"Then a wild joy took possession of me, and stealthily I pressed him to me; something within me shouted joyously: "Oh! how I would cherish and protect you; how I would kiss away the furrows misery has made in your brow, and the cares from your soul! How I would toil for you with all my young strength, and never rest till your eyes were fill of gladness, and your heart of sunshine. But to do that----"
"I glanced over at Martha. Yes, she lived, still lived. Her bosom rose and sank in short, quick sobs. She seemed more alive than ever.
"And suddenly there flamed before me, and it was as if I read written clearly on the wall the words:
""If only she were to die!"
""Yes, that was it, that was it. Oh! if only she were to die! Oh! if only she were to die!""
We have only to read Jean Ricard"s _S[oe]urs_, a novel lately published in Paris, and dealing with the same theme, to recognise how very far superior is Sudermann"s treatment of it.
The volume of short tales ent.i.tled _Im Zwielicht_ is of a somewhat different character. Though coloured to some extent by the melancholy and "inevitableness" of the longer novels, those qualities are less intense, and we have lively touches of satire and brilliant flashes of wit that remind us of the sprightliness of French writers. The tales are told in the twilight by one or other of two friends, a man and a woman, between whom there exists merely an intellectual bond of sympathy and union. The stories laugh good-naturedly at narrow-mindedness and silly prejudice, an evil that Sudermann wisely recognises as existing everywhere, in the big city as in the small village. Women"s social aspirations, their immense delight in entertaining celebrities, and their belief that in so doing they are moving in the stream of the world"s history, are satirised with keenness and truth. He strikes a deeper note in the tale that sets forth the difficulties of friendship and love between a woman of mature years and a young man, a subject ably treated by Jean Richepin in his fine novel, Madame Andre, and it is very interesting to note the coincidence of view of the French and German writer. Perhaps Sudermann"s views may help towards a satisfactory solution of that ever-recurring will-o"-the-wisp--platonic affection. His heroine declares that to turn friendship into love, or love into friendship, is impossible, because where such a transformation does take place, there must, in the first instance, have been either not friendship or not love. "From the day on which we reap love where we sowed friendship, the magic charm would be broken," she says, "Till then I was all and everything--then I should be merely one more." And again, "Love begins in the intoxication of the senses, and ends in the peace of calm friendship, that is marriage; the contrary is not forbidden, but it leads--to the desert."
In _Iolanthe"s Hochzeit_, Sudermann proves himself the possessor of the humour that borders on pathos. The little story has no tendency, it preaches no sermon, Onkel Hanckel, "a good fellow (_ein guter Kerl_) by profession," relates how he had to live up to the t.i.tle, and how, at the mature age of forty-seven, he became, almost against his will, engaged to a young girl. His feelings at the wedding ceremony, his horror and shyness at the notion of being left alone with his bride afterwards, form a most delightful piece of comedy. Putz, a surly, grasping, miserly, rich old man; Lothar, a dashing young lieutenant of dragoons; the maiden sister; and Iolanthe herself--are portrayed with a quaint humour of which the earlier works gave little indication, while the vigour, simplicity, and directness of the narrative are as fine as ever. The East Prussian dialect lends the original a local colour that would be difficult to reproduce in a translation.
In his dramas Sudermann treats life very much from the same standpoint as Ibsen does. His characters talk a great deal, and do next to nothing. He wages war against shams, thinks people should live out their own lives and develop their individuality at all hazards. He presents abnormal types, men and women who would be abnormal anywhere, in civilised society or the reverse, and who must not be taken as representative of modern life. Each of the three dramas he has as yet given us presents a moral problem to the consideration of the spectators.
_Die Ehre_ was first performed at the Lessing Theatre in Berlin, on November 27, 1889, and had an immense success. The dramatist ruthlessly and boldly draws aside the curtain from the false ideas of honour held by high and low alike, not only by the middle cla.s.s and proletariat of Berlin, but by civilised men in general: such social conventions, according to Sudermann, tend to make money-getting the sole aim of the citizen, and help to undermine the peace and happiness of family life.
The revelation is undoubtedly unpleasing, but all the same a great truth underlies it, and in the end of the play the virtuous are not sacrificed to the wicked. In the speeches of Count Trast, the good angel, the G.o.d from the machine of the drama, it is not perhaps altogether fanciful to see the beliefs and opinions of Sudermann himself. Trast"s conclusion is that we shall do better to subst.i.tute duty for the many and varied sorts of honour recognised by society.
