The Life of Friedrich Schiller Part 26

LETTERS OF SCHILLER.

A few Extracts from Schiller's correspondence may be gratifying to some readers. The _Letters to Dalberg_, which const.i.tute the chief part of it as yet before the public, are on the whole less interesting than might have been expected, if we did not recollect that the writer of them was still an inexperienced youth, overawed by his idea of Dalberg, to whom he could communicate with freedom only on a single topic; and besides oppressed with grievances, which of themselves would have weighed down his spirit, and prevented any frank or cordial exposition of its feelings.

Of the Reichsfreiherr von Dalberg himself, this correspondence gives us little information, and we have gleaned little elsewhere. He is mentioned incidentally in almost every literary history connected with his time; and generally as a mild gentlemanly person, a judicious critic, and a warm lover of the arts and their cultivators. The following notice of his death is extracted from the _Conversations-Lexicon_, Part III. p. 12: 'Died at Mannheim, on the 27th of December 1806, in his 85th year, Wolfgang Heribert, Reichsfreiherr von Dalberg; knighted by the Emperor Leopold on his coronation at Frankfort. A warm friend and patron of the arts and sciences; while the German Society flourished at Mannheim, he was its first President; and the theatre of that town, the school of the best actors in Germany, of Iffland, Beck, Beil, and many others, owes to him its foundation, and its maintenance throughout his long Intendancy, which he held till 1803. As a writer and a poet, he is no less favourably known. We need only refer to his _Cora_, a musical drama, and to 'the _Monch von Carmel_.'-These letters of Schiller were found among his papers at his death; rescued from destruction by two of his executors, and published at Carlsruhe, in a small duodecimo, in the year 1819. There is a verbose preface, but no note or comment, though some such aid is now and then a little wanted.

The letters most worthy of our notice are those relating to the exhibition of the _Robbers_ on the Mannheim stage, and to Schiller's consequent embarra.s.sments and flight. From these, accordingly, the most of our selections shall be taken. It is curious to see with what timidity the intercourse on Schiller's part commences; and how this awkward shyness gradually gives place to some degree of confidence, as he becomes acquainted with his patron, or is called to treat of subjects where he feels that he himself has a dignity, and rights of his own, forlorn and humble as he is. At first he never mentions Dalberg but with all his t.i.tles, some of which to our unceremonious ears seem ludicrous enough. Thus in the full style of German reverence, he avoids directly naming his correspondent, but uses the oblique designation of 'your Excellency,' or something equally exalted: and he begins his two earliest letters with an address, which, literally interpreted, runs thus: 'Empire-free, Highly-wellborn, Particularly-much-to-be-venerated, Lord Privy Counsellor!' Such sounding phrases make us smile: but they entirely depend on custom for their import, and the smile which they excite is not by any means a philosophic one. It is but fair that in our version we omit them, or render them by some more grave equivalent.

The first letter is as follows:

[No date.]

'The proud judgment, pa.s.sed upon me in the flattering letter which I had the honour to receive from your Excellency, is enough to set the prudence of an Author on a very slippery eminence. The authority of the quarter it proceeds from, would almost communicate to that sentence the stamp of infallibility, if I could regard it as anything but a mere encouragement of my Muse. More than this a deep feeling of my weakness will not let me think it; but if my strength shall ever climb to the height of a masterpiece, I certainly shall have this warm approval of your Excellency alone to thank for it, and so will the world. For several years I have had the happiness to know you from the public papers: long ago the splendour of the Mannheim theatre attracted my attention.

And, I confess, ever since I felt any touch of dramatic talent in myself, it has been among my darling projects some time or other to remove to Mannheim, the true temple of Thalia; a project, however, which my _closer_ connection with Wurtemberg might possibly impede.

'Your Excellency's very kind proposal on the subject of the _Robbers_, and such other pieces as I may produce in future, is infinitely precious to me; the maturing of it well deserves a narrower investigation of your Excellency's theatre, its special mode of management, its actors, the _non plus ultra_ of its machinery; in a word, a full conception of it, such as I shall never get while my only scale of estimation is this Stuttgard theatre of ours, an establishment still in its minority. Unhappily my _economical_ circ.u.mstances render it impossible for me to travel much; though I could travel now with the greater happiness and confidence, as I have still some _pregnant ideas_ for the Mannheim theatre, which I could wish to have the honour of communicating to your Excellency. For the rest, I remain,' &c.

