Chapter IV: Part 4

[6] See an interesting article in the _Outlook_ for 3 August, 1901, _A Visit to Sienkiewicz_, by L. E. Van Norman.

Sienkiewicz was born in 1845. After student days at Warsaw, he came over in 1876-1877 to California, in a party that included Madame Modjeska. They attempted to establish a kind of socialistic community, which bears in the retrospect a certain resemblance to Brook Farm. Fortunately for the cause of art, which the world needs more than it does socialism, the enterprise was a failure. Sienkiewicz returned to Poland, and began his literary career; Madame Modjeska became one of the chief ornaments of the English stage for a quarter of a century. Her ashes now rest in the ancient Polish city where President Gilman uttered his fine tribute to the friend of her youth.

The three great Polish romances were all written in the eighties; and at about the same time the author was also engaged in the composition of purely realistic work, which displays his powers in a quite different form of art, and constitutes the most original--though not the most popular--part of his literary production. The _Children of the Soil_, which some of the elect in Poland consider his masterpiece, is a novel, constructed and executed in the strictest style of realism; _Without Dogma_ is still farther removed from the Romantic manner, for it is a story of psychological analytical introspection. Sienkiewicz himself regards _Children of the Soil_ as his favourite, although he is "not prepared to say just why." And _Without Dogma_ he thinks to be "in many respects my strongest work." It is evident that he does not consider himself primarily a maker of stirring historical romance. But in the nineties he returned to this form of fiction, producing his Roman panorama called _Quo Vadis_, which, although it has made the biggest noise of all his books, is perhaps the least valuable. Like _Ben Hur_, it was warmed over into a tremendously successful melodrama, and received the final compliment of parody.[7] Toward the close of the century, Sienkiewicz completed another massive historical romance, _The Knights of the Cross_, which, in its abundant action, striking characterisation, and charming humour, recalled the Trilogy; this was followed by _On the Field of Glory_, and we may confidently expect more, though never too much; he simply could not be dull if he tried.

[7] One of the most grotesque and laughable burlesques ever seen on the American stage was the travesty of _Quo Vadis_, with the heroine Lithia, who drew a lobster on the sand: the strong man, Zero, wrenched the neck off a wild borax.

In a time like ours, when literary tabloids take the place of wholesome mental food, when many successful novels can be read at a sitting or a lying--requiring no exertion either of soul or body--the portentous size of these Polish stories is a magnificent challenge. If some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested, what shall we do with Sienkiewicz? In Mr. Curtin's admirable translation, the Trilogy covers over twenty-five hundred closely printed pages; the _Knights of the Cross_ over seven hundred and fifty, _Children of the Soil_ over six hundred and fifty; _Without Dogma_ (Englished by another hand) has been silently so much abridged in translation that we do not know what its actual length may be. We do not rebel, because the next chapter is invariably not a task, but a temptation; but when we wake up with a start at the call _Finis_, which magic word transfers us from the seventeenth to the twentieth century, and contemplate the vast fabric of our dream, we cannot help asking if there is any law in the construction that requires so much material. Gogol, in his astonishing romance, _Taras Bulba_, which every lover of Sienkiewicz should read, gives us the same impression of Vastness, in a book Lilliputian in size. Nor is there any apparent reason why the Polish narratives should stop on the last page, nor indeed stop at all. Combat succeeds combat, when in the midst of the hurly-burly, the Master of the Show calls time. It is his arbitrary will, rather than any inevitable succession of events, that shuts off the scene: the men might be fighting yet. This passion for mere detail mars the first part of _With Fire and Sword_; one cannot see the forest for the trees.

One reason for this immensity is the author's desire to be historically accurate, the besetting sin of many recent dramas and novels. Before beginning to write, Sienkiewicz reads all the authorities and documentary evidence he can find. The result is plainly seen in the early pages of _With Fire and Sword_, which read far more like a history than like a work of fiction--note the striking contrast in _Pan Michael_! The _Knights of the Cross_ appeared with maps. The topography of _Quo Vadis_ was so carefully prepared that it almost serves as a guide-book to ancient Rome. Now the relation of History to Fiction has never been better stated than by Lessing: "The dramatist uses history, not because it has happened, but because it has so happened that he could scarcely find anything else better adapted to his purpose." No work of fiction has ever gained immortality by its historical accuracy.

Everyone notices that the works of Sienkiewicz are Epics rather than Novels. Even bearing Fielding clearly in mind, there is no better illustration to be found in literary history. The Trilogy bears the same relation to the wars of Poland that the Iliad bears to the struggle at Troy. The scope and flow of the narrative, the power of the scenes, the vast perspective, the portraits of individual heroes, the impassioned poetry of the style--all these qualities are of the Epic. The intense patriotism is thrilling, and makes one envy the sensations of native readers. And yet the reasons for the downfall of Poland are made perfectly clear.