_Sodom"s Ende_ is a startling play. Even the Berlin censorship required alterations before it could permit the production of the drama on the stage of the Lessing Theatre. It still contains one scene that would effectually prevent its performance in an English playhouse. The drama takes its name from the t.i.tle of a picture painted by w.i.l.l.y Janowski, who bids fair to become a great artist. But he has fallen under the influence of Adah Barcinowski, a cold, heartless, pleasure-loving woman, the wife of a wealthy stockbroker. That connection and his own weak nature have ruined w.i.l.l.y mentally, morally, and physically. He ceases to work, leads a life of self-indulgence, heedless of the hurt he does to others. The character, unpleasing as it is, is consistently drawn by the dramatist, for even in the pangs of death w.i.l.l.y does not cease to note the artistic pose taken by the dead body of the girl he has injured and betrayed. Never, perhaps, has the worst side of that section of frivolous idle society we are accustomed to call "smart"
been more ably painted: its foolish vapidity, its utter futility, and its elegant wickedness and sinfulness, are boldly displayed.
Unfortunately men and women without conscience, without comprehension of duty, have always existed and still exist, but we doubt if their evil influence is as far-reaching and all-important as latter-day novelists and dramatists would have us believe.
In his latest play, _Heimat_, produced January 7, 1893, Sudermann takes for theme the duty owed by the child to the parent, and that due from parent to child. A high-spirited and talented girl, daughter of commonplace, conventional parents, to the scandal of all concerned, leaves her home to carve for herself a career in the world, and by reason of her fine voice becomes a celebrated singer. After an absence of many years chance brings her professionally to her native town, and a very natural desire is awakened in her to revisit her parents and her home. Her father, whose health had been destroyed through the effects of her former disobedience, wishes her to come back provided she renounces for ever the life she has been leading. This she has no desire to do, but for her father"s sake she is not all unwilling to yield. When, however, she is further required to break with certain ties very dear to her, she refuses, and the father dies from the shock.
Now when we carefully read the play, or see it acted by competent artists, it is clear that much might be said on both sides. But as there is nothing in the world more beautiful and holy than the tie that binds parent and child, so is the contemplation of conflict between them always unlovely. We grant that in the storm and stress of modern life such conflict is at times unavoidable, but it is scarcely the stuff of which works of art should be formed.
A new play, a comedy, _Schmetterling-Schlacht_ (b.u.t.terfly Battle), is to be produced shortly at the Hofburg Theatre in Vienna. Again a moral problem is to be presented to the consideration of the public. The three heroines, honest working girls, paint b.u.t.terflies on fans for a living. Two of the girls, tired of being sweated, give up fan painting; they take to painting their faces instead, and practice other abominations. The third girl continues her work, and remains virtuous.
The play chiefly consists of a series of discussions between the girls as to which way of life is preferable.
Like his contemporaries, Ibsen and Bjornson, Zola and Tolstoi, Sudermann would transfer the sermon from the pulpit to the stage: he sets before us certain phases of life that have come under his notice in all their ugliness and brutality, and would have us forthwith leave the theatre sworn enemies of the evils he denounces. But his characters are contented to preach and discuss, they never feel that they are called upon to act. Thus they lack life and reality, we have little sympathy with them, and are never profoundly touched.
As a writer of fiction, however, Sudermann"s high position is una.s.sailable. He ranks with the great masters in all countries who have sought, and are still seeking, to set before us modern life in its manifold aspects, in its complexity and its difficulties, but who, unlike the more p.r.o.nounced school of naturalists, remember Joubert"s maxim that "fiction has no business to exist unless it is more beautiful than reality."
_August_, 1894.
THE WISH.
I.
In the old doctor"s bedroom a cheerful fire was flickering. He himself still lay a-bed, quite penetrated by the delightful sensation of a man who knows his life"s work is completed. When one has been sitting half a century through, for twelve long hours every day, in the rumbling conveyance of a country doctor, thumped and b.u.mped along over stones and lumps of clay, one may now and again lie in bed till daylight, especially when one knows one"s work is safe in younger hands.
He stretched and straightened his stiff old limbs, and once more buried in the pillows his weather-beaten, yellowish-grey face, covered with white stubble like granite with Iceland moss. But habit, that austere mistress, who had for so many years driven him forth from his bed before dawn, whether it was necessary or not, would not let him rest even now.
He sighed, he yawned, he abused his laziness, and then reached for the bell standing on the little table at his bedside.
His housekeeper, an equally grey, tumble-down specimen of humanity, appeared on the threshold.
