"FERMENTATION TIME"
Goaded by misfortune, the recalcitrant scholar returned to Upsala
determined to distinguish himself by obtaining his degree or by writing
a successful play which would compensate for past failures. His return
was made possible by the possession of a few hundred kronor, left to
him under his mother's will.
With five kindred souls he founded a poetical guild to which the
name _Rune_--"Song"--was given. The meetings of the brethren were
occasions for improvisation and tippling, for hair-splitting arguments
and epicurean excesses. They philosophised over life and literature,
expressed the joy of existence in music, and alcoholic melancholy in
sad tales of suffering.
August wrote and read poetry which breathed idealism, nature-worship
and patriotism. He sang to the guitar, sometimes sentimental
folk-songs, sometimes compositions of a less worthy kind.
The dialectics of the company stimulated August's powers of expression,
though they interfered with his studies.
A friend advised him to write a one-act play in verse. This, he said,
would have a greater chance of being acted than a tragedy in five
acts, which August thought more fitting. The one-act play was written
in a fortnight. It was called _In Rome_ and dealt with Thorvaldsen's
first stay in that city. The idea had long been present in his mind.
It burst into dramatic shape with unmistakable force, and the friends,
recognising that it had a living spirit, prophesied that it would be
accepted. The birth of the play was duly celebrated with carousals, in
which the author was acclaimed with generous admiration.
The psychology of drunkenness was one of the subjects for incisive
discussion and historical analysis at the meetings of the _Rune_. The
members certainly did not lack practical experience of its mental
perplexities, but, however vinous their youthful judgment of the
problems of life generally, they appraised the possibilities of August
Strindberg's art with singular accuracy.
Strindberg's slender resources did not save him from the pinch of
poverty. He had tasted luxury in the doctor's house. His room in
Upsala was squalid; the rain came through the ceiling, fire-wood was
scarce, and occasional frugal suppers of bread and water were forcible
reminders of life's realities. He managed, nevertheless, to study
æsthetics and living languages with a new ardour. His range of reading
was widened, and his critical faculties were in a continuous process of
development.
Ibsen and Björnson dominated the intellectual horizon. August had
been deeply stirred by _Brand_, when reading it a year earlier, and
had felt the soul-struggles of Ibsen's deliverer to be identical with
his own, but he now reacted against the Norwegian invasion of the
Swedish mind. The gloom of the mountains and fjords of Norway, the
poverty and enforced abstinences of its people were reflected in the
minds of its writers, and had no rightful place amongst the smiling
lakes and flower-strewn sward of Sweden. Ibsen's women now roused the
instinctive sex-antagonism in Strindberg; he hated Nora, and the whole
brood of matriarchal ideas, of which he thought Ibsen a dangerous
modern exponent. Strindberg's later writings against women are
indirect replies to Ibsen; and his objections to woman's struggle for
emancipation were expressed with a controversial vehemence which robbed
them of literary effect.
In the autumn of 1870 _In Rome_ was performed at the Royal Theatre at
Stockholm. The author was twenty-one years old. He watched the play,
standing in his old place in the gallery. The inebriation of success
was now followed by acute pangs of self-criticism. He felt as if he had
been under an electric battery, his legs trembled, and he wept with
nervousness. A friend seized his hand to calm him.
"Every stupidity," he writes, "which had slipped into the verse shook
him and jarred upon his ears. He saw nothing but imperfections in his
work. His ears burnt with shame, and he ran out before the curtain
fell."
The attacks upon the clergy now seemed stupid and unjust, the
glorification of poverty and pride, mistaken; the description of his
relationship to his father, cynical.
He had found his own play stupid; he was overcome with shame, and death
by drowning in the rapid waters of Norrström seemed the only atonement.
The incident is characteristic of the man. The thoughts which a few
months before had been conjured up by the imaginative contemplation
of Thorvaldsen before the statue of Jason, of the struggle between
filial duty and artistic consciousness, were now outside their author,
dismissed, objects of pity. He had grown, whilst the imperfect words
lay dead on the paper.
The evening ended in the company of friends. His searchings after
perfection and his intellectual remorse were assuaged by food and drink
and by the gratification of the lower impulses, to which he yielded
without the sense of shame or sin.
On the following day he read a favourable notice of the play, in which
the language was described as beautiful, and the anonymous author was
said to be a well-known critic who was familiar with the artistic world
in Rome.
Thus he made his first acquaintance with the sweets of dramatic
criticism. In Rome has nothing of the fierce personality which, in his
later plays, outraged the critics of Sweden. There are strokes of fine
picturing, and there is charm of phrase, but the piece is meagre in
conception and puerile in expression.
