rame 1909) Romain Rolland after a drawing by G ( ROMAIN HOLLAND

TH E MA N A N D H I S W O R K

BY STEFAN ZWEIG

TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGIN AL MA NUSCRIPT BY

EDEN and CEDAR PAUL

TD LONDON : GEORGE ALLEN UNWIN L .

H E W . C . 1 RUSKIN OUSE, 40 MUSEUM STR ET, 5 5

S Z ‘W B

Co ri ht 1921 py g , , by T MA H O S SELTZER , IN C .

A ll rig ht: res erved

8 05 46 3

PRI N TED I N U . B. A. E t htt afimt

N ot merely do I describe the w ork of a great e A ove all do a t i ute to a ers on Europ an . b I p y r b p alit that of one who for me and for man others y, y has loomed as the most impres sive m oral phenom o de ed u on his o n bio ra en on of o u r age . M ll p w g hies o f ass i al u es endeavourin to o tr a p cl c fig r , g p r y the greatnes s of an arti st while never los ing s ight of the man o r f orgetting his i nfluence u pon the w o d of mo a endeavou on eived in this s irit rl r l r, c c p , my b ook is likewise inspired with a sense of per so na atitu de in t at amid these da s fo o n it l gr , h , y rl r , has been vouchs afed to me to know the miracle of i so rad ant an exis tence .

IN CO M MORATION

o f this uni uenes s dedi ate the oo to t o se q , I c b k h few who in the hou o f e t ia mained faith , r fi ry r l, re ful to ROMA IN nou m)

AND TO O UR BELOVED H OME O F

EUROPE

F TA BLE O CONTENTS . PAGE DEDICATIO N PART O N E: BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTORY

EARLY C H ILD H O O D

SCH O O L DAYS

THE NOR MA L SCH O O L

A MESSAGE FR OM AFAR

S T LOUIS 18 94 AIN , THE CONSECRATION

YEARS O F APPRENTICESHIP YEARS O F STRUGGLE

A DECADE O F SECLUSION A PORTRAIT RENOWN

ROLLAND AS THE EMBODIMENT EUROPEAN SPIRIT

PART TWO : EA RLY WORK AS A DRAMATIST

THE WORK AND THE EPOCH

THE WIL L TO GREATNESS

THE CREATIVE CYCLES THE UNK NOWN DRAMATIC CYCLE

TRA C EDIES F FA ITH SA T LO I A R 18 95—1 98 O . U S E T 8 THE IN , , T LO 18 94 SAIN UIS . viii TABLE OF CONTENTS

A ERT, 18 98

ATTEMPT TO REGENERATE TH E FRENCH

A N APPEAL To THE PEOPLE THE PROGRAM

D M O T R VO T O THE RA A F HE E LU I N,

FO URTEEN TH O J 1902 THE F ULY , D TO 1900 AN N,

XV. I M H O R ASO 1899 THE TR U P F E N ,

THE CALL LOST IN THE VOID

D L L OM 1 2 VIII. A AY WI C 90 X E ,

PART THREE : THE HEROIC BIOGRAPHIES

DE PRO PUND IS THE HEROES O P SUFFERING

BEETHOVEN MICHELANGELO TOLSTOI THE UNWRITTEN BIOGRAPHIES

PART FOUR : JEAN CHRISTOPHE SANCTUS CHRISTOPHORUS RESURRECTION

THE ORIGIN O P THE WORK

TH E WORK WITHOUT A FORMULA TABLE OF CONTENTS ix

KEY TO THE CHARACTER S A HEROIC SYMPHONY

THE ENIGMA OF CREATIVE WORK JEAN CHRISTOPHE

OLIVIER

GRAZIA JEAN CHRISTOPHE AND HIS FELLOW MEN JEAN CHRISTOPHE AND THE NATIONS THE PICTURE OF FRANCE THE PICTURE OF GERMANY THE PICTURE OF ITALY THE JEWS

THE GENERATIONS

XVIII . DEPARTURE

PART FIVE : INTERMEZZO SCHERZO ( COLAS BREUGNON)

K U I. TA EN NAWARES 241

II . THE BURGUNDIAN BROTHER

III. GAULOISERIES I V. A FRUSTRATE MESSAGE

PART SIX: THE CONSCIENCE OF EUROPE

THE WARDEN OF TH E INHERITANCE

FO REA RMED THE PLACE OF REFUGE

THE SERVICE OF MA N

THE TRIBUNAL O R THE SPIRIT

THE CONTROVERSY WITH GER HARDT HAUPTMANN x TABLE OF CONTENTS

THE CORRESPONDENCE WITH VER H AEREN

E VIII . THE E UROPEAN CONSCI NCE M IX. THE ANIFESTOES

ABOV TH TT X. E E BA LE

M I ST H T D XI. THE CA PA GN AGAIN A RE

XII. OPPONENTS FRIENDS

XIV. THE LETTERS

XV . THE COUNSELOR

O TA XVI . THE S LI RY

THE DIARY

XVIII. THE FORERUNNERS AND EMPEDOCLES LILULI CLERAMBAULT THE LAST APPEAL DECLARATION OF THE INDEPENDENCE OF

XXIII . EN VOY

BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Romain Rolland after a drawing by Grame ( 1909 ) Frantispiece I A C I N G PA G E Romain Rolland at the Normal School 12

’ Le o To ls toi s Letter

’ ’ Rolland s Transcript of Franc esc o Provenzale s A r ia from L a Schiavo di s ua Moglie

’ ’ Ro and s ans ri t of a e o d Pau D u in L O ncle ll Tr c p M l y by l p , Go ttfried

Romain Rolland at the Time o f Writing Beetho ven

Romain Roll an d at the Time o f Writing Jean Christophe 16 2

Romain Rolland at the Time o f Writing A bove the Battle 294

’ Rolland s M other

Original M anu s cript o f The D eclaration of the Ind ep end e nce of the Mind

BIOGRA PHICAL

’ The surge of the H eart s energies w ou ld not ea in a mist O f fo am br k , n or b e s u tili ed into i it did not b z Sp r , the o O f ate fr om the e inn in r ck F , b g g f da s tand e e i ent in o s the a . y , s v r l w y

H O LDERLIN .

R O MAIN R O LLAND

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY

HE first fifty years Of Romain Rolland’s life were passed in inconspicuous and almost soli n tary labors . The ceforward , his name was to f E become a storm center o uropean discussion . Until of Shortly before the apocalyptic year, hardly an artist or re our days worked in such complete retirement, i ce ved so little recognition . of Since that year, no artist has been the subject so much controversy . His fundamental ideas were not destined to make themselves generally known until there was a world in arms bent upon destroying them . E s the i nvious fate work ever thus, interweaving l ves of t the great wi h tragical threads . She tries her powers to the uttermost upon the strong, sending events to run counter to their plans , permeating their lives with strange n — allegories, imposi g obstacles in their path that they may be guided more unmistakably in the right course . u Fate plays with them, plays a game with a s blime issue, I 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

of for all experience is precious . Think the greatest t among our contemporaries ; hink Of Wagner, Nietzsche, n O f o f Dostoevsky, Tolstoi , Stri dberg ; in the case each i of them, dest ny has Superadded to the creations the ’

n of . artist s mi d , the drama personal experience Notably do these considerations apply to the life O f l ’ Romain Ro land . The Significance Of his life s work n becomes plain only when it is co templated as a whole .

It was slowly produced , for it had to encounter great consum dangers ; it was a gradual revelation , tardily u d O f d mated . The fo n ations this splen id structure were the d of deeply dug in firm groun knowledge, and were laid upon the hidden masonry of years spent in isola o f tion . Thus tempered by the ordeal a furnace seven n o f hu times heated , his work has the essential impri t fo n a manity. Precisely owing to the strength of its u d ’ d of tions, to the soli ity its moral energy, was Rolland s thought able to stand unshaken throughout the war storms E that have been ravaging urope . While other monu d ments to which we had looke up with veneration , crack in and w g crumbling, have been leveled ith the quaking “ n n earth , the mo ume t he had builded stands firm above ” the battle, above the medley Of Opinions , a pillar Of strength towards which all free spirits can turn for con ul of solation amid the tum t the world .

4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

endowed by both parents with tendencies to fervent faith , but tendencies to faith in contradictory ideals . In France this cleavage between love for religion and pas

n sio for freedom , between faith and revolution , dates Its to from centuries back . seeds were destined blos som in the artist . His first years o f childhood were passed in the shadow A nto inette o f O f 18 70 . the defeat In , Rolland sketches the tranquil life o f just such a provincial town as Gla o n mecy. His home was an old house the bank Of a n ca al . Not from this narrow world were to Spring the d O f bo who first elights the y , despite his physical frailty, was s o passionately sensitive to enjoyment . A mighty n impulse from afar, from the u fathomable past , came E did lan to stir his pulses . arly he discover music , the f n o s . guage la guage , the first great message Of the soul

a . His mother t ught him the piano . From its tones he learned to build for himself the infinite world Of feel ing, thus transcending the limits imposed by nationality . For while the pupil eagerly assimilated the easily under O f stood music French classical composers , German music at the same time enthralled his youthful soul . He has given an admirable description Of the way in “ which this revelation came to him : We had a num of O ld ? I ber German music books . German Did know the meaning Of the word ? In our part of the world I believe no one had ever seen a German I tu rned O ld l ou the leaves of the books, spel ing t the notes on the e t unnels piano , and th se , these streamlets Of mel ' EARLY CHILDHOOD 5

Ody, which watered my heart, sank into the thirsty t s and ground as the rain soaks into the ear h . The bli s n d of and the pai , the desires and the reams , Mozart and of Beethoven, have become flesh of my flesh bone my bone . I am them , and they are me How much h w e . n was do I o them Whe I ill as a c ild , and death seemed near, a melody Of Mozart would watch over my L and pillow like a lover ater, in crises Of doubt

n 1 depressio , the mus c Of Beethoven would revive in me the Sparks of eternal life Whenever my spirit is weary, whenever I am sick at heart, I turn to my piano ” and bathe in music . Thus early did the child enter into communion with the wordless speech of humanity ; thus early had the all embracing sympathy Of the life of feeling enabled him n w and O f n to pass beyo d the narrows Of to n provi ce, Of f as nation and o era . Music w his first prayer to the elemental forces O f life ; a prayer daily repeated in SO a n a countless forms ; th t now, half a ce tury l ter, a week and even a day rarely elapses without his hold n o f ing converse with Beethoven . The other sai t his ’ C d a n d hil hood s days , Sh kespeare, likewise belo ge to a t n lad foreign land . Wi h his first loves , all u aware , the o f n had already overstridden the confines natio ality . Amid the dusty lumber in a loft he discovered an edition a n u n a of Shakespe re, which his gra dfather (a st de t in P ris when Victor Hugo was a young man and Shakespeare mania was rife) had bought and forgotten . His child ish interest was first awakened by a volume of faded en 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

e gravings entitled Galerie des femmes de Shakespear .

His fancy was thrilled by the charming faces , by the magical names Perdita , Imogen , and Miranda . But soon , reading the plays, he became immersed in the maze of happenings and personalities . He would remain in the loft hour after hour, disturbed by nothing beyond the occasional trampling of the horses in the stable below o r by the rattling o f a chain on a passing barge . Forget ting everything and forgotten by all he sat in a great arm bO Ok of chair with the beloved , which like that Prospero made all the Spirits O f the universe his servants . He was O f encircled by a throng unseen auditors , by imaginary figures which formed a rampart between himself and the f world o realities . se As ever happens, we e a great life opening with

a great dreams . His first enthusi sms were most power an fully aroused by Shakespeare d Beethoven . The youth inherited from the child , the man from the youth , this passionate admiration for greatness . One who has n hearke ed to such a call, cannot easily confine his ener gies within a narrow circle . The school in the petty provincial town had nothing more to teach this aspiring d not boy . The parents coul bring themselves to send SO their darling alone to the metropolis , with heroic self denial they decided to sacrifice their own peaceful exist n ence . The father resig ed his lucrative and independent n position as notary, which made him a leadi g figure in C one lamecy society , in order to become Of the num berless O f employees a Parisian bank . The familiar w home, the patriarchal life, were thro n aside that the EARLY CHILDHOOD 7

’ Rollands might watch over their boy s schooling and upgrowing in the great city . The whole family looked ’ to Romain s interest, thus teaching him early what others — do not usually learn until full manhood responsibility . CHAPTER III

SCHOOL DAYS

HE boy was still too young to feel the magic of

TO Glamo rou s Paris . his dreamy nature, the and brutal materialism o f the city seemed on strange and almost hostile . Far into life he was to n retain from these hours a hidde dread , a hidden shrink

and of n ing from the fatuity soullessness great tow s, an inexplicable feelin g that there was a lack O f truth and genuineness in the life of the capital . His parents sent L L e him to the yceum of ouis the Gr at , a celebrated high o f school in the heart Paris . Many of the ablest and most distinguished sons of France, have been among the o f da boys who , humming like a swarm bees , emerge ily at noon from the great hive O f knowledge . He was intro duced o f to the items French classical education , that he “ li ” might become un bon perroquet Com é en . His vital d d experiences, however, lay outsi e the omain Of this logical poesy or poetical logic ; his enthusiasms drew him , as heretofore, towards a poesy that was really alive, and towards music . Nevertheless , it was at school that d his he foun first companion . n By the caprice Of chance, for this frie d likewise fame was to come only after twenty years of silence . Romain 8 SCHOOL DAYS 9

Rolland and his intimate Paul Claudel (author Of An

n aite aMarie n n o ce f ) , the two greatest imagi ative writ d ters in contemporary France, who crossed the threshol l w t of school together, were a most simultaneously, t en y

to e . n years later, secure a European r putation Duri g f the last quarter O a century, the two have followed very n and d different paths i faith Spirit , have cultivated wi ely ’ lau del s divergent ideals . C steps have been directed towards the mystic cathedral of the Catholic past ; Rol a land has moved through France and beyond , tow rds the in d E . i eal Of a free urope At that time , however, their n d n daily walks to and from school , they e joye e dless n co versations , exchanging thoughts upon the books they ’ had inflamin n read , and mutually g one a other s youthful ul o f ardors . The bright partic ar star their heaven was who d n Richard Wagner, at that ate was casti g a marvel ’ n O f ous spell over the mi d French youth . In Rolland s case it was not Simply Wagner the artist who exercised r this influence, but Wagne the universal poietic person ality .

