Über den Hauptspielern aber kommen die andern nicht zu kurz, und eine halbe Seite Ewald von Kleist gewidmet bringt uns,, diesen schwermutvollen, menschenflüchtigen, duldsamen Menschen, der so voll Sehnsucht nach Freude durchs Leben ging und doch so unfähig war, selbst Frohsinn zu wecken zum erstenmal nahe in einem so weit gespannten Rahmen, der zudem zur richtigen Proportionierung nationaler Gestalten ständig Ausblicke über die Grenzen erlauben muß. Der Kunst, deren Ausdrucksmittel das Wort ist, werden zahlreiche feine Wortwandel- und Stilbeobachtungen gerecht: Wollust wird zur Freude Hagedorns und klingt,, vielstimmig durch ein ganzes Jahrhundert weiter; zu Klopstock hinüber, zu Schiller und bis in das Finale von Beethovens Neunter Symphonie,"—,, Die Partikel, Wenn,' das Wahrzeichen sentimentaler Lyrik, ist dem Minnesang ebenso eigen, wie dem Volkslied und der Lyrik Klopstocks." Und abschließend zum Laokoon: Das Zeitalter der beschreibenden Poesie, oder grammatisch-stilistisch ausgedrückt, das des Substantiv- und Adjektivstils, war vorüber; ein Gedicht wie Goethes, Auf dem See,' in dem alle Schilderung in Verba der Bewegung aufgelöst war, gab zehn Jahre nach dem Laokoon Lessing in allem wesentlichen recht." Der Anhang,,, Die allgemeinen Tendenzen der Geniebewegung im 18. Jahrhundert," ist schon im Jahre 1912 als Leipziger Universitätsprogramm erschienen. Ein Vergleich zwischen ihm und dem eigentlichen Buche scheint mir besonders in der Darstellung die reifere Ernte der dazwischenliegenden Jahre zu beweisen. Und doch mußte das Werk ein Torso bleiben, weil dieser Mann, der oft so zierlich und preziös erschien, der noch wie ein junges Mädchen vor seinen Seminaristen erröten konnte, jenes Erbteil, deutscher, norddeutscher Zweifelsucht in sich trug, zu oft, seine Entwürfe ins Feuer warf,' zu oft, bereicherte und wieder vereinfachte und noch am Ende seiner Laufbahn den Satz schrieb:,, Mag sein, daß Literaturgeschichte nur von einem Gelehrten geschrieben werden darf und ich keiner bin.“ Erschüttert stehen wir vor diesem Zeugnis einer problematischen Natur. Erschüttert mag wohl mancher den Abguß seiner Totenmaske im Münchner Theaterarchiv betrachten und jener Hand, die den Reichtum von Büchern, Stichen und Marionetten sammelte und die saubern Miniaturbühnen schuf, einen Schatz, dessen Umfang der Gewissenhafte und Bescheidene nicht einmal seine nächsten Freunde ahnen ließ. OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY ERNST FEISE Jakob Wassermann, Der Aufruhr um den Junker Ernst. Berlin: S. Fischer Verlag, 1926. Wassermann has struck a new note in this novel. There is absent the sensationalism of his recent cinemas of hectic contemporary life depicting millionaires and divorce lawyers in big cities. Yet this poetic story localized in and about Würzburg in the first half of the seventeenth century is not purely historical; its figures have eternal values as symbols in the struggle of light against darkness, and as such they have a very contemporary interest in these post-war years in Germany as well as in America. Junker Ernst is a youth of fourteen endowed with "die Lust zu fabulieren" and the personal charm of a Shelley. His story-telling wins him large audiences of children throughout the country-side and many friends among the grown-ups. Even his uncle, the notorious witch-burning Bishop Philipp Adolf von Ehrenberg, succumbs to his spell in spite of himself. But not so Pater Gropp, a Jesuit, secretary and right hand of the Bishop of Würzburg, who according to historical records of the time burned at the stake on the charge of witchcraft hundreds of women and also several young noblemen and pages, a blind girl, and two children under nine years of age. When he becomes aware of Junker Ernst's love of poetry, of freedom, of beauty, and of imagery, he feels for him an instinctive hatred and decides that for the greater glory of God he must be put to death as one more soul possessed with the devil. Wassermann draws a most convincing and depressing picture of the times when men were in the power of those whom Nietzsche calls "Die Prediger des Todes," "Die Verächter des Leibes," or "Die Schwindsüchtigen der Seele." To summarize what was going on one is tempted to quote further from Zarathustra: "Blutzeichen schrieben sie auf den Weg, den sie gingen, und ihre Torheit lehrte, daß man mit Blut die Wahrheit beweise." The small, envious, bigoted and sadistic fanatics are psychologically analyzed; as Nietzsche has it, "Wenn sie sagen: ‘ich bin gerecht,' so klingt es immer gleich wie: 'ich bin gerächt."" But Junker Ernst is not executed; the children come to the city by the hundreds, storm the prison, and free him. There is something profoundly symbolical in this, quite aside from