He returned to Upsala and was now, by his father's intervention,
lodged in the house of the widow of a clergyman. It was hoped that a
well-regulated home-life, with sufficiency of food and a minimum of
comfort, would provide his spirits with wholesome restraint. But the
reverse happened. There were a number of undergraduates staying in the
house; the table was laden with good things; card-playing and heavy
drinking occupied the evenings. August was frequently drunk, his brain
was saturated with the clashing opinions of the young men, who loudly
wooed their _Weltanschauung_; he was dissatisfied, persecuted by doubts
and unreasonable remorse. He was in love--for the eighth time--and the
object of his love was, as usual, unattainable.
In Rome had met with severe, though not altogether unjust criticism in
another paper. His earlier play, The Freethinker, had been printed and
published anonymously through the kind offices of a friend. It fell
into the hands of a hostile journalist who ridiculed it. Strindberg now
underwent the painful experience of mental dissection at the hands of a
ruthless critic. However willingly we may condemn ourselves and indulge
in the bitter-sweet contemplation of the follies of yesterday's ego,
the rude touch of another's flail arouses every fibre of self-defence.
Though he had promised his father to turn his face against the
temptations of authorship and to give single-minded attention
to studies, the creative impulse could not be quelled. He wrote
_Blotsven_, a tragedy in five acts, which reiterated the religious
rebellion of _The Freethinker_, depicting the struggle between the
spirit of the Viking and proselytising Christianity. The old Icelandish
tales which he now read in the original, and the influence of
Oehlenschläger, had helped to mould the form.
At this time he became absorbed in the mentality of the Danish writer
Sören Kierkegaard. His book _Enten-Eller_--Either Or--which treats
of the struggle between the flesh and the spirit, and which preaches
the life-fearing asceticism of the helpless sensualist, stirred
Strindberg's doubts and self-reproaches. An elder friend by the
runic name of "Is," whose real name was Josef Linck, managed, by the
simulation of much learning, culminating in intellectual nihilism, to
persuade August that his stand-point was untenable. The friend talked
philosophy, æsthetics, world-history, dished up Kant, Schopenhauer,
Thackeray and George Sand, and dyed August's soul with impotent
scepticism.
The result was that Strindberg burnt the MSS. of his _Blotsven_. The
friend had shown that he was not a poet, and the tears which he shed
over the ashes were embittered by the knowledge that he had deceived
his father.
He hurriedly decided to pass his examination in Latin compositions.
He had not made the requisite preparation, called on the Professor in
a state of after-dinner exaltation, demonstrated his independence of
spirit, and was promptly turned out.
The suicide of a student brought the supernatural to the door of the
already over-visited mind. Strindberg had met the unhappy man some days
before and avoided his company. On visiting the place of the tragedy,
he was completely unnerved by the sight of blood and the gruesome
associations. He felt half guilty of murder, could not sleep and was
haunted by the dead man. The Runic brethren watched over him, but his
friend "Rejd" nevertheless found him with a bottle of prussic acid
and sinister intentions. The friend shrewdly suggested a preparatory
sacrificial rite of four "toddies" before the fatal poison was
drained. The desired effect was soon apparent. August had to be carried
home, but as the gate of the house was closed his friends threw him
over the fence. He remained in a snow-drift until he had recovered
sufficiently to find his room. But his ghost-ridden soul did not find
peace until he quitted Upsala a few days later.
He confessed his sins to his father and obtained permission to remain
at home, and to prepare for his degree in a less disturbing atmosphere.
He now "felt protected as if he had landed after a night's stormy
voyage," and slept calmly in his old truckle-bed. _Blotsven_ rose from
the ashes. He re-wrote it in a fortnight. It was now condensed into one
act under the title _The Outlaw_, and was sent to the theatre.
Being thus relieved of the supreme duties to his dramatic _daimon_, he
again descended to Latin compositions and passed his examen in spite of
continued defiance of the Professor's rules of procedure. The æsthetic
thesis, which he submitted shortly afterwards, was promptly returned
to him by the Professor, with the remark that its contents were more
suitable for the fair readers of an illustrated weekly than for an
academical discourse. This was indeed injustice. August had poured out
his most mature views on realism versus idealism, utilising the Danish
dramatist Oehlenschläger as a buffer between his new and his old self.
The essay is re-printed in full in the autobiography, and is well worth
reading. The style is rich in imagery and analogy, the conclusions
audacious, though a gentle world-weariness pervades every argument.
Strindberg's later style as an incisive essayist is discernible in
spite of the periphrastic treatment of dramatic problems from Sophocles
to Shakespeare. The desire to show erudition is apparent on every
page, and the author confesses that the wish to show the Professor
his profound knowledge of Danish literature was one of his motives in
choosing the subject. The Professor's unsympathetic attitude towards
his review of Danish literature was, therefore, mortifying.
