It forms the first part of his pairing of 'Lulu' plays; the second is Pandora's Box (1904), both depicting a society "riven by the demands of lust and greed".
The premiere of Earth Spirit took place in Leipzig on 25 February 1898, in a production by Carl Heine, with Wedekind himself in the role of Dr Schön.
Wedekind is known to have taken his inspiration from at least two sources: the pantomime Lulu by Félicien Champsaur, which he saw in Paris in the early 1890s, and the sex murders of Jack the Ripper in London in 1888.
[2] The Lulu character may also have been partially inspired by the famed dancer/courtesan Lola Montez, also a woman of humble origin who fabricated an exotic identity.
[4] In a letter written by the playwright in 1899, Wedekind wrote: "On the first evening of my stay here, I was in Folies Bergêre, saw Eugenie Fougère, a little wild, but didn't take the opportunity to renew our acquaintance.
When the action of the play starts, Lulu has been rescued by the rich newspaper publisher Dr Schön from a life on the streets with her alleged father, the petty criminal Schigolch.
Wishing to be rid of her ahead of his forthcoming marriage to a society belle, Charlotte von Zarnikow, Schön informs Schwarz about her dissolute past.
In Act Four Lulu is now married to Dr Schön but is unfaithful to him with several other people (Schigolch, Alwa, the circus artist Rodrigo Quast and the lesbian Countess Geschwitz).
Her escape from prison with the aid of Countess Geschwitz and subsequent career down to her death at the hands of Jack the Ripper in London are the subject of the sequel, Pandora's Box.
[9] To Schön she is "Mignon", the name of the mysterious girl in Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship who pursues the hero with submissive fidelity.