| Summary: | After an introductory chapter which places general considerations pertinent to a study of Viennese parody within a wider context, chapters II and III provide a historical survey respectively of parody in Vienna, and of music in the theatre in Vienna. Chapter III in particular contains much new material, its section (l, e) correcting the erroneous but hitherto generally held view that music played little or no part in the performances of the German company during its early years in the Ka rtnertor Theatre. Chapter IV is the first attempt to examine the term quodlibet as used in late 18th and early 19th century Vienna and to study the pasticcio play and the musical pot-pourri. Chapters V, VI and VII are devoted to a detailed analysis of three parodied operas; no such study seems until now to have been undertaken. The writer has studied not only the various printed and surviving manuscript versions of the texts but also the extant musical scores and parts connected with them. A bonus was the discovery of an unknown Nestroy autograph. Chapter VIII includes material that justifies the writer's contention that sociological as well as musical factors are essential to a balanced study of the Volkskomödie; these factors combined indicate the vitality and relative absence of class distinction in the theatrical life of Vienna in the period under consideration. Appendix 1 contains a list of all identified parodistic works that were written for Vienna in the period being examined, and Appendix 2 is a tabulation showing the size of the various theatre orchestras.
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