the thrillingly told story. Nor is it, regarded as fact, in the least surprising to one who has lived in China; for there in recent years school children have frequently marched in political demonstrations, burned down the house of a "traitorous" cabinet member, and freed their fellow students from prison. And did we not have a Children's Crusade in our own Middle Ages, of which present-day China is the counterpart? I mention this by way of stressing that in this novel Wassermann avoids sensationalism; the events are all plausible, the characters convincing, and the archaisms in the text lend a true historic flavor. In many respects the book recalls his first novel, Die Juden von Zirndorf, describing the suffering of the Jews, likewise in the seventeenth century and in Bavaria. The chief charm of the book, however, lies in the masterful portrait of Friedrich von Spee, the poet of Trutz-Nachtigall. Wassermann gets his best effects by restraint; von Spee, his hair prematurely gray because of the suffering he has had to witness in confessing the poor women who were burned at the stake, is generally a silent figure in the background. When he visits Junker Ernst in his cell in prison, he makes no mention of repentance or preparation for death, but he offers the boy some degree of comfort by letting him talk of his rambles in the woods where he discovered the hiding places of the owls and deer. In short, it is a worthy portrait of the first man to protest effectively against witch-burning, and of the poet of Truts-Nachtigall, who consumed himself in the service of his fellowmen, who loved all the beauties of nature, and who could write the song calling on the ox and the ass to eat roses that they might with their sweet breath warm the Child in the manger. A. E. ZUCKER UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND The Oxford Book of Scandinavian Verse. XVIIth Century-XXth Century. Chosen by Sir Edmund Gosse and W. A. Craigie. New York: Oxford University Press, American Branch, 1925. $3.75. Presumably, there are not a score of persons in this country-more in England, I judge who understand Swedish, Danish, Norwegian landsmaal, and Modern Icelandic sufficiently to derive enjoyment from the choice contents of this Golden Treasury of Scandinavian poetry. For those who understand one or the other of these languages, there exist a number of satisfactory anthologies of the individual literatures, notably Danish, edited by competent native authors: indeed, an embarrassment of riches. One is not inclined to take too seriously the protestations of the co-editors in their general preface that the selection has been prepared with an English audience in mind. All in all, rarely was a handsomely gotten up volume less called for as little "called for," indeed, as were many of the creations of frail and pensive beauty here enshrined when they were first offered to the "book market." The syndics of the Oxford University Press are to be congratulated for their idealism; and those whom it concerns should see to it that sufficient attention is called to the publication before it is shelved inconspicuously to collect dust among the many, the all-too-many other books. Incidentally, before it does this it might serve a quizzically useful purpose-to convince those drunk with the wealth and power of our land that true culture is not a necessary concomitant of "a car for every family." Of course it will not. As brought together in this florilegium, the joint output of lyrical poetry in the small, poverty-stricken Scandinavian nations is easily comparable to that of any other large nation-barring, perhaps, England-in originality, in delicate sense of form, in solid spiritual values. If I counted correctly, there are 126 authors, represented by 280 poems. By bulk, 116 pages are given to Denmark, 42 to Norway, 113 to Sweden, 82 to Iceland. Surprising though this may seem to some, this allotment is exceedingly fair. Both Denmark and Sweden have had a continuous and rich literary history during the last three centuries; whereas an independent Norwegian literature can be said to have arisen only a generation or so after that country won its independence, early in the nineteenth century. Since then, to be sure, the profoundly original lyrics of Wergeland, Björnson, and Ibsen shine with an extraordinary lustre. As to Iceland-tiny outpost of civilization in the howling wastes of the Arctic Seas-its literary life, interestingly sui generis, is continuous with a slender thread down from the oldest times and boasts of a number of poets of versatility and power ludicrously out of proportion to the resources and numbers on the island. It is always invidious to criticize an anthology, difference in taste