Is the _romanticist_ Sienkiewicz an original writer? In the narrow and strict sense of the word, I think not. He is eclectic rather than original. He is a skilful fuser of material, like Shakespeare. At any rate, his most conspicuous virtue is not originality. He has enormous force, a glorious imagination, astonishing facility, and a remarkable power of making pictures, both in panorama and in miniature; but his work shows constantly the inspiration not only of his historical authorities, but of previous poets and novelists. Those who are really familiar with the writings of Homer, Shakespeare, Scott, and Dumas, will not require further comment on this point. The influence of Homer is seen in the constant similes, the epithets like "incomparable bowman," and the stress laid on the deeds of individual heroes; a thing quite natural in Homeric warfare, but rather disquieting in the days of villainous saltpetre. The three swordsmen in _With Fire and Sword_--Pan Yan, Pan Podbienta, and Pan Michael--infallibly remind us of Dumas's three guardsmen; and the great duel scenes in the same story, and in the _Knights of the Cross_, are quite in the manner of the Frenchman. Would that other writers could employ their reminiscences to such advantage! In the high colouring, in the management of historical events, and in patriotic enthusiasm, we cannot help thinking of Scott. But be the debt to Dumas and to Scott as great as one pleases to estimate, I am free to acknowledge that I find the romances of the Pole more enthralling than those of either or both of his two great predecessors.

With reference to the much-discussed character of Zagloba, I confess I cannot join in the common verdict that pronounces him a "new creation in literature." Those who believe this delightful person to be something new and original have simply forgotten Falstaff. If one will begin all over again, and read the two parts of _Henry IV_, and then take a look at Zagloba, the author of his being is immediately apparent. Zagloba is a Polish Falstaff, an astonishingly clever imitation of the real thing. He is old, white-haired, fat, a resourceful wit and humorist, better at bottles than at battles, and yet bold when policy requires: in every essential feature of body and mind he resembles the immortal creation of Shakespeare. Sienkiewicz _develops_ him with subtle skill and affectionate solicitude, even as Dickens developed Mr. Pickwick; the Zagloba of _Pan Michael_ is far sweeter and more mellow than when we make his acquaintance in the first volume of the Trilogy; but the last word for this character is the word "original." The real triumph of Sienkiewicz in the portrayal of the jester is in the fact that he could imitate Falstaff without spoiling him, for no other living writer could have done it. A copy that can safely be placed alongside the original implies art of a very high class. To see Zagloba is to realise the truth of Falstaff's remark, "I am not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men."

Sienkiewicz himself perhaps does not appreciate how much he owes to Shakespeare, or possibly he is a bit sensitive on the subject, for he explains, "If I may be permitted to make a comparison, I think that Zagloba is a better character than Falstaff. At heart the old noble was a good fellow. He would fight bravely when it became necessary, whereas Shakespeare makes Falstaff a coward and a poltroon."[8] If the last two epithets were really an accurate description of Falstaff, he would never have conquered so many millions of readers.[9]

[8] See Mr. Van Norman's article.

[9] It would be well for Sienkiewicz (and others) to read the brilliant essay that appeared, "by another hand," in the First Series of Mr. Birrell's _Obiter Dicta_.

In power of description on a large scale, Sienkiewicz seems to take a place among the world's great masters of fiction. The bigger the canvas, the more impressive he becomes. His pictures of the boundless steppes by day and night, and in the varying seasons of the year, leave permanent images in the mind. Especially in huge battle scenes is his genius resplendent. It is as if we viewed the whole drama of blood from a convenient mountain peak. The awful tumult gathers and breaks like some hideous storm. So far as I know no writer has ever excelled this Verestchagin of the pen except Tolstoi--and Tolstoi's power lies more in the subjective side of the horrors of war. The Russian's skill is more intellectual, more psychological, of a really higher order of art. For in the endeavour to make the picture vivid, Sienkiewicz becomes at times merely sensational. There is no excuse for his frequent descent into loathsome and horrible detail. The employment of human entrails as a necklace may be historically accurate, but it is out of place in a work of art. The minute description of the use of the stake is another instance of the same tendency, and the unspeakably horrid torture of Azya in _Pan Michael_ is a sad blot on an otherwise splendid romance. The love of the physically horrible is an unfortunate characteristic of our Polish novelist, for it appears in _Quo Vadis_ as well as in the Trilogy. The greatest works appeal to the mind rather than the senses. _Pan Michael_ is a great book, not because it reeks with blood and abounds in hell's ingenuity of pain, but because it presents the character of a hero made perfect through suffering; every sword-stroke develops his spirit as well as his arm. Superfluous events, so frequent in the other works, are here omitted; the story progresses steadily; it is the most condensed and the most human book in the Trilogy. Again, in _The Deluge_, the author's highest skill is shown not in the portrayal of moving accidents by flood and field, but in the regeneration of Kmita. He passes through a long period of slow moral gestation, which ultimately brings him from darkness to light.

