Page:The Journal of English and Germanic Philology Volume 18.djvu/658

 654 Campbell Klinger also preserved in his later prose works. It is especially interesting to note how in the two versions of his Aristodemos (1787, 1794), he really completed the cycle back to a strict, pre-Klopstockian form of narrative, yet in spite of this form retained a large measure of the atmosphere and illusion of the battle, which were so completely lacking in the older writers. The same cycle that we see here in Klinger's case is exactly paralleled by Goethe, from Gotz to Iphigenie and Tasso, in a higher sphere of art. One of the chief characteristics of Gotz, an intense joy in the objective world, has given place in these plays to the drama of spiritual conflict, practically in pure French form. However, even in Iphigenie the connection be- tween the stage and the battle progressing outside is not entirely lost sight of. So in Tasso the duel scene is strictly classic in the best sense of the word. But that this form was no longer considered as a binding canon, except in so far as it might best suit a particular theme, is clearly shown in Goethe's treatment of the Valentin scene in Faust I and in the fourth act of Faust II. In the 10th Chapter the author discusses generally the the- atrical exploitation of the scenes of battle. In the lavish shows of Schikaneder the spectacle was developed to its fullest extent, while Kotzebue attained the greatest influence on the legitimate stage. Kotzebue showed equal skill in all the technical forms, whether the teichoskopic or the looser types. The extreme contrast between the original joy of the poet introducing battle- episode for its own sake, and the mere exploitation of such effects for the stage, is plainly noticeable in the comparison of the original Gotz with its theatrical version. If sensationalism was thus one of the pitfalls past which the course of sound evolution had to lead, another was the undramatic looseness of Roman- ticism. Here again, in the works of Tieck, we find a turning away from the stage, a reveling in mood, a renewed confusion between genuine dramatic values (especially teichoskopic) with formless emotion, a confusion similar, with some variations, to that found in the early years of the Sturm und Drang. From the historical point of view Tieck represents a decided retro- gression, notwithstanding his clever satire and his occasional display of true technical insight. But the foundation had been firmly laid, and in Schiller the man was present who was able to raise the completed structure. He accomplished this in two different plays, Wallenstein and the Jungfrau. The former, on a strictly classical basis, furnished a satisfactory solution of the problem of form, while the latter, in one act at least, offered a true synthesis of the two elements that had been striving apart for so long. In Wallenstein the poet practically forsakes the method of direct presentation. He relies in the first place, and chiefly, upon the old accepted, classical technique of the messenger, which he uses, however,