His quiet life at home had begun well. The earlier struggle against
poverty had been superseded by well-ordered home-life. August's
sisters were now grown up; he was impressed and felt sanctified by
their unostentatious discharge of daily duties which contrasted so
sharply with his own wild and worthless past. The stem father had been
mellowed by time, and August spent many evenings with him in friendly
talk on great subjects.
But rebellion soon drove the son away. August resented some trifling
interference with his liberty, borrowed a few hundred kronor, and
settled for the summer in a fisher-man's cottage on one of the Baltic
islands outside Stockholm. With three of the Runic brethren he now
threw himself into a healthy outdoor life, bathing, sailing, fencing.
The body was to be taught natural goodness, and the counsels of Satan
were to be unheeded. He studied philology, avoided alcohol, and dwelt
with Dante, Shakespeare and Goethe. Natural asceticism and the mental
discipline of classifying root-words would curb his vigorous fantasy
and help him to acquit himself with honour at Upsala. He could expect
no further help from the father.
At the beginning of the autumn term he arrived in Upsala hungry and
with one krona in his pocket. He felt justified in borrowing from
friends, for he was confident of the future. With the small sums which
he succeeded in drawing on the bank of friendship he rented a miserable
room, which contained little but a bed without sheets or pillowcases.
He lay on it in his underclothing, reading by the light of a candle
stuck in a bottle. Kind friends were responsible for an irregular
supply of food, but no spartan resolutions could temper the cold
weather. He succeeded in borrowing a little wood and carried it home
under cover of darkness. A physicist taught him to extract the full
calorific value from the charcoal. There was a stovepipe in the room
which was hot every Thursday when the landlady did her washing. Then
he stood reading with his hands on his back, leaning against the pipe,
with the chest of drawers doing service as a reading-desk.
His Viking play had meanwhile been accepted. The first performance was
received coldly. The critics were ungracious; he was accused of having
borrowed the form from Ibsen, though the cold restraint and rugged
simplicity of the language were directly inspired by the Icelandish
Sagas.
Sick at heart, Strindberg resumed his battle with poverty and
dejection. The darkness of uncertainty was again upon him, when, with
the suddenness which is usually reserved for good boys in fairy tales,
Fortuna held out her hand. He received a letter announcing that the
King was interested in his play and wished to see him. He could not
believe his eyes, and suspected that the letter was a joke. On being
re-assured of the genuineness of the message, he went to Stockholm
and was received by Charles XV. The King smiled as the young author
made his stumbling way to the royal presence through the lines of
courtiers, and greeted him with geniality. Charles XV, himself a poet,
expressed the pleasure which he had derived from the Viking play, and
his personal interest in the revival of the old northern tales. After
inquiries regarding Strindberg's financial prospects, the King ordered
a yearly stipend of eight hundred kronor to be paid to him from the
privy purse.
August left the palace, moved and grateful, with the first quarterly
instalment of the monarch's bounty in his pocket.
The short play which had won royal favour is the first work in which
Strindberg's mastery over his dramatic art was foreshadowed. The
terse phrasing fitly embodies the spirit of Norseman valour. It grips
the reader with the force of a _drapa_, sung in faithful celebration
of life's attempts and hard-won victories. Gunlöd, the daughter of
Thorfinn, the old heathen Viking, has been secretly baptised and loves
the Christian Viking, Gunnar. The human conflict between sorrow and
resignation, faith and doubt, is drawn with a passionate wish to do
justice to everyone. Strindberg possessed that power of visualising
and speaking through the characters of a play with equally apportioned
interest, which is essential to the true dramatist. His own words on
his relationship to the Viking play, show that he was fully aware of
this faculty of artistic self-multiplication and of its penalties:
"Johan[1] had incarnated himself in five persons in the play. In the
earl, who fights against time; in the bard, who surveys and penetrates;
in the mother, who rebels and takes revenge, but who is deprived of
her avenging power through her sympathy; in the girl, who breaks with
her father because of her faith; in the lover, who is burdened with
an unhappy love. He understood the motives of all the characters
and pleaded every-one's cause. But a play which is written for the
mediocre, who have ready-made opinions about everything, must at least
be partial to a couple of its characters in order to win the ordinary
audience which is always passionate and partial. Johan could not do
this, for he did not believe in absolute right or wrong, for the simple
reason that all these conceptions are relative. One can be right in
regard to the future and wrong in respect to the present; one is wrong
this year, but considered right next year; the father may think that
the son is right, whilst the mother thinks him wrong; the daughter
has the right to love whomsoever she loves, but the father thinks her
wrong in loving a heathen. This was doubt. Why do men hate and despise
the doubter? Because doubt is evolution, and Society hates evolution
because it disturbs the peace, but doubt is true humanity and will
end in equity of judgment. The stupid only are certain, the ignorant
only believe that they have found truth. But peace is happiness, and
pietists therefore seek it in the peace of stupidity. It is said that
doubt consumes the power of action, but is it then better to act
without considering and weighing the consequences of the act? The
animal and the savage act blindly, obeying lusts and impulses, thereby
being like men of action."