To non-Slavonic readers, who became acquainted with Sienkiewicz through the Trilogy, it was a surprise to discover that at home he was equally distinguished as an exponent of modern realism. The acute demand for anything and everything from his pen led to the translation of _The Family of Polanyetski_, rechristened in English (one hardly knows why) _Children of the Soil_; this was preceded by the curious psychological study, _Without Dogma_. It is extremely fortunate that these two works have been made accessible to English readers, for they display powers that would not otherwise be suspected. It is true that English novelists have shone in both realism and romance: we need remember only Defoe, Dickens, and Thackeray. But at the very moment when we were all thinking of Sienkiewicz as a reincarnation of Scott or Dumas, we were compelled to revise previous estimates of his position and abilities. Genius always refuses to be classified, ticketed, or inventoried; just as you have got your man "placed," or, to change the figure, have solemnly and definitely ushered him to a seat in the second row on the upper tier, you discover that he is much bigger than or quite different from your definition of him. Sienkiewicz is undoubtedly one of the greatest living masters of the realistic novel. In the two stories just mentioned above, the most minute trivialities in human intercourse are set forth in a style that never becomes trivial. He is as good at external description as he is at psychological analysis. He takes all human nature for his province. He belongs not only to the "feel" school of novelists, with Zola, but to the "thought" school, with Turgenev. The workings of the human mind, as impelled by all sorts of motives, ambitions, and passions, make the subject for his examination. In the Trilogy, he took an enormous canvas, and splashed on myriads of figures; in _Without Dogma_, he puts the soul of one man under the microscope. The events in this man's life are mainly "transitions from one state of spiritual experience to another." Naturally the mirror selected is a diary, for _Without Dogma_ belongs to a school of literature illustrated by such examples as the _Sorrows of Werther_ and _Amiel's Journal_. It must be remembered that we have here a study primarily of the Slav character. The hero cleverly diagnoses his own symptoms as _Slave Improductivite_. He is perhaps puzzling to the practical Philistine Anglo-Saxon: but not if one has read Turgenev, Dostoievsky, or Gorky. Turgenev's brilliant analysis of Rudin must stand for all time as a perfect portrait of the educated Slav, a person who fulfils the witty definition of a Mugwump, "one who is educated beyond his capacity." We have a similar character here, the conventional conception of Hamlet, a man whose power of reasoning overbalances his strength of will. He can talk brilliantly on all kinds of intellectual topics, but he cannot bring things to pass. He has a bad case of _slave improductivite_. The very title, _Without Dogma_, reveals the lack of conviction that ultimately destroys the hero. He has absolutely no driving power; as he expresses it, _he does not know_. If one wishes to examine this sort of mind, extremely common among the upper classes of Poles and Russians, one cannot do better than read attentively this book. Every futile impulse, every vain longing, every idle day-dream, is clearly reflected. It is a melancholy spectacle, but fascinating and highly instructive. For it is not merely an individual, but the national Slavonic character that is revealed.

Sienkiewicz is not only a Romanticist and a Realist--he is also a Moralist. The foundations of his art are set deep in the bed-rock of moral ideas. As Tolstoi would say, he has the right attitude toward his characters. He believes that the Novel should strengthen life, not undermine it; ennoble, not defile it; for it is good tidings, not evil. "I care not whether the word that I say pleases or not, since I believe that I reflect the great urgent need of the soul of humanity, which is crying for a change. People must think according to the laws of logic. And because they must also live, they want some consolation on the road of life. Masters after the manner of Zola give them only dissolution, chaos, a disgust for life, and despair."[10] This is the signal of a strong and healthy soul. The fact is, that at heart Sienkiewicz is as stout a moralist as Tolstoi, and with equal ardour recognises Christianity as the world's best standard and greatest need. The basis of the novel _Children of the Soil_ is purely Christian. The simple-hearted Marynia is married to a man far superior to her in mental endowment and training, as so often happens in Slavonic fiction; she cannot follow his intellectual flights, and does not even understand the processes of his mind. She has no talent for metaphysical discussion, and no knowledge of modern science. But although her education does not compare with that of her husband, she has, without suspecting it, completely mastered the art of life; for she is a devout and sincere Christian, meek and lowly in heart. He finally recognises that while he has more learning, she has more wisdom; and when the book closes, we see him a pupil at her feet. All his vain speculations are overthrown by the power of religion manifested in the purity, peace, and contentment of his wife's daily life. And now he too--

"Leads it companioned by the woman there.
To live, and see her learn, and learn by her,
Out of the low obscure and petty world....
To have to do with nothing but the true,
The good, the eternal--and these, not alone,
In the main current of the general life,
But small experiences of every day,
Concerns of the particular hearth and home:
To learn not only by a comet's rush
But a rose's birth,--not by the grandeur, God--
But the comfort, Christ."

This idea is revealed positively in _Children of the Soil_, and negatively in _Without Dogma_. The two women, Marynia and Aniela, are very similar. Aniela's intellect is elementary compared with that of her brilliant lover, Leon Ploszowski. But her Christian faith turns out to be a much better guide to conduct than his flux of metaphysics. She is a good woman, and knows the difference between right and wrong without having to look it up in a book. When he urges her to a _liaison_, and overwhelms her objections with a fine display of modern dialectic, she concludes the debate by saying, "I cannot argue with you, because you are so much cleverer than I; but I know that what you want me to do is wrong, and I will not do it."

[10] Taken here and there from his essay on Zola.

We find exactly the same emphasis when we turn to the historical romance _Quo Vadis_. The whole story is a glorification of Christianity, of Christian ethics and Christian belief. The despised Christians have discovered the secret of life, which the culture of Petronius sought in vain. It was hidden from the wise and prudent, and revealed unto babes. The influence of Lygia on Vinicius is, with a totally different environment, precisely the same as the influence of Marynia on Pan Stanislav.