From the second letter we learn that Schiller had engaged to _theatrilise_ his original edition of the _Robbers_, and still wished much to be connected in some shape with Mannheim. The third explains itself:

'Stuttgard, 6th October 1781.

'Here then at last returns the luckless prodigal, the remodelled _Robbers_! I am sorry that I have not kept the time, appointed by myself; but a transitory glance at the number and extent of the changes I have made, will, I trust, be sufficient to excuse me. Add to this, that a contagious epidemic was at work in our military Hospital, which, of course, interfered very often with my _otia poetica_. After finis.h.i.+ng my work, I may a.s.sure you I could engage with less effort of mind, and certainly with far more contentment, to compose a new piece, than to undergo the labour I have just concluded. The task was complicated and tedious. Here I had to correct an error, which naturally was rooted in the very groundwork of the play; there perhaps to sacrifice a beauty to the limits of the stage, the humour of the pit, the stupidity of the gallery, or some such sorrowful convention; and I need not tell you, that as in nature, so on the stage, an idea, an emotion, can have only one suitable expression, one proper tone. A single alteration in a trait of character may give a new tendency to the whole personage, and, consequently, to his actions, and the mechanism of the piece which depends on them.

'In the original, the Robbers are exhibited in strong contrast with each other; and I dare maintain that it is difficult to draw half a dozen robbers in strong contrast, without in some of them offending the delicacy of the stage.

In my first conception of the piece, I excluded the idea of its ever being represented in a theatre; hence came it that Franz was planned as a _reasoning_ villain; a plan which, though it may content the thinking Reader, cannot fail to vex and weary the Spectator, who does not come to think, and who wants not philosophy, but action.

'In the new edition, I could not overturn this arrangement without breaking-down the whole economy of the piece.

Accordingly I can predict, with tolerable certainty, that Franz when he appears on the stage, will not play the part which he has played with the reader. And, at all events, the rus.h.i.+ng stream of the action will hurry the spectator over all the finer shadings, and rob him of a third part of the whole character.

'Karl von Moor might chance to form an era on the stage; except a few speculations, which, however, work as indispensable colours in the general picture, he is all action, all visible life. Spiegelberg, Schweitzer, Hermann, are, in the strictest sense, personages for the stage; in a less degree, Amelia and the Father.

'Written and oral criticisms I have endeavoured to turn to advantage. The alterations are important; certain scenes are altogether new. Of this number, are Hermann's counter-plots to undermine the schemes of Franz; his interview with that personage, which, in the first composition of the work, was entirely and very unhappily forgotten. His interview with Amelia in the garden has been postponed to the succeeding act; and my friends tell me that I could have fixed upon no better act than this, no better time than a few moments prior to the meeting of Amelia with Moor. Franz is brought a little nearer human nature; but the mode of it is rather strange. A scene like his condemnation in the fifth act has never, to my knowledge, been exhibited on any stage; and the same may be said of the scene where Amelia is sacrificed by her lover.

'If the piece should be too long, it stands at the discretion of the manager to abbreviate the speculative parts of it, or here and there, without prejudice to the general impression, to omit them altogether. But in the _printing_, I use the freedom humbly to protest against the leaving out of anything. I had satisfactory reasons of my own for all that I allowed to pa.s.s; and my submission to the stage does not extend so far, that I can leave _holes_ in my work, and mutilate the characters of men for the convenience of actors.

'In regard to the selection of costume, without wis.h.i.+ng to prescribe any rules, I may be permitted to remark, that though in nature dress is unimportant, on the stage it is never so. In this particular, the taste of my Robber Moor will not be difficult to hit. He wears a plume; for this is mentioned expressly in the play, at the time when he abdicates his office. I have also given him a baton. His dress should always be n.o.ble without ornament, unstudied but not negligent.

'A young but excellent composer is working at a symphony for my unhappy prodigal: I know it will be masterly. So soon as it is finished, I shall take the liberty of offering it to you.

'I must also beg you to excuse the irregular state of the ma.n.u.script, the incorrectness of the penmans.h.i.+p. I was in haste to get the piece ready for you; hence the double sort of handwriting in it; hence also my forbearing to correct it.