being axiomatic. When the selection has been entrusted to such good hands as those of Sir Edmund Gosse and W. A. Craigie, we may rest assured that it has been done excellently well. Within the English speaking world a more fortunate choice of editors was hardly possible. Sir Edmund, besides being a poet in his own right, has with admirable catholicity of taste labored all his life to bring foreign literatures home to his own insular nation, in particular those of the Northern countries. He has done this with a considerable number of appreciative essays and by skilful translations. His Northern Studies (1879), in which he introduced Ibsen and Björnson, may be said to mark an epoch in English letters. Professor Craigie is known to every student of Icelandic. Nevertheless your critic must have his fling. "The design is not purely esthetic, but historical as well." Notwithstanding this guiding restriction, a somewhat stronger emphasis on the truly great might have been desirable and feasible. In the case of Norway this is attained, for obvious reasons. Not so with the sister countries. To be specific, that most extraordinary lyrical phenomenon, Bellman, within his limitations the most spontaneous singer of Europe during the latter half of the eighteenth century; Fröding, the greatest musical and rhythmical genius Sweden has so far produced; and Drachmann, the Byron of Denmark, have to be content with a beggarly six pages each (the latter two, by the way, with curiously unrepresentative poems); against the sixteen given to Oehlenschläger, and the nine of Grundtvig—an allotment to which the fewest would assent on any grounds. Far more seriously, one misses Arne Garborg and Jeppe Aakjær. They should unquestionably have found a prominent place. In the Icelandic part, I find it strange that Stephan G. Stephansson and Einar Benediktsson should have been mentioned in the introduction but no example of their work given. Surely, the former's wistful “þó þú langförull legðir" and the latter's colorfully joyous "Sumarmorgun í Ásbyrgi" have sunk deep into the hearts of their countrymen. On historical principles, too, Bjarni Thórarensen's "Eldgamla Ísafold" and Matthias Jochumsson's "Ó, Guð vors lands!" might have been included. The comparatively difficult proofreading has been done commendably well. Few serious mistakes have been noted, except that the year of Drachmann's death is given as 1919 (instead of 1908), that Sophus Claussen's name is consistently misspelled, and that Johan Skjoldborg's birth date (1861) is omitted. UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS L. M. HOLLANDER AMERICAN BIBLIOGRAPHY OF GERMANIC LANGUAGES AND LITERATURES, JANUARY-FEBRUARY 19271 I. GENERAL Jespersen, Otto. Mankind, Nation and Individual from a Linguistic Point of View. Oslo 1925. (Instituttet for Sammenlignende Kulturforskning. Series A, IV.) Rev. by E. J. Bashe: PQ, VI, 1, (Jan.), p. 96. Petsch, RoberT. Gehalt und Form. Gesammelte Abhandlungen zur Literaturwissenschaft u. zur allgemeinen Geistesgeschichte. Dortmund 1925. Rev. by A. R. Hohlfeld: PQ, VI, 1, (Jan.), pp. 91, 92. Contains 22 papers published between 1903 and 1924. II. MISCELLANEOUS Germanic Review, Vol. I. Rev. by A. W. Porterfield: SRL, (Jan. 1), p. 484. CLEMEN, OTTO. Valentin Ickelsamer. MP, XXIV, 3, (Feb.), pp. 341-350. Ickelsamer first to realize a German Grammar could not merely be an adaptation of a Latin work. First to teach sounds in reading. Complete account of life and works. MUNCKER, FRANZ. Obituary, by Camillo von Klenze: GR, II, 1, (Jan.), p. 81. III. GERMANIC PHILOLOGY SEHRT, EDWARD H. German Trespe. MLN, XLII, 1, (Jan.), pp. 38, 39. Suggests Lat. (miles) gregārius > MAHR, August C. Vom Optativ des kindlichen Spiels. JEGP, XXVI, 1, (Jan.), pp. 106-111. Restricts himself to his native Frankfurt dialect (Middle Rhenish Franconian). Mode of ideal reality, not dependent on Vordersatz. In play of children same seriousness as in symbols of religion for adults. Optative became like Zauberformel an utterance implying fulfilment. Not like so-called subjunctive of modest statement. SCANDINAVIAN BUCKHURST, HELEN MCMILLAN. An Elementary Grammar of Old Icelandic. London 1925. Rev. by George T. Flom: SS, IX, 5, (Feb.), pp. 162, 163. Finds attempt confusing to correlate Old and Modern Icelandic in one book. Criticisms offered on phonology; considers treatment of adverbs, prepositions and conjunctions excellent. STURTEVANT, A. M. Some Etymologies of certain Old Norse Words dealing with the Supernatural. SS, IX, 5, (Feb.), Etymologies of Dólgr, flyka, reimt, skars: skass, ski, skrípi. 1 The compiler requests that his attention be called to material he has overlooked, so that it may be added to the bibliography for March-May. |