Sienkiewicz seems to have much the same Christian conception of Love as that shown in so many ways by Browning. Love is the _summum bonum_, and every manifestation of it has something divine. Love in all its forms appears in these Polish novels, as it does in Browning, from the basest sensual desire to the purest self-sacrifice. There is indeed a streak of animalism in Sienkiewicz, which shows in all his works; but, if we may believe him, it is merely one representation of the great passion, which so largely controls life and conduct. Love, says Sienkiewicz, with perhaps more force than clearness, should be the foundation of all literature. "L'amour--c'est un droit eternel, une force vitale, c'est le genie--bienfaiteur de notre globe: l'harmonie. Sienkiewicz croit que l'amour, ainsi compris, est le fondement de la litterature polonaise--et que cet amour devrait l'etre pour toute la litterature."[11] Some light may be thrown on this statement by a careful reading of _Pan Michael_.

[11] Sent to me by Dr. Glabisz.

Sienkiewicz is indeed a mighty man--someone has ironically called him a literary blacksmith. There is nothing decadent in his nature. Compared with many English, German, and French writers, who seem at times to express an anaemic and played-out civilisation, he has the very exuberance of power and an endless wealth of material. It is as if the world were fresh and new. And he has not only delighted us with the pageantry of chivalry, and with the depiction of our complex modern civilisation, he has for us also the stimulating influence of a great moral force.

VII

HERMANN SUDERMANN

Walking along Michigan Avenue in Chicago one fine day, I stopped in front of the recently completed hall devoted to music. On the facade of this building had been placed five names, supposed to represent the five greatest composers that the world has thus far seen. It was worth while to pause a moment and to reflect that those five men were all Germans. Germany's contribution to music is not only greater than that of any other nation, it is probably greater than that of all the other countries of the earth put together, and multiplied several times. In many forms of literary art,--especially perhaps in drama and in lyrical poetry,--Germany has been eminent; and she has produced the greatest literary genius since Shakespeare. To-day the Fatherland remains the intellectual workshop of the world; men and women flock thither to study subjects as varied as Theology, Chemistry, Mathematics, and Music. All this splendid achievement in science and in culture makes poverty in the field of prose fiction all the more remarkable. For the fact is, that the total number of truly great world-novels written in the German language, throughout its entire history, can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

In the making of fiction, from the point of view solely of quality, Germany cannot stand an instant's comparison with Russia, whose four great novelists have immensely enriched the world; nor with Great Britain, where masterpieces have been produced for nearly two hundred years; nor with France, where the names of notable novels crowd into the memory; and even America, so poor in literature and in genuine culture, can show at least one romance that stands higher than anything which has come from beyond the Rhine. Germany has no reason to feel ashamed of her barrenness in fiction, so pre-eminent is she in many other and perhaps nobler forms of art. But it is interesting to enquire for a moment into possible causes of this phenomenon, and to see if we can discover why Teutonic fiction is, relatively speaking, so bad.

One dominant fault in most German novels is a lack of true proportion. The principle of selection, which differentiates a painting from a photograph, and makes the artist an Interpreter instead of a Recorder, has been forgotten or overlooked. The high and holy virtue of Omission should be cultivated more sedulously. The art of leaving out is the art that produces the real illusion--where, by the omission of unessential details, things that are salient can be properly emphasised. And what German novels lack is emphasis. This cannot be obtained by merely spacing the letters in descriptions and in conversations; it can be reached only by remembering that prose fiction is as truly an art form as a Sonata. Instead of novels, the weary reader gets long and tiresome biographies of rather unimportant persons; people whom we should not in the least care to know in real life. We follow them dejectedly from the cradle to the grave. Matters of no earthly consequence either to the reader, to the hero, or to the course of the plot, are given as much prominence as great events. In _Joern Uhl_, to take a recent illustration, the novel is positively choked by trivial detail. Despite the enormous vogue of this story, it does not seem destined to live. It will fall by its own weight.

Another great fault is an excess of sentimentality. For the Germans, who delight in destroying old faiths of humanity, and who remorselessly hammer away at the shrines where we worship in history and religion, are, notwithstanding their iconoclasm, the most sentimental people in the world. Many second-and third-rate German novels are ruined for an Anglo-Saxon reader by a lush streak of sentimental gush, a curious blemish in so intellectual and sceptical a race. This excess of soft material appears in a variety of forms; but to take one common manifestation of it, I should say that the one single object that has done more than anything else to weaken and to destroy German fiction, is the Moon. The Germans are, by nature and by training, scientific; and what their novels need is not the examination of literary critics, but the thoughtful attention of astronomers. The Moon is overworked, and needs a long rest. An immense number of pages are illumined by its chaste beams, for this satellite is both active and ubiquitous. It behaves, it must be confessed, in a dramatic manner, but in a way hopelessly at variance with its methodical and orderly self. In other words, the Moon, in German fiction, is not astronomical, but decorative. I have read some stories where it seems to rise on almost every page, and is invariably full. When Stevenson came to grief on the Moon in _Prince Otto_, he declared that the next time he wrote a novel, he should use an almanac. He unwittingly laid his finger on a weak spot in German fiction. The almanac is, after all, what is most sorely needed. Even Herr Sudermann, for whom we entertain the highest respect, places in _Es War_ a young crescent Moon in the eastern sky! But it is in his story, _Der Katzensteg_, that the lunar orb plays its heaviest role. It rises so constantly that after a time the very words "_der Mond_" get on one's nerves. At the climax, when the lover looks down on the stream, he there beholds the dead body of his sweetheart. By some scientific process, "unknown to me and which 'twere well to know," she is floating on her back in the water, while the Moon illumines her face, leaving the rest of her remains in darkness. This constitutes a striking picture; and is also of material assistance to the man in locating the whereabouts of the girl. He descends, rescues her from the flood, and digs a grave in which to bury her. The Moon actively and dramatically takes part in this labour. Finally, he has lowered the corpse into the bottom of the cavity. The Moon now shines into the grave in such a manner that the dead woman's face is bright with its rays, whereas the rest of her body and the walls of the tomb are in obscurity. This phenomenon naturally makes a powerful impression on the mourner's mind.

