She belongs to me, and to no one, no one else!"
Svava finds this feeling perfectly natural, and reciprocates it. She ardently believes that he brings her as fresh a heart as she brings him; that his past is as free from contaminating experience as is her own.
When, therefore, she obtains proof to the contrary, in an indignant revulsion of feeling, she hurls her glove in his face and breaks the engagement. This act is, I fancy, intended to be half symbolic. The young girl expresses not only her personal sense of outrage; but she flings a challenge in the face of the whole community, which by its indulgence made his transgression easy. She discovers that what in her would have been a crime is in him a lapse, readily forgiven. Her whole soul revolts against this inequality of conditions; and in terminating their relation, which has lost all its beauty, she wishes to cut off all chance of its future resumption.
In order to determine whether this sentiment of pa.s.sionate virginity (which in effect makes the marriage vow of fidelity retroactive) is not, in the present condition of the world, a trifle overstrained, I have submitted the question to two refined women for whom I have a high regard. To my surprise they both declared that Svava, whatever she may have said to the contrary, did not love her _fiance_; that her sorrow and even her indignation were just and natural; but that her somewhat over-conscious purity--her _virginite savante_, as Balzac phrases it in "Modeste Mignon," and her inability to give due weight to ameliorating circ.u.mstances were unwomanly. I confess I am not without sympathy with this criticism. Svava, though she is right in her vehement protest against masculine immorality, is not charming--that is, according to our present notion of what const.i.tutes womanly charm. It is not unlikely, however, that like Leonarda she is meant to antic.i.p.ate a new type of womanhood, co-ordinate and coequal with man, whose charm shall be of a wholly different order. The coquetry, the sweet hypocrisy, nay, all the frivolous arts which exercise such a potent sway over the heart of man have their roots in the prehistoric capture and thraldom; and from the point of view of the woman suffragists, are so many reminiscences of degradation. I fancy that BjOrnson, sharing this view, has with full deliberation made Svava boldly and inexorably truthful, frank as a boy and as uncompromisingly honest as a man.
She has sufficient use for this masculine equipment (I am speaking in accordance with the effete standards) in the battle which is before her.
Dr. Nordan, the family physician, her parents, and those of her _fiance_, take her to task and endeavor to demonstrate to her the consequences of her unprecedented demand. She learns in the course of this prolonged debate that she has been living in a fool"s paradise. She has been purposely (and with the most benevolent intention) deceived in regard to this question from the very cradle. Her father, whom she has believed to be a model husband, proves to have been unworthy of her trust. The elder Christensen has also had a compromising intrigue of the same kind; and it becomes obvious that each male creature is so indulgent in this chapter toward every other male creature, because each knows himself to be equally vulnerable. There is a sort of tacit freemasonry among them, which takes its revenge upon him who tells tales out of school. It is a consciousness of this which makes Christensen, after having declared war to the knife against the Riises, withdraw his challenge and become doubly cordial toward his enemy. Alf, who in the second act has expressed the opinion that a man is responsible to his wife for his future, but not for his past, retracts, and does penance.
Svava, in consideration of his penitence, gives him a vague hope of future reconciliation.[9]
[9] In the later acting version of the play, which ends with the throwing of the glove, this hope of reconciliation is definitely cut off. The author has evidently come to the conclusion that his argument is weakened by Svava"s conciliatory att.i.tude, and he enforces his moral by making the sin appear unpardonable. The acting version, which is more dramatically concise, differs in several other respects from the version here presented; but the other changes seem to be dictated by a stricter regard for the exigencies of theatrical representation. The play has been translated into English under the t.i.tle, "A Gauntlet," London, 1894.
It will be observed by every reader of "A Glove" that it is not a drama, according to our American notion. It has very little dramatic action. It might be styled a series of brilliant and searching debates concerning a theme of great moment. The same definition applies, though in a lesser degree, to "The New System" (1879), a five-act play of great power and beauty. By power I do not mean noise, but convincing impressiveness and concentration of interest. One could scarcely imagine anything farther removed from the ha! and ho! style of melodrama.
"The New System" is primarily social satire. It is a psychological a.n.a.lysis of the effect of the "small state" upon its citizens. It is an expansion and exemplification of the proposition (Act I., 1) that "while the great states cannot subsist without sacrificing their small people by the thousands, small states cannot subsist without the sacrifice of many of their great men, nay of the very greatest." The smooth, crafty man, "who can smile ingratiatingly like a woman," rises to the higher heights; while the bold, strong, capable man, who is unversed in the arts of humility and intrigue, struggles hopelessly, and perhaps in the end goes to the dogs, because he is denied the proper field for his energy. Never has BjOrnson written anything more convincing, penetrating, subtly satirical. He cuts deep; every incision draws blood.
