Uncle Drosselmeyer

Uncle Drosselmeyer is the familyship between Professor Drosselmeyer and Clara Stahlbaum from the Nutcracker fandom.

The Nutcracker and the Mouse King - E.T.A. Hoffmann
The story starts at Christmas Eve, when Marie (or Clara) and her older brother Fritz are anxiously watching a strange figure come into their house with a large box in his arm. When realizing that it's their beloved godfather Drosselmeyer, Marie lightens up and claps her hands at the thought of receiving a quantity of hand-made gifts from him. Drosselmeyer was a passionate inventor, who had made a name for himself in the Stahlbaum household as a real wizard when it comes to repairing the clocks. However, Marie could not stand watching him fix them, believing that he is hurting the poor clock when he is hammering nails into it to make it tick again, making the entire family relieved again. Even though he was always bringing an invention for the children as a guest gift, Christmas is special as he was offering the family a longer, more expensive passion project. Remembering hearing something about a beautiful, mechanical garden from Drosselmeyer, she gets into a little fight with her older brother, who was expecting an awesome fortress with independently moving soldiers instead.

As it came to the gift-giving ceremony, the parents revealed Drosselmeyer's annual gift: a giant castle with a garden on the front and a mechanic allowing the men and women (one of whom being a miniature of Drosselmeyer himself) inside the castle to spin around in circles. Though her brother contiued to demand to somehow change the mechanics spontaneously, Marie loved Drosselmeyer's gift so much that she started dancing around the castle herself. However, she also began to tire of the repeated motions of the little figurines soon, but unlike Fritz, she was too polite to make her opinion known. Though Drosselmeyer was annoyed at the ungratefulness of the children, Marie's mother gave the castle the admiration he desired and the inventor softened up, agreeing to give Marie and her siblings sugar dolls as secondary gifts.

During the Christmas dinner, Marie observed Drosselmeyer's rather hideous appearance, though dismissed it as he was a kind man. She remembered that she liked Drosselmeyer the moment she first met him and only liked him more the more he visited. Trailing off from Drosselmeyer, she notices a small, wooden man lying under the tree, another one of Drosselmeyer's gifts. Upon finding out from her father that the Nutcracker was not intended to be a gift for a specific child, Marie immediately tried cracking a nut and was rather taken by him. But when she shared the Nutcracker with her siblings, Fritz broke the poor thing by accident, making Marie unconsolable, refusing to give him to Fritz and quickly wrapping the little man in a handkerchief. The Stahlbaum parents and Drosselmeyer heard her cry, but to Marie's shock, Drosselmeyer agreed with Fritz that the Nutcracker should continue his use. When Drosselmeyer laughed a little at Marie's attempt at nursing the Nutcracker back to health, Marie innocently told him that he would probably look prettier too if he took a little more care of himself. Little Marie was very confused at her parents laughing at the inventor and the latter's nose turning red.

That night, when going to sleep, Marie was watching her grandfather clock with another miniature of Drosselmeyer sitting on top struggle to strike twelve, as if Drosselmeyer himself was trying to prevent time from catching up to them. However, once it did strike twelve, a mischief of mice invaded Marie's bedroom, with her Nutcracker and her dolls springing into action to fight them off. Marie faints at seeing this play out and hurts herself on the glass door of her toy cabinet. The next morning, her parents had bandaged her arm while she was unconscious and Drosselmeyer went in to check on her. Marie tried to tell her parents that there was a huge battle between her toys and invading mice and was hoping that Drosselmeyer could confirm this, believing him to be a witness due to his miniature watching the whole thing happen. Drosselmeyer however seemed embarrassed at Marie's story and offers to tell her the story of how the Nutcracker came to be. A man also named Drosselmeyer was a part of his story, though his name slightly changes when its mentioned a third time, Drosselmeyer plays the part of the court's head scientist trying to find a way to lift the curse placed on the fair Princess Pirlipat by the vengeful Madam Mouserinks. He tells the story in three days, on the last day, he reveals that Drosselmeyer had a nephew back in his hometown of Nuremberg, who was deemed one of many young boys capable of cracking a very hard nut and offering it to the cursed princess as a way of lifting the curse. However, his nephew happened to step on Madam Mouserinks while taking seven steps backwards, so instead of breaking Pirlipat's curse, the nephew absorbed it and turned ugly by being turned into a living Nutcracker. Mouserinks promised in her dying breath that her son would come back to haunt the Nutcracker, Drosselmeyer says that the only way to break the curse is by slaying the Mouse King and having a fair maiden confess her love to the Nutcracker despite his looks.

A year passes, with Marie continuously having to sacrifice her precious toys to get the Mouse King to spare the Nutcracker. However, after the Nutcracker slays the Mouse King with the help of a spare sword owned by Fritz, it turns out that Drosselmeyer's prophecy was true when Marie confesses her love to the Nutcracker. Soon after Marie faints, Drosselmeyer's Nephew comes for a visit while his uncle is busy fixing one of the Stahlbaum's clocks.

Fanon
Given Drosselmeyer's importance to the story, some fanwork for the original novel reflects his bond with Marie.

Fandom

 * FAN FICTION

Trivia

 * In the Barbie adaptation, Drosselmeyer is a woman and Clara's biological aunt.