If such things can happen in the works of a writer like Sudermann, one can easily imagine the reckless behaviour of the Moon in the common run of German fiction. The Moon, in fact, is in German novels what the calcium light is in American melodrama. If one "assists" at a performance of, let us say, _No Wedding Bells for Her_, and can take his eye a moment from the stage, he may observe up in the back gallery a person working the calcium light, and directing its powerful beams in such a fashion that no matter where the heroine moves, they dwell exclusively on her face, so that we may contemplate her features convulsed with emotion. Now in _Der Katzensteg_, the patient Moon follows the heroine about with much the same assiduity, and accuracy of aim. Possibly Herr Sudermann, since the composition of that work, has really consulted an almanac; for in _Das hohe Lied_, the Moon is practically ignored, and never gets a fair start. Toward the end, I felt sure that it would appear, and finally, when I came to the words, "The weary disk of the full moon (_matte Vollmondscheibe_) hung somewhere in the dark sky," I exclaimed, "Art thou there, truepenny?"--but the next sentence showed that the author was playing fast and loose with his old friend. "It was the illuminated clock of a railway-station." Can Sudermann have purposely set a trap for his moon-struck constituency?

From the astronomical point of view, I have seldom read a novel that contained so much moonlight as _Der Katzensteg_, and I have never read one that contained so little as _Das hohe Lied_. Perhaps Sudermann is now quietly protesting against what he himself may regard as a national calamity, for it is little less than that. Be this as it may, the lack of proportion and the excess of sentimentality are two great evils that have militated against the final success of German fiction.

Hermann Sudermann was born at a little village in East Prussia, near the Russian frontier. The natal landscape is dull, depressing, gloomy, and the skies are low and threatening. The clouds return after the rain. Dame Care has spread her grey wings over the flat earth, and neither the scenery nor the quality of the air are such as to inspire hope and vigour. The boy's parents were desperately poor, and the bitter struggles with poverty so frequently described in his novels are reminiscent of early experiences. In the beautiful and affectionate verses, which constitute the dedication to his father and mother, and which are placed at the beginning of _Frau Sorge_, these privations of the Sudermann household are dwelt on with loving tenderness. At the age of fourteen, the child was forced to leave school, and was apprenticed to a chemist--something that recalls chapters in the lives of Keats and of Ibsen. But, like most boys who really long for a good education, Sudermann obtained it; he continued his studies in private, and later returned to school at Tilsit. In 1875 he attended the University at Koenigsberg, and in 1877 migrated to the University of Berlin. His first impulse was to become a teacher, and he spent several years in a wide range of studies in philosophy and literature. Then he turned to journalism, and edited a political weekly. He finally forsook journalism for literature, and for the last twenty years he has been known in every part of the intellectual world.

Like Mr. J. M. Barrie, Signor D'Annunzio, and other contemporaries, Sudermann has achieved high distinction both as a novelist and as a dramatist. Indeed, one of the signs of the times is the recruiting of playwrights from the ranks of trained experts in prose fiction. It may perhaps be regarded as one more evidence of the approaching supremacy of the Drama, which many literary prophets have foretold. After he had published a small collection of "Zwanglose Geschichten," called _Im Zwielicht_, Sudermann issued his first real novel, _Dame Care_ (_Frau Sorge_). This was followed by two tales bound together under the heading _Geschwister_, one of them being the morbidly powerful story, _The Wish_ (_Der Wunsch_). Soon after came _Der Katzensteg_, translated into English with the title, _Regina_. Then, after a surprisingly short interval, came his first play, _Die Ehre_ (1889), which appeared in the same year as his rival Hauptmann's first drama, _Vor Sonnenaufgang_. _Die Ehre_ created a tremendous sensation, and Sudermann was excitedly read and discussed far beyond the limits of his native land. He reached a wild climax of popularity a few years later with his play _Heimat_ (English version _Magda_), which has been presented by the greatest actresses in the world, and is familiar to everybody. With the exception of the long novel, _Es War_ (English translation, _The Undying Past_), which appeared in 1894, Sudermann devoted himself exclusively to the stage for almost twenty years, and most of us believed he had definitely abandoned novel-writing. From 1889 to 1909, he produced nineteen plays, nearly every one of them successful. Then last year he astonished everybody by publishing a novel of over six hundred closely printed pages, called _Das hohe Lied_, translated into English as _The Song of Songs_. This has had an enormous success, and for 1908-1909, is the best selling work of fiction in the large cities of Germany.