School days passed quickly and somewhat joylessly . TO O sudden had been the tran sition from the romanticist TO n home to the harshly realist Paris . the se sitive lad , d d ff the city could only Show its teeth, isplay its in i erence,

fi h a manifest the erceness Of its rhyt m . These qu lities d d n a this Maelstrom aspect, arouse in his min somethi g p roachin a for p g to alarm . He ye rned sympathy, cordial a w as ity, soaring spirations ; now as before, art his “ ”

so . savior, glorious art , in many gray hours His chief joys were the rare afternoons spent at popular Sunday 1 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

to l concerts , when the pulse Of music came thri l his heart — how charmingly is not this described in Anto inette ! in N o r had Shakespeare lost power any degree , now that on his figures , seen the stage, were able to arouse min bo gled dread and ecstasy . The y gave his whole soul “ d a O f to the r matist . He took possession me like a conqu eror ; I threw myself to him like a flower . At the th d same time , e spirit Of music flowe over me as water floods a plain ; Beethoven and Berlioz even more than

Wagner . I had to pay for these joys . I was , as it were, for intoxicated a year or two , much as the earth becomes supersaturated in time Of flood . In the entrance ex n to ami ation to the Normal School I failed twice , thanks ” a my preoccupation with Shakespeare nd with music . u Subseq ently, he discovered a third master, a liberator

of . his faith This was Spinoza , whose acquaintance he n and made duri g an evening spent alone at school , whose gentle intellectual light was henceforward to illumine ’ Rolland s soul throughout life . The greatest Of mankind n have ever bee his examples and companions . Wh fo r en the time came him to leave school , a conflict ’ n n d arose between i cli ation and uty . Rolland s most ardent wish was to become an artist after the mann er O f

Wagner, to be at once musician and poet , to write heroic d d musical ramas . Alrea y there were floating through n his mi d certain musical conceptions which, as a national h of contrast to t ose Wagner, were to deal with the French of O f L cycle of legends . One these, that St . ouis, he r transfi ure was in later yea s indeed to g , not in music , n d H is s but in wi ge words . parent , however, considered

CHAPTER IV

TH E NORMAL SC HOOL

OLLAND ’S childhood was passed amid the

rural landscapes of Burgundy . His school

life was spent in the roar of Paris . His stu dent years involved a still closer confinement in airless

m . spaces, when he became a boarder at the Nor al School T the o f o avoid all distraction , pupils this institution are shut away from the world , kept remote from real life , that they may understand historical life the better . ’ So uvenirs d en ance et de eun sse Renan , in f j e , has given a powerful description of the isolation Of bu dding theo E r se logians in the seminary . mb yo army Officers are g r regated at St . Cy . In like manner at the Normal School a general staff for the intellectual world is trained in “ ” n cloistral seclusio . The normaliens are to be the a n O f te chers Of the coming ge eration . The spirit tradi n in tion unites with stereotyped method , the two breedi g and - in with fruitful results ; the ablest among the scholars u u n will become in t rn teachers in the same instit tio .

n d d a The trai ing is severe , eman ing indefatig ble dili

n Bu gence, for its goal is to discipline the i tellect . t

u N o since it aspires towards universality of cult re, the r mal School permits considerable freedom O f organiza 12 Rom i a n Rollan d at the N ormal School

TH E NORMAL SCHOOL 1 3

- tion , and avoids the dangerous over specialization char n N ot acteristic Of Germa y . by chance did the most universal spirits O f France emanate from the Normal f e . o School We think such men as Renan , Jaur s, d Michelet, Mono , and Rolland . Although during these years Rolland ’s chief interest

a a d was directed tow rds philosophy, lthough he was a ili gent student of the pre - Socratic philosophers o f ancient o f C Greece , the artesians , and Of Spinoza , nevertheless , d n n a o f or uri g the seco d ye r his course, he chose , was n n d i tellige tly gui ed to choose, history and geography n un as his pri cipal subjects . The choice was a fort ate on and n of e, was decisive for the developme t his artistic a life . Here he first came to look upon univers l history of as an eternal ebb and flow epochs, wherein yesterday,

- - da and . to y, to morrow comprise but a single living entity u d He learned to take broad views . He acq ire his pre n V emi ent capacity for italizing history . On the other to o f hand , he owes this same strenuous school youth his power for contemplating the present from the detachment ima InatIve Of a higher cultural sphere . No other g writer of our time possesses anything like SO solid a foundation in the form of real and methodical knowl

in all . edge domains It may well be, moreover, that his incomparable capacity for work was acquired during these years Of seclusion . ’ Here in the Prytaneum (Rolland s life is full Of such mystical word plays) the young man found a friend . He also was in the future to be one O f the leading spirits of a C Fr nce, one who , like laudel and Rolland himself, 14 ROMAIN ROLLAND was not to attain widespread celebrity until the lapse O f u of a q arter a century . We should err were we to con sider it the outcome of pure chance that the three greatest representatives O f idealism Of the new poetic faith in C e C Pé u France, Paul laudel, Andre Suar s , and harles g y, should in their formative years have been intimate friends of Romain Rolland , and that after long years of obscurity they should almost at the same hour have ac F quired extensive influence over the rench nation . In their mutual converse, in their mysterious and ardent the faith , were created elements Of a world which was not immediately to become visible through the formless one h vapors Of time . Though not of t ese friends had as O f yet a clear vision his goal , and though their respective energies were to lead them along widely divergent paths , their mutual reactions strengthened the primary forces of passion and o f steadfast earnestness to become a sense

- of all embracing world community . They were inspired with an identical mission to devote their lives, renouncing success and pecuniary reward , that by work and appeal they might help to restore to their nation its lost faith .

one of e Each these four comrades, Rolland , Suar s, e f Claudel , and P guy, has from a di ferent intellectual standpoint brought this revival to his nation . C L As in the case of laudel at the yceum , so now with are Sn s at the Normal School , Rolland was drawn to his friend through the love which they shared for music , and especially for the music Of Wagner . A further bond of “ was fo r union the passion both had Shakespeare . This ” “ passion , Rolland has written , was the first link in the THE NORMAL SCHOOL 1 5

Snares long chain of our friendship . was then , what he has again become tod ay after traversing the numerous and n o f phases Of a rich manifold ature , a man the n Re aissance . He had the very soul, the stormy tempera a ment, Of that epoch . With his long black hair, his p le an face, and his burning eyes, he looked like Italian r A s exer painted by Carpaccio o Ghirlandajo . a school n a cise he pe ned an O de to Cesare Borgia . Shakespe re od n was his g , as Shakespeare was mi e ; and we Often fought side by side for Shakespeare against ou r profes sors . But soon came a new passion which partially replaced that for the great English dramatist . There “ ” ff ensued the Scythian invasion , an enthusiastic a ection for Tolstoi , which was likewise to be lifelong . These young idealists were repelled by the trite naturalism of

Zola and Maupassant . They were enthusiasts who looked for life to be sustained at a level of heroic ten sion . They, like Flaubert and Anatole France , could not res t content with a literature Of self gratification and N ow amusement . , above these trivialities, was revealed of God of one the figure Of a messenger , prepared to de t n vote his life to the ideal . Our sympa hies we t out to fo r our him . Our love Tolstoi was able to reconcile all on contradictions . Doubtless each e Of us loved him d f one of from i ferent motives , for each us found him in self the master . But for all of us alike he opened a gate into an infinite universe ; for all he was a revelation ” A of . s d life always since earliest chil hood , Rolland f was wholly occupied in the search or ul timate values , th for the hero , for e un iversal artist . 1 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

e of During th se years hard work at the Normal School ,

d . Rolland evoured book after book, writing after writing e His teachers, Bruneti re , and above all Gabriel Monod , already recognized his peculiar gift for historical descrip n tion . Rolland was especially e thralled by the branch O f kn owledge which Jakob Burckhardt had in a sense n inve ted not long before , and to which he had given the “ ” name of history o f civilization —the spiritual picture ’ Of an entire era . As regards special epochs, Rolland s interest was notably aroused by the wars Of religion , wherein the spiritual elements Of faith were permeated do with the heroism of personal sacrifice . Thus early the motifs of all his creative work shape themselves ! of He drafted a whole series studies , and simultaneously of planned a more ambitious work, a history the heroic M O f C . epoch atherine de edici In the scientific field , too , our student was boldly attacking ultimate problems , drinking in ideas thirstily from all the streamlets and rivers Of philosophy, natural science , logic, music, and n n the history of art . But the burde of these acquireme ts was no more able to crush the poet in him than the weight a o Of tree is able to crush its ro ts . During stolen hours d and he ma e essays in poetry music, which , however, he has always kept hidden from the world . In the year 18 8 8 , before leaving the Normal School to face the ex r n d u v e ie ces Cre o ia erum . p Of actual life, he wrote q

This is a remarkable document, a spiritual testament , a and u n ub moral philosophical confession . It remains p ’ lished r , but a friend of Rolland s youth assu es us that it contains the essential elements of his untrammeled

CHAPTER V

A MESSAGE FROM AFAR

H C OOL days were over . The Old problem con cerning the choice of profession came up anew fo r n discussion . Although science had proved e t riching, al hough it had aroused enthusiasm, it had by ’ no means fulfilled the young artist s cherished dream . More than ever his longings turned towards imaginative literature and towards music . His most ardent ambition was still to join the ranks Of those whose words and melo d ’ ies unlock men s souls ; he aspired to become a creator, n a co soler . But life seemed to demand orderly forms, O f discipline instead freedom , an occupation instead Of a

n now - - of mission . The you g man , two and twenty years age , stood undecided at the parting Of the ways .

Then came a message from afar, a message from the o L e beloved hand f o Tolstoi . The whole generation d d honored the Russian as a lea er, looke up to him as the embodied symbol O f truth . In this year was published ’ What is to be D one ? Tolstoi s booklet , containing a fierce of C indictment art . ontemptuously he shattered all that

l . t was dearest to Rol and Bee hoven , to whom the young d Frenchman daily ad ressed a fervent prayer, was termed a seducer to sensuality . Shakespeare was a poet Of the 1 8 A MESSAGE FROM AFAR 19

of fourth rank, a wastrel . The whole modern art was ' ’ swept away like chafl from the threshing -floor ; the heart s holy of holies was cast into outer darkness . This tract, which rang through Europe, could be dismissed with a smile by those O f an Older generation ; but for the young men who revered Tolstoi as their one hope in a n and con lyi g cowardly age, it stormed through their a sciences like hurricane . The bitter necessity was forced upon them of choosing between Beethoven and the holy o ne t n : of their hearts . Writing Of his hour, Rolla d says “ strai htfor The goodness , the sincerity, the absolute g wardness Of this man made Of him fo r me an infallible guide in the prevailing moral anarchy . But at the same ’

C d n . time , from hil hood s days , I had passio ately loved art in w as do exa er Music, especial, my daily food ; I not gg ate in saying that to me music was as much a necessary ” d O f life as bread . Yet this very music was stigmatize of by Tolstoi , the beloved teacher, the most human men ; “ was decried as an enjoyment that leads men to neglect ” n a duty . Tolstoi co temned the Ariel of the soul as ? seducer to sensuality . What was to be done The ’ a young man s heart w s racked . Was he to follow the O f sage Yasnaya Polyana , to cut away from his life all will to art ; or was he to follow the innermost call which would lead him to transfuse the whole Of his life with and ? music poesy He must perforce be unfaithful, o r either to the most venerated among artists , to art itself ; either to the most beloved among men or to the most beloved among ideas . of In this state mental cleavage , the student now 20 ROMAIN ROLLAND

n formed an amazing resolve . Sitting dow one day in t re his little attic , he wrote a le ter to be sent into the O f mote distances Russia , a letter describing to Tolstoi the doubts that perplexed his conscience . He wrote as those who despair pray to God , with no hope for a O f miracle, no expectation an answer, but merely to n n d satisfy the burni g ee for confession . Weeks elapsed , and Rolland had long since forgotten his hou r of impulse . one But evening, returning to his room , he found upon ’ the table a small packet . It was Tolstoi s answer to the

n n - u known correspo dent , thirty eight pages written in 1 4 n . Fre ch , an entire treatise This letter Of October , d P N O 4 O f 1 8 8 7 u é u . , subsequently p blishe by g y as the “ ” O f Cahi rs de la uinzaine third series e q , began with “ ” aff C Frére an the ectionate words , her First was nounced the profou nd impression produced upon the had great man , to whose heart this cry for help struck . to I have received your first letter. It has touched me ” r the hea t . I have read it with tears in my eyes . Tol stoi on to nd went expou his ideas upon art . That alone of is value , he said , which binds men together ; the only artist who counts is the artist who makes a sacrifice for n d his co victions . The precon ition of every true calling fo r for must be , not love art , but love mankind . Those only who are filled with such a love can hope that they

n . will ever be able, as artists , to do anything worth doi g These words exercised a decisive influence upon the O f d future Romain Rollan . But the doctrine summa rized above has been expounded by Tolstoi Often enough,

A MESSAGE FROM AFAR 2 1

ff and expounded more clearly . What especially a ected ’ our novice was the proof of the sage s readiness to give m d was d hu an help . Far more than by the wor s Rollan f man of moved by the kindly deed O Tolstoi . This

- n O f world wide fame, respo ding to the appeal a nameless in O f and unknown youth, a student a back street Paris , own had promptly laid aside his labors , had devoted a

da or a o f an n whole y, perhaps two days , to the t sk sweri g and n For consoli g his unknown brother . Rolland this

d and . was a vital experience, a eep creative experience own d The remembrance Of his nee , the remembrance Of the help then received from a foreign thinker, taught him a O f n n n to reg rd every crisis co scie ce as somethi g sacred , ’ and to look upon the rendering O f aid as the artist s pri ’ mary moral duty . From the day he opened Tolstoi s

a letter, he himself became the gre t helper, the brotherly d . u a viser His whole work, his human authority, fo nd n n w n its beginni gs here . Never si ce then , ho ever pressi g

d a the emands upon his time , has he f iled to bear in mind the help he received . Never has he refu sed to render help to any unknown person appealin g out O f a ’ u n gen i ely troubled conscience . From Tolstoi s letter n d n n n spra g countless Rollan s, bri gi g aid and cou sel

a d throughout the years . Henceforw r , poesy was to him d one d o f a sacre trust, which he has fulfille in the name ho m e nd his master . Rarely has history more sple id witness to the fact that in the moral sphere no less than in n the physical , force never ru s to waste . The hour when Tolstoi wrote to his unknown correspondent has 22 ROMAIN ROLLAND been revived in a thousand letters from Rolland to a u n n of thousand nk owns . An i finite quantity seed is tod ay wafted through the world , seed that has sprung of from this single grain kindness .

24 ROMAIN ROLLAND

The duty imposed on hi m was to arrange documents in aw Pallace the gloomy F ese , to cull history from regis r ters and books . Fo a brief space he paid due tribute of be com to this service, and in the archives the Vatican piled a memoir upon the nuncio Salvi ati and the sack of u Rome . But ere long his attention was concentrated p o n n a d the livi g lone . His mind was floo ed by the n C a wo derfully clear light of the amp gna , which reduces

- d n all things to a self evi e t harmony, making life appear Fo r simple and giving it the aspect of pure sensation . ’ many, the gentle grace Of the artist s promised land ex er is Re c es an irresistible charm . The memorials of the naissance issue to the wanderer a summons to greatn ess . a d In It ly, more strongly than elsewhere, oes it seem that n Of art is the mea ing human life, and that art must be ’ n man s heroic aim . Throwi g aside his theses , the n n you g man Of twenty, i toxicated with the adventure of and d love of life , wandere for months in blissful free dom h o f and t rough the lesser cities Italy Sicily . Even

was o f Tolstoi forgotten , for in this region sensuous pre sentation n , in the dazzli g south, the voice from the Rus d n n sian steppes , deman i g renunciatio , fell upon deaf dd ears . Of a su en , however, Shakespeare, friend and ’ nd d guide Of Rolla s chil hood , resumed his sway . A

r cycle Of the Shakespearean dramas , presented by E d nesto Rossi , isplayed to him the splendor Of elemental and n n n passion , aroused an irresistible lo gi g to tra s fi u re g , like Shakespeare , history in poetic form . He ‘ was moving day by day among the stone witnesses to the of l greatness past centuries . He would reca l those cen ROME 25

turies to life . The poet in him awakened . In cheerful his n of faithlessness to mission , he pen ed a series n on n dramas, catchi g them the wing with that burni g n ecstacy which inspiration , comi g unawares , invariably En n arouses in the artist . Just as gla d is presented in ’ SO w as Re Shakespeare s historical plays , the whole own naissance epoch to be reflected in his writings . L en ight Of heart, in the intoxication Of composition he p one a n ned pl y after another, without co cerning himself a n N ot ne as to the earthly possibilities for st gi g them . o o f a t these rom nticist dramas has , in fac , ever been per N ot one of d formed . them is to ay accessible to the n has public . The maturer critical se se of the artist n n made him hide them from the world . He has a fo d ess for the faded manuscripts simply as memorials of the t ardors of you h . The most momentous experience of these years spent in Italy was the formation o f a new friendship . Rolland never sought people out . In essence he is a solitary, n one who loves b est to live amo g his books . Yet from the mystical and symbolical outlook it is characteristic Of his biography that each epoch of his youth brought him into contact with one or other of the leading personalities h w Of the day . In accordance wit the mysterious la s of and attraction , he has been drawn ever again into the d heroic sphere, has associate with the mighty ones Of n the earth . Shakespeare, Mozart, and Beethove were

o f d . Snares the stars his chil hood During school life,

! C his . A S and laudel became intimates a student , in an of hour when he was needing the help sages, he followed Renan ; Spinoza free d his mind in matters of religion ; 26 ROMAIN ROLLAND

from afar came the brotherly greeting of Tolstoi . In

Rome, through a letter Of introduction from Monod , he of Malwida Me senbu made the acquaintance von y g, whose whole life had been a contemplation of the heroic past . Wagner, Nietzsche , Mazzini , Herzen , and Kossuth Fo r were her perennial intimates . this free spirit, the ot barriers O f nationality and language did n exist . No fl i h “ revolution in art o r politics could a r g t her . A ” she human magnet, exercised an irresistible appeal upon l she great natures . When Ro land met her was already an Old woman, a lucid intelligence , untroubled by disil

lus ionment . , still an idealist as in youth From the of she height her seventy years, looked down over the o f n past, serene and wise . A wealth k owledge and ex ri n d f pe e ce streamed from her min to that o the learner . the Rolland found in her same gentle illumination , the u same s blime repose after passion , which had endeared

