Ondine (play)

Ondine
Jan Żardecki and Joanna Jedlewska in Ondine, Warsaw, 1965
Written byJean Giraudoux
Date premiered1939
Place premieredThéâtre de l'Athénée in Paris
Original languageFrench
SubjectOndine, a water-sprite, falls in love with and marries a mortal, the knight-errant Hans
GenreDrama
SettingMiddle Ages; Germany

Ondine is a play written in 1938 by French dramatist Jean Giraudoux, based on the 1811 novella Undine by the German Romantic Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué that tells the story of Hans and Ondine. Hans is a knight-errant who has been sent off on a quest by his betrothed. In the forest he meets and falls in love with Ondine, a water sprite who is attracted to the world of mortal man. The subsequent marriage of people from different worlds is, of course, folly.