In June, 1867, about a hundred enthusiastic youths were vociferously
celebrating the attainment of the baccalaureate degree at the
University of Norway. The orator on this occasion was a tall, handsome,
distinguished-looking young man named Alexander Kielland, from the
little coast-town of Stavanger. There was none of the crudity of a
provincial dither in his manners or his appearance. He spoke with a
quiet self-possession and a pithy incisiveness which were altogether
phenomenal.
“That young man will be heard from one of these days,” was the unanimous
verdict of those who listened to his clear-cut and finished sentences,
and noted the maturity of his opinions.
But ten years passed, and outside of Stavanger no one ever heard of
Alexander Kielland. His friends were aware that he had studied law,
spent some winters in France, married, and settled himself as a
dignitary in his native town. It was understood that he had bought
a large brick and tile factory, and that, as a manufacturer of these
useful articles, he bid fair to become a provincial magnate, as his
fathers had been before him. People had almost forgotten that great
things had been expected of him; and some fancied, perhaps, that he
had been spoiled by prosperity. Remembering him, as I did, as the most
brilliant and notable personality among my university friends, I began
to apply to him Malloch’s epigrammatic damnation of the man of whom
it was said at twenty that he would do great things, at thirty that
he might do great things, and at forty that he might have done great
things.
This was the frame of mind of those who remembered Alexander Kielland
(and he was an extremely difficult man to forget), when in the year 1879
a modest volume of “novelettes” appeared, bearing his name. It was, to
all appearances, a light performance, but it revealed a sense of style
which made it, nevertheless, notable. No man had ever written the
Norwegian language as this man wrote it. There was a lightness of touch,
a perspicacity, an epigrammatic sparkle and occasional flashes of wit,
which seemed altogether un-Norwegian. It was obvious that this author
was familiar with the best French writers, and had acquired through
them that clear and crisp incisiveness of utterance which was supposed,
hitherto, to be untransferable to any other tongue.
As regards the themes of these “novelettes” (from which the present
collection is chiefly made up), it was remarked at the time of their
first appearance that they hinted at a more serious purpose than their
style seemed to imply. Who can read, for instance, “Pharaoh” (which
in the original is entitled “A Hall Mood”) without detecting the
revolutionary note which trembles quite audibly through the calm
and unimpassioned language? There is, by-the-way, a little touch of
melodrama in this tale which is very unusual with Kielland. “Romance
and Reality,” too, is glaringly at variance with the conventional
romanticism in its satirical contributing of the pre-matrimonial and the
post-matrimonial view of love and marriage. The same persistent tendency
to present the wrong side as well as the right side--and not, as
literary good-manners are supposed to prescribe, ignore the former--is
obvious in the charming tale “At the Fair,” where a little spice of
wholesome truth spoils the thoughtlessly festive mood; and the squalor,
the want, the envy, hate, and greed which prudence and a regard for
business compel the performers to disguise to the public, become the
more cruelly visible to the visitors of the little alley-way at the rear
of the tents. In “A Good Conscience” the satirical note has a still more
serious ring; but the same admirable self-restraint which, next to the
power of thought and expression, is the happiest gift an author’s fairy
godmother can bestow upon him, saves Kielland from saying too much--from
enforcing his lesson by marginal comments, _à la_ George Eliot. But he
must be obtuse, indeed, to whom this reticence is not more eloquent and
effective than a page of philosophical moralizing.
“Hope’s Clad in April Green” and “The Battle of Waterloo” (the first and
the last tale in the Norwegian edition), are more untinged with a moral
tendency than any of the foregoing. The former is a mere _jeu d’esprit_,
full of good-natured satire on the calf-love of very young people, and
the amusing over-estimate of our importance to which we are all, at that
age, peculiarly liable.
As an organist with vaguely-melodious hints foreshadows in his prelude
the musical _motifs_ which he means to vary and elaborate in his fugue,
so Kielland lightly touched in these “novelettes” the themes which in
his later works he has struck with a fuller volume and power. What he
gave in this little book was it light sketch of his mental physiognomy,
from which, perhaps, his horoscope might be cast and his literary future
predicted.