A Norwegian who reads the play cannot well rid himself of a startled sense of exposure that is at first wounding to his patriotism. It is mortifying to have to admit that things are thus in Norway. And the worst of it is that there appears to be no remedy. The condition is, according to BjOrnson, inherent in all small states which cripple the souls of men, stunt their growth, and contract their horizon.
The first act opens with a conversation between the civil engineers Kampe and Ravn, and the former"s son Hans, who has just returned from a prolonged sojourn abroad. The keynote is struck in the sarcastic remark of Ravn, that in a small society only small truths can be tolerated--of the kind that takes twenty to the inch; but great truths are apt to be explosive and should therefore be avoided, for they might burst the whole society. This is _a propos_ of a book which Hans Kampe has written, exposing the wastefulness and antiquated condition of the so-called "new system" of railway management introduced, or supposed to have been introduced, by Kampe"s and Ravn"s brother-in-law, the supervisor-general Riis. The way for Hans to make a career, declares the worldly wise Ravn, is not to oppose the source of promotion and power, but to be silent and marry the supervisor-general"s daughter. Ravn has learned this lesson by bitter experience, and hopes that his nephew will profit by it. All talk about duty to the state and society he pretends to regard as pure moonshine, and he professes not to see the connection between the elder Kampe"s drunkenness and the artificial bottling up to which he has been subjected, the curbing and jailing of t.i.tanic powers which once sought outlet in significant action. The same mighty force which in its repression drives the men to the brandy-bottle makes the women intoxicate themselves with fict.i.tious narratives of high courage, daring rescues, and all kinds of melodramatic heroism. Extremely amusing is the scene in which Karen Riis (who loves Hans and is beloved by him) goes rowing with her friends Nora and Lisa, taking with her a stock of high-strung novels, and when a drowning man cries to them for help they row away posthaste, because the man is naked.
The second act shows us the type of the successful man of compromise, who takes the world as he finds it, and cleverly utilizes the foibles of his fellow-men. The supervisor-general is a sort of personification of public opinion. He is always correct, professes to believe what others believe, and conforms from prudent calculation to the religious customs of the community. He demands of his son Frederic that he shall abandon a young girl whom he loves and has seduced, and he requires of his daughter Karen that she shall, out of regard for her family, renounce her lover. He feigns all proper sentiments and emotions, while under the smooth, agreeable mask lurk malice and cunning. When Hans Kampe"s book reaches him, it never occurs to him to examine it on its merits; his only thought is to make it harmless by inventing a scandalous motive. The elder Kampe has just resigned from the railway service; the supervisor-general (with infamous shrewdness) demands an official inquiry into the state of his accounts. Then all the world will say that Hans Kampe has been used as a cat"s-paw by his father, who, knowing that an investigation is inevitable, wishes to throw dust in the eyes of the public and save his own reputation by attacking that of his superior. It is needless to say that he has not a shadow of suspicion regarding Kampe"s honesty, but merely chooses for his own defence the weapon which he knows to be the most effective.
In order to fortify his position and sound the sentiment of the profession, Riis gives a grand dinner to the engineers of the city, to which Kampe and his son are also invited. The chairman of the committee on railways (of the national diet) is present, and when it appears that Hans Kampe makes a favorable impression upon him, the friends of Riis concoct a scheme to injure him. They inform his father that he is suspected of embezzlement, and get him drunk, whereupon the old man scandalizes the company by a burst of uncomplimentary candor. When Hans arrives the mischief is done; though the pathetic scene between father and son convinces the chairman that, whatever their failings, these men are true and genuine. Simply delicious is the satire in the scene where the ladies discuss the question at issue between Riis and Kampe. But this satire is deprived of much of its force by the subsequent development of the plot. The logical ending would seem to be the triumph of the supervisor-general"s defensive tactics and the discomfiture of his critics. That would have given point to the criticism of the small state and invested the victims of progress with an almost tragic dignity. BjOrnson chooses, however, to let neither the one party nor the other triumph. In a small state, he says, no one is victorious; everything ends in compromise. If two parties championed two different plans of railway construction, the one of which was demonstrated to be superior in economy and safety to the other, such a demonstration would not be likely to result in its adoption. No, the two parties would come together, d.i.c.ker and compromise, and in the end the diet would agree to build one road according to the one plan, and one according to the other. Agreeably to this principle BjOrnson leaves the honors between the combatants about easy; but Riis, deserted by his children, undergoes a partial change of heart and is seized with doubt as to the excellence of his philosophy of life.
That the satire of "The New System" struck home is obvious from the fierceness and virulence of the criticism with which it was hailed. It has never become fairly domesticated on the Scandinavian stages, and probably never will be. In Germany, France, and Holland it has received respectful attention, and (I am informed) has proved extremely effective upon the boards.
