(1822)

Certainly if any course of human follies, presented in lofty style, is to be put upon the stage, then this drama should carry off the prize.

We often allow ourselves to be charmed by the merits of a work of art, to the extent that the last good thing which has come before us we consider and discuss as the greatest we have ever seen. Still this does no harm, for we study such a work then con amore and all the more closely, and seek to discover its merits, in order that our judgment may be justified. For this reason I do not hesitate to acknowledge that in the Daughter of the Air I admire more than ever Calderon’s great talent, his lofty genius and clear insight. We should not fail to recognize that the subject is superior to his other plays, in that the story is based on motives purely human, and there is no more of the supernatural element than is necessary for the extraordinary and the exceptional in human affairs to develop and proceed in natural fashion. Only the beginning and the end are marvelous; everything else proceeds in a natural course.

What there is to say of this play is true of all the plays by this poet. He gives us in no way a real view of nature; he is rather theatrical throughout, even stagey. Of what we call illusion, especially such as touches the feelings, we find not a trace. The design is clear to one’s mind, the scenes follow of necessity, in a kind of ballet-order, pleasing and artistic in its way, and suggest the technique of our latest comic opera. The inner leading motives are always the same,—conflict of duty, passion, conditions derived from the antithesis of the characters and the existing relations.

The main action proceeds in a poetic and dignified manner; the minor scenes, which have an elegant movement, in the style of the minuet, are rhetorical, dialectical, sophisticated. All the types of humanity are exhausted; there is not missing even the fool, whose simple mind makes havoc of deception whenever a pretense is made of sympathy and kindness.

Now we must admit on reflection that human situations and emotions cannot be put on the stage in their primitive realism, but must be worked up, touched up, idealized. And thus we find them in this case, too; the poet however stands on the threshold of over-refinement, he gives us a quintessence of humanity.

Shakespeare on the contrary gives us the rich ripe grape from the vine. According to our taste we can enjoy the single berries, press them out and taste or sip the juice or the fermented wine—however we treat them we are refreshed. With Calderon, on the other hand, nothing is left to the choice or taste of the spectator; we receive from him the spirits already drawn off and distilled, seasoned with many spices, or flavored with sweets; we must accept the beverage as it is, as a delicious and palatable stimulant, or else refuse it.

But the reason for our giving the Daughter of the Air so high a place has already been suggested; it is favored by its excellent subject-matter. For we object to seeing a noble and free man, as in several of Calderon’s plays, indulging in dark error and lending his reason to indiscretions and folly; here we have a quarrel with the poet himself, since his material offends us, whereas his manner charms. This is the case in The Devotion of the Cross and in Daybreak in Copacabana.

In this connection we may say in print what we have often expressed privately, that we must regard it as one of the greatest advantages of life that Shakespeare enjoyed, that he was born and brought up as a Protestant. He appears always as a human being, with a complete faith and confidence in human values and affairs: error and superstition he feels to be beneath him, and only toys with them, compelling the supernatural to serve his purposes. Tragic ghosts, droll goblins he summons to his ends, in which everything is clarified and cleansed of superstition, so that the poet never feels the dilemma of being compelled to deify the absurd, the saddest downfall which mankind, conscious of possessing reason, can experience.

Returning to the Daughter of the Air, this question suggests itself: If we are now enabled to transport ourselves to so remote an atmosphere, without knowing the locality or understanding the language, to enter familiarly into a foreign literature without previous historical research, and to bring home to ourselves in one example the quality and flavor of a certain age, the mind and genius of a people—to whom do we owe thanks for all this? Evidently to the translator, who all his life and with laborious industry has thus utilized his talent to our benefit. Our warmest thanks, therefore, we present to Dr. Gries; he has given us a gift whose value is overwhelming, a gift in considering which we gladly refrain from all comparisons, because it delights us by its clearness, wins us by its charm, and by the complete harmony of all its parts convinces us that nothing in it could or should have been different.

Such excellence older readers are likely to prize more highly, for they like to enjoy in comfort a perfectly adequate presentation; younger men, on the contrary, actively engaged in work, coöperating and struggling, do not always acknowledge merit which they themselves hope to emulate.

All honor then to the translator, who concentrated his energies on a single point, and went ahead in a single direction, so that we could enjoy in a thousand different ways!