughts.
Read More