In the same year as "The New System" (1879) appeared the delightful novelette "Captain Mansana," dealing with Italian life, and throwing interesting side-lights upon the War of Liberation. There is an irresistible charm in the freshness, the vividness, the extreme modernness of this little tale. The mingled simplicity and sophistication of the Italian character, the histrionic touch which yet goes with perfect sincerity, the author has apprehended and presented with happy realism.
In "Beyond their Strength" (_Over Aevne_) (1883) BjOrnson has invaded the twilight realm of psycho-pathological phenomena, and refers the reader for further information to _Lecons sur le systeme nerveux, faites par J. M. Charcot_, and _etudes cliniques sur l"hystero-epilepsie ou grande hysterie, par le Dr. Richer_. As a man is always in danger of talking nonsense in dealing with a subject concerning which his knowledge is superficial, I shall not undertake to p.r.o.nounce upon the validity of the theory which is here advanced. The play is an inquiry into the significance and authenticity of miracles. Incidentally the theme is faith-healing, the hypnotic effect of prayer, and kindred phenomena.
Pastor Sang, a clergyman in a remote parish of Northern Norway, is famed far and wide as the miracle-priest, and it is popularly believed that he can work wonders, as the apostles did of old. He has given away his large fortune to the poor; in a fervor of faith he plunges into every danger, and comes out unscathed; he lives constantly in an overstrained ecstasy, and by his mere presence, and the atmosphere which surrounds him, forces his wife and children to live in the same state of high nervous tension and unnatural abstraction from mundane reality and all its concerns. His wife, Clara, who loves him ardently, is gradually worn out by this perpetual strain, which involves a daily overdraft upon her vitality; and finally the break comes, and she is paralyzed. For, like everyone who comes in contact with Sang, she has had to live "beyond her strength." She does not fully share her husband"s faith, and though she feels his influence and admires his lofty devotion, there is a half-suppressed criticism in her mind. She feels the unwholesomeness of thus "living by inspiration, and not by reason." When he comes to her, "beaming always with a Sabbath joy," she would fain tune him down, if she could, into a lower key, "the C-major of every-day life," as Browning calls it. But in this effort she has had no success, for Sang"s ecstatic elevation above the concerns of earth is not only temperamental; nature itself, in the extreme North, favors it. As Clara expresses it:
"Nature here exceeds the limits of the ordinary. We have night nearly all winter; we have day nearly all summer--and then the sun is above the horizon, both day and night. Have you seen it in the night? Do you know that behind the ocean vapors it often looks three or four times as large as usual? And then the color-effects upon sky, sea, and mountain! From the deepest glow of red to the finest, tenderest, golden white. And the colors of the aurora upon the wintry sky!" etc.
It is the most ardent desire of Sang to heal his wife, as he has healed many others. But the doubt in her mind baffles him, and for a long time he is unsuccessful. At last, however, he resolves to make a mighty effort--to besiege the Lord with his prayer, to wrestle with him, as Jacob did of old, and not to release him, until he has granted his pet.i.tion. While he lies thus before the altar calling upon the Lord in sacred rapture, a tremendous avalanche sweeps down the mountainside, but divides, leaving the church and parsonage unharmed. The rumor of this new wonder spreads like fire in withered gra.s.s, and among thousands of others a number of clergymen, with their bishop, on their way to some convention, stop to convince themselves of the authenticity of the miracle, and to determine the att.i.tude which they are to a.s.sume toward it. Then follows a long discussion between the bishop and the clergy regarding the value of miracles, some maintaining that the church has outgrown the need of them, others that they are indispensable--that Christianity cannot survive without them. For has not Christ promised that "even greater things than these shall ye do?" Is not this a case of the faith which verily can say to the mountain, "Rise up and cast thyself into the sea?"
The other miracle, scarcely less marvellous than the deflection of the avalanche, is that Clara, who has slept for the first time in a month, now rises from her bed and goes forth to meet her husband, and falls upon his neck amid the ringing of the church-bells and the hallelujahs of the a.s.sembled mult.i.tudes. But when he tries to raise her she is dead, and he himself, overwhelmed by his emotion, falls dead at her side.