- the Italian landscape to his mind . Just as from the monuments and pictures of Italy he could reconstruct the ’ of s e so Malwida s figures the Renais ance hero s , from confidential talk coul d he reconstruct the tragedy in the she lives of the artists had known . In Rome he learned a just and loving appreciation fo r the genius O f the present . His new friend taught him what in truth he had long ere this learned unawares from within , that there is a lofty level O f thought and sensation where nations and one languages become as in the universal tongue of art . n on m Duri g a walk the Ja iculum , a vision came to him of one of the work European scope he was day to write, of ean hristo he the vision J C p . ROME 27

Wonderful was the friendship between the old German

o f - e he woman and the Frenchman twenty thr e . Soon it came difficult for either Of them to say which was more o so indebted to the other . Romain wed much to Mal wida , in that she had enabled him to form juster views of some O f her great contemporaries ; while Malwida d value Romain , because in this enthusiastic young artist she discerned new possibilities O f greatness . The same and idealism animated both, tried chastened in the many wintered woman , fiery and impetuous in the youth . Every day Rolland came to visit his ven erable friend in he d on t Via ella Polveriera , playing to her the piano the f o . works his favorite masters She, in turn , introduced h im to Roman society . Ge ntly guiding his restless na

u . t re, She led him towards spiritual freedom In his

To the Und in Anti one essay y g g , Rolland tells us that to two C Malwida women , his mother, a sincere hristian , and Me senbu n von y g, a pure idealist, he owes his awakeni g d alwida ul an . M to the f l significance Of art Of life , writing in D er L ebens Abend einer Idealistin a quarter of a century before Rolland had attained celebrity , ex pressed her confident belief in his coming fame . We cannot fail to be moved when we read tod ay the descrip “ tion Of Rolland in youth : My friendship with this young man was a great pleasure to me in other respects t of d besides hat music . For those advance in years , there can be no loftier gratification than to rediscover in ul the young the same imp se towards idealism, the same striving towards the highest aims, the same contempt for ul or all that is v gar trivial, the same courage in the strug 28 ROMAIN ROLLAND gle for freedom of individuality For two years I enjoyed the intellectual companionship o f young Rol

an L not l d et me repeat, it was from his musical

a d t lent alone that my pleasure was erived , though here he was able to fill what had long been a gap in my life . In other intellectual fields I fou nd him likewise con d n genial . He aspire to the fullest possible developme t

a n Of his faculties ; whilst I myself, in his stimul ti g pres to t e O f ence, was able revive you hfuln ss thought , to re discover an intense interest in the whole world Of imagi native beauty . As far as poesy is concerned , I gradu ’ ally became aware Of the greatness o f my young friend s endowments , to be finally convinced Of the fact by the of one h o f reading Of is dramatic poems . Speaking she this early work, prophetically declared that the writ ’ er s moral energy might well be expected to bring about f a regeneration o French imaginative literature . In a poem , finely conceived but a trifle sentimental , she ex pressed her thankfulness for the experience of these two Malwida years . had recognized Romain as her Euro t n pean bro her, just as Tolstoi had recog ized a disciple .

Twenty years before the world had heard Of Rolland , his on n life was moving heroic paths . Greatness ca not be id Wh on b . e is and en any born to greatness, the past the present send him images and figures to serve as x x e hortation and e ample . From every country and E from every race Of urope, voices rise to greet the man is one for who day to speak them all . CHAPTER VII

TH E CONSECRATION

in of HE two years Italy, a time free receptivity

and n . n creative enjoyme t, were over A summo s

now came from Paris ; the Normal School , which n had Rolla d left as pupil, required his services as n and Malwida on . v teacher The parti g was a wrench , ’ Meysenbug s farewell was designed to convey a sym oli al a i n ao b c me n ng . She invited her you g friend to

n u ivi compa y her to Bayre th , the chief sphere Of the act O f the man n ties who , with Tolstoi , had been the leadi g n of d d n a inspiratio Rollan uri g e rly youth , the man whose image had been endowed with more vigorous life by ’ M lwida n wan a s memories Of his personality . Rolla d d o n to d in ered foot across Umbria , meet his frien n d a in w Wa Ve ice . Together they visite the p lace hich g d d ner had die , and thence journeyed northwar to the ’ “ ” Malwida scene Of his life s work . My aim , writes in

a d emo her ch racteristic style, which sel om attains strong “ ional Ro t force, but is none the less moving, was that main should have these sublime impressions to clo se

a nd his years in It ly a the fecund epoch of youth . I likewise wished the experience to be a consecration upon o f d the threshold manhoo , with its prospective labors ” u l and its inevitable str ggles and disi lusionments . 2 9 3 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Olivier had entered the country of Jean Christophe ! fi n o f On the rst morni g their arrival, before introducing Wahnfried Malwida her friend at , took him into the gar ’ l den to see the master s grave . Ro land uncovered as if in church , and the two stood for a while in silence medi on to one of tating the hero , them a friend , to the other ’ to a leader. In the evening they went hear Wagner s Pars i al posthumous work f . This composition , which, t like the visit to Bayreuth , is strangely interconnected wi h ean Chris to he consecra the genesis Of J p , is as it were a ’ a tion l prelude to Rolland s future . For life was now to Mal ida call him from these great dreams . w gives a “ - moving description of their good by. My friends had kindly placed their box at my disposal . Once more I Pars i al who went to hear f with Rolland , was about to return to France in order to play an active part in the of work of life . It was a matter deep regret to me that ‘ this gifted friend was not free to lift himself to higher ’ not spheres, that he could ripen from youth to manhood while wholly devoted to the unfolding of his artistic im pulses . But I knew that none the less he would work at the roaring loom Of time, weaving the living garment Of divinity . The tears with which his eyes were filled at the close Of the opera made me feel once more that my faith in him would be justified . Thus I bade him farewell with heartfelt thanks for the time filled with poesy which his talents had bestowed on me . I dismissed him with the blessing that age gives to youth entering upon life . Although an epoch that had been rich for both was now t Fo r closed , heir friendship was by no means over.

CHAPTER VIII

YEARS OF APPRENTICESHIP

’ of d HE form Rollan s career, no less than the n n substa ce Of his In er life, was decisively fash ioned t by hese two years in Italy . As happened ’ no in Goethe s case, so in that with which we are w con was cerned , the conflict Of the will harmonized amid the a n had sublime cl rity of the southern landscape . Rolla d

o d . gone t Rome with his mind still undecide By genius , n n n he was a musicia ; by i cli ation , a poet ; by necessity, L n a historian . ittle by little, a magical union had bee

d . a effecte between music and poesy In his first dr mas, the phrasing is permeated with lyrical melody . Simul aneousl n d had y, behi d the winged wor s , his historic sense f f h built up a mighty scene out o the rich hues O t e past . After the success Of his thesis L es o rigines d a theat re ’ lyrique modem s (H isto ire de l opera en Europe avant L ully et S carlatti) he became professor of the history O f fir the a 1903 O n music, st at Norm l School , and from wards at the Sorbonne . The aim he set before himself “ ’ ” d l étem e lle oraison was to isplay fl , the sempiternal n d blossomi g, Of music as an en less series through the

e rt ages , while each age none the l ss puts fo h its own for characteristic shoots . Discovering the first time what 3 2 YEARS OF APPRENTICESHIP 3 3

was to be henceforward his favorite theme, he showed how, in this apparently abstract sphere, the nations culti n vate their individual characteristics, while never ceasi g to develop unawares the higher unity wherein time and k a national differences are un nown . A gre t power for understanding others , in association with the faculty for d d es writing so as to be readily un erstoo , constitutes the sence Of his activities . Here, moreover, in the element a n with which he was most famili r, his emotio al force was n ff si gularly e ective . More than any teacher before him did had n n he make the science he to convey, a livi g thi g . n n of Deali g with the invisible e tity music , he Showed that the greatness of mankind is never concentrated in a s in

n or na gle age, exclusively allotted to a single tion , but is transmitted from age to age and from nation to nation . one n Thus like a torch does it pass from master to a other, a torch that will never be extinguished while human be in to O f gs continue draw the breath inspiration . There “ no ad are contr ictions, there is no cleavage, in art . His tory must take for its Object the living unity of the human

. C to a spirit onsequently , history is compelled m intain ” the tie between all the thoughts Of the human spirit . ’ Many o f those who heard Rolland s lectures at the O f n and n School Social Scie ce at the Sorbo ne, still speak O f d n them to ay with undiminished gratitude . O ly in a was O f formal sense history the topic these discourses , and n was i scie ce merely their foundation . It s true that

t s u a n has Rolland , side by side wi h his univer al rep t tio , a reputation among specialists in musical research for hav~ ’ of L O r eo ing discovered the manuscript uigi Rossi s f , 3 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

and for having been the first to do justice to the forgotten Francesco Provenzale (the teacher O f Alessandro Scar

latti who founded the Neapolitan school) . But their s broad humanist scope, their encyclopedic outlook , make his lectures on The Beginnings of Opera frescoes of

. o f whilom civilizations In interludes speaking, he

on - would give music voice , playing the piano long lost so airs, that in the very Paris where they first blossomed

three hundred years before , their silvery tones were now

reawakened from dust and parchment . At this date, while Rolland was still quite young, he began to exercise upon his fellows that clarifying, guiding, inspiring, and formative influence, which since then , increasingly rein forced by the power O f his imaginative writings and n n spread by these into ever wide i g circles , has become r immeasu able in its extent . Nevertheless, throughout n its expa sion , this force has remained true to its primary ’ aim . From first to last , Rolland s leading thought has ’ been to display, amid all the forms Of man s past and ’ man s present , the things that are really great in human

f n - o a n o . pers n lity, and the u ity all si gle hearted endeavor ’ It is Obvious that Romain Rolland s passion for music n n could not be restricted within the co fi es O f history . in He could never become a specialist . The limitations volved in the career of such experts are utterly umcon For genial to his synthetic temperament . him the past 5 but a preparation for the present ; what has been merely provides the possibility for increasin g comprehension of the future . Thus side by side with his learned theses ’ hi s m Musiciens d aut re o is H aendel and with volu es f , ,

YEARS OF APPRENTICESHIP 3 5

’ ’ is Mu i ien H toire de l O éra . s c s d au our p , etc , we have his j ’ d hai , a collection Of essays which were first published in “ ” “ ’ the Revue de Par is and the Revue de l art dra ” mat i ue n nd n o f q , essays pen ed by Rolla as champio the n n modern and the unknown . This collectio co tains the o in first portrait f Hugo Wolf ever published France, together with striking pres entations O f Richard Strauss and of new Debussy . He was never weary looking for creative forces in European music ; he went to the Stras

a a a and burg musical festiv l to hear Gust v M hler, visited a n B onn to attend the Beethoven festiv l . Nothi g seemed alien to his eager pursuit o f knowledge ; his sense Of

- Ca a n a ' justice was all embracing . From t lo ia to Sc n dinavia he listened for every new wave in the ocean Of music . He was no less at home with the spirit of the present than with the spirit Of the past .

n a o f as Duri g these ye rs activity teacher, he learned in much from life . New circles were opened to him the Paris which hitherto he had known little Of except from

u n a the win dow o f his lonely study . His position at the i versity and his marriage brought the man who had hitherto associated only with a few intimates and with n n a and a distant heroes, i to co tact with intellectu l soci l

In the - in - d n u d life . house Of his father law, the isti g ishe s ea philologi t Michel Br l , he became acquainted with the

a of n . E le ding lights the Sorbo ne lsewhere, in the draw

- d a n n O th ing rooms, he move mo g fi anciers, bourgeois , cials d O f n , persons rawn from all strata city life, i clud ing the cosmopolitan s who are always to be found in

Paris . Involuntarily, during these years, Rolland the 3 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

H is idealism romanticist became an observer . , without d forfeiting intensity, gaine critical strength . The ex

eriences p garnered (it might be better to say, the disil lusionments n d in sustai e ) these contacts, all this medley of subse Of commonplace life , were to form the basis his quent descriptions Of the Parisian world in L a fo ire s ur la lace and D ans on p la mais . Occasional journeys to n n and Germa y, Switzerla d , Austria , his beloved Italy, gave him Opportunities for comparison , and provided d fresh knowle ge . More and more, the growing horizon of modern culture came to occupy his thoughts , thus dis of placing the science history . The wanderer returned E had from urope discovered his home , had discovered Paris ; the historian had found the most important epoch for — living men and women the present .

3 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

was a fighter, but his world desired an easy life . He d wante fellowship , but all that his world wanted was enjoyment .

Suddenly a storm burst over the country . France was n u stirred to the depths . The entire natio became e

in u . a grossed an intellect al and moral problem Roll nd , w as one of a bold swimmer, the first to leap into the and turbulent flood . Betwixt night morning, the Dreyfus affair rent France in twain . There were no abstention ists ; there was no calm contemplation . The finest among Fo r Frenchmen were the hottest partisans . two years the country wa s severed as by a knife blade into two “ i ” camps , that of those whose verdict was gu lty, and that “ r o f those whose verdict was not guilty . In Jean Ch is ’ he Pé u s top and in g y reminiscences , we learn how the d section cut pitilessly athwart families , divi ing brother TO from brother, father from son , friend from friend . day we find it difficult to understand how this accusation O f espionage brought against an artillery captain could ll involve a France in a crisis . The passions aroused transcended the immediate cause to invade the whole E Sphere Of mental life . very Frenchman was faced by a problem of conscience, was compelled to make a deci d x l sion between fatherlan and justice . Thus with e p o

for - n sive energy the moral forces were , all right thi king

. n minds , dragged into the vortex Rolland was amo g the few who from the very outset insisted that Dreyfus was o f innocent . The apparent hopelessness these early en deavors to secure justice were for Rolland a spur to e e conscience . Whereas P guy was nthralled by the mys YEARS OF STRUGGLE 3 9

of u d tical power the problem , which wo l he hoped bring n his and in about a moral purificatio Of country, while conjunction with Bernard Lazare he wrote propagandist

to Rol pamphlets calculated to add fuel the flames , ’ land s energies were devoted to the consideration of the immanent problem Of justice . Under the pseudonym

a n - u L es lo u s S i t J st he published a dramatic parable, p , wherein he lifted the problem from the realm O f time into d an en the realm Of the eternal . This was playe to thus iastic audience, among which were Zola , Scheurer d n n and u . Kest er, Picq art The more efi itely political the

a a tri l bec me , the more evident was it that the freemasons,

- a n af the anti clericalists, and the soci lists were usi g the fair to secure their own ends ; and the more the qu estion a the d Of m terial success replaced the question Of i eal , the more did Rolland withdraw from active participation . n His enthusiasm is devoted o ly to spiritual matters, to

u In aff problems , to lost ca ses . the Dreyfus air, just as one O f later, it was his glory to have been the first to take a and e a up rms , to have b en a solitary ch mpion in a his toric moment .

u n n u Sim lta eously, Rolla d was working Sho lder to e and Suarés d of shoulder with P guy, with the frien his in n f ew . d adolescence, a campaign This i fered from the champion ship Of Dreyfus in that it was not stormy Glamorou s and , but involved a tranquil heroism which d O f ma e it resemble rather the way the cross . The friends were painfully aware Of the corruption and a a n a TO trivi lity Of the liter ture then domina t in P ris .

d a attempt a irect att ck would have been fruitless, for ' 40 ROMAIN ROLLAN D

this hydra had the whole periodical pres s at its Service . Nowhere was it possible to inflict a mortal blow upon

- - re the many headed and thousand armed entity . They d t own solve , therefore, to work against it, not wi h its a not n me ns , by imitati g its own noisy activities, but by in the force Of moral example , by quiet sacrifice and vincible patience . For fifteen years they wrote and “ ” d ahier u inz ine e ited the C s de la q a . Not a centime on n nd was spent advertisi g it, and it was rarely to be fou on sale at any of the usual agents . It was read by stu

o f dents and by a few men letters, by a small circle grow ing imperceptibly . Throughout an entire decade , all ’ n O f ean Rolla d s works appeared in its pages , the whole J

