In the early-20th century, the theatre of eastern Europe was just getting off the ground. It grew as an art form tied to the nationalist movements which were spreading through Europe: all nations were seeking freedom and a new literature in their own languages.

Of major importance was the birth of the “Mloda Polska” (Young Poland) movement, which supported the independence of art from precepts and rules. Among those who joined the movement were Przybyszewski and Wyspianski.
The former was the real ideologist and also a writer of works of a symbolist nature for the theatre. Among his plays are For Happiness (1900), Dance of Love and Death (1901) and Snow (1902). These focus on the contrast between passion and moral reason and fatally end dramatically.

The second playwright, Stanislaw Wyspianski, was also a skilful painter, and wrote tragedies of classic inspiration, where the references to the Greek world represent a primary source: Meleager (1898), Protesilas and Laodomia (1899), Achilleis (1903) and The Return of Odysseus (1907). Tackling historical problems closer to himself in time, Wyspianski also wrote four plays on the theme of the insurrections that occurred between 1830 and 1848: Warsawianka (1898), Lelewel (1899), The Legion (1900), The November Night (1904). His writings for the stage were completed by two popular tragedies: The Anathema (1899) and The Judges (1907).

No less flourishing was the Czech literary scene. Many works were based on events from the First World War, including The Good Soldier Schweik by Jaroslav Hasek (1883-1923), a novel that was never finished. This is a sarcastic work that goes beyond the anti-military theme and that of the destiny of the Bohemian people. Schweik became very popular and was several times adapted for the theatre, including by Berthold Brecht in the 40s, with the title Schweik in the second world war (1941-1944). Thanks to irony and burlesque, Hasek is able to defend himself from superhuman forces and the character he created is an anti-hero who experiences tragicomic situations in the desolating historical context of the war. The novel narrates the adventures of a Bohemian enlisted as a private soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army at the beginning of the First World War. Naive and far from his family and job (he sells dogs) he is a cause of desperation for his superiors because of the disasters, accidental and not, which he creates. He also makes ridicule of military bureaucracy and battle actions.

Equally famous was Karel Capek (1890-1938), also a Czech, who, in his theatre works, opted for evident pragmatism and a pessimist view here and there attenuated by disenchanted resignation, managing to trace with acute satire and humour the most deep-rooted defects of the early-20th century. Among his works are RUR (Rossum’s Universal Robots) (1920) and The Makropoulos Secret (1922). In the former, the writer represents progress taken to the extreme: the building of robots at the service of human beings, which is contrasted by the rebellion of machines, who end up annihilating their inventors. The Makropoulos Secret, on the other hand, narrates of a woman who, thanks to a fantastic recipe, continues to live and stay young for over three hundred years. Nevertheless, when she tries to offer others her extraordinary recipe of eternal youth, no one accepts it or follows it, because everyone thinks a human existence without end and timeless is terribly unnatural.

In that same period, Ferenc Molnār (1878-1952) came to the fore, a Hungarian journalist and writer, famous for the successful novel The Paal Street Boys (1907), an evergreen for people of all ages. Molnār has also left us numerous theatre works, including the comedy The Devil (1907) and above all Liliom (1909), a poem whose protagonist is a barker in a funfair. Various events succeed one another on the stage, sometimes in the real world, sometimes in the after-world. Liliom is a man incapable of showing affection or love who behaves violently and is a cheat. He finally joins up with another criminal to carry out a robbery during which however the protagonist dies. Taken to the after-world, where he is sentenced to burn in fire for sixteen years, Liliom is given the chance to return to earth to expiate his sins once and for all through good behaviour. But once again he cannot manage to be different from what he is and throws away this second chance by continuing to steal and remaining a slave to his own violent nature.(Translated by interpres sas)