This is so obviously a closet-drama that it is difficult to imagine how it would look under the illumination of the foot-lights. For all that, I see a recent announcement that the trial is soon to be made at the _Theatre Libre_ in Paris.[10] No Scandinavian theatre, as far as I know, has as yet had the courage to risk the experiment. In his next play, however, "Love and Geography" (1885), BjOrnson reconquered the stage and repeated his early triumphs. From the scientific seriousness of "Beyond their Strength" his pendulum swung to the opposite extreme of light comedy, almost bordering on farce. Not that "Love and Geography" is without a BjOrnsonian moral, but it is amusingly, jocosely enforced in scenes of great vivacity and theatrical effect. This time it is himself the author has chosen to satirize. The unconscious tyranny of a man who has a mission, a life-work, is delightfully ill.u.s.trated in the person of the geographer, Professor Tygesen, to whom BjOrn BjOrnson, the actor, when he played the part at the Christiania Theatre, had the boldness to give his father"s mask. Professor Tygesen is engaged upon a great geographical opus, and gradually takes possession of the whole house with his maps, globes, and books, driving his wife from the parlor floor and his daughter to boarding-school. So absorbed is he in his work that he can talk and think of nothing else. He neglects the social forms from sheer abstraction and becomes almost a boor, because all the world outside of his book pales into insignificance, and all persons and events are merely interesting in so far as they can stimulate inquiry or furnish information bearing upon the immortal opus. The inevitable consequence follows. The professor alienates all who come in contact with him. He is on the point of losing the affection of his wife, and his daughter comes near going astray for want of paternal supervision.
Both these calamities are, however, averted, though in an arbitrary and highly eccentric manner. The professor"s eyes are opened to the error of his ways, he does penance, and the curtain falls upon a reunited family.
[10] July, 1894.
The unpretentious little story "Dust" (_StOv_, 1882) undertakes to demonstrate the unwholesomeness of the religious ideas regarding the life to come usually impressed upon children by parents and teachers. By dust BjOrnson means all obsolete, lifeless matter in the world of thought which settles upon, and often impairs, the vitality of the living growth, or even chokes it outright. "When children are taught that the life here is nothing compared to the life to come--that to be visible is nothing compared to being invisible--that to be a man is nothing compared to being an angel--that to be alive is nothing compared to being dead--then that is not the way to give them the right view of life; not the way to teach them to love life; not the way to inspire them with courage, energy, and patriotism."
In his novel "Flags in City and Harbor" (1884), the English translation of which is ent.i.tled "The Heritage of the Kurts," BjOrnson has attacked a tremendous problem. He has attempted to ill.u.s.trate the force of heredity, and the exact extent to which it may be modified by environment--to what extent an unfavorable heredity may be counteracted by a favorable environment. The family of Kurt, whose history is here traced through five generations, inherits a temperament which would have secured its survival and raised it to distinction in barbaric ages, but which will as surely, unless powerfully modified, necessitate its extinction in the present age. For the Kurts are incapable of a.s.similating civilization. An excess of physical vigor in the first Kurt who settled in Norway takes the form of lawlessness and an entire absence of moral restraint.
Violence of the most atrocious kind goes unpunished because Kurt is powerful and has friends at court. In his two legitimate sons, Adler and Max (he has a host of illegitimate ones), the family temperament is modified, though in Max, who perpetuates the race, the modification is not radical. Adler is a weakling of enormous vanity, silent and moody, and addicted to the pleasures of the table. Max, on the other hand, is a man of inexhaustible vitality, violent like his father, but possessed of a gift of speech and a tremendous voice which serve to establish his authority over the simple inhabitants of the little coast town.
Moreover, he is endowed with great shrewdness and practical sense, and is an expert in ship-building, agriculture, and other pursuits. But he is the terror of women, and his sensual excesses so undermine his strength that he becomes insane, and believes that he is continually pursued by the spirit of his brother, whose death he had caused. Konrad Kurt, the son of Max, runs away from home because he cannot endure to see his mother maltreated by his father. He inherits a shattered const.i.tution and poor nerves; outwardly he is quite a respectable man, but he has a strong physical need of drink, and every night he goes to bed intoxicated. It is the author"s purpose to show how the sins of his fathers, by a physiological necessity, predisposed Konrad Kurt to drink.
His son, John Kurt, who is the result of a criminal relation, is the complete incarnation of the genius of the family. The fresh blood which he has derived from his English mother has postponed the doom of the race and enabled him to repeat, in a modified form, the excesses of his ancestors. He first distinguishes himself as a virtuoso in swearing. The magnificent redundance and originality of his oaths make him famous in the army, which he chooses as the first field of his exploits. Later he roams aimlessly about the world, merely to satisfy a wild need of adventure. On his return to his native town he signalizes himself by his vices as a genuine Kurt. The little town, however, cannot find it in its heart to condemn a man of so distinguished a race, and society, though it is fully cognizant of his mode of life, not only tolerates but even pets him. He is entertaining, has been everywhere and seen everything.
