Woyzeck was written in 1835-36 by 23-year-old German playwright, medical student, and social revolutionary, Georg Büchner. Only weeks after he began writing, Büchner died of typhus, leaving behind the fragmented, unordered text that has become the classic Woyzeck. It is remarkable to note that nearly two centuries after its creation, Büchner's story has not lost its edge. Based on a true-life controversial murder trial, Woyzeck continues to be recreated by avant-garde artists throughout the years.
Büchner based his play on the true and widely publicized story of Johann Christian Woyzeck, an impoverished soldier and jack-of-all trades drifter who murdered his female companion in a fit of jealousy in Leipzig in 1821. The real-life Woyzeck was the subject of controversial medical evaluations that unfairly pronounced him sane enough for execution. Woyzeck was publicly beheaded in a Leipzig square in 1824, sparking heated debates about capital punishment.
Stimulated by the then-liberal Enlightenment conception of individual rights and freedoms, Büchner started an underground revolutionary group called the Society for the Rights of Man. Through his work with this group, he wrote an inflammatory pamphlet, "The Hessian Courier," which has been called a precursor to the Communist Manifesto (3). At the time Büchner was writing Woyzeck, he was under constant threat of arrest for his revolutionary activities. One of his closest friends and fellow revolutionaries was arrested and tortured to death in prison (2).
Although Büchner's primary training was in zoology and comparative anatomy, he is remembered for writing Woyzeck, a piece which never seems to lose its edge and resonance (Patterson vii).
For more information about Georg Büchner, the author of the original Woyzeck script upon which our translation and adaptation is based, please visit The Georg Büchner Society.