The immense vogue of his early plays had much to do with the wide circulation of his previously published novels. Despite the now universally acknowledged excellence of _Frau Sorge_, it attracted, at the time of its appearance, very little attention. It is going beyond the facts to say with one German critic that "it dropped stillborn from the press"; but it did not give the author anything like the fame he deserved. After the first night of _Die Ehre_, the public became inquisitive. A search was made for everything the new author had written, and the two novels _Frau Sorge_, and the very recent _Katzensteg_, were fairly pounced upon. The small stock on hand was immediately exhausted, and the presses poured forth edition after edition. At first _Der Katzensteg_ received the louder tribute of praise; it was hailed by many otherwise sane critics as the greatest work of fiction that Germany had ever produced. But after the tumult and the shouting died, the people recognised the superiority of the former novel. To-day _Der Katzensteg_ is, comparatively speaking, little read, and one seldom hears it mentioned. _Frau Sorge_, on the other hand, has not only attained more editions than any other work, either play or novel, by its author, but it bears the signs that mark a classic. It is one of the very few truly great German novels, and it is possible that this early written story will survive everything that Sudermann has since produced, which is saying a good deal. It looks like a fixed star.

Sudermann's four novels, _Frau Sorge_, _Der Katzensteg_, _Es War_, and _Das hohe Lied_, show a steady progression in Space as well as in Time. The first is the shortest; the second is larger; the third is a long book; the fourth is a leviathan. If novelists were heard for their much speaking, the order of merit in this output would need no comment. But the first of these is almost as superior in quality as it is inferior in size. When the author prepared it for the press, he was an absolutely unknown man. Possibly he put more work on it than went into the other books, for it apparently bears the marks of careful revision. It is a great exception to the ordinary run of German novels in its complete freedom from superfluous and clogging detail. Turgenev used to write his stories originally at great length, and then reduce them to a small fraction of their original bulk, before offering them to the public. We thus receive the quintessence of his thought and of his art. Now _Frau Sorge_ has apparently been subjected to some such process. Much of the huge and varied cargo of ideas, reflections, comments, and speculations carried by the regulation German freight-novel of heavy draught, has here been jettisoned. Then the craft itself has been completely remodelled, and the final result is a thing of grace and beauty.

_Frau Sorge_ is an admirable story in its absolute unity, in its harmonious development, and in its natural conclusion. I do not know of any other German novel that has a more attractive outline. It ought to serve as an example to its author's countrymen.

It is in a way an anatomy of melancholy. It is written throughout in the minor key, and the atmosphere of melancholy envelops it with as much natural charm as though it were a beautiful piece of music. The book is profoundly sad, without any false sentiment and without any revolting coarseness. It is as far removed from the silly sentimentality so common in Teutonic fiction, as it is from the filth of Zola or of Gorky. The deep melancholy of the story is as natural to it as a cloudy sky. The characters live and move and have their being in this grey medium, which fits them like a garment; just as in the early tales of Bjoernson we feel the strong sunshine and the sharp air. The early environment of the young author, the depressing landscape of his boyhood days, the daily fight with grim want in his father's house--all these elements are faithfully reflected here, and lend their colour to the narrative. And this surrounding melancholy, though it overshadows the whole book, is made to serve an artistic purpose. It contrasts favourably with Ibsen's harsh bitterness, with Gorky's maudlin dreariness, and with the hysterical outbursts of pessimism from the manikins who try to see life from the mighty shoulders of Schopenhauer. At the very heart of the work we find no sentiment of revolt against life, and no cry of despair, but true tenderness and broad sympathy. It is the clear expression of a rich, warm nature.

The story is realistic, with a veil of Romanticism. The various scenes of the tale seem almost photographically real. The daily life on the farm, the struggles with the agricultural machine, the peat-bogs, the childish experiences at school, the brutality of the boys, the graphic picture of the funeral,--these would not be out of place in a genuine experimental novel. But we see everything through an imaginative medium, like the impalpable silver-grey mist on the paintings of Andrea del Sarto. The way in which the difficult conception of _Frau Sorge_--part woman, part vague abstraction--is managed, reminds one in its shadowy nature of Nathaniel Hawthorne. This might have been done clumsily, as in a crude fairy-tale, but it exhibits the most subtle art. The first description of Frau Sorge by the mother, the boy's first glimpse of the supernatural woman, his father's overcoat, the Magdalene in church, the flutter of Frau Sorge's wings,--all this gives us a realistic story, and yet takes us into the borderland between the actual and the unknown. From one point of view we have a plain narrative of fact; from another an imaginative poem, and at the end we feel that both have been marvellously blended.

The simplicity of the style gives the novel a high rank in German prose. It has that naive quality wherein the Germans so greatly excel writers in other languages. It is a surprising fact that this tongue, so full of difficulties for foreigners, and which seems often so confused and involved, can, in the hands of a master, be made to speak like a little child. The literary style of _Frau Sorge_ is naive without ever being trivial or absurd. It is pleasant to observe, by the way, that to some extent this book is filling the place in American educational programmes of German that _L'Abbe Constantin_ has for so long a time occupied in early studies of French. Both novels are masterpieces of simplicity.

