ABSTRACT
The first performance of Vor Sonnenaufgang on 20 October, 1889, in Berlin’s Lessingtheater marks the real breakthrough of the German Naturalist drama. This, the second production under the auspices of the recently-formed Freie Bühne, was one of the noisiest and most violent premières in the history of the German theatre. Gerhart Hauptmann’s play had been published in the summer of 1889 by C.F.Conrad; sides had already been taken, and this first performance thus became a veritable trial of strength between the young Naturalists and the literary establishment.