My copyist, according to the custom of all _reforming_ caligraphers, I find, has wofully abused the spelling. To conclude, I recommend myself and my endeavours to the kindness of an honoured judge. I am,' &c.

'Stuttgard, 12th December 1781.

'With the change projected by your Excellency, in regard to the publis.h.i.+ng of my play, I feel entirely contented, especially as I perceive that by this means two interests that had become very alien, are again made one, without, as I hope, any prejudice to the results and the success of my work. Your Excellency, however, touches on some other _very_ weighty changes, which the piece has undergone from your hands; and these, in respect of myself, I feel to be so important, that I shall beg to explain my mind at some length regarding them. At the outset, then, I must honestly confess to you, I hold the projected transference of the action represented in my play to the epoch of the _Landfried_, and the Suppression of Private Wars, with the whole accompaniment which it gains by this new position, as infinitely better than mine; and must hold it so, although the whole piece should go to ruin thereby. Doubtless it is an objection, that in our enlightened century, with our watchful police and fixedness of statute, such a reckless gang should have arisen in the very bosom of the laws, and still more, have taken root and subsisted for years: doubtless the objection is well founded, and I have nothing to allege against it, but the license of Poetry to raise the probabilities of the real world to the rank of true, and its possibilities to the rank of probable.

'This excuse, it must be owned, is little adequate to the objection it opposes. But when I grant your Excellency so much (and I grant it honestly, and with complete conviction), what will follow? Simply that my play has got an ugly fault at its birth, which fault, if I may say so, it must carry with it to its grave, the fault being interwoven with its very nature, and not to be removed without destruction of the whole.

'In the first place, all my personages speak in a style too modern, too enlightened for that ancient time. The dialect is not the right one. That simplicity so vividly presented to us by the author of _Gotz von Berlichingen_, is altogether wanting. Many long tirades, touches great and small, nay entire characters, are taken from the aspect of the present world, and would not answer for the age of Maximilian. In a word, this change would reduce the piece into something like a certain woodcut which I remember meeting with in an edition of Virgil. The Trojans wore hussar boots, and King Agamemnon had a pair of pistols in his belt. I should commit a _crime_ against the age of Maximilian, to avoid an _error_ against the age of Frederick the Second.

'Again, my whole episode of Amelia's love would make a frightful contrast with the simple chivalry attachment of that period. Amelia would, at all hazards, need to be re-moulded into a chivalry maiden; and I need not tell you that this character, and the sort of love which reigns in my work, are so deeply and broadly tinted into the whole picture of the Robber Moor, nay, into the whole piece, that every part of the delineation would require to be re-painted, before those tints could be removed. So likewise is it with the character of Franz, that speculative, metaphysico-refining knave.

'In a word, I think I may affirm, that this projected transposition of my work, which, prior to the commencement, would have lent it the highest splendour and completeness, could not fail now, when the piece is planned and finished, to change it into a defective _quodlibet_, a crow with peac.o.c.k's feathers.

'Your Excellency will forgive a father this earnest pleading in behalf of his son. These are but words, and in the long-run every theatre can make of any piece what they think proper; the author must content himself. In the present case, he looks upon it as a happiness that he has fallen into such hands. With Herr Schwann, however, I will make it a condition that, at least, he _print_ the piece according to the first plan. In the theatre I pretend to no vote whatever.

'That other change relating to Amelia's death was perhaps even more interesting to me. Believe me, your Excellency, this was the portion of my play which cost me the greatest effort and deliberation, of all which the result was nothing else than this, that Moor _must_ kill his Amelia, and that the action is even a _positive beauty_, in his character; on the one hand painting the ardent lover, on the other the Bandit Captain, with the liveliest colours. But the vindication of this part is not to be exhausted in a single letter. For the rest, the few words which you propose to subst.i.tute in place of this scene, are truly exquisite, and altogether worthy of the situation. I should be proud of having written them.

'As Herr Schwann informs me that the piece, with the music and indispensably necessary pauses, will last about five hours (too long for any piece!), a second curtailment of it will be called for. I should not wish that any but myself undertook this task, and I myself, _without the sight of a rehearsal, or of the first representation_, cannot undertake it.