- Christo he Beetho ven Michel A n e . p , , g , and the plays ’ Though during this epoch the author s fin ancial position d n was far from easy , he receive nothi g for any of these writings— the case is perhaps unexampled in modern literature . To fortify their idealism , to set an example O f to others , these heroic figures renounced the chance publicity, circulation , and remuneration for their writ ings ; they renounced the holy trinity of the literary faith . ’ ’ An d n n Pé u s whe at length , through Rolla d s , g y , and ’ “ ” e a the C Suar s t rdily achieved fame , ahiers had come

n o wn n . i to its , its publication was disco tinued But it remains an imperishable monument Of French idealism a t and r istic comradeship . ’ A third time Rolland s intellectual ardor led him to tr of y his mettle in the field action . A third time , for a space, did he enter into a comradeship that he might out of fashion life life . A group Of young men had YEARS OF STRUGGLE 41 come to recognize the futility and harmfulness Of the n French boulevard drama , whose ce tral topic is the eter nal recurrence of adu ltery issuing from the tedi um Of n d n an bourgeois existence . They determi e upo attempt a and to restore the drama to the people , to the prolet riat, R ol thus to furnish it with new energies . Impetuously n n an land threw himself i to the scheme, writi g essays , m i ll be d oes an n . a fest , e tire book Above , contribute a series of plays conceived in the spirit of the French revo a e lution and composed for its glorification . J ur s de livered a speech introducin g D anton to the French work

a d . e rs . The other plays were likewise st ge But the da e did ily press , Obviously sc nting a hostile force , its

a utmost to chill the enthusi sm . The other participators SO a fine soon lost their zeal, th t ere long the impetus Of n n d the you g group was spe t . Rollan was left alone, nd n richer in experience a disillusionme t, but not poorer in ith fa . Although by sentiment Rolland is attached to all n man n great moveme ts , the inner has ever remai ed free ’ n ff from ties . He gives his e ergies to help others e orts , ’ n nd n but ever follows bli ly i others footsteps . Whatever creative work he has attempted in common with others has been a disappointment ; the fellowship has been

an clou ded by the universality Of hum frailty . The Dreyfus case was subordinated to political scheming ; the ’ ’ People s Theater was wrecked by jealousies ; Rolland s plays, written for the workers , were staged but for a night ; his wedded life came to a sudden and disastrou s

— bu t end nothing could shatter his idealism . When 42 ROMAIN ROLLAND contemporary existence could not be controlled by the forces of the spirit , he still retained his faith in the In n l the spirit . hours Of disillusionme t he cal ed up

a n im ges Of the great o es Of the earth , who conquered u n mo rni g by action , who conquered life by art . He left the d the be re theater, he renounce professorial chair, d n d a tired from the worl . Si ce life repu i ted his single hearted endeavors he would transfigure life in gracious n had pictures . His disillusionme ts but been further

n O f experience . Duri g the ensuing ten years solitude he

ean Christo he wrote J p , a work which in the ethical sense is more truly real than reality itself, a work which em bodies the living faith O f hi s generation . CHAPTER X

A DECADE OF SECLUSION

OR a brief season the Parisian public was fa ’ miliar with Romain Rolland s name as that Of an i a musical expert d a promis ng dramatist . d d V Thereafter for years he isappeare from iew, for the capital Of France excels all others in its faculty for mer w as O f n ciless forgetfulness . He never spoken eve in of literary circles , although poets and other men letters might be expected to be the best judges Of the values in d which they eal . If the curious reader Should care to the n turn over reviews and a thologies Of the period, to n n ot exami e the histories Of literature, he will find a d m an d wor Of the who had already written a ozen plays , had composed wonderful biographies, and had published i ean hristo he Cahi r e s x volumes Of J C p . The e s d la ” q uinzaine were at once the birthplace and the tomb of n w as his writi gs . He a stranger in the city at the very time when he was describing its mental life with a pic turesquene ss and comprehensiveness whi ch has never of been equaled . At forty years age, he had won neither fame nor pecuniary reward ; he seemed to pos en sess no influ ce ; he was not a living force . At the of tu opening the twentieth cen ry, like Charles Louis 43 44 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Verhaeren C e Philippe, like , like laudel, and like Suar s , re in truth the strongest writers Of the time, Rolland mained unrecogn ized when he was at the zen ith O f his In o wn n n creative powers . his perso he experie ced the fate which he has depicted in such moving terms, the tragedy of French idealism . o f u A period secl sion is, however, needful as a pre r limina y to labors of such concentration . Force must n an develop i solitude before it c capture the world .

Only a man prepared to ignore the public, only a man n ff animated with heroic i di erence to success , could ven ture upon the forlorn hope of planning a romance in ten

o f volumes ; a French romance which , in an epoch

a fo r exacerbated n tionalism , was to have a German its n u hero . In such detachment alo e co ld this universality n N O Of knowledge shape itself into a literary creatio . where but aimd tranquillity undisturbed by the n oise Of the crowd could a work of such vast scope be brought to fruition . Fo r a decade Rolland seemed to have vanished from the French literary world . Mystery enveloped him , the mystery Of toil . Through all these long years his cloistered labors represented the hidden stage Of the C w hrysalis, from hich the imago is to issue in winged

o f u u n d o f glory . It was a period m ch s fferi g, a perio n w o f silence, a period characterized by k o ledge the world— the knowledge O f a man whom the world did not yet know.

46 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Amid the books Sits the gentle monk Of this cell , soberly clad like a clergyman . He is slim , tall, deli his n l cate looking ; complexio is sal ow, like that Of one in who is rarely in the Open . His face is l ed , suggesting in that here is a worker who Spends few hours sleep . — His whole aspect is somewhat fragile the sharply- cut profile which no photograph seems to reproduce per e tl n d f c y ; the small ha ds , his hair silvering alrea y behind the lofty brow ; his moustache falling softly like a E shadow over the thin lips . verything about him is gentle : his voice in its rare utterances ; his figure of S which , even in repose, shows the traces his edentary a life ; his gestures , which are alw ys restrained ; his slow gait . His whole personality radiates gentleness . The casual observer might derive the impression that the d d d man is ebilitate or extremely fatigue , were it not for the way in which the eyes flash ever and again from t benea h the slightly reddened eyelids , to relapse always n into their customary expression of ki dliness . The eyes d f have a blue tint as Of eep waters O exceptional purity . That is why no photograph can convey a just impres sion Of one in whose eyes the whole force O f his soul n n seems to be co centrated . The face is i spired with u a and life by the glance , j st as the sm ll frail body radiates the mysterious energy Of work . n This work , the unceasi g labor Of a Spirit imprisoned in a body, imprisoned within narrow walls during all ? these years , who can measure it The written books of are but a fraction it . The ardor of ou r recluse is

- i all embrac ng, reaching forth to include the cultures of A PORTRAIT 47

and every tongue , the history, philosophy, poesy, music

in . O f every nation . He is touch with all endeavors n He receives sketches , letters, and reviews concerni g

n . one n a everythi g He is who thi ks as he writes, spe k ing to himself and to others while his pen moves over

the . u h n w in paper With his small, prig t ha d riting all the u d which letters are clearly and powerf lly forme , be permanently fix es the thoughts that pass through his d o r n min , whether spontaneously arising comi g from t and n wi hout ; he records the airs Of past rece t times , noting them down in manuscript books ; he makes ex tracts from newspapers , drafts plans for future work ; his thriftily collected b o ard of these autographic intel a f lectual goods is enormous . The fl me O his labor burns unceasingly . Rarely does he take more than five ’ hours sleep ; seldom does he go for a stroll in the ad joinin g Luxembourg ; infrequently does a friend climb ’ the five flights O f winding stair for an hour s quiet talk ; even such journeys as he undertakes are mostly for pur O f a an poses research . Repose signifies for him ch ge of n of occupation ; to write letters i stead books , to read of ac philosophy instead poetry . His solitude is an n tive communi g with the world . His free hours are his only holiday, stolen from the long days when he sits at in the twilight the piano , holding converse with the o f d n great masters music, rawi g melodies from other worlds into this confined space which is itself a world the Of creative spirit . CHAPTER XII

RENOWN

1 E are in the year 19 0 . A motor is tearing C El sées n along the hamps y , outrunni g the O belated warnings f its own hooter . There is a cry, and a man who was incautiously crossing the hom street lies beneath the wheels . He is e away wounded and with broken limbs , to be nursed back to life . slendem ess Nothing can better exemplify the , as yet, ’ n Of Romain Rolland s fame, than the reflectio how little his death at this juncture would have signified to the literary world . There would have been a paragraph or two in the newspapers informing the public that the sometime professor Of musical history at the Sorbonne had succumbed after being run over by a motor . A few, perhaps , would have remembered that fifteen years

an n n d a earlier this man Roll d had writte promisi g ram s , nn and books on musical topics . Among the i umerable o f n n inhabitants Paris, scarce a ha dful would have k own f RO anything o the deceased author . Thus ignored was main Rolland two years before he obtained a European reputation ; thus nameless was be when he had finished most of the works which were to make him a leader of 4s RENOWN 49

— so ou r generation the dozen or dramas, the biographies of ean Of the heroes , and the first eight volumes J

e Christoph . w nd l A o erful thing is fame , wonderful its eterna t E multiplici y . very reputation has peculiar character istics of , independent the man to whom it attaches, and yet appertain ing to him as his destiny . Fame may be wise and it may be foolish ; it may be deserved and it ma on n y be undeserved . On the e ha d it may be easily n d and n on attai e brief, flashing tra siently like a meteor ; n the other ha d it may be tardy, slow in blossoming, fol w in O f lo ing reluctantly the footsteps the works . Some times fame is malicious, ghoulish , arriving too late, and n batteni g upon corpses . n Stra ge is the relationship between Rolland and fame . From early youth he was allured by its magic ; but charmed by the thought Of the only reputation that n n u cou ts, the reputatio that is based pon moral strength d ad re and ethical authority, he prou ly and ste fastly nounced the ordinary amenities Of cliquism and con ventional n n tem a i tercourse . He knew the da gers and pt tions O f power ; he knew that fussy activity could grasp nothing but a cold shadow, and was impotent to seize the i radiant l ght . Never, therefore, did he take any de

out liberate step towards fame, never did he reach his nd ha to fame , near to him as fame had been more than in n once his life . I deed , he deliberately repelled the oncoming footsteps by the publication of his scathing

L a o ire s ur la lace a f p , through which he perm nently for feited the favor of the Parisian press . What he writes 5 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

“ of Jean Christophe applies perfectly to himself : Le ’ succes n était pas son but ; son but était la foi ! Not success , but faith was his goal . ! um Fame loved Rolland , who loved fame from afar, “ “ a obtrusively . It were pity, fame seemed to s y, to ’ disturb this man s work . The seeds must lie for a whi le in the darkness, enduring patiently, until the time comes for germination Reputation and the work were grow f l ing in two di ferent worlds , awaiting contact . A smal community Of admirers had formed after the publication o f Beetho ven . They followed Jean Christophe in his “ The Cahier e a i pilgrimage . faithful Of the s d l qu n ” ain z e won new friends . Without any help from the press , through the unseen influence Of responsive sym

o f . Transla pathics , the circulation his works grew tions were published . Paul Seippel , the distinguished

Swiss author, penned a comprehensive biography . newspapers had begun to print his name . The crown Rolland had found many devoted admirers before the ing o f his completed work by the Academy was nothing more than the sound Of a trumpet summon ing the armies n of his admirers to a review . All at o ce accounts Of n be Rolla d broke upon the world like a flood , shortly 19 12 fore he had attained his fiftieth year . In he was 1 14 still unknown ; in 9 he had a wide reputation . With

o a cry f astonishment, a generation recognized its leader, and Europe became aware Of the first product Of the new E un iversal uropean spirit . ’ There is a mystical significance in Romain Rolland s f s o . rise to fame, ju t as in every event his life Fame RENOWN 5 1 came late to this man whom fame had passed by during the bitter years of mental distress and material need .

at h Nevertheless it came the rig t hour, since it came ’ d n w before the war . Rollan s re o n put a sword into his an hand . At the decisive morr 3 nt he had power d a E so voice to speak for urope . He stood on a pedestal , w as that he visible above the medley . In truth fame a n ff n was gr nted at a fitti g time , when through su eri g and knowledge Rolland had grown ripe for his highest function , to assume his European responsibility . Repu tation and u , the power that rep tation gives , came at a moment when the world o f the courageous needed a m an who shou ld proclaim again st the world itself the ’ world s eternal message of brotherhood . CHAPTER XIII

ROLLAND AS TH E EMBODIMENT OF TH E EUROPEAN SPIRIT

HUS does Rolland’ s life pass from Obscurity into

o f . the light day Progress is slow, but the

impul sion comes from powerful energies . The movement towards the goal is not always obvious , and yet his life is associated as is none other with the f E disastrously impending destiny o urope . Regarded from the outlook of fulfillment , we discern that all the incon ostensibly counteracting influences, the years of s icuous m p and apparently vain struggle , have been eces sary ; we see that every incident has been symbolic .

The career develops like a work Of art , building itself o up in a wise ordination f will and chance . We should a o f t t ke too mean a view destiny, were we to hink it the outcome of pure sport that this man hitherto unknown Should become a moral force in the world during the very years when , as never before, there was need for one n n o f who would champio the thi gs the spirit . ’ The year 19 14 marks the close of Romain Rolland s private life . Henceforth his career belongs to the world ; his biography becomes part Of history ; his per sonal experiences can no longer be detached from his b pu lic activities . The solitary has been forced out of 5 2

PART TWO

EARL Y WORK AS A DRAMATIST

’ Son b ut n était pas le s ucces ; s on i l but éta t a fo i . “ ’ H T PH e l JEAN C RIS O E , La R vo te .

CHAPTER I

TH E WORK AN D TH E EPOCH

OMAIN ROLLAND ’S work cannot be under stood without an understanding of the epoch in

F r which that work came into being . o here we have a passion that springs from the weariness Of n an entire cou try, a faith that springs from the disil e of 1 8 70 lusiomn nt of a humiliated nation . The shadow of n was cast across the youth the Fre ch author . The significance and greatn ess of his work taken as a whole depend upon the way in which it constitutes a spiritual bridge between one great war and the next . It arises from a blood - stained earth and a storm - tossed horizon on one on Side , reaching across the other to the new struggle and the new spirit .

It originates in gloom . A land defeated in war is man ho ha o d n is like a w s lost his g . Divi e ecstasy sud denly replaced by dull exhaustion ; a fire that blazed so in millions is extinguished , that nothing but ash and n cinder remai . There is a sudden collapse Of all values . Enthusiasm has become meaningless ; death is purpose the d d d less ; ee s , which but yesterday were deeme heroic, are now looked upon as folli es ; faith is a fraud ; belief u u in oneself, a pitiful ill sion . The imp lse to fellowship one for own res on fades ; every fights his hand, evades p S7 5 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND s ibilit y that he may throw it upon his neighbor, thinks , o f n n L only profit, utility, and perso al adva tage . ofty d an n n aspirations are kille by infinite weari ess . Nothi g is so utterly destructive to the moral energy O f the masses as a defeat ; nothing else degrades and weakens to the same extent the whole spiritual poise Of a nation . Such was the condition Of France after 18 70 ; the country was mentally tired ; it had become a land with n out a leader . The best among its imagi ative writers could give no help . They staggered for a while, as if n d stun e by the bludgeoning of the disaster . Then , as

ff d o ff reéntered the first e ects passe , they their Old paths i wh ch led them into a purely literary field , remote and ever remoter from the destinies Of their nation . It is not within the power Of men already mature to make

a headw y against a national catastrophe . Zola , Flau bert, Anatole France , and Maupassant , needed all their strength to keep themselves erect on their own feet .