He meets a young girl, named Thomasine Rendalen, the daughter of an educated peasant, who occupies a position as a teacher. She is large, ruddy, full of health and uncorrupted vigor. John Kurt takes a violent fancy to her, and moves heaven and earth to induce her to marry him. He goes even to the length of bribing all her female friends, and they by degrees begin to sing his praises. At last she yields; a net of subtle influences surrounds her, and unconsciously she comes to reflect the view of society. Her moral prudery begins to appear ridiculous to her, and the so-called common-sense view predominates. The author here, with great earnestness, emphasizes the responsibility of society in weakening the moral resistance of the individual rather than strengthening it.
Thomasine Rendalen would not have married John Kurt if society had not condoned his offences; and society in condoning such offences undermines its own foundations.
After his marriage Kurt endeavors to hold his exuberant nature in check, and for a while is moderately successful. But an uneasy suspicion haunts him that his wife"s friends, in a confidential moment, may expose his delinquencies, and destroy her confidence in him. He watches her like a lynx, surprises her at all hours and places, and thereby produces the suspicion which he is endeavoring to avert. The relation develops with inevitable logic toward an awful crisis. This is brought about by a mere trifle. John Kurt, failing to humble his wife, strikes her. The baleful forces that lurk in the depths of the Kurt temperament rise to the surface; the whole terrible heritage of savagery overwhelms the feeble civilization which the last scion has acquired. If Thomasine had been weak, she would have been killed; but she defends herself with fierce persistency, and though it seems as if she must succ.u.mb, her compact frame, strengthened by generations of healthful toil, possesses an endurance which in the end must prevail over the paroxysmal rage of John Kurt. When the combatants part there is not a whole piece of furniture in the room. John Kurt retires a conquered man. But with cowardly viciousness he locks the door and leaves his wife for hours despairing, while he himself goes to a dinner-party. There he is stricken down by apoplexy.
The terror with which Thomasine contemplates her approaching maternity is one of the finest points in the book. Has she the right to perpetuate such a race, which will be a curse to itself and to future generations?
Would she not confer a boon upon mankind if, by destroying herself, she sweetened the life-blood of humanity? For by self-destruction she would forever cut off the turbid current of the Kurt blood which had darkened the vital stream of the race for centuries. The moral exaltation which manifests itself in this struggle is most vividly portrayed. She clings to life desperately; she is young and strong, unsentimental, and averse to ascetic enthusiasm. It finally occurs to her that her own race, too, will a.s.sert itself in this child; that the pure and vigorous strain which her own blood will infuse may redeem it from the dark destiny of the Kurts. She finally resolves upon a compromise; if the child is dark, like the Kurts, both it and its mother shall die. If it is blue-eyed and light-haired, like the Rendalens, she will devote her life to obliterating in it, or transforming into useful activities, the destructive vigor of the paternal character. Thomas, when he is born, chooses a golden mean between these two extremes, and perversely makes his appearance as a red-haired, gray-eyed infant, in which both a Kurt and a Rendalen might have made comforting observations. He is accordingly permitted to live, and to become the hero of one of the most remarkable novels which has ever been published in Scandinavia.
He is by no means a good boy, but his mother, by a kind of heroic conscientiousness and rationality, slowly conquers him and secures his attachment. She has solemnly abjured her connection with her husband"s family, a.s.sumed her maiden name, and has consecrated her life to what she regards as the highest utility--the work of education. She wishes to atone to the race for her guilt in having perpetuated the race of the Kurts. The scene in which she makes a bonfire of all the ancestral portraits in the Hall of Knights, and the smell of all the burning Kurts is blown far and wide over city and harbor, would, in the hands of another novelist, have been made the central scene in the book. But BjOrnson is so tremendously in earnest that he cannot afford to stop and note picturesque effect. Therefore he relates the burning of the Kurts quite incidentally, and proceeds at once to talk of more serious things.
By turning the great, dusky, ancestral mansion into a school, Mrs.
Rendalen believes that she can best settle the account of the Kurts with humanity. All the latest, improved methods of education are introduced.
The Hall of Knights is turned into a chemical laboratory, and the daylight is allowed to pour un.o.bscured into all its murky recesses.
Through the dim and lofty pa.s.sage-ways resounds the laughter of children; on the scenes of so many h.o.a.ry crimes the prattle of innocent girls is heard; a mult.i.tude of scientific instruments labor to demonstrate the laws of nature, and to simplify the problem of existence which the crimes of the Kurts had tended to complicate. Thomas Rendalen, profoundly impressed as he is with his responsibility as the last descendant of such a race, takes up this educational mission with a lofty humanitarian enthusiasm. He has spent many years abroad in preparing himself for this work, and possesses, like his great-grandfather, the gift of lucid exposition. But his perpetual and conscious struggle with his heritage makes him nervous and ill-balanced.
