5oth Birthdag box 39/1
the mountalns, is feund bg the nemnphelit
sprite Rautendelein, tended to lise und hap¬
piness again, and inspired with new creative
energy. He now determines to tound jor¬
bells, not church beils. But his forsaken
children wander up into his retreat, hearing
in an urn the tears of their mother, who lnd
cast herself into the lake. Her dead hand
touches and sounds Die versunkene
Glocke, and Heinrich awakes from bis
dream, and endeavours, too late, to cast off
Rautendelein. He dies, and the dream of
bringing joy and beauty into the world dies
with him. The versc of this Märchen drama
has been variously estimated by native
critics. Certain it is that poetry is Haupt¬
mann's native element. He is Dichter,
whlich indicates a temperament more than
an achievement. Another quasi-aliegorical
fairy tale,“ Und Pippa tanzt.“ and a blank¬
verse play, Kaiser Karls Geisel,“ contain
the same central idea as" The Sunken
Bell. The haunting Idea of. Beauty,
typified as a maiden of non-mortal charm,
who destroys while she enchants, comes to#
men in Hauptmann's view from the woods
and wild places.“ Pippa is, as it were,
an earth bubble, who dances at the bidding
of Huhn, the artificer, even as the glass
bubbles dance under the hands of the
blower. Gersuind, the scourge (Geisel) of
the Emperor Charlemagne, is of witch-like
primeval charm. These two, with Rauten¬
delein, are forms of the same essential
impression of life that Hauptmann delights
to depict.
Though his work has been so far tinged
with melancholy, it is not of the Byronie
type. He loves his kind, and in the years
of creation that remain his versatile genius
may perhaps be occupied with brighter
themes, and may ultimately produce some
such gift of serene beauty as" The "
Tempest.“
He has found able exponents
for his work on the stage, a proof that actors
at least accept him as the possessor of a
sense of character upen whose foundations
they may, as they say,“ create.“ Want of
space forbids more than the briefest men. W(S
tion of the peasant pieces,“ Fuhrmann
Henschel,
Rose Berndt,? and the
popuiar“ Hannele, of which an English Vg
version has been given in London, or of the
two painter-plars, Michael Kramer“ and NKo
College Crampton.
Suffice it that bis
present high reputation is firmly founded
on achievement and not likely to be
permanently shaken.
Schnitzler.
Arthur Schnitzler, born just six months
earlier than Hauptmann, belongs to Ger¬
man literature, but is of Austrian Jewish
origin, and first caught the public ear by an
experiment of the most opposite kind from
Hauptmann’s social drama. The witty
dialogues in which Anatol figures are
known to the British public through the
stage and printed versions of Mr Granville
Barker. This Viennese Don Juan (if he
even deserves the comparative dignity of
such a title) struck a note which has been
constantly repeated in Schnitzler’s work,
and the merits and limitations of his pre¬
sentment are at once clearly scen. It is
not the modern way to represent man as
master of his fate, and in that respect bot'i
our dramatists are children of theage. But.
whereas Hauptmann'’s characters succumb
for the most part to oppression from wita
eut, Schnitzler’s fascmating youths, for
fascinating they remain, are infected with
an incurable weakness of spirit. Anatoi
may regret the entanglements of his
various amours, but he has no sense
of sin or of duty.
In Schnitzler
remarkabiv fine novel,“ Der Weg ins
Freie“ (1908), Georg von Wergenthin.