They could give no support to their nation . Their ex periences had made them skeptical ; they no longer pos sessed sufficient faith to give a new faith to the French n o people . But the younger writers , those who had

o f d personal memories the isaster, those who had not witnessed the actual struggle and had merely grown up d the d ami spiritual corpses left upon the battlefiel , those who looked upon the ravaged and tormented soul Of d not to n France, coul succumb the influe ces Of this weari n ness . The young ca not live without faith , cannot breathe in the moral stagnation Of a materialistic world . n For them, life and creation mean the lighti g up of TH E WORK AND TH E EPOCH 5 9

un faith , that mystically burning faith which glows

u enchabl in n n n q y every new ge eratio , glows even amo g n ha a a TO the tombs of the generatio which s p ssed aw y . d one O f the newcomers , the efeat is no more than the o f n n O f primary factors their experie ce , the most urge t n n the problems their art must take i to accou t . They feel that they are naught unless they prove able to re

and d n . store this France, torn blee i g after the struggle It is their mission to provide a new faith for this skep

n a ro tically resig ed people . Such is the t sk for their

n a of n . bust e ergies , such the go l their aspiratio Not by chance do we find that among the best in defeated n ations a new idealism invariably springs to life ; that o f one the poets such peoples have but aim, to bring solace to their nation that the sense O f defeat may be a u ss aged . ? How can a vanquished nation be solaced H ow can ? the sting o f defeat be soothed The writer must be ’ competent to divert his readers thoughts from the pres ent ; he must fashion a dialectic o f defeat which shall n replace despair by hope . These you g authors en deavored n in d ff n to bri g help two i ere t ways . Some “ n d n : C poi te towards the future, sayi g herish hatred ; ‘ ” n last time we were beate , next time we shall conquer . of This was the argument the nationalists , and there is significance in the fact that it was predominantly voiced n of n by the sometime compa ions Rolla d , by Maurice e C d n e a d . Fo r t Barr s, Paul lau el , P guy hirty years ,

o f and a with the hammers verse prose, they f shioned the wounded pride Of the French nation that it might become 6 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

f e a weapon to strike the hated o to the heart . For thirty years they talked Of nothing but yesterday’ s defeat and ’ - to morrow s triumph . Ever afresh did they tear open l nd th o d . e the wou Again and again, when young were n a in inclining towards reco cili tion , did these writers flame their minds anew with exhortations in the heroic d an vein . From han to h d they passed the unquench O f and able torch revenge, ready eager to fling it into E ’ urope s powder barrel . of of cla The other type idealism, that Rolland , less direc mant and long ignored , looked in a very different r its a im tion for solace, tu ning gaze not tow rds the n mediate future but towards eter ity . It did not prom i se a new victory, but showed that false values had been F d n . or use in estimati g defeat writers Of this school , the of is n o a u n fo r for pupils Tolstoi , force rg me t the spirit , the externals of success provide no criterion of V n value for the soul . In their iew, the i dividual does not conquer when the generals O f his n ation march to victory through a hundred provinces ; the individual is not van quished when the army loses a thousand pieces

t . n n Of ar illery The i dividual gai s the victory, only

n u and has whe he is free from ill sion , when he no part n n In in a y wrong committed by his ation . their isola n a en tio , those who hold such views h ve continually de avo red n to i duce France, not indeed to forget her de feat, but to make Of that defeat a source Of moral great of ness, to recognize the worth the spiritual seed which

n - n has germinated o the blood dre ched battlefields . Of

‘ ean Chris to he o f such a character, in l p , are the words

6 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

— war to hinder the revival of the horrible cleavage be h tw . as een victory and defeat His aim been , not to teach a new national pride, but to inculcate a new

- heroism Of self conquest, a new faith in justice . the o f Thus from same source , from the darkness de

d ff of . feat, there have flowe two di erent streams idealism n In speech and writing, an i visible struggle has been d fo r wage the soul O f the new generation . The facts o e f history turned the scale in favor of Maurice Barr s . The year 19 14 marked the defeat o f the ideas O f Romain n Rolla d . Thus defeat was not merely an experience on i imposed him in youth , for defeat has l kewise been the tragic substance Of his years Of mature manhood . But it has always been his peculiar talent to create out o f to res i defeat the strongest Of his works , draw from g n nation new ardors , to derive from disillusionme t a pas s ionate van faith . He has ever been the poet of the u ished o f s q , the consoler the despairing, the dauntles guide towards that world where suff eri ng is transmuted into positive values and where misfortune becomes a

f out o f source o strength . That which was born a trag o f ical time , the experience Of a nation under the heel d n for and esti y, Rolland has made available all times all nations . CHAPTER II

TH E WILL TO GREATNESS

OLLAND realized his missi on early in his

. o f one his career The hero Of first writings , the Girondist H u got in L e triomphe de la ’ n own rais o , discloses the author s ardent faith when he “ is to declares : Our first duty be great, and to defend ” greatness on earth . This will to greatness lies hidden at the heart of all n personal greatness . What disti guishes Romain Rol of land from others , what distinguishes the beginner those days and the fighter Of the thirty years that have since elapsed, is that in art he never creates anything or isolated , anything with a purely literary casual scope . Invariably his efforts are directed towards the loftiest moral aims ; he aspires towards eternal forms ; strives n to fashion the monume tal . His goal is to produce a fresco , to paint a comprehensive picture, to achieve an not epic completeness . He does choose his literary col leagues as models , but takes as examples the heroes of the ages . He tears his gaze away from Paris, from the Of movement contemporary life, which he regards as l trivial . Tolstoi , the on y modern who seems to him as of poietic, the great men an earlier day were poietic, 6 3 6 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

is his teacher and master . Despite his humility, he cannot but feel that his own creative impulse makes ’ him more closely akin to Shakespeare s historical plays , ’ ’ War and Peace to Tolstoi s , to Goethe s universality, to ’ ’ n Balzac s wealth Of imagination , to Wag er s promethean

o f n art, than he is akin to the activities his co temporaries , d whose energies are concentrate upon material success . ’ his He studies exemplars lives , to draw courage from their courage ; he examines their works , in order that, using their measure , he may lift his own achievements a H is above the commonplace and the rel tive . zeal for

a the absolute is lmost a religion . Without venturing to f n in compare himsel with them , he thi ks always of the of comparably great , Of the meteors that have fallen out o r eternity into u own day . He dreams of creating a ’ O f his Sistine symphonies, dramas like Shakespeare s War and Peace of tories , an epic like ; not writing a new ar o r Madame Bav y tales like those Of Maupassant . The timeless is his true world ; it is the star towards which his creative will modestly and yet passionately aspires . Among latter- day Frenchmen none but Victor Hugo and B alzac have had this glorious fervor for the monu mental ; among the Germans none has had it since Rich ard Wagner ; among contemporary Englishmen, none perhaps but Thomas Hardy . Neither talent nor diligence suffices unaided to inspire n d such an urge towards the tra scen ent . A moral force must be the lever to shake a spiritual world to its foun

a dations . The moral force which Roll nd possesses is a courage unexampled in the history of modern litera THE WILL TO GREATNESS 6 5

tud ture . The quality that first made his atti e on the war n d ma ifest to the worl , the heroism which led him to take his stand alone again st the sentiments o f an entire had d n n n epoch , , to the iscer i g, already bee made appar ent in the writings Of the inconspicu ou s beginner a

a - n quarter Of century earlier . A man Of an easy goi g and concili atory nature is not suddenly transformed n C u O f i to a hero . o rage, like every other power the

d and n a . soul , must be steele tempered by ma y tri ls

al O f a n n n Among l those his gener tio , Rolla d had lo g been signalized as the boldest by his preoccu pation with n did mighty desig s . Not merely he dream, like ambi

u I d and a tio s schoolboys , Of lia s pentalogies ; he ctually o f d a in created them in the fevered world to y, working

w t n of . isolation , i h the dau tless Spirit past centuries

o t on a a not N e of his pl ys had been st ged , a publisher had an accepted y Of his books , when he began a dra ’ matic cycle as comprehensive as Shakespeare s histories .

as n He had yet no public , no name, whe he began his hri to he n ean C s . colossal roma ce, J p He embroiled him w a in Le théatre self ith the the ters, when his manifesto da peuple he censured the triteness and commercialism

Of the contemporary drama . He likewise embroiled in La oire s ur la lace himself with the critics , when , f p , he pilloried the cheapjackery of Parisian journalism and French dilettantism with a severity which had been un known westward o f the Rhine since the publication of ’ a Le ill n Balz c s s us io s perdues . This young man whose n financial positio was precarious, who had no powerful had n associates , who fou d no favor with newspaper edi 6 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

or re tors, publishers, theatrical managers , proposed to his his l mold the spirit Of generation , simply by own wi l

of o and the power his own deeds . Instead f aiming at a

n or neighbori g goal , he always worked f a distant future , worked with that religious faith in greatness which was displayed by the medieval architects— men who planned for God cathedrals the honor Of , recking little whether they themselves would survive to see the completion o f their designs . This courage, which draws its strength from the religious elements Of his nature, is his sole helper . The watchword Of his life may be said to have RO 1 been the phrase Of William the Silent, prefixed by ' “ land as motto to A ért : I have no n eed Of approval to of give me hope ; nor success, to brace me to persever ” ance . CHAPTER III

TH E CREATIV E CYCLES

HE will to greatness involuntarily finds expres Rol sion in characteristic forms . Rarely does to and land attempt deal with any isolated topic , he never concerns himself about a mere episode in feel

r n ing o i history . His creative imagination is attracted “ a solely by elemental phenomena , by the great cour nts ” de foi , whereby with mystical energy a single idea is Suddenly carried into the minds Of millions Of individ u als ; whereby a country, an epoch, a generation , will n and become ki dled like a firebrand , will shed light over the environing darkness . He lights his own poetic flame

the of d O f at great beacons mankin , be they individuals or o r genius inspired epochs, Beethoven the Renaissance ,

or C . Tolstoi or the Revolution , Michelangelo the rusades

Yet for the artistic control Of such phenomena , widely coSmos s en ranging, deeply rooted in the , over hadowing i ‘ t re eras , more is requisite than the raw ambition and fitful of enthusiasm an adolescent . If a mental state of this nature is to fashion anything that shall endure, so it must do in boldly conceived forms . The cultural r of histo y inspired and heroic periods, cannot be limned in fugitive sketches ; careful grounding is indispensable . 6 7 6 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Above all does this apply to monumental architecture . Here we must have a spacious site for the display of the e structures , and terrac s from which a general view can be secured . hi s l so That is why, in all works , Rol and needs much room . He desires to be just to every epoch as to every individual . He never wishes to display a chance sec O f tion, but would fain exhibit the entire cycle happen n O f i gs . He would fain depict , not episodes the French revolution , but the Revolution as a whole ; not the his of C f the tory Jean hristophe Kra ft, individual modern E musician , but the history of contemporary urope . He

not of aims at presenting, only the central force an era , but likewise the manifold counterforces ; not the action f . o alone, but the reaction as well For Rolland , breadth n scope is a moral necessity rather than an artistic . Si ce he would be just in his enthusiasm , since in the parlia ment of his work he would give every idea its spokes m n he t - a o . , is compelled write many voiced choruses

That he may exhibit the Revolution in all its aspects, its its rise, its troubles , its political activities , decline , and

of . its fall , he plans a cycle ten dramas The Renais n sa ce needs a treatment hardly less extensive . Jean h TO Rol Chris top e must have three thousand pages . a land , the intermediate form , the v riety, seems no less a of import nt than the generic type . He is aware the h danger of dealing exclusively with types . W at would ean Christo he J p be worth to us, if with the figure Of the hero there were merely contrasted that of Olivier as a find typical Frenchman ; if we did not subsidiary figures ,

70 ROMAIN ROLLAND

fin forms the third . Both are un ished , but the frag

of . ments are imperishable value The fourth cycle , the Vie des hommes illu stres , a cycle of biographies planned to form as it were a frieze round the temple Of the in

GOd . visible , is likewise incomplete The ten volumes Of Jean Christophe alone succeed in rounding O ff the full circle of a generation , uniting grandeur and justice in the foreshadowed concord . Above these five creative cycles there looms another n and later cycle, recognizable as yet o ly in its begin ning and its end , its origination and its recurrence . It will express the harmonious connection of a manifold ’ existence with a lofty and universal life - cycle in Goethe s n sense, a cycle wherein life and poesy, word and writi g, c O f ar haracter and action , themselves become works t . h But this cycle still glows in the process Of fas ioning .

We feel its vital heat radiating into our mortal world . CHAPTER IV

TH E K O D 1 8 — 8 UN N WN RAMATIC CYCLE . 90 1 95

n o f - HE you g man twenty two , just liberated from

the walls Of the Parisian seminary, fired with the genius of music and with that Of Shake ’ ex e speare s enthralling plays, had in Italy his first p had ricuce of the w orld as a sphere O f freedom . He learned history from documents and syllabuses . Now history looked at him with living eyes out of statues and figures ; the Italian cities , the centuries , seemed to on e move as if a stage under his impassioned gaz . Give them but speech , these sublime memories, and history d would become poesy, the past woul grow into a peopled tragedy . During his first hours in the south he was a in a sublime intoxication . Not s historian but as poet di d he first see Rome and Florence . ” ul Here, he said to himself in youthf fervor, here is the greatness for which I have yearned . Here, at n least, it used to be, in the days of the Re aissance, when these cathedrals grew heavenward amid the storms of m battle, and when Michelangelo and Raphael were ado ing the walls of the Vatican , what time the popes were no less mighty in Spirit than the masters o f art— for in that epoch, after centuries Of interment with the antique 71 72 ROMAIN ROLLAND

statues , the heroic spirit Of ancient Greece had been re ” iv E v ed in a new urope . His imagination conjured up the superhuman figures O f that earlier day ; and O f a n o f l sudde , Shakespeare, the friend his first youth , fi led his mind once more . Simultaneously, as I have already d of Er recounte , witnessing a number performances by

own . nesto Rossi , he came to realize his dramatic talent N ot now of old C al , as , in the lamecy loft, was he chiefly The n a lured by the gentle feminine figures . stro gest p

a fierce pe l , to his early manhood , was exercised by the of ness the more powerful characters, by the penetrating of truth Of a knowledge mankind , by the stormy tumult

Of the soul . In France , Shakespeare is hardly known at all by stage presentation , and but very little in prose now translation . Rolland , however, attained as intimate an acquaintanceship with Shakespeare as had been pos sessed a hundred years earlier, almost at the same age , by Goethe when be conceived his O ration on Shake e re l Sp a . This new inspiration showed itse f in a vig orous creative impul se . Rolland penned a series of

of dramas dealing with the great figures the past, work of ing with the fervor the beginner, and with that sense of newly acquired mastery which was felt by the Ger o f t mans the S urm und Drang era .