He conceives the idea, fostered both by observation and by the study of his own family history, that unchast.i.ty is the chief curse of humanity, and the primal cause of the degeneracy of races. He believes that the false modesty which leaves young people in ignorance of one of the most important natural functions is largely responsible for the prevailing immorality, and he advocates, as a remedy, fearless and searching physiological study. His inaugural address as superintendent of the school deals uncompromisingly with this subject, and excites such universal indignation that it comes near wrecking the promising enterprise. A great speech in a small town, BjOrnson hints, is always more or less risky. But we are also given to understand that though Rendalen obviously speaks out of the author"s heart, this very speech is in itself a subtle manifestation of the Kurt heritage. Rendalen is as immoderate in virtue as his ancestors have been in vice. The violent energy which formerly expended itself in lawless acts now expends itself in an excessive, ascetic enthusiasm for self-conquest and lofty humanitarian ideals. As a piece of psychology this is admirable.
Prudent, well adapted or adaptable to the civilization in which he lives, the scion of the Kurts is not yet; but as a promise of the redemption of the race he represents the first upward step. It is highly characteristic of BjOrnson"s respect for reality that he makes Rendalen neither agreeable, handsome, nor lovable; nay, he dwells again and again on the bad relations which temporarily exist between him and his mother, between him and the teachers, between him and the town. For all that we are filled with a profound respect for a man who can fight in himself so great a fight, and win so great a victory. It is the st.u.r.dy peasant blood which he derived from his mother that enables him to wrestle thus mightily with the Lord, and extort at last the tardy blessing; for we are a.s.sured in the last pages of the book that he makes a marriage, which is a further step toward health and virtue. We are not a.s.sured that he conquers happiness either for himself or for his wife; and there is not a syllable to betray that he cherishes for her any romantic attachment. But the chances are that, in transforming and enn.o.bling the Kurt heritage, he insures vigor and usefulness to his descendants. He bequeathes to them a more wholesome mixture of blood than he himself possesses, and an energy, nay, perhaps a genius, derived from the Kurts, which, with an upward instead of a downward tendency, may be a redeeming force in society instead of a corrupting one.
In order not to miss any phase of his problem, BjOrnson also takes up briefly the illegitimate line of the Kurts, which, being unsupplied with any favorable environment, sinks deeper and deeper into the mire of vice. The inevitable result is insanity and ultimate extinction. Mrs.
Rendalen"s visit to the slums, and her recognition of the peculiar scream of her own son in a terrible little ragam.u.f.fin, is one of the most remarkable incidents in this remarkable book.
One thing that especially strikes the reader in this novel is the author"s fierce indignation against all shams, deceits, and social lies.
Therefore he calls a spade a spade, and leaves you to blush if you are so inclined. The young girls whom he introduces are mostly misses in their teens, and his portrayal of them is physiological rather than pictorial. The points which he selects for comment are those which would particularly be noted by their medical advisers; and the progress of their histories, as he follows them, is characterized by this same scientific minuteness of observation. Zola"s ideal of scientific realism (which BjOrnson has repudiated) has nevertheless found its most brilliant exponent in him. Here the sordid and cruel facts of life are not dwelt upon by preference; nor are they optimistically glossed over.
I doubt if a great and vital problem has ever been more vigorously, unflinchingly, and convincingly treated in a work of fiction.
"_Paa Guds Veje_" ("In the Ways of G.o.d"), (1889), in which Thomas Rendalen again figures, though not as hero, is another indictment of conventional morality. It is a very powerful but scarcely an agreeable book. The abrupt, laconic style has no flux, no continuity, and gives the reader the sensation of being pulled up sharply with a curb bit, whenever he fancies that he has a free rein. Though every page is crowded with trenchant and often admirable observations, they have not the coherence of an organic structure, but rather that of a mosaic. The design is obvious, striking, and impressive. It is neither distorted nor overdrawn. It is unquestionably thus we treat moral non-conformists, even though it be in pure self-preservation that they broke the bond which we are agreed to enforce. The question resolves itself into this: Has society, in its effort to uphold its moral standards, the right to exact the sacrifice of life itself and every hope of happiness from the victims of its own ignorance and injustice? When the young physician, Edward Kallem, rescues the eighteen-year old Ragni Kule from the degradation of her marriage to a husband afflicted with a most loathsome disease, and afterward marries her--does he deserve censure or praise?
