Zwangseinquartierung

(Forced EmergencyHousing) by Franz Arnold and Ernst Bach.

   Premiered 1920. A humorous treatment from "the firm of Arnold and Bach" of the catastrophic housing shortage in Germany after the return of the defeated German army. Its focus was on Anton Schwalbe, a retired industrialist and owner of a comfortable villa within a large German city. Schwalbe's nemesis is an overzealous government housing official named Dr. Hans Hellwig, whose efforts upend the household's domestic tranquility. These two characters represent opposing mentalities in the immediate postwar period, as Schwalbe passionately desires an ordered calm within his villa, while Hellwig (like many in the republican government) seems determined to ameliorate suffering among the German population. To that end, he delivers several unfortunate homeless individuals to the villa; Schwalbe's servants then go on strike for higher wages, and Schwalbe himself is threatened with bankruptcy. In the midst of his troubles, Schwalbe gets news that he is the putative father of an illegitimate daughter. His reaction is similar to that of most Germans when contemplating the reparations payments dictated in the Versailles Treaty: stupefaction, quickly followed by outrage. When he meets the young woman who may be his daughter (a Hungarian violinist named Etélka), Schwalbe is utterly charmed, even though she turns out not to be his daughter. This conflict, along with all the others, is peaceably resolved by the final curtain. The villa returns to normal, young lovers are united, servants return to work with a new sense of respect (in fact, the household maid turns out to be Schwalbe's daughter), and the intrusive government official is censured.