But what we remember the most vividly, years after we have finished this story, is not its scenic background, nor its unearthly charm, nor the grace of its style; it is the character and temperament of the boy-hero. It is the first, and possibly the best, of Sudermann's remarkable psychological studies. The whole interest is centred in young Paul. He is not exactly the normal type of growing boy,--compare him with Tom Sawyer!--but because he is not ordinary, it does not follow that he is unnatural. To many thoroughly respectable Philistine readers, he may appear not only abnormal, but impossible; but the book was not intended for Philistines. I believe that this boy is absolutely true to life, though I do not recall at this moment any other novel where this particular kind of youth occupies the centre of the stage.

For _Frau Sorge_ is a careful study and analysis of _bashfulness_, a characteristic that causes more exquisite torture to many boys and girls than is commonly recognised. Many of us, when we laugh at a boy's bashfulness, are brutal, when we mean to be merely jocular. Paul is intensely self-conscious. He is not at all like a healthy, practical, objective child, brought up in a large family, and surrounded by the noisy progeny of neighbours. His life is perforcedly largely subjective. He would give anything could he associate with schoolmates with the ease that makes a popular boy sure of his welcome. His accursed timidity makes him invariably show his most awkward and unattractive side. He is not in the least a _Weltkind_. He has none of the coarseness and none of the clever shirking of work and study so characteristic of the perfectly normal small boy. He does his duty _without any reservations_, and without understanding why. The narrative of his mental life is deeply pathetic. It is impossible to read the book without a lump in the throat.

Paul is finally saved from himself by the redeeming power of love. The little heroine Elsbeth is shadowy,--a merely conventional picture of hair, complexion, and eyes,--but she is, after all, _das Ewigweibliche_, and draws Paul upward and onward. She rescues him from the Slough of Despond. There is no touch of cynicism here. Sudermann shows us the healing power of a good woman's heart.

The next novel, _Der Katzensteg_, is more pretentious than _Frau Sorge_, but not nearly so fine a book. It abounds in dramatic scenes, and glows with fierce passion. It seems more like a melodrama than a story, and it is not surprising that its author immediately discovered--perhaps in the very composition of this romance--his genius for the stage. It is a historical novel, but the chief interest, as always in Sudermann, is psychological. The element of Contrast--so essential to true drama, and which is so strikingly employed in _Die Ehre_, _Sodoms Ende_, _Heimat_, and _Johannes_--is the mainspring of _Der Katzensteg_. We have here the irrepressible conflict between the artificial and the natural. The heroine of the story is a veritable child of nature, with absolutely elemental passions, as completely removed from civilisation as a wild beast. She was formerly the mistress of the hero's father, and for a long time is naturally regarded with loathing by the son. But she transfers her dog-like fidelity from the dead parent to the morbid scion of the house. The more cruelly the young man treats her, the deeper becomes her love for him. Nor does he at first suspect the hold she has on his heart. He imagines himself to be in love with the pastor's daughter in the village, who has been brought up like a hothouse plant. This simpering, affected girl, who has had all the advantages of careful nurture and education, is throughout the story contrasted with the wild flower, Regina. The contrast is thorough--mental, moral, physical. The educated girl has no real mind; she has only accomplishments. Her morality has nothing to do with the heart; it is a bundle of conventions. And finally, while Regina has a magnificent, voluptuous physique, the hero discovers--by the light of the moon--that the lady of his dreams is too thin! This is unendurable. He rushes away from the town to the heights where stands his lonely dwelling, cursing himself for his folly in being so long blind to the wonderful charm and devotion of the passionate girl who, he feels sure, is waiting for him. He hastens on the very wings of love, wild with his new-found happiness. But the very fidelity of the child of nature has caused her death. She stood out on the bridge--_der Katzensteg_--to warn her lover of his danger. There she is shot by her drunken father, and the impatient lover sees her dead body in the stream below.

Now he has leisure to reflect on what a fool he has been. He sees how much nobler are natural passions than artificial conventions. Regina had lived "on the other side of good and evil," knowing and caring nothing for the standards of society. The entire significance of the novel is summed up in this paragraph:--

"And as he thought and pondered, it seemed to him as if the clouds
which separate the foundations of human being from human
consciousness" (that is, things as they are from our conceptions of
them,--_den Boden des menschlichen Seins vom menschlichen
Bewusstsein_) "were dispersed, and he saw a space deeper than men
commonly see, into the depths of the unconscious. That which men
call Good and Bad, moved restless in the clouds around the surface;
below, in dreaming strength, lay the _Natural_ (_das Natuerliche_).
'Whom Nature has blessed,' he said to himself, 'him she lets safely
grow in her dark depths and allows him to struggle boldly toward
the light, without the clouds of Wisdom and Error surrounding and
bewildering him.'"

But there is nothing new or original in this doctrine, however daring it may be. One can find it all in Nietzsche and in Rousseau. The best thing about the novel is that it once more illustrates Sudermann's sympathy for the outcast and the despised.