BjOrnson"s answer is unmistakable. It is exactly the situation, depicted five years later, by Madame Sarah Grand in the relation of Edith to the young rake, Sir Moseley Menteith. Only, BjOrnson rescues the victim, while the author of "The Heavenly Twins" makes her perish. In both instances it is the pious ignorance of clerical parents which precipitates the tragedy. Ragni"s deliverance is, however, only an apparent one. Society, which without indignation had witnessed her sale to the corrupt old libertine, is frightfully shocked by her marriage to Dr. Kallem, and manifests its disapproval with an emphasis which takes no account of ameliorating circ.u.mstances. The sanguinary ingenuity in the constant slights and stabs to which she is exposed makes her life a martyrdom and finally kills her. "Contempt will pierce the armor of a tortoise," says an oriental proverb; and poor Ragni had no chelonian armor. When her most harmless remarks are misinterpreted and her most generous acts become weapons wherewith to slay her, she loses all heart for resistance, and merely lies down to die. Very subtile and beautiful is the manner in which BjOrnson indicates the interaction of psychical and physical conditions. The "soul-frost" which chills the very marrow of her bones is so vividly conveyed that you shiver sympathetically. The self-righteous and brutally censorious att.i.tude of the community lowers the temperature and makes the atmosphere deadly. And the fact that it is Ragni"s unsuspicious innocence, and even her love of her husband, which expose her to this condemnation is made plain with much delicate art. Her residence of five years in the United States after her divorce, and before her second marriage, had, no doubt, accustomed her to a greater freedom of intercourse between man and woman, and thereby disposed her to trip rather lightly over the stumbling-blocks of prudence.
The history of Kallem"s sister, Josephine, and her husband, the Reverend Ole Tuft, which is closely interwoven with the above, furnishes us with two more characters deeply felt and strongly realized. It is they who are the chief instruments of Ragni"s martyrdom. As the upholders of social purity, and, as it were, professional guardians of morals, it would seem that Tuft and his wife had scarcely any choice but to condemn marriage with a _divorcee_. When, however, after Ragni"s death, they discover whom they have slain--how much purer, n.o.bler, and of more delicate nature she was than either of them--they are dissolved in shame and remorse. A tremendous crisis in their spiritual lives is produced by the mortal peril of their only child, whom Kallem saves by a skilful operation. Out of the ancient religion of dogmas which judges and d.a.m.ns, Tuft is by these experiences led into a new religion of love, which values life above faith, and charity above all. The reconciliation of brother and sister in the last chapter is profoundly moving. The moral is emphasized in the phrase with which the story closes: "Wherever good men walk, there are the ways of G.o.d."
The charm of this novel is, to me, that it is strong, virile, instinct with vital thought. There are blemishes in it, too, which no one will be likely to overlook. Several chapters read like the reports of a clinic in a medical journal, so extremely minute and circ.u.mstantial are the accounts of Kallem"s operations and hypnotic experiments. An excursion into botany, _a propos_ of Ragni"s walk in the woods, is likewise overloaded with details and teems with scientific terms. But the greatest blemish is the outbreak in Kallem (who has the author"s fullest sympathy) of a certain barbaric violence which to civilized people is well-nigh incomprehensible. Thus, when, after an absence of six years, he calls upon his brother-in-law, the pastor, he proceeds to turn handsprings about the latter"s study. When, after his marriage, his sister meets him in the street for the purpose of informing him of the scandalous rumors concerning his wife, he gives her a box on the ear.
In BjOrnson"s last book, "New Tales" (_Nye Fortaellinger_) (1894), this tendency to vehemence is even more marked. In the masterly story, "Absalom"s Hair" (than which the author has never written anything more boldly original) old Harold Kaas literally spanks his young wife in the presence of his servants. And the matter is in nowise minced, but described with an unblushing zest which makes the impression of _navete_. It is obvious that in his delight in the exhibition of a healthy, primitive wrath, BjOrnson half forgets how such barbarism must affect his readers. We hear, to be sure, that the servants were filled with indignation and horror, and that Harold Kaas, having expected laughter and applause, "went away a defeated and irremediably crushed man." But for all that the incident is crude, harsh, and needlessly revolting. In Russia it might have happened; but I am inclined to doubt if a Norwegian gentleman, even though he were descended from the untamable Kurts, would have been capable of so outrageous a breach of decency.
Apart from this incident, "Absalom"s Hair" is so interpenetrated with a sense of reality that we seem to live the story rather than read it. I verily believe it to be a type of what the fiction of the future will be, when scientific education shall have been largely subst.i.tuted for the cla.s.sical; and even the novelists will be expected to know something about the world in which they live and the sublime and inexorable laws which govern it. At present the majority of them spin irresponsible yarns, and play Providence _ad libitum_ to their characters. Man"s vital coherence with his environment is but loosely indicated. Chance reigns supreme. They have observed carefully enough the external phenomena of life--and chiefly for their picturesque or dramatic interest--but of the causes which underlie them they rarely give us a glimpse.