Though an aristocrat by birth and training, he revealed a strong
sympathy with the toiling masses. But it was a democracy of the brain, I
should fancy, rather than of the heart. As I read the book, twelve years
ago, its tendency puzzled me considerably, remembering, as I did, with
the greatest vividness, the fastidious and elegant personality of the
author. I found it difficult to believe that he was in earnest. The
book seemed to me to betray the whimsical _sans-culottism_ of a man of
pleasure who, when the ball is at an end, sits down with his gloves
on and philosophizes on the artificiality of civilization and the
wholesomeness of honest toil. An indigestion makes him a temporary
communist; but a bottle of seltzer presently reconciles him to his lot,
and restores the equilibrium of the universe. He loves the people at a
distance, can talk prettily about the sturdy son of the soil, who is
the core and marrow of the nation, etc.; but he avoids contact with
him, and, if chance brings them into contact, he loves him with his
handkerchief to his nose.
I may be pardoned for having identified Alexander Kielland with this
type with which I am very familiar; and he convinced me, presently, that
I had done him injustice. In his next book, the admirable novel _Garman
and Worse_, he showed that his democratic proclivities were something
more than a mood. He showed that he took himself seriously, and he
compelled the public to take him seriously. The tendency which had only
flashed forth here and there in the “novelettes” now revealed its
whole countenance. The author’s theme was the life of the prosperous
bourgeoisie in the western coast-towns; he drew their types with a hand
that gave evidence of intimate knowledge. He had himself sprung from
one of these rich ship-owning, patrician families, had been given every
opportunity to study life both at home and abroad, and had accumulated
a fund of knowledge of the world, which he had allowed quietly to grow
before making literary drafts upon it. The same Gallic perspicacity
of style which had charmed in his first book was here in a heightened
degree; and there was, besides, the same underlying sympathy with
progress and what is called the ideas of the age. What mastery of
description, what rich and vigorous colors Kielland had at his disposal
was demonstrated in such scenes as the funeral of Consul Garman and the
burning of the ship. There was, moreover, a delightful autobiographical
note in the book, particularly in boyish experiences of Gabriel Garman.
Such things no man invents, however clever; such material no imagination
supplies, however fertile. Except Fritz Reuter’s Stavenhagen, I know no
small town in fiction which is so vividly and completely individualized,
and populated with such living and credible characters. Take, for
instance, the two clergymen, Archdeacon Sparre and the Rev. Mr. Martens,
and it is not necessary to have lived in Norway in order to recognize
and enjoy the faithfulness and the artistic subtlety of these portraits.
If they have a dash of satire (which I will not undertake to deny), it
is such delicate and well-bred satire that no one, except the originals,
would think of taking offence. People are willing, for the sake of the
entertainment which it affords, to forgive a little quiet malice at
their neighbors’ expense. The members of the provincial bureaucracy are
drawn with the same firm but delicate touch, and everything has that
beautiful air of reality which proves the world akin.
It was by no means a departure from his previous style and tendency
which Kielland signalized in his next novel, _Laboring People_ (1881).
He only emphasizes, as it were, the heavy, serious bass chords in the
composite theme which expresses his complex personality, and allows the
lighter treble notes to be momentarily drowned. Superficially speaking,
there is perhaps a reminiscence of Zola in this book, not in the manner
of treatment, but in the subject, which is the corrupting influence of
the higher classes upon the lower. There is no denying that in spite
of the ability, which it betrays in every line, _Laboring People_ is
unpleasant reading. It frightened away a host of the author’s early
admirers by the uncompromising vigor and the glaring realism with
which it depicted the consequences of vicious indulgence. It showed
no consideration for delicate nerves, but was for all that a clean and
wholesome book.
Kielland’s third novel, _Skipper Worse_, marked a distinct step in his
development. It was less of a social satire and more of a social study.
It was not merely a series of brilliant, exquisitely-finished scenes,
loosely strung together on a slender thread of narrative, but it was
a concise, and well constructed story, full of beautiful scenes
and admirable portraits. The theme is akin to that of Daudet’s
_L’Evangéliste_; but Kielland, as it appears to me, has in this instance
outdone his French _confrère_ as regards insight into the peculiar
character and poetry of the pietistic movement. He has dealt with it
as a psychological and not primarily as a pathological phenomenon. A
comparison with Daudet suggests itself constantly in reading Kielland.
Their methods of workmanship and their attitude towards life have many
points in common. The charm of style, the delicacy of touch and felicity
of phrase, is in both cases pre-eminent. Daudet has, however, the
advantage (or, as he himself asserts, the disadvantage) of working in
a flexible and highly-finished language, which bears the impress of the
labors of a hundred masters; while Kielland has to produce his effects
of style in a poorer and less pliable language, which often pants and
groans in its efforts to render a subtle thought. To have polished this
tongue and sharpened its capacity for refined and incisive utterance is
one--and not the least--of his merits.
