Page:Emma Goldman - The Social Significance of the Modern Drama - 1914.djvu/77

Rh economic and social status, different races, peoples and times holding different ideas of it. Smith " Honor " Sudermann succeeded in undermining to a considerable extent the stupid and ridiculous notion of the Germans ruled by the rod and the Kaiser's coat.

But I particularly wish to consider " Magda," because, of all the plays written by Hermann Sudermann, it is the most revolutionary and the least national. It deals with a universal subject,-the awakening of woman. It is revolutionary, not because Sudermann was the first to treat this subject, for Ibsen had preceded him, but because in " Magda " he was the first to raise the question of woman's right to motherhood with or without the sanction of State and Church. MAGDA

LIEUTENANT COLONEL SCHWARTZE, Magda's father, represents all the conventional and conservative notions of society.

Schwartze. Modern ideas! Oh, pshaw! I know them. But come into the quiet homes where are bred brave soldiers and virtuous wives. There you'll hear no talk about heredity, no arguments about individuality, no scandalous gossip. There modern ideas have no foothold, for it is there that the life and strength of the Fatherland abide. Look at this home! There is no luxury,-hardly even what you call good taste,-faded