It is in this respect that BjOrnson"s last tales offer so grateful a contrast to conventional fiction. Here is a man who has resolutely aroused himself from the old romantic doze, cleared his eyes of the film of dreams, and with a sharp, wide-awake intensity focussed them to the actual aspect of the actual world. He has sat down with his windows wide open, and allowed the sounds and sights and smells of reality to pour in upon him. And the magic spectacles are his which enable him to gauge the significance of the phenomena and divine the causes which lurk behind them. Therefore his characterizations are often extremely unconventional, and amid all their picturesque vigor of phrase hint at the kind of knowledge which could only be possessed by a family physician. In "Absalom"s Hair" we have no mere agglomeration of half-digested scientific data, but a scientific view of life. The story moves, from beginning to end, with a beautiful epic calm and a grand inevitableness which remind one of Tolstoi, and reaches far toward the high-water mark of modern realism. Take, for instance, the characterization of Kirsten Ravn (pp. 11-15), and I wonder where in contemporary fiction so large and deep a comprehension is shown both of psychic and of physical forces. Emma, the heroine of Flaubert"s "Madame Bovary" is the only parallel I can recall, as regards the kind and method of portraiture, though there is no resemblance between the characters. In the development of the character of Rafael Kaas, there is the same beautiful respect for human nature, the same unshrinking statement of "shocking" facts, and the same undeviating adherence to the logic of reality. The hair by which Rafael, as his prototype, the son of David, is arrested and suspended in the midst of his triumphant race is sensuality. His life is on the point of being wrecked, and his splendid powers are dissipated by his inability to restrain his pa.s.sions. The tragic fate which hovers over him from the moment of his birth is admirably hinted at, but not emphasized, in the sketch of his parents.
The carnal overbalance, supplied by the blood of the Kurts, wellnigh neutralizes the mechanical genius which is hereditary in the blood of the Ravns.
It is reported that "Absalom"s Hair" has aroused great indignation in Christiania, because it is claimed that the characters are drawn, with scarcely an attempt at disguise, from well-known persons in the Norwegian capital.
The remaining stories of the volume, "An Ugly Reminiscence of Childhood," "Mother"s Hands," and "One Day" betray the same contempt for romantic standards, the same capacity for making acquaintance with life at first hand. The first-named is an account of a murder and execution, and extremely painful. The second is a bit of pathological psychology _a propos_ of intemperance. Tastes imprisoned, genius cramped and perverted, joy of life (_joie de vivre_) denied, will avenge themselves.
They will break out in drunkenness. The hero of "One Day" is afflicted with the same vice, and apparently for the same reason. The cruel disillusion which in consequence overtakes the poor little soul-starved heroine rises almost to the height of tragedy. It is an every-day tale, full of "deep and blood-veined humanity," and deriving its interest and significance from the very fact of its commonness.
What distinguishes the Nors.e.m.e.n above other nations is, generally speaking, an indestructible self-respect and force of individuality. The old Norse sagas abound in ill.u.s.trations of this untamable vigor and ruthless self-a.s.sertion. It was the looseness of the social structure, resulting from this sense of independence and consequent jealousy and internecine warfare, which destroyed the Icelandic republic and made Norway for four centuries a province of Denmark. In all the great men of Norway we recognize something of the rampant individualism of their Viking forefathers. Ibsen is the modern apostle _par excellence_ of philosophic anarchism; and BjOrnson, too, has his full share of the national aggressiveness and pugnacity. For all that there is a radical difference between the two. The sense of social obligation which Ibsen lacks, BjOrnson possesses in a high degree. He fights, not as a daring guerilla, but as the spokesman and leader of thousands. He is the chieftain who looms a head above all the people. He wields a heavy sword, and he deals mighty blows. The wrath that possesses him is, however, born of love. He fights man in the name of humanity. It is not for himself, primarily, that he demands larger liberties, securer rights, more humanizing conditions of life; but it is for his fellow-men. The many, the small and down-trodden, the dumb millions, whom Ibsen despises, BjOrnson loves. As Dr. Brandes[11] has so happily said:
[11] Det Moderne Gjennembruds Maend, p. 60.
"Ibsen is a judge, stern as the old judges of Israel. BjOrnson is a prophet, the hopeful herald of a better day. Ibsen is, in the depth of his mind, a great revolutionist. In "The Comedy of Love," "A Doll"s House," and "Ghosts," he scourges marriage; in "Brand," the State Church; in the "Pillars of Society," the dominant bourgeoisie. Whatever he attacks is shivered into splinters by his profound and superior criticism. Only the shattered ruins remain, and we are unable to espy the new social inst.i.tutions beyond them. BjOrnson is a conciliatory spirit who wages war without bitterness. April sunshine glints and gleams through all his works, while those of Ibsen, with their sombre seriousness, lie in deep shadow. Ibsen loves the idea--the logical and psychological consistency which drives Brand out of the church and Nora out of the marital relation. To Ibsen"s love of the idea corresponds BjOrnson"s love of man."