Heinrich Leopold Wagner's play Die Kindermörderin [The Child Murderess, 1776] is one of the more important examples of bürgerliches Trauerspiel (domestic tragedy), especially because of its controversial reception history that sheds light on the German literary scene in the 1770s. Printed anonymously in the same year that two other Sturm und Drang tragedies were published – J. M. R. Lenz' Die Soldaten [The Soldiers] and F. M. Klinger's Die Zwillinge [The Twins] – Die Kindermörderin gave rise to half a dozen reprints and a substantially revised version for the Berlin stage, before Wagner put his name to the title page (1777). Until this point, rumor had it that Lenz was the play's author since he had treated the very same theme – the seduction of a middle-class girl by an officer of noble birth –...
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Citation: Hoffmeister, Gerhart. "Die Kindermörderin". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 April 2007 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=21644, accessed 09 June 2026.]