Though he has by nature no more sympathy with the pietistic movement
than Daudet, Kielland yet manages to get, psychologically, closer to his
problem. His pietists are more humanly interesting than those of
Daudet, and the little drama which they set in motion is more genuinely
pathetic. Two superb figures--the lay preacher, Hans Nilsen, and Skipper
Worse--surpass all that the author had hitherto produced, in depth of
conception and brilliancy of execution. The marriage of that delightful,
profane old sea-dog Jacob Worse, with the pious Sara Torvested, and the
attempts of his mother-in-law to convert him, are described, not with
the merely superficial drollery to which the subject invites, but with a
sweet and delicate humor, which trembles on the verge of pathos.
The beautiful story _Elsie_, which, though published separately, is
scarcely a full-grown novel, is intended to impress society with a sense
of responsibility for its outcasts. While Björnstjerne Björnson is fond
of emphasizing the responsibility of the individual to society, Kielland
chooses by preference to reverse the relation. The former (in his
remarkable novel _Flags are Flying in City and Harbor_) selects a
hero with vicious inherited tendencies, redeemed by wise education and
favorable environment; the latter portrays in Elsie a heroine with no
corrupt predisposition, destroyed by the corrupting environment which
society forces upon those who are born in her circumstances. Elsie could
not be good, because the world is so constituted that girls of her kind
are not expected to be good. Temptations, perpetually thronging in her
way, break down the moral bulwarks of her nature. Resistance seems in
vain. In the end there is scarcely one who, having read her story, will
have the heart to condemn her.
Incomparably clever is the satire on the benevolent societies, which
appear to exist as a sort of moral poultice to tender consciences, and
to furnish an officious sense of virtue to its prosperous members. “The
Society for the Redemption of the Abandoned Women of St. Peter’s Parish”
is presided over by a gentleman who privately furnishes subjects for his
public benevolence. However, as his private activity is not bounded by
the precincts of St. Peter’s Parish, within which the society confines
its remedial labors, the miserable creatures who might need its aid
are sent away uncomforted. The delicious joke of the thing is that “St.
Peter’s” is a rich and exclusive parish, consisting of what is called
“the better classes,” and has no “abandoned women.” Whatever wickedness
there may be in St. Peter’s is discreetly veiled, and makes no claim
upon public charity. The virtuous horror of the secretary when she
hears that the “abandoned woman” who calls upon her for aid has a child,
though she is unmarried, is both comic and pathetic. It is the clean,
“deserving poor,” who understand the art of hypocritical humility--it is
these whom the society seeks in vain in St. Peter’s Parish.
Still another problem of the most vital consequence Kielland has
attacked in his two novels, _Poison_ and _Fortuna_ (1884). It is,
broadly stated, the problem of education. The hero in both books is
Abraham Lövdahl, a well-endowed, healthy, and altogether promising boy
who, by the approved modern educational process, is mentally and
morally crippled, and the germs of what is great and good in him are
systematically smothered by that disrespect for individuality and
insistence upon uniformity, which are the curses of a small society.
The revolutionary discontent which vibrates in the deepest depth of
Kielland’s nature; the profound and uncompromising radicalism which
smoulders under his polished exterior; the philosophical pessimism
which relentlessly condemns all the flimsy and superficial reformatory
movements of the day, have found expression in the history of the
childhood, youth, and manhood of Abraham Lvdahl. In the first place, it
is worthy of note that to Kielland the knowledge which is offered in
the guise of intellectual nourishment is poison. It is the dry and dusty
accumulation of antiquarian lore, which has little or no application
to modern life--it is this which the young man of the higher classes is
required to assimilate. Apropos of this, let me quote Dr. G. Brandes,
who has summed up the tendency of these two novels with great felicity:
“The author has surveyed the generation to which he himself belongs, and
after having scanned these wide domains of emasculation, these prairies
of spiritual sterility, these vast plains of servility and irresolution,
he has addressed to himself the questions: How does a whole generation
become such? How was it possible to nip in the bud all that was
fertile and eminent? And he has painted a picture of the history of the
development of the present generation in the home-life and school-life
of Abraham Lövdahl, in order to show from what kind of parentage those
most fortunately situated and best endowed have sprung, and what kind
of education they received at home and in the school. This is, indeed, a
simple and an excellent theme.