"What time is it, Frau Liebetreu?" he called out to her.
Since the day on which the young a.s.sistant arrived in Gromowo, the old Black Forest clock hanging at the doctor"s bedside, and whose rattling alarum had often unpleasantly jarred upon his morning slumbers, was no longer wound up. "So that I know that my life too henceforth stands still," as he was wont to say.
"A quarter to eight, doctor," the old woman answered, beginning meanwhile to busy herself about the stove.
"For shame! for shame!" cried he, raising himself up, "what a lazybones I am getting to be! I say, have any letters come?"
"Yes, a few by post, and one that young Mr. h.e.l.linger brought himself two hours ago."
"Two hours ago! Why, it was dark yet at that time!"
"Yes; he said he had to drive out to the manor farm, and could wait no longer. Yesterday evening, too, when you were at the "Black Eagle,"
sir, he called, and sat here for about two hours."
"Why didn"t you send for me?" cried the doctor, in the bl.u.s.tering tone of voice of old, good-natured grumblers.
"Well, and hadn"t he forbidden us to do so?" cried his housekeeper, in exactly the same tone of voice, which seemed, however, more an echo of her master"s manner than personal defiance. "He was sitting in the study till ten o"clock--or rather he was not sitting, he raced about like a madman, and laughed and talked to himself--I hardly knew the calm, quiet man again; and then I brought him beer--six bottles--he drained them all; and I had to drink with him. As I tell you, he was quite beside himself."
"Ah, indeed, indeed," muttered the old man smiling to himself with satisfaction. "I should say Olga had something to do with that. Perhaps after all she----. Well, do you intend bringing me my letters to-day, or not?" he suddenly shouted, as if he were goodness knows how wild, but his face laughed the while. And when his housekeeper had grumblingly done his bidding, he drew out with a sure hand from the little heap of letters one without a stamp, not deigning to look at the others at all. His hands trembled with happy excitement as he unfolded the paper; and he read, while his grey face beamed with pleasure:
"Dear old Uncle,--You shall be the first to know it. If only I had you with me, that I might press your dear old hands and tell you face to face what is in my heart! I do not realise it yet--my head whirls when I think of it! Uncle, you were at my side in the days of darkest trouble, helping and protecting. You were the only one to take Martha"s part when all--even my parents turned their backs on her with coldness and suspicion.
"You could not save her for me, uncle--the Lord asked her back of me.
But when, at the bedside of my dead wife, my reason threatened to give way, you took my poor head between your hands and spoke to me--as a preacher speaks. And you were right. Of course I do not believe that I can ever quite revive and become again as I was before the cares of existence and my longing for Martha made my head dull and heavy; for even Martha--even my wife--could not accomplish that in the three years of our quiet happiness. But life seems about to give me whatever it has left for me yet of joy and peace. You know, uncle, how in the midst of my sorrow for my dead wife, I learnt to love her sister. Cousin Olga, more and more. I confessed all to you, and sought comfort with you when tortured by self-reproach at the thought that I was breaking my troth to my wife already in the year of mourning. And you said to me at that time: "If the dead woman might seek a second mother for her child, whom else would she choose but the sister whom, next to you, she loved best in the world?" I was startled to the very depths of my soul, for I should never have dared to raise my eyes to her. But you never ceased to encourage me, until, a week ago, I took heart and begged her to share my fortunes.
"You know she refused me.
"She grew deathly pale--then gave me her hand, and standing up rigidly said to me: "Put it from your thoughts, Robert, for I can never be your wife." Then I slunk away, and thought to myself, "It serves you right for your presumption." And now, to-day----. Uncle, I cannot put it on paper!--my hand fails me. This happiness is too great--it came so unexpectedly, it almost overpowers me! To-morrow, uncle--to-morrow I will tell you all.
"I have to go out early to the manor farm. At mid-day I shall return, and then forthwith shall undertake the dreaded visit to my parents. My mother suspects nothing as yet. Her plans have once again been frustrated, and Olga will have to suffer heavily enough for it. I fear she may even turn her out of the house. If only I had her already under my own roof!
"It is three o"clock in the morning. Enough for to-day. Your grateful and happy
"Robert h.e.l.linger."
The old doctor wiped a tear from his cheek.
"The dear boy," he murmured. "How his emotions crowd each other in his over-heated brain; and how simple, how honest everything is to the last jot! In truth, he deserves you, my brave, proud girl; he is the only one to whom I do not grudge you. And now I will put you to the test, and see if you too put confidence in your old uncle. Straightway I will do it."