'If it were possible that your Excellency could fix the general rehearsal of the piece some time between the twentieth and the thirtieth of this month, and make good to me the main expenses of a journey to you, I should hope, in some few days, I might unite the interest of the stage with my own, and give the piece that proper rounding-off, which, without an actual view of the representation, cannot well be given it. On this point, may I request the favour of your Excellency's decision soon, that I may be prepared for the event.

'Herr Schwann writes me that a Baron von Gemmingen has given himself the trouble and done me the honour to read my piece.

This Herr von Gemmingen, I also hear, is author of the _Deutsche Hausvater_. I long to have the honour of a.s.suring him that I liked his _Hausvater_ uncommonly, and admired in it the traces of a most accomplished man and writer. But what does the author of the _Deutsche Hausvater_ care about the babble of a young apprentice? If I should ever have the honour of meeting Dalberg at Mannheim, and testifying the affection and reverence I bear him, I will then also press into the arms of that other, and tell him how dear to me such souls are as Dalberg and Gemmingen.

'Your thought about the small Advertis.e.m.e.nt, before our production of the piece, I exceedingly approve of; along with this I have enclosed a sketch of one. For the rest, I have the honour, with perfect respect, to be always,' &c.

This is the enclosed scheme of an Advertis.e.m.e.nt; which was afterwards adopted:

'THE ROBBERS,

'A PLAY.

'The picture of a great, misguided soul, furnished with every gift for excellence, and lost in spite of all its gifts: unchecked ardour and bad companions.h.i.+p contaminate his heart; hurry him from vice to vice, till at last he stands at the head of a gang of murderers, heaps horror upon horror, plunges from abyss to abyss into all the depths of desperation. Great and majestic in misfortune; and by misfortune improved, led back to virtue. Such a man in the Robber Moor you shall "bewail and hate, abhor and love. A hypocritical, malicious deceiver, you shall likewise see unmasked, and blown to pieces in his own mines. A feeble, fond, and too indulgent father. The sorrows of enthusiastic love, and the torture of ungoverned pa.s.sion. Here also, not without abhorrence, you shall cast a look into the interior economy of vice, and from the stage be taught how all the gilding of fortune cannot kill the inward worm; how terror, anguish, remorse, and despair follow close upon the heels of the wicked. Let the spectator weep today before our scene, and shudder, and learn to bend his pa.s.sions under the laws of reason and religion. Let the youth behold with affright the end of unbridled extravagance; nor let the man depart from our theatre, without a feeling that Providence makes even villains instruments of His purposes and judgments, and can marvellously unravel the most intricate perplexities of fate.'

Whatever reverence Schiller entertained for Dalberg as a critic and a patron, and however ready to adopt his alterations when they seemed judicious, it is plain, from various pa.s.sages of these extracts, that in regard to writing, he had also firm persuasions of his own, and conscientiousness enough to adhere to them while they continued such.

In regard to the conducting of his life, his views as yet were far less clear. The following fragments serve to trace him from the first exhibition of his play at Mannheim to his flight from Stuttgard:

'Stuttgard, 17th January 1782.

'I here in writing repeat my warmest thanks for the courtesies received from your Excellency, for your attention to my slender efforts, for the dignity and splendour you bestowed upon my piece, for all your Excellency did to exalt its little merits and hide its weaknesses by the greatest outlay of theatric art. The shortness of my stay at Mannheim would not allow me to go into details respecting the play or its representation; and as I could not say all, my time being meted out to me so sparingly, I thought it better to say absolutely nothing. I observed much, I learned much; and I believe, if Germany shall ever find in me a true dramatic poet, I must reckon the date of my commencement from the past week.' * * *

'Stuttgard, 24th May 1782.

* * * 'My impatient wish to see the piece played a second time, and the absence of my Sovereign favouring that purpose, have induced me, with some ladies and male friends as full of curiosity respecting Dalberg's theatre and _Robbers_ as myself, to undertake a little journey to Mannheim, which we are to set about tomorrow. As this is the princ.i.p.al aim of our journey, and to me a more perfect enjoyment of my play is an exceedingly important object, especially since this would put it in my power to set about _Fiesco_ under better auspices, I make it my earnest request of your Excellency, if possible, to procure me this enjoyment on Tuesday the 28th current.' * * *