though deeper, is almost as irrespon
sible as Anatel. Fatalism, a delicate per¬
ception of character, and a fine sympath,
are this author’s most notable qualities¬
Love and death are his topics, the lover¬
being for the most part, according to the
French tradition, married persons, whese
entanglements and recouplings sccm almos:
incredible to a healthy taste. His latest
plav, Das weite Land, might be de¬
scribed as a study in conjugal infidelite
But, incidentally, he touches in a bach¬
ground of all sorts and conditions of men
Thus. in“ Freiwild“ (1896), whose subje¬
is the duel problem, a complete impressicn
is given of the oflicer class (Offizierstand
Das Märchen! treats various views
female honour unon a background of musier
the mountalns, is feund bg the nemnphelit
sprite Rautendelein, tended to lise und hap¬
piness again, and inspired with new creative
energy. He now determines to tound jor¬
bells, not church beils. But his forsaken
children wander up into his retreat, hearing
in an urn the tears of their mother, who lnd
cast herself into the lake. Her dead hand
touches and sounds Die versunkene
Glocke, and Heinrich awakes from bis
dream, and endeavours, too late, to cast off
Rautendelein. He dies, and the dream of
bringing joy and beauty into the world dies
with him. The versc of this Märchen drama
has been variously estimated by native
critics. Certain it is that poetry is Haupt¬
mann's native element. He is Dichter,
whlich indicates a temperament more than
an achievement. Another quasi-aliegorical
fairy tale,“ Und Pippa tanzt.“ and a blank¬
verse play, Kaiser Karls Geisel,“ contain
the same central idea as" The Sunken
Bell. The haunting Idea of. Beauty,
typified as a maiden of non-mortal charm,
who destroys while she enchants, comes to#
men in Hauptmann's view from the woods
and wild places.“ Pippa is, as it were,
an earth bubble, who dances at the bidding
of Huhn, the artificer, even as the glass
bubbles dance under the hands of the
blower. Gersuind, the scourge (Geisel) of
the Emperor Charlemagne, is of witch-like
primeval charm. These two, with Rauten¬
delein, are forms of the same essential
impression of life that Hauptmann delights
to depict.
Though his work has been so far tinged
with melancholy, it is not of the Byronie
type. He loves his kind, and in the years
of creation that remain his versatile genius
may perhaps be occupied with brighter
themes, and may ultimately produce some
such gift of serene beauty as" The "
Tempest.“
He has found able exponents
for his work on the stage, a proof that actors
at least accept him as the possessor of a
sense of character upen whose foundations
they may, as they say,“ create.“ Want of
space forbids more than the briefest men. W(S
tion of the peasant pieces,“ Fuhrmann
Henschel,
Rose Berndt,? and the
popuiar“ Hannele, of which an English Vg
version has been given in London, or of the
two painter-plars, Michael Kramer“ and NKo
College Crampton.
Suffice it that bis
present high reputation is firmly founded
on achievement and not likely to be
permanently shaken.
Schnitzler.
Arthur Schnitzler, born just six months
earlier than Hauptmann, belongs to Ger¬
man literature, but is of Austrian Jewish
origin, and first caught the public ear by an
experiment of the most opposite kind from
Hauptmann’s social drama. The witty
dialogues in which Anatol figures are
known to the British public through the
stage and printed versions of Mr Granville
Barker. This Viennese Don Juan (if he
even deserves the comparative dignity of
such a title) struck a note which has been
constantly repeated in Schnitzler’s work,
and the merits and limitations of his pre¬
sentment are at once clearly scen. It is
not the modern way to represent man as
master of his fate, and in that respect bot'i
our dramatists are children of theage. But.
whereas Hauptmann'’s characters succumb
for the most part to oppression from wita
eut, Schnitzler’s fascmating youths, for
fascinating they remain, are infected with
an incurable weakness of spirit. Anatoi
may regret the entanglements of his
various amours, but he has no sense
of sin or of duty.
In Schnitzler
remarkabiv fine novel,“ Der Weg ins
Freie“ (1908), Georg von Wergenthin.
though deeper, is almost as irrespon
sible as Anatel. Fatalism, a delicate per¬
ception of character, and a fine sympath,
are this author’s most notable qualities¬
Love and death are his topics, the lover¬
being for the most part, according to the
French tradition, married persons, whese
entanglements and recouplings sccm almos:
incredible to a healthy taste. His latest
plav, Das weite Land, might be de¬
scribed as a study in conjugal infidelite
But, incidentally, he touches in a bach¬
ground of all sorts and conditions of men
Thus. in“ Freiwild“ (1896), whose subje¬
is the duel problem, a complete impressicn
is given of the oflicer class (Offizierstand
Das Märchen! treats various views
female honour unon a background of musier