These plays remained unpublished , at first owing to of the disfavor circumstances, but subsequently because ’ the author s ripening critical faculty made him with

. rs ino hold them from the world The first, entitled O , 1 8 90 t was written at Rome in . Nex , in the halcyon O f Em edocles uninfluenced clime Sicily, he composed p , THE UNKNOWN DRAMATIC CYCLE 73 18 90— 18 95

’ HOlderlin O f by s ambitious draft, which Rolland heard Mal d M bu wi a von e sen . first from y g In the same year, 1 9 1 Ba li n to 8 Gl o i . , he wrote i g His return Paris did 1 8 92 not interrupt this outpouring, for in he wrote two i ul n Cal a a d N io be. plays , g , From his wedding jour ney to the beloved Italy in 1 893 he returned with a new L e ie Manto ue Renaissance drama , s ge de . This is the only one o f the early plays which the author acknow

- t u an ledges to day, hough by an unfort nate misch ce the n n manuscript has bee lost . At length turning his atte

n e aint Louis the tion to Fre ch history, he wrot S Tra e l i eanne de first of his g dies de a fo . Next came J Piennes which remains unpublished Aé rt

o f Tra édies de la o i the second the g f , was the ’ 1 8 96 first of Rolland s plays to be staged . There now ( 1 902 ) followed the four dramas of the Theatre de la r l n 1900 La Montes an Les evo utio . In he wrote p and r is amo ureuse t o s . Thus before the era of the more important works there were composed no less than twelve dramas , equaling in k the r of o r bul enti e dramatic output Schiller, Kleist, of t Hebbel . The first eight hese were never either or printed staged . Except for the appreciation by his confidant Malwida von Meysenbug in D er L ebens Abend ’ einer ldealistin (a connoisseur s tribute to their artistic

S . merits) , not a word has ever been aid about them

With a single exception . One of the plays was read on a classical occasion by one of the greatest French f o the one . actors the day, but reminiscence is a painful 74 ROMAIN ROLLAND

’ Gabriel Monod , who from being Rolland s teacher had ’ his Malwida Me senbu s en become friend , noting von y g ’ thusiasm O f - , gave three Rolland s pieces to Mounet Sully, who was delighted with them . The actor submitted them C éd ran aise d n to the om ie F g , and in the rea i g committee on n he fought desperately behalf Of the unknow , whose the dramatic talent was more Obvious to him , comedian , r than it was to the men Of letters . O s ino and Gli Bag lion io e i were ruthlessly rejected , but N b was read to the committee . This was a momentous incident in Rol ’

a . l nd s life ; for the first time, fame seemed close at hand

- d . Mounet Sully rea the play . Rolland was present two The reading took hours , and for a further two min ’ N ot utes the young author s fate hung in the balance .

was . yet, however, celebrity to come The drama was

. ao refused , to relapse into Oblivion It was not even corded the lesser grace O f print ; and Of the dozen o r s o dramatic works which the dauntless author penned e n ot one its on during the next d cade, found way to the o th boards f e national theater . We know no more than the names Of these early works, and are unable to judge their worth . But when we study the later plays we may deduce the conclusion that in the earlier ones a premature flame, raging too

out. hotly, burned itself If the dramas which first ap peared in the press charm us by their maturity and con e centration , they depend for thes qualities upon the fate which left their predecessors unknown . Their calm is built upon the passion of those whi ch were sacrificed unborn ; they owe their orderly structure to the heroic THE UNKNOWN DRAMATIC CYCLE 75 1 8 90— 18 95

zeal of their martyred brethren . All true creation grows n o ut of the dark humus Of rejected creatio s . Of none is it more true than of Romain Rolland that hi s work blos soms upon the soil of renunciation . CHAPTER V

TH E TRAGEDIES OF FAITH

’ — Saint Louis . Aért . 1 8 95 18 98

Y re WENT years after their first composition , publishing the forgotten dramas O f his youth under the title L es tragedies de la fo i Rolland alluded in the preface to the tragical melan “ choly of the epoch in which they were composed . At “ t our hat time , he writes, we were much further from ” of goal , and far more isolated . The elder brothers C Jean hristophe and Olivier, less robust though not less fervent in the faith , had found it harder to defend their beliefs , to maintain their idealism at its lofty level , than O f n F did the youth the new day, livi g in a stronger rance , a freer Europe . Twenty years earlier, the shadow Of defeat still lay athwart the land . These heroes o f the

French spirit had been compelled , even within them selves, to fight the evil genius of the race , to combat doubts as to the high destinies Of their nation , to strug

of gle against the lassitude the vanquished . Then was to be heard the cry of a petty era lamenting its van ished greatness ; it aroused no echo from the stage or from the people ; it wasted itself in the unresponsive 76

78 ROMAIN ROLLAN D is why Saint Louis died without seeing Jerusalem ; why Aé rt th , fleeing from bondage, found only e eternal free dom Of death ; why the Girondists were trampled be f neath the heels O the mob . These men had the true faith, that faith which does not demand realization in this world . In widely separated centuries, and against f of of di ferent storms time, they were the banner bearers the same ideal, whether they carried the cross or held o f or the sword , whether they wore the cap liberty the the en visored helm . They were animated with same u a fo th s i sm r the unseen ; they had the same enemy, call o f it cowardice , call it poverty spirit, call it the supine ness Of a weary age . When destiny refused them the xtem als e Of greatness , they created greatness in their own souls . Amid unheroic environments they displayed the perennial heroism of the undaunted will ; the triumph of the spirit which, when animated with faith, can prove victorious over time . of The significance, the lofty aim, these early plays , was their intention to recall to the minds O f contempora o f t ries the memory forgotten bro hers in the faith, to arouse for the service of the spirit and no t for the ends of brute force that idealism which ever burgeons from the imperishable seed Of youth . Already we discern ’ the entire moral purport Of Rolland s later work , the endeavor to change the world by the force of inspira “ ” E tion . Tout est bien qui exalte la vie . verything ’ which exalts life is good , This is Rolland s confession of own Of faith, as it is that his Olivier . Ardor alone can create vital realities . There is no defeat over which THE TRAGEDIES OF FAITH 79 the will cannot triumph ; there is no sorrow above which n a free spirit cannot soar . Who wills the u attainable, is stronger than destiny ; even his destruction in this mo r th tal world is none e less a mastery of fate . The tragedy O f his heroism kindles fresh enthusiasm , which seizes the standard as it slips from his grasp, to raise it anew and bear it onward through the ages . CHAPTER VI

SAINT LOUIS

HIS epic o f King Louis IX is a drama Of religious O f O f exaltation , born the spirit music , an adap tation of the Wagnerian idea of elucidating an cestral sagas in works of art . It was originally de signed as an opera . Rolland actually composed an over ture to the work ; but this, like his other musical compo

sitions . , remains unpublished Subsequently he was f satisfied with lyrical treatment in place o music . We find no touch of Shakespearean passion in these gentle is pictures . It a heroic legend of the saints , in dramatic ’ of form . The scenes remind us Of a phrase Flaubert s ’ ’ L a l ende de Saint alien IH os italier in eg J p , in that they “ are written as they appear in the stained - glass windows ”

our . n a of Of churches The ti ts are delic te, like those

n é w Puvis C the frescoes in the Pa th on , here de havannes e w n depicts another French saint, Sainte Genevi ve atchi g ’ The on over Paris . soft moonlight playing the saint s figure in the frescoes is identical with the light which in Rolland’ s drama shines like a halo Of goodness round of the head Of the pious king France . 8 0

8 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

u ished re q in such a struggle, the highest triumph is served . He has stirred up the weak in soul to do a deed whose rapture is denied to himself ; from his own faith he has created faith in others ; from his own spirit has issued the eternal spirit . Rolland ’s first published work exhales the atmosphere

C . u con Of hristianity Humility conq ers force, faith quers the world , love conquers hatred ; these eternal truths which have been incorporated in countless sayings and writings from those of the primitive Christians down to those of Tolstoi , are repeated once again by Rolland in the form Of a legend Of the saints . In his later works , of however, with a freer touch , he shows that the power s mboli faith is not tied to any particular creed . The y a cal world , which is here used as romanticist vehicle own in which to enwrap his idealism , is replaced by the environment of modern days . Thus we are taught that from S aint Louis and the crusades it is but a step to ou r “ own soul , if it desire to be great and to defend great ” o ness n earth . CHAPTER VII

ERTwas written a year later than Saint Louis ; more explicitly than the pious epic does it aim at restorin g faith and idealism to the disheart

n d n Saint L o uis n nd e e ation . is a heroic lege d , a te er

’ reminiscence Of former greatness ; A ért is the tragedy of

a to the vanquished , and a passionate appe l to them awaken . The stage directions express this aim clearly : “ The scene is cast in an imaginary Holland of the seven teenth and century . We see a people broken by defeat ,

d . u which is much worse, ebased thereby The fut re pre n se ts itself as a period Of slow decadence, whose antici ation p definitively annul s the already exhausted energies . The moral and political humiliations of recent ” s year are the foundation of the troubles still in store . h A e rt Such is the environment in w ich Rolland places ,

n t . the you g prince, heir to vanished grea ness This Hol

d of m the . lan is, course, sy bolical of Third Republic s of Fruitless attempts are made, by the temptation loose n artifices of livi g, by various , by the instilling doubt, to ’ the n the break captive s faith in great ess, to undermine 8 3 8 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND one power that still sustains the debile body and the

ff i o f su ering soul . The hypocr tes his entourage do their and utmost, with luxury, frivolity, lies , to wean him from n what he considers his high calli g, which is to prove him un self worthy heir of a glorious past . He remains Tr anu s n . o shaken His tutor, Maitre j (a foreru ner of d Anatole France) , all Of whose qualities, kin liness , skep ticism n d , e ergy, and wis om , are but lukewarm , would Au reliu f one like to make a Marcus S o his ardent pupil, nk n who thi s and renounces rather than o e who acts . The lad proudly answers : “I pay due reverence to ideas but I recognize something higher than they, moral gran ”

In r . deur . a laodicean age, he yea ns for action

But action is force , struggle is blood . His gentle spirit desires peace ; his moral will craves for the right . The youth has within him both a Hamlet and a S aint

a Just, both a vacillator and a zealot . He is a wr ithlike double Of Olivier, already able to reckon up all val ’ Aér n ues . The goal Of t s youthful passion is still i de terminate ; this passion is nothing but a flame which n wastes itself in words a d aspirations . He does not make the deed come at his beckoning ; but the deed takes n possession Of him , draggi g the weakling down with it i nto the depths when ce there is no other issue than by F d fin death . rom degra ation he ds a last rescue, a path n own to moral great ess , his deed , done for the sake Of

s co m ful all . Surrounded by the victors, calling to him “ ” “ ” Not Too late, he answers proudly, too late to be free, u f and plunges headlong o t O life .

This romanticist play is a piece of tragical Symbolism .

CHAPTER VIII

ATTEMPT TO REGENERA TE THE FRENC H STAGE

TH whole - souled faith the young poet uttered his first dramatic appeals in the ’ o f heroic form , being mindful Schiller s saying that fortunate epochs could devote themselves to v of the ser ice beauty, whereas in times of weakness it was necessary to lean upon the examples Of past heroism . n Rolland had issued to his nation a summons to great ess . im There was no answer . His conviction that a new etus p was indispensable remaining unshaken , Rolland f r looked o the cause Of this lack of response . He rightly not O wn refractori discerned it, in his work, but in the ness Of the age . Tolstoi , in his books and in the won derful r letter to Rolland , had been the fi st to make the young man realize the sterility of bourgeois art . Above

n of n all in the drama , its most se sual form expressio , that art had lost touch with the moral and emotional forces o f of n life . A clique busy playwrights had mo opolized the

Parisian stage . Their eternal theme was adultery, in its manifold variations . They depicted petty erotic con flicts , but never dealt with a universally human ethical problem . The audiences , badly counseled by the press , which deliberately fostered the public’s intellectual 8 6 THE FRENCH STAGE 8 7

not ask lethargy, did to be morally awakened , but merely d t to be amused and please . The theater was any hing in “ ” the world other than the moral institution demanded ’ N o by Schiller and championed by d Alembert. breath of passion found its way from such dramatic art as this into the heart O f the nation ; there was nothing but spin drift scattered over the surface by the breeze . A great gul f was fixed between this witty and s ensuous amuse ment, and the genuinely creative and receptive energies

Of France . nd and enthusi Rolla , led by Tolstoi accompanied by f astic n d o . frie ds , realize the moral dangers the Situation He perceived that dramatic art is worthless and destruo n on tive when it lives a life remote from the people . U c sciou sly in Aé rt he had heralded what he now formu d n n late as a defi ite pri ciple, that the people will be the n first to u derstand genuinely heroic problems . The s imple craftsman Claes in that play is the only member ’ O f the captive prince s circle who revolts against tepid n submissio , who burns at the disgrace inflicted on his

d . the fatherlan In other artistic forms than drama , the titanic forces surging up from the depths of the people d had alrea y been recognized . Zola and the naturalists had depicted the tragical beauty of the proletariat ; Millet and Meunier had given pictorial and sculptural repre sentations of proletarians ; socialism had unleashed the o religious might f the collective consciousness . The

a n of theater lo e, vehicle for the most direct working art had d upon the common people, been capture by the bour eoisie g , its tremendous possibilities fo r promoting a 8 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

' ofl moral renascence being thereby cut . Unceasingly did the drama practice the in - and - in breeding O f sexual In ifle . o f tr s problems its pursuit erotic , it had over looked the new social ideas , the most fundamental Of

of modern times . It was in danger decay because it no longer thrust its roots into the permanent subsoil Of the

n . ana as n natio The emia Of dramatic art, Rolla d recog nized n a a , could be cured o ly by intim te associ tion with o f ff the life the people . The e eminateness of the French drama must be replaced by virility through vital contact “ the e u with masses . Seul la s ve pop laire peut lui ” rendre la vie et la santé . If the theater aspires to be n not to the o f natio al , it must merely minister luxury the n d upper te thousan . It must become the moral nutri of ment the common people, and must draw fertility from

- the folk soul . ’ Rolland s work during the next few years was an en d o eav r to provide such a theater for the people . A few

men u n o r young witho t i fluence authority, strong only in the n ardor and sincerity Of their youthful ess , tried to indif bring this lofty idea to fruition , despite the utter

n a fere ce of the metropolis, and in defi nce of the veiled “ ” O R evue drama ue hostility f the press . In their tiq they published manifestoes . They sought for actors, stages , and helpers . They wrote plays , formed commit

. eu tees, sent dispatches to ministers Of state In their deavor to bridge the chasm between the bourgeois theater and the nation , they wrought with the fanatical zeal of

n . the leaders Of forlorn hopes . Rolla d was their chief L e heatre da eu le Théatre de His manifesto , t p p , and his

CHAPTER IX

AN APPEAL TO TH E PEOPL E

HE Old era is finished ; the new era is begin “ ning . Rolland , writing in the Revue dra 1900 his matique in , opened appeal with

- . two these words by Schiller The summons was fold , to the writers and to the people , that they should consti ’ tute a new unity, Should form a people s theater . The stage and the plays were to belong to the people . Since of the the forces people are eternal and unalterable , art not must accommodate itself to the people , the people to

n a art . This union must be perfected i the cre tive depths . n It must not be a casual i timacy, but a permeation , a d f own genetic we ding O souls . The people requires its own d art, its drama . As Tolstoi phrase it , the people must be the ultimate touchstone Of all values . Its pow erful a n of n , mystical , etern lly religious e ergy i spiration , f must become more afirmative and stronger, so that art, which in its bourgeois associations has grown morbid and of wan , can draw new vigor from the vigor the people . TO this end it is essential that the people should no n n longer be a chance audience, tra sie tly patronized by erfo friendly managers and actors . The popular p f r anoes o the g eat theaters , such as have been customary 9 0 AN APPEAL TO THE PEOPLE 9 1

’ in Paris Since the issue of Napoleon s decree on the sub ’ fi ect uf . j , do not s ce Valueless also , in Rolland s view, are the attempts made from time to time by the Comédie Francaise to present to the workers the plays Of such court l poets as Com eil e and Racine . The people do not want For m caviare, but wholesome fare . the nourish ent Of their indestructible idealism they need an art of their

own of own , a theater their , and , above all , works adapted to their sensibilities and to their intellectual not tastes . When they come to the theater, they must be made to feel that they are tolerated guests in a world of

unfamiliar ideas . In the art that is presented to them they must be able to recognize the mainspring of their own energies . ’ at More appropriate, in Rolland s opinion , are the tempts which have been made by isolated individuals like Maurice Po ttecher in Bussang (Vosges) to provide a “ ” théatre du peuple , presenting to restricted audiences pieces easily understood . But such endeavors touch a n sm ll circles only . The chasm in the giga tic metropolis between the stage and the real population remains un

. s o r bridged With the be t will in the world , the twenty thirty special representations are witnessed by no more an n f than i finitesimal proportion o the population . or They do not signify a spiritual union, promote a new nflu moral impetus . Dramatic art has no permanent i on and ence the masses ; the masses , in their turn , have n on no i fluence dramatic art . Though, in another liter C L ary sphere, Zola , harles ouis Philippe, and Maupas sant, began long ago to draw fertile inspiration from 92 ROMAIN ROLLAND m proletarian idealism , the drama has re ained sterile and antipopular. own The people, therefore, must have its theater . ff When this has been achieved , what Shall we O er to the popular audiences ? Rolland makes a brief survey O f h world literature . The result is appalling . W at can the workers care for the classical pieces o f the French ? Com eille drama and Racine, with their decorous emo e tion , are alien to him ; the subtleties Of Moli re are n barely comprehensible . The tragedies Of classical a ti uit O f q y, the writings the Greek dramatists , would bore ’ the workers ; Hugo s romanticism would repel, despite ’ the author s healthy instinct for reality . Shakespeare,

is - the universally human , more akin to the folk mind , but his plays must be adapted to fit them for popular presen

tation . D ie , and thereby they are falsified Schiller, with Rii uber and Wilhelm Tell , might be expected to arouse

D er Prinz von enthusiasm ; but Schiller, like Kleist with

H ambur n u ncon g, is , for ationalist reasons , somewhat ’ The D o minion o genial to the Parisians . Tolstoi s f ’ D arkness and Hauptmann s D ie We ber would be compre hens ible h enough, but their matter would prove somew at d n n epressi g . While well calculated to stir the co sciences o f the guilty, among the people they would arouse feel t o f ings of despair rather han hope . Anzengruber, a

- genuine folk poet, is too distinctively Viennese in his D ie Me isters in er re topics . Wagner, whose g Rolland gards as the climax o f universally comprehensible and the of elevating art , cannot be presented without aid music .