“We first see the child led about upon the wide and withered common
of knowledge, with the same sort of meagre fodder for all; we see it
trained in mechanical memorizing, in barren knowledge concerning things
and forms that are dead and gone; in ignorance concerning the life
that is, in contempt for it, and in the consciousness of its privileged
position, by dint of its possession of this doubtful culture. We see
pride strengthened; the healthy curiosity, the desire to ask questions,
killed.”
We are apt to console ourselves on this side of the ocean with the idea
that these social problems appertain only to the effete monarchies of
Europe, and have no application with us. But, though I readily admit
that the keenest point of this satire is directed against the small
States which, by the tyranny of the dominant mediocrity, cripple much
that is good and great by denying it the conditions of growth and
development, there is yet a deep and abiding lesson in these two novels
which applies to modern civilization in general, exposing glaring
defects which are no less prevalent here than in the Old World.
Besides being the author of some minor comedies and a full-grown drama
(“The Professor”), Kielland has published two more novels, _St. John’s
Eve_ (1887) and _Snow_. The latter is particularly directed against
the orthodox Lutheran clergy, of which the Rev. Daniel Jürges is an
excellent specimen. He is, in my opinion, not in the least caricatured;
but portrayed with a conscientious desire to do justice to his
sincerity. Mr. Jürges is a worthy type of the Norwegian country pope,
proud and secure in the feeling of his divine authority, passionately
hostile to “the age,” because he believes it to be hostile to Christ;
intolerant of dissent; a guide and ruler of men, a shepherd of the
people. The only trouble in Norway, as elsewhere, is that the people
will no longer consent to be shepherded. They refuse to be guided and
ruled. They rebel against spiritual and secular authority, and follow
no longer the bell-wether with the timid gregariousness of servility and
irresolution. To bring the new age into the parsonage of the reverend
obscurantist in the shape of a young girl--the _fiancée_ of the pastor’s
son--was an interesting experiment which gives occasion for strong
scenes and, at last, for a drawn battle between the old and the new. The
new, though not acknowledging itself to be beaten, takes to its heels,
and flees in the stormy night through wind and snow. But the snow is
moist and heavy; it is beginning to thaw. There is a vague presentiment
of spring in the air.
This note of promise and suspense with which the book ends is meant to
be symbolic. From Kielland’s point of view, Norway is yet wrapped in the
wintry winding-sheet of a tyrannical orthodoxy; and all that he dares
assert is that the chains of frost and snow seem to be loosening. There
is a spring feeling in the air.
This spring feeling is, however, scarcely perceptible in his last book,
_Jacob_, which is written in anything but a hopeful mood. It is, rather,
a protest against that optimism which in fiction we call poetic justice.
The harsh and unsentimental logic of reality is emphasized with a
ruthless disregard of rose-colored traditions. The peasant lad Wold,
who, like all Norse peasants, has been brought up on the Bible, has
become deeply impressed with the story of Jacob, and God’s persistent
partisanship for him, in spite of his dishonesty and tricky behavior.
The story becomes, half unconsciously, the basis of his philosophy of
life, and he undertakes to model his career on that of the Biblical
hero. He accordingly cheats and steals with a clever moderation, and in
a cautious and circumspect manner which defies detection. Step by step
he rises in the regard of his fellow-citizens; crushes, with long-headed
calculation or with brutal promptness (as it may suit his purpose)
all those who stand in his way, and arrives at last at the goal of his
desires. He becomes a local magnate, a member of parliament, where he
poses as a defender of the simple, old-fashioned orthodoxy, is decorated
by the King, and is an object of the envious admiration of his fellow
townsmen.
From the pedagogic point of view, I have no doubt that _Jacob_ would be
classed as an immoral book. But the question of its morality is of
less consequence than the question as to its truth. The most modern
literature, which is interpenetrated with the spirit of the age, has a
way of asking dangerous questions--questions before which the reader,
when he perceives their full scope, stands aghast. Our old idyllic faith
in the goodness and wisdom of all mundane arrangements has undoubtedly
received a shock from which it will never recover. Our attitude towards
the universe is changing with the change of its attitude towards us.
What the thinking part of humanity is now largely engaged in doing is to
readjust itself towards the world and the world towards it. Success is
but a complete adaptation to environment; and success is the supreme
aim of the modern man. The authors who, by their fearless thinking
and speaking, help us towards this readjustment should, in my opinion,
whether we choose to accept their conclusions or not, be hailed as
benefactors. It is in the ranks of these that Alexander Kielland has
taken his place, and now occupies a conspicuous position.