Which German playwright created Lulu, the heroine linked to Pandora’s Box?

Frank Wedekind created Lulu, the heroine linked to Pandora’s Box.

Frank Wedekind was a German playwright whose Lulu character appears in the plays Earth Spirit and Pandora’s Box. G. W. Pabst adapted these works for his 1929 film Pandora’s Box, in which Louise Brooks played Lulu.

Wedekind’s Lulu dramas explore sexuality, social hypocrisy, power, and violence. The character is not Pandora from Greek mythology, but the film’s title connects her destructive effect on the people around her with the ancient image of a container releasing troubles into the world.

The two Lulu plays are often discussed together as the “Lulu” cycle. Wedekind’s work influenced later stage, film, and operatic adaptations, including Alban Berg’s opera Lulu. Bertolt Brecht and Gerhart Hauptmann were also important German dramatists, while Thomas Mann was chiefly known as a novelist; none created Lulu.