Joseph Ferdinand Kringsteiner

Kringsteiner, Joseph Ferdinand (Vienna, 1775-1810, Vienna), an Austrian civil servant, wrote in his spare time plays in Viennese dialect for the Viennese popular stage. He is said to have written more than 25 of these, but only 14, mostly Lokalstücke, survive. The best known is Der Zwirnhändler aus Oberösterreich (1807), in which a nouveau riche loses his fortune through his infatuation for a scheming woman. Werthers Leiden (1806) parodies Die Leiden des jungen Werthers by Goethe. Kringsteiner died of consumption.