* * * * *
Life at Upsala was strangely changed. The royal patronage endowed
August with a distinction, the pleasure of which was evident. The
sense of freedom from the pressure of poverty, of having achieved some
measure of success, expanded his chest and straightened his back.
His friends did not recognise him. They were accustomed to see in
August the poor half-starved, erratic youth who needed their help.
In unconsciously looking down, we add to our self-respect. August
no longer needed the pity which had given pleasure to givers and
recipient, and the result was disharmony. The _Rune_ was weakened
through indifference and internal strife, and died naturally, a victim
of competition.
August's good fortune was not of long duration. He, die rebel, the
destroyer of common idols and conventions, had not hesitated to receive
the King's gift. For he had never believed that the ills of the world
would be set right by the abolition of monarchy, and in the King's
gift he saw not the grace of the ruler, but recognition accorded to
him by a personal friend and admirer. But he soon began to chafe under
the obligations and restrictions which his new position entailed. At
the end of the term he manfully struggled through his examination in
philology, astronomy and sociology. During the next term his mental
restlessness became acute. The brain was filled with creative energy,
and the path of learning was blocked. Doubt and apathy chilled his
efforts to do the work which was expected of him. Sometimes he lay
all day on a sofa, longing to be free and in the midst of life. He
felt imprisoned by the royal stipend and sought succour in reading
the history of philosophy. But the different systems seemed to him to
possess the same degree of validity, and his head was replete with his
own thoughts.
One evening he evoked the anger of one of the professors by attacking
Dante. He declared the composition of the _Commedia_ to be an imitation
of Albericus' vision, and Dante's greatness to be over-rated. Dante
was ignorant of Greek, therefore uncultured; he was no philosopher,
as he suppressed thought by revelation; he was a foolish monk who
sent unbaptised children to hell. He lacked all self-criticism when
he classed ingratitude to friends and treason to one's country among
the worst of crimes, whilst he himself sent his friend and teacher,
Brunetto Latini, to the nether world and supported the German Emperor
Henry VII against his native town, Florence. He showed bad taste, for
amongst the six greatest poets of the world, he placed Homer, Horace,
Lucanus, Ovid, Virgil and--himself.
The result of these observations was that Strindberg was dismissed as
insolent and crazy.
A period of increased mental distress and uncertainty followed upon the
explosion. The town was grey and dirty, and the chill of winter lay
over the land. There was no stability in his soul--he felt as if it had
been dissolved, and hovered as a sensitive smoke around him. A forcible
new impression pulled him together. One day he found his friend, the
naturalist, painting as a recreation. This was something that would
condense and support an evaporating ego. To paint green landscape
in the midst of dull winter, and to hang it on one's wall--that was
something worth doing!
"Is it difficult to paint?" he asked.
"No, it is easier than drawing. Try it," was the reply.
August borrowed an easel, brushes and paint, locked his door and gave
himself up to colour-worship. When he saw the blue colour give the
effect of a clear sky he was enraptured, and when he conjured up green
bushes and a lawn on the canvas, "he was inexpressibly happy--as if he
had eaten hashish."
One day, when he had locked himself in, he heard a conversation between
his friends outside the door. They talked as if they were discussing
someone who was ill.
"Now he is painting too!" said one of the friends in a tone of deep
depression.
August reflected and came to the conclusion that he was going mad.
Fearing compulsory incarceration, he wrote to the manager of a private
asylum in which the patients were allowed their liberty and to till the
soil. He expressed his willingness to submit to the curative principles
of the institution. The reply was kind and reassuring. The manager had
made inquiries about the would-be patient and found that there was no
need for extreme steps.
Three months, passed and the second instalment of the royal stipend was
not paid. A letter of humble inquiry brought the reply that His Majesty
had never meant to give permanent support to Strindberg, and that it
was only a question of temporary help. A further sum was enclosed, as
His Majesty had graciously decided to help his protégé once more.
The first sense of relief was followed by some anxiety as to the
consequences. The King's promise was no mistake. The real explanation
of the "disgrace" was not easy to find. Some thought the King had
forgotten; others that his proverbial generosity had exceeded his
means. Ten years later Strindberg heard that he had been wrongfully
accused of writing defamatory verses about the King.
He decided to leave Upsala and to seek work in Stockholm as a
journalist. At a valedictory gathering of the old friends he thanked
them for their contributions to his self, "for a personality is
not developed out of itself; out of each soul with which it comes
in contact it sucks a drop, like the bee collecting its honey from
millions of flowers, transforming it and passing it on as its own."
[1] In his autobiography he uses his first Christian name: Johan, and
speaks of himself in the third person.