An extraordinarily powerful study in morbid psychology is shown in one of his short stories, called _Der Wunsch_. The tale is told backward. It begins with the discovery of a horrible suicide, the explanation of which is furnished to the prostrated lover by the dead woman's manuscript. A man and his wife, at first happily married, encounter the dreadful obstacles of poverty and disease; the fatal illness of his wife plunges the husband into a hard, bitter melancholy. From this he is partially saved by the appearance of his wife's younger sister on the scene, who comes to take care of the sick woman. The close companionship of the two, previously fond of each other, and now united daily by their care of the invalid, results in love; but both are absolutely loyal to the suffering wife. They cannot help thinking, however, of the wonderful happiness that might be theirs, were the man free; nevertheless, they do everything possible to solace the last hours of the woman for whom they feel an immense compassion. One night, as the sister watches at the bedside, and gazes on the face of her sister, she suddenly feels the uncontrollable and fatal _wish_--"Would that she might die!" She is so smitten with remorse that after the death of the invalid she commits suicide. For although her wish had nothing to do with this event, she nevertheless regards herself as a murderer, and goes to self-execution. The physician remarks that this psychological _wish_ is not uncommon; that during his professional services he has often seen it legibly written on the faces of relatives by the bedside--sometimes actuated by avarice, sometimes by other forms of personal greed.

The next regular novel, _Es War_, is the study of a past sin on a man's character, temperament, and conduct. The hero, Leo, has committed adultery with the wife of a disagreeable husband, and, being challenged by the latter to a duel, has killed him. Thus having broken two of the commandments, he departs for South America, where for four years he lives a joyous, care-free, savage existence, with murder and sensuality a regular part of the day's work. It is perhaps a little hard on South America that Leo could live there in such liberty and return to Germany unscathed by the arm of the law; but this is essential to the story. He returns a kind of Superman, rejoicing in his magnificent health and absolutely determined to repent nothing. He will not allow the past to obscure his happiness. But unfortunately his friend Ulrich, whom he has loved since childhood with an affection passing the love of women, has married the guilty widow, in blissful unconsciousness of his friend's guilt. And here the story opens. It is a long, depressing, but intensely interesting tale. At the very close, when it seems that wholesale tragedy is inevitable, the clouds lift, and Leo, who has found the Past stronger than he, regains something of the cheerfulness that characterises his first appearance in the narrative. Nevertheless _es war_; the Past cannot be lightly tossed aside or forgotten. It comes near wrecking the lives of every important character in the novel. Yet the idea at the end seems to be that although sin entails fearful punishment, and the scars can never be obliterated, it is possible to triumph over it and find happiness once more. The most beautiful and impressive thing in _Es War_ is the friendship between the two men--so different in temperament and so passionately devoted to each other. A large group of characters is splendidly kept in hand, and each is individual and clearly drawn. One can never forget the gluttonous, wine-bibbing Parson, who comes eating and drinking, but who is a terror to publicans and sinners.

Last year appeared _Das hohe Lied_, which, although it lacks the morbid horror of much of Sudermann's work, is the most pessimistic book he has ever written. The irony of the title is the motive of the whole novel. Between the covers of this thick volume we find the entire detailed life-history of a woman. She passes through much debauchery, and we follow her into many places where we should hesitate to penetrate in real life. But the steps in her degradation are not put in, as they so often are in Guy de Maupassant, merely to lend spice to the narrative; every event has a definite influence on the heroine's character. The story, although very long, is strikingly similar to that in a recent successful American play, _The Easiest Way_. Lilly Czepanek is not naturally base or depraved. The manuscript roll of her father's musical composition, _Das hohe Lied_, which she carries with her from childhood until her final submission to circumstances, and which saves her body from suicide but not her soul from death, is emblematic of the _elan_ which she has in her heart. With the best intentions in the world, with noble, romantic sentiments, with a passionate desire to be a rescuing angel to the men and women whom she meets, she gradually sinks in the mire, until, at the end, her case is hopeless. She struggles desperately, but each struggle finds her stock of resistance reduced. She always ends by taking the easiest way. Like a person in a quicksand, every effort to escape sinks the body deeper; or, like a drowning man, the more he raises his hands to heaven, the more speedy is his destruction. Much of Lilly's degradation is caused by what she believes to be an elevating altruistic impulse. And when she finally meets the only man in her whole career who respects her in his heart, who really means well by her, and whose salvation she can accomplish along with her own,--one single evening, where she begins with the best of intentions and with a sincere effort toward a higher plane, results in complete damnation. Then, like the heroine in _The Easiest Way_, she determines to commit suicide, and really means to do it. But the same weakness that has made it hitherto impossible for her to triumph over serious obstacles, prevents her from taking this last decisive step. As she hears the splash of her talisman in the cold, dark water, she realises that she is not the stuff of which heroines are made, either in life or in death.

"And as she heard that sound, then she knew instantly that she
would _never_ do it.--No indeed! Lilly Czepanek was _no_ Heroine.
_No_ martyr of her love was Lilly Czepanek. No Isolde, who in the
determination not to be, sees the highest self-assertion. She was
only a poor brittle, crushed, broken thing, who must drag along
through her days as best she can."

And with this realisation she goes wearily back to a rich lover she had definitely forsaken, knowing that in saving her life she has now lost it for ever.