CHAPTER X

TH E PROGRAM

AT kind of plays do the people want?

It wants good plays , in the sense in which the word “ good” is used by Tolstoi when he n a speaks of good books . It wa ts pl ys which are easy to understand without being commonplace ; those which stimulate faith without leading the spirit astray ; those

to which appeal, not sensuality, not to the love of Sight

o f seeing , but to the powerful idealistic instincts the

O f n masses . These plays must not treat minor co flicts ; O f n dis but, in the spirit the a tique tragedies, they must in t play man the struggle wi h elemental forces , man as “ L et subject to heroic destiny . us away with compli cated psychologies , with subtle innuendoes , with Obscure ” d n - and symbolisms , with the art Of rawi g rooms alcoves .

Art for the people must be monumental . Though the to people desires truth , it must not be delivered over

o f naturalism , for art which makes the masses aware their own misery will never kindle the sacred flame of enthu si of a asm , but only the insensate passion nger . If, next

a a day, the workers are to resume their d ily t sks with a heightened and more cheerful confidence , they need a of tonic . Thus the evening must have been a source 94 THE PROGRAM 95

energy, but must at the same time have sharpened the d intelligence . Undoubtedly the drama shoul display the people to the people, not however in the proletarian th dullness of narrow dwellings , but on the pinnacles of e o inee past . Rolland therefore p , following to a large ’ ’ extent in Schiller s footsteps , that the people s theater O must be historical in scope . The p pul ace must not own on merely make its acquaintance the stage, but must s be brought to admire its own pas t . Here we ee the for motif to which Rolland continually returns, the need arousing a passionate aspiration towards greatness . In its ff n su eri g, the people must learn to regain delight in o n its w self . With marvelous vividness does the imaginative his d of torian isplay the epic significance history . The forces of the past are sacred by reason Of the spiritual is o energy which part f every great movement . Reason ing persons can hardly fail to be revolted when they O h serve the unwarranted amount O f space allotted to anec trifles of dotes, accessories , the history, at the expense

Of its living soul . The power of the past must be awak d ene ; the will to action must be steeled . Those who live to - day must learn greatness from their fathers and fore “ fathers . History can teach people to get outside them in selves , to read the souls of others . We discern our in n O f selves the past, in a mingli g like characters and ff n di ering lineame ts, with errors and vices which we can avoid . But precisely because histo ry depicts the muta d ble , oes it give us a better knowledge of the unchang m g. 96 ROMAIN ROLLAND

on ask What, he goes to , have French dramatists hith ? erto brought the people o ut o f the past The burlesque figure Of Cyrano ; the gracefully sentimental pe rsonality of the duke o f Reichstadt ; the artificial conception O f ! “ Madame Sans - Gene Tout est a faire ! Tout est 21 ” “ d ! O f t F r ire The land drama ic art still lies fallow . o

n new n . France , natio al epopee is quite a thi g Our play wrights have neglected the drama of the French people , although that people has been perhaps , since the days Of E ’ Rome , the most heroic in the world . urope s heart was

o f beating in the kings , the thinkers, the revolutionists And a France . great s this nation has been in all do of w mains the Spirit, its greatness has been Sho n above all in the field of action . Herein lay its most sublime crea tion ; here was its poem , its drama , its epos . France did

O f . what others dreamed doing France wrote no Iliads , n but lived a dozen . The heroes Of Fra ce wrought more

a splendidly than the poets . No Sh kespeare sang their deeds ; but Danton on the scaff old was the Spirit of of Shakespeare personified . The life France has touched the loftiest summits Of joy ; it has plumbed the e n deepest abysses Of sorrow . It has b e a wonderful ‘ ’ a o f comédie hum ine, a series Of dramas ; each its epochs ” a new poem . This past must be recalled to life French historical drama must restore it to the French “ people . The spirit which soars above the centuries, en will thus soar for centuries to come . If we would gender strong souls, we must nourish them with the ener ” gies of the world . Rolland now expands the French ode into a European Ode . The world must be our

CHAPTER XI

TH E CREATIVE ARTIST

a set ? HE t sk is . Who shall accomplish it RO main Rolland answers by putting his hand to

the work . The hero in him shrinks from no de th in fi feat ; e youth him dreads no dif culty . An epic Of n the French people is to be written . He does ot hesitate to lay the foundations, though environed by the Silence

. w and indifference Of the metropolis As al ays, the impetus that drives him is moral rather than artistic . He has a sense of personal responsibility for an entire nation . By such productive, by such heroic idealism , alone, and not by a purely theoretical idealism , can ideal ism b e engendered .

The theme is easy to find . Rolland turns to the great

O f n . est moment French history, to the Revolutio He responds to the appeal Of his revolutionary forefathers . 27th e 1 794 C of On the Of Flor al , , the ommittee Public Safety issued an invocation to authors “to glorify the chief happenings Of the French revolution ; to compose republican dramas ; to hand down to posterity the great epochs Of the French renascence ; to inspire history with the firmness of character appropriate to the annals Of a great nation defending its freedom against the onslaught 98 TH E CREATIVE ARTIST 99

1 l th O f o . of all the tyrants f Europe On the Messidor, “ the Committee asked young authors boldly to recognize of the whole magnitude the undertaking, and to avoid ” - the easy and well trodden paths of mediocrity . The s of Car ignatories these decrees , Danton , Robespierre,

outhon not, and C , have now become national figures ,

d . legen ary heroes, monuments in public places Where restrictions were imposed on poetic inspiration by undue proximity to the subject, there is now room for the n imagi ation to expand , seeing that this history Of the period is remote enough to give free play to the tragic n muse . The docume ts just quoted issue a summons to the poet and the historian in Rolland ; but the same chal lenge rings from within as a personal heritage . Boni

one of a - d ard , his gre t gran fathers on the paternal side, took part in the revolutionary struggle as “an apostle of ” d o f liberty, and described in his iary the storming the

Bastille . More than half a century later, another rela tive was fatally stabbed in Clamecy during a rising ’ a e f ag inst the coup d tat . The blood o revolutionary ’ o f zealots runs in Rolland s veins , no less than the blood 1 2 . 79 religious devotees A century after , in the fervor o f of commemoration , he reconstructed the great figures “ that glorious past . The theater in which the French ” Iliads were to be staged did not yet exist ; no one had hitherto recognized Rollan d as a literary force ; actors and audience were alike lacking . Of all the requisites

own t for the new creation , there existed solely his fai h own and his will . Building upon faith alone, he began ' to Le the atre d re o lut i n write e la v o . CHAPTER XII

TH E DRAMA OF THE REVOLUTION

18 98 — 1902

LANNING this Iliad of the French People for ’ n the people s theater, Rolla d designed it as a decalo of gy, as a time sequence ten dramas ’ of somewhat after the manner Shakespeare s histories . “ ” 1909 L e héa re I wished , he writes in the preface to t t “ de la revo lution l , in the tota ity Of this work to exhibit of as it were the drama Of a convulsion nature , to depict a s ocial storm from the moment when the first waves began to rise above the surface Of the ocean down to the mo ment when calm Spread once more over the face Of the ” N O b - waters . y play, no anecdotal trifling, was to miti “ gate the mighty rhythm O f the primitive forces . My of leading aim was to purify the course events , as far as might be , from all romanticist intrigue , which would serve only to encumber and belittle the movement . Above all I desired to throw light upon the great politi cal and social interests on behalf of which mankind has f ” been fighting or a hundred years . It is obvious that the work of Schiller is closely akin to the idealistic style ’ ’ C techni u Of this people s theater . omparing Rolland s q I OO

102 ROMAIN ROLLAND

on the which are merely touched in extant plays, were to receive detailed treatment in the dramas that remain b . u of unwritten Do tless, too , the figure Napoleon would have towered above the dying Revolution .

Opening with a musical and lyrical prelude, this symphonic composition was to end with a postlude .

After the great storm , castaways from the Shipwreck were

w . to foregather in S itzerland , near Soleure Royalists and regicides, Girondists and Montagnards, were to ex change reminiscences ; a love episode between two O f their children was to lend an idyllic touch to the after of math O f the European storm . Fragments only this great design have been carried to completion , comprising

d L e I4 uillet D anton L es lo u s the four ramas , J , , p , and L e triom he e l rais n had been p d a o . When these plays s written , Rolland abandoned the cheme, to which the the and people, like literary world the stage , had given no F encouragement . or more than a decade these tragedies

TO - n a have been forgotten . day, percha ce , the aw kening impulses of an age becoming aware Of its own lineaments

o f in the prophetic image a world convulsion , may arouse in the author an impulse to complete what was so magnifi centl y begun . CHAPTER XIII

THE FOURTEENTH OF J ULY

d Le F the four complete revolutionary dramas ,

1 4 Juillet stands first in point Of historic time . Here we see the Revolution as one Of the ele

N O d ments of nature . conscious thought has forme it ; d L n sk no leader has guide it . ike thu der from a clear y comes the aimless discharge O f the tensions that have ac n cumulated amo g the people . The thunderbolt strikes the Bastille ; the lightning flash illumines the soul Of the entire nation . This piece has no heroes , for the hero “ nd d Of the play is the multitude . I ivi uals are merged i ” n o f n in . the ocean the people, writes Rolla d the preface “ n d He who limns a storm at sea , need not pai t the etails Of every wave ; he must Show the unchained forces of the n ocean . Meticulous precision is a mi or matter com ” pared with the impassioned truth O f the whole . In in actual fact, this drama is all tumultuous movement ; dividuals rush across the stage like figures on the cine matographic screen ; the storming Of the Bastille is not e the outcome Of a reasoned purpose, but of an ov rwhelm t ing, an ecsta ic impulse . 1 04 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Le 1 4 u illet J , therefore, is not properly speaking a drama, and does not really seek to be anything Of the

. C kind onsciously or unconsciously, Rolland aimed at “ ” creating one O f those fetes populaires which the Con ’ vention had encouraged , a people s festival with music n n and danci g, an epi ikion, a triumphal ode . His work , therefore , is not suitable for the artificial environment of the boards , and Should rather be played under the free l heaven . Opening symphonica ly, it closes in exultant choruses for which the author gives definite directions to “ the composer . The music must be, as it were , the back O f ground a fresco . It must make manifest the heroical significance o f the festival ; it must fill in pauses as they can never be adequately filled in by a crowd Of super numeraries , for these, however much noise they make, fail to sustain the illusion O f real life . This music l Shou d be inspired by that Of Beethoven , which more powerfu lly than any other reflects the enthusiasms of the

Revolution . Above all, it must breathe an ardent faith . N O composer will eff ect anything great in this vein unless he be personally inspired by the soul Of the people , unless he himself feel the burning passion that is here portrayed . Rolland wishes to create an atmosphere o f ecstatic N ot rapture . by dramatic excitement , but by its oppo site . The theater is to be forgotten ; the multitude in the audience is to become spiritually at one with its image on the stage . In the last scene , when the phrases are the O f directly addressed to audience , when the stormers the Bastille appeal to their hearers on behalf of the im

CHAPTER XIV

D AN TON

AN TON deals with a decisive moment of the water artin Revolution , the p g between the ascent

and the decline . What the masses had created

a as elemental forces , were now being turned to person l a E advantage by individu ls , by ambitious leaders . very n o r spiritual movement , and above all every revolutio n n reformation , k ows this tragical i stant Of victory, when power passes into the hands o f the few ; when moral unity is broken in sun der by the conflict between political aims ;

an when the masses , who in impetuous onrush have d secured freedom , blindly follow emagogues inspired

- solely by self interest . It seems to be an inevitable sequel Of success in such cases , that the nobler should

an st d aside in disillusionment, that the idealists should

- n hold aloof while the self seeki g triumph . At that very

in ff a a time , the Dreyfus a ir, Roll nd had witnessed simi n n lar happe i gs . He realized that the genuine strength

an d n - fulfilm nt Of i ea subsists only duri g its non e . Its true power is in the hands O f those who are not victori e ous ; those to whom the ideal is everything, succ ss noth 106 DANTON 1 07

in . g Victory brings power, and power is just to itself alone .

The play, therefore, is no longer a drama of the

Revolution ; it is the drama Of the great revolutionist . Mystical power crystallizes in the form Of human charac ters . Resoluteness becomes contentiousness . In the of very intoxication victory, in the queasy atmosphere Of

- new n the blood stained field , begins the struggle amo g the pretorian s for the empire they have conquered . There is struggle between ideas ; struggle between personalities ; struggle between temperaments ; struggle between persons o f d N ow are ifferent social origin . that they no longer united as comrades by the compulsion Of imminent dan

n a The ger, they recog ize their mutual incomp tibilities . of revolutionary crisis comes in the hour triumph . The hostile armies have been defeated ; the royalists and the

nd a Giro ists h ve been crushed and scattered . Now there

C O f arises in the onvention a battle all against all . The n characters are admirably delineated . Danto is the d n n u a goo gia t , sa g ine, w rm, and human , a hurricane in ’ his passions but with no love Of fighting for fighting s sake . He has dreamed of the Revolution as bringing now ul n joy to mankind, and sees that it has c mi ated in a is new tyranny . He sickened by bloodshed , and he ’ c O f C detests the but her s work the guillotine, just as hrist would have loathed the Inquisition claiming to represent n the spirit Of his teachi g . He is filled with horror at his “ ” sofil e fellows . Je suis des hommes . Je les vomis .

u of . I am surfeited with men . I spue them o t my mouth —H e unSO histi longs for a frank naturalness , for an p 108 ROMAIN ROLLAND

ated c natural life . Now that the danger to the republic is over, his passion has cooled ; his love goes ou t to to woman, the people , to happiness ; he wishes others to H is love him . revolutionary fervor has been the out come of an impulse towards freedom and justice ; hence be is beloved by the masses , who recognize in him the i l nstinct which led them to storm the Bastil e, the same

o wn . scorn Of consequence, the same marrow as their

Robespierre is uncongenial to them . He is too frigid , he is too much the lawyer, to enlist their sympathies . But i n h s doctrinaire fanaticism , his far from ignoble ambitio , give him a terrible power which makes him forge his way onwards when Danton with his cheerful love of life

h n da has ceased to strive . W ilst Da ton becomes every y more and more nauseated by politics, the concentrated ’ energy of Robespierre s frigid temperament strikes ever O f L closer towards the centralized control power . ike — n - o f u his friend Sai t Just the zealot virt e , the blood O f u o r thirsty apostle j stice, the stubborn papist calvinist — n n n for Robespierre can no lo ger see huma bei gs , who now him are hidden behind the theories, the laws , and the dogmas Of the new religion . Not for him , as for Dan f O . Wh ton , the goal a happy and free humanity at he desires is that men shall be virtuous as the slaves Of pre scribed formulas . The collision between Danton and Robespierre upon the topmost summit of victory is in ultimate analysis the collision between freedom and law,

of between the elasticity of life and the rigidity concepts . n too Danton is overthrow . He is too indolent, heedless, too human in his defense . But even as he falls it is plain

CHAPTER XV

TH E TRIUMPH OF REASON

E triomphe de la rais on is no more than a frag d ment of the great fresco . But it is inspire with the central thought round which Rolland ’s

d the i eas turn . In it for first time there is a complete exposition Of the dialectic of defeat - the passionate o f advocacy the vanquished , the transformation Of actual overthrow into spiritual triumph . This thought , first con ceived in his childhood and reinforced by all his ex ’ erien e p c , forms the kernel Of the author s moral sensi bilit a and are y. The Girondists have been defe ted , de n n in t fe di g themselves a fortress against the sansculot es . En The royalists , aided by the glish , wish to rescue them . d O f Their i eal , the freedom the spirit and the freedom n Of the fatherland , has been destroyed by the Revolutio ; their foes are Frenchmen . But the royalists who would help them are likewise their enemies ; the English are ’ r their count y s foes . Hence arises a conflict of con science which is powerfully portrayed . Are they to be t to or n ? fai hless their ideal , to betray their cou try Are they to be citi zens o f the spirit or citizens o f France? 1 10 THE TRIUMPH OF REASON 1 1 1

Are they to be true to themselves or true to the nation? Such is the fateful decision with which they are con for fronted . They choose death , they know that their the d ideal is immortal, that free om of a nation is but the reflection O f an inner freedom which no foe can destroy .

Fo r the first time, in this play, Rolland proclaims his “ : hostility to victory . Faber proudly declares We have saved our faith from a victory which would have one disgraced us , from wherein the conqueror is the first victim . In our unsullied defeat, that faith looms more ” Lux richly and gloriously than before . , the German the o f d revolutionist, proclaims gospel inner free om in “ : the words All victory is evil, whereas all defeat is ” good in so far as it is the outcome of free choice . “ H u t m go says : I have outstripped victory, and that is y ” victory . These men Of noble mind who perish , know that they die alone ; they do not look towards a future u the for success ; they put no tr st in masses , they are aware that in the higher sense Of the term freedom it is a thing which the multitude can never understand , that the “ al people always misconceives the best . The people for ways dreads those who form an elite, these bear ! ” torches . Would that the fire might scorch the people

nd of In the e , the only home these Girondists is the ideal ; their domain is an ideal freedom ; their world is the fu ture . They have saved their country from the despots ; now they had to defend it once again against the mob lust n n who ing for domi ion and reve ge, against those care no more for freedom than the despots cared . Design e l the d y, rigid nationalists, those who demand that a 1 12 ROMAIN ROLLAND

t r man shall sacrifice every hing for his count y, Shall sacri fice his convictions , liberty, reason itself, designedly I say are these monomaniacs of patriotism typified in the plebeian figure O f Haubourdin . This sansculotte knows “ ” “ of only two kinds men , traitors and patriots, thus rending the world in twain in his bigotry . It is true that the vigor Of his brutal partisanship brings victory . But the very force that makes it possible to save a people against a world in arms , is at the same time a force which ’ destroys that people s most gracious blossoms . of The drama is the Opening an ode to the free man , of to the hero the spirit, the only hero whose heroism n Rolland acknowledges . The conceptio , which had Aé r been merely outlined in t, begins here to take more Lux of n definite Shape . Adam , a member the Mai z o f enthu si revolutionary club , who, animated by the fire fo r asm , has made his way to France that he may live freedom (and that he may be led in pursuit o f freedom r to the guillotine) , this first ma tyr to idealism , is the n first messenger from the la d O f Jean Christophe . The struggle O f the free man for the undying fatherland which

O f . is above and beyond the land his birth , has begun This is the struggle wherein the vanqu ished is ever the victor, and wherein he is the strongest who fights alone .

1 14 ROMAIN ROLLAND

e the S befor argument , acrificing honor to expediency, th hi e law to s fatherland . L es lo u s In p , we have the obverse Of the same tragedy . Here is depicted a man who would rather sacrifice him self than the law. One who holds with Faber in L e triomphe de la rais on that a single injustice makes the

one H u ot whole world unjust ; to whom , as to g , the other n ff hero in the same play , it seems i di erent whether jus or s o d tice be victorious be defeated , long as justice oes Teuli . er o f not give up the struggle , the man learning, ’ knows that his enemy d Oyron has been unjustly accused

Of treachery . Though he realizes that the case is hope d less and that he is wasting his pains , he undertakes to e ’ fend d O yron against the patriotic savagery Of the revo i lut onar . y soldiers , to whom victory is the only argument “ as a n u Adopting his motto the Old s yi g, fiat j stitia , pereat

- n mundus , facing open eyed all the dangers this i volves , he would rather repudiate life than the leadings Of the

Spirit . A soul which has seen truth and seeks to deny truth , destroys itself . But the others are of tougher “

n o f . L et fiber, and thi k only success in arms my name ” be besmirched , provided only my country is saved , is ’ l r O f Teu ie . ! uesnel s answer to Patriotism , the faith o f in the masses , triumphs over the heroism faith in the visible justice . This tragedy O f a conflict recurring throughout the

one ages, which every individual has forced upon him in wartime through the need for choosing between his re sponsibilities as a free moral agent and as an obedient TH E WOLVES 1 15

i of of cit zen the state, was the reflection the actual hap enin s a p g during the d ys when it was written . In Les lou s u f em p , the Dreyf s a fair is embl atically presented in masterly fashion . Dreyfus the Jew is typified by an o f s u d aristocrat, the member a spect and etested social

m . of eul r stratu Picquart, the defender Dreyfus , is T ie . ’ The aristocrat s enemies represent the French general f t e in headquarters sta f, who would ra her perp tuate an justice once committed than allow the honor of the army to be tarnished or confidence in the army to be

n d . a ef undermi e Upon a narrow st ge, and yet with fective o f was pictorial force, in this tragedy army life compressed the whole of the history which was agitating France from the presidential palace down to the hu m

n - n blest worki g class dwelli g . The performance at the ’ e de l O euvre on 18 1 8 98 Th atre May , , was from first to

a d a - last a politic l emonstr tion . Zola , Scheurer Kestner, e and a d o f n P guy, Picqu rt, the efenders the i nocent man,

in d - u all the chief figures the worl famo s trial, were for two hours spectators o f the dramatic symbolization o f a d d their own deeds . Roll n had grasped and extracte the o f u f had moral essence the Dreyf s a fair, which in fact become a purifying process for the whole French nation . L n eavi g history , the author had made his first venture into the field of contemporary actuality . But he had i in d n d done th s only, accor a ce with the metho he has d followe ever since , that he might disclose the eternal a and d d elements in the tempor l , efen freedom of opinion n on agai st mob infatuation . He was this occasion what 1 16 ROMAIN ROLLAND

he the of has always remained , advocate that heroism one t l t which knows au hority on y, nei her fatherland nor

victory, neither success nor expediency, nothing but the t Supreme au hority of conscience .

1 18 RO MAIN ROLLAND

f e . o been touch d Bundles studies , newspaper cuttings ,

loose leaves , manuscript books , waste paper, are the vestiges o f an edifice which was planned as a pantheon for the French people, a theater which was to reflect the

n an heroic achieveme ts of the French Spirit . Roll d may o f mou m full well have shared the feelings Goethe who , y a on o ne recalling his earlier dramatic dreams , s id occa “ sion to Eckermann : Formerly I fancied it would be d possible to create a German theater . I cherishe the illusion that 1 could myself contribute to the foundations of such a building But there was no stir in response

efl o ns r o f . to my , and eve ything remains as old Had I to I a been able exert an influence , had secured p d I hi enia proval , I Should have written a ozen plays like p g T f as so . o . and There was no scarcity material But, as

I ou to have told y , we lack actors play such pieces with u spirit, and we lack a p blic to form an appreciative ” audience .

The call was lost in the void . There was no stir in f of response to my ef orts, and everything remains as l ” o d . But Rolland , likewise, remains as of old , inspired

has d with the same faith , whether he succeede or whether d n n he has faile . He is ever willi g to begi work over

n o f n a again , marching stoutly across the la d lost e de vor

a towards a new and more distant go l . We may apply ’ fin e sa a n to him Rilke s phrase, and y th t , if he eeds must “ be vanquished , he aspires to be vanquished always in a ” greater and yet greater cause . CHAPTER XVIII

A D AY WI LL COME

NGE on ly has Rolland been tempted to resume n I dramatic composition . (Pare thetically may mention a minor play of the same per L a Montes an not n iod , p , which does belo g to the series A S n the of his greater works . ) i case of the Dreyfus a d aff ir, he en eavored to extract the moral essence from

n u political occurre ces, to show how a spirit al conflict n ni was typified in o e o f the great happe ngs o f the time . n u as The Boer War is no more tha a vehicle ; j st , for the a n d n R pl ys we have bee stu yi g, the evolution was merely a d d a stage . The new rama eals in actual f ct with the ri nd r o izes n n auho t c n . on o ly y Rolla g , conscie ce The c science of the individual and the conscience of the world . L e tem s viend ra p is the third , the most impressive a vari tion upon the earlier theme , depicting the cleavage

n n and d and between co victio uty, citizenship humanity , n the o the national man a d free man . A war drama f n n d the co scie ce staged ami a war in the material world .

L e r om he de la raison was on of In t i p , the problem e free dom versus the fatherland ; in L es loups it was one of 1 19 1 20 RO MAIN ROLLAND

rlan justice versus the fathe d. Here we have a yet loftier of n of variation the theme ; the co flict of conscience,

at n eternal truth , versus the f herla d . The chief figure, a f C though not spiritu lly the hero o the piece, is lifford , o f d leader the inva ing army . He is waging an unjust war— and what war is just ? But he wages it with a ’ strategist s brain ; his heart is not in the work . He knows “ ” how much rottenness there is in war ; he knows that war cannot be effectively waged without hatred for the d t a enemy ; but he is too culture o hate . He knows th t it is impossible to carry on war without falsehood ; im possible to kill without infringing the principles of hu manity ; impossible to create military justice , since the o one whole aim f war is unjust . He knows this with C f part of his being, which is the real li ford ; but he has to repudiate the knowledge with the other part o f his h t e . being, professional soldier He is confined within “ é ? an iron ring of contradictions . Ob ir a ma patrie Obéir a ma conscience ?” It is impossible to gain the victory without doing wrong, yet who can command an a rmy if he lack the will to conquer? Clifford must serve d that will, even while he espises the force which his duty n man compels him to use . He ca not be a unless he thinks, and yet he cannot remain a soldier while pre

u e serving his h manity . Vainly does he seek to mitigat the brutalities o f his task ; fru itlessly does he endeavor to do good amid the bloodshed which issues from his “ n orders . He is aware that there are gradatio s in crime, ” one o f but every these gradations remains a crime .

1 22 RO MAIN ROLLAND

i lar env ronment . This faith grows ever greater, takes l In on . an ever wider osci lation , as the years pass his

first plays he was still speaking to France . His last work written fo r the stage addresses a wider audience ; it is his confession of world citizenship . CHAPTER XIX

TH E PLAYWRIGHT

’ have seen that Rolland s plays form a n whole, which for comprehensive ess may d of a be compare with the work Sh kespeare , o n a Schiller, r Hebbel . Rece t st ge performances in Ger n a in ma y h ve shown that places , at least, they possess d a w of great ramatic force . The historical f ct that ork such m agnitude and power should remain o for twenty

u o years practically nknown , must have s me deeper cause n f of n than cha ce . The e fect a literary compositio is always in large part dependent upon the atmosphere of so the time . Sometimes this atmosphere may operate as to make it seem that a Spark has fallen into a powder f a u a barrel heaped full o cc mul ted sensibilities . Some times the influence o f the atmosphere may be repressive in manifold ways . A work, therefore, taken alone, can n never reflect an epoch . Such reflection can o ly be secured when the work is harmonious to the epoch in which it originates . ’ We infer that the innermost essence o f Rolland s pl ays must in one way or another have conflicted with the age d . u in which they were written In act al fact, these ramas were penned in deliberate opposition to the dominant 123 124 ROMAIN ROLLAN D

literary mode . Naturalism , the representation of real n ity, simulta eously mastered and oppressed the time, a n leading b ck with i tent into the narrows, the trivialities, f d o . l on every ay life Ro land , the other hand , aspired t towards grea ness , wishing to raise the dynamic of un dying ideals high above the transiencies of fact ; be d n of aime at a soaring flight, at a wi ged freedom senti n ment, at exuberant e ergy ; he was a romanticist and an f a . o r of ide list Not him to describe the forces life, its distresses, its powers, and its passions ; his purpose was ever to depict the spirit that overcomes these things ;

d - da n the i ea through which to y is merged i to eternity . Whilst other writers were endeavoring to portray every his day occurrences with the utmost fidelity, aim was to ’ s n the repre e t rare, the sublime, the heroic, the seeds of

a n eternity that f ll from heaven to germinate o earth . He not l d was al ure by life as it is , but by life freely inter and penetrated with spirit with will .

his All dramas , therefore, are problem plays, wherein the characters are but the expression of theses and anti not theses in dialectical struggle . The idea , the living n figure, is the primary thi g . When the persons of the drama are in conflict, above them , like the gods in the n Iliad , hover unseen the ideas that lead the huma pro ta onists d g , the i eas between which the struggle is really ’ n not waged . Rolla d s heroes are impelled to action by the force Of circumstances, but are lured to action by the fascination of their own thoughts ; the circumstances are merely the friction - su rfaces upon which their ardor

h a is struck into flame . W en to the eye of the re list

126 R OMAIN ROLLAND

most fervent in his faith, should borrow the artistic forms th o n he employs from e master f cautious doubt . He ce a d n wh t in Renan had a retar ing and cooli g influence, becomes in Rolland a cause of vigorous and enthusiastic

t . ac ion Whilst Renan stripped all the legends, even the d b ut most sacred of legen s, bare, in his search for a wise r led n tepid t uth , Rolland is by his revolutio ary tempera

n new me t to create a legend , a new heroism , a new emo ti nal o Spur to action . This ideological scaffolding is unmistakable in every f d’ one o . Rollan s dramas The scenic variations, the

n u n motley cha ges in the cult ral environments , ca not pre vent ou r realizing that the problems revealed to our eyes na n and n ema te , not from feeli gs not from perso alities , E but from intelligences and from ideas . ven the his torical - figures , those of Robespierre , Danton , Saint Just,

a n and Desmoulins, are schem ta rather tha portraits . n Nevertheless , the prolonged estrangement betwee his n in not dramas a d the age which they were written , was ’ so much due to the playwright s method of treatment as to the nature o f the problems with which he chose to n who a n deal . Ibse , at th t time domi ated the drama , like a wise wrote plays with purpose . Ibsen , far more even

lla d L n V . tha Ro nd , had definite en s in iew ike Strind n did n berg, Ibse not merely wish to prese t comparisons

bu t in between elemental forces , addition to present their T n formulation . hese northern writers i tellectua lized

u n ro a m ch more than Rolla d , inasmuch as they were p p andists a d g , whereas Roll n merely endeavored to show ideas in the act of unfolding their own contradictions . THE PLAYWRIGHT 127

’ Ibsen and Strindberg desired to make converts ; Rolland s aim was to display the inner energy that animates every the s e idea . Whilst northerners hoped to produce a p cific ff d in of ff e ect, Rollan was search a general e ect, the f n For o . arousing e thusiasm Ibsen , as for the contem orar d p y French ramatists , the conflict between man and woman living in the bourgeois environment always o c ’ cu ies of p the center the stage . Strindberg s work is ani d o f mate by the myth sexual polarity . The lie against which both these writers are campaigning is a conven i n l a n t o a . , a social , lie The dramatic interest rem i s the n a f . o same The spiritual are a is still th t bourgeois life . This applies even to the mathematical sobriety of Ibsen of d and to the remorseless analysis Strin berg . Despite o f the the vituperation critics , the world of Ibsen and ’ nd d Stri berg was still the critics worl . ’ n On the other ha d , the problems with which Rolland s plays were concerned could never awaken the interest of a a bourgeois public, for they were politic l , ideal , heroic, o f revolutionary problems . The surge his more compre h i n n n ens ve feelings e gulfed the lesser te sio s o f sex . ’ n Rolla d s dramas leave the erotic problem untouched, n and this dam s them for a modern audience . He pre s sent a new type, political drama in the sense phrased by

n E L a Napoleo , conversing with Goethe at rfurt

a é modem e . d politique , voila la fat lit The tragic rama tis w r t al ays displays human beings in conflict with fo ces .

Man becomes great through his resistance to these forces . In Greek tragedy the powers of fate assumed mythical : of of forms the wrath the gods, the disfavor evil spirits, 128 ROMAIN ROLLAND

see disastrous oracles . We this in the figures of Oedi For d m pus, Prometheus , and Philoctetes . us mo e s, it of is the overwhelming power the state, organized politi cal force, massed destiny, against which as individuals “ is we stand weaponless ; it the great spiritual storms , les ” fo i courants de , which inexorably sweep us away like straws before the wind . No less incalculably than did o f the fabled gods antiquity, no less overwhelmingly and

- pitilessly, does the world destiny make us its sport . War for is the most powerful of these mass influences, and , ’ t this reason , nearly all Rolland s plays take war as heir theme . Their moral force consists in the way wherein again and again they show how the individual, a Prome theus in conflict with the gods , is able in the spiritual sphere to break the unseen yoke ; how the individual

d the i ea remains stronger than the mass idea, the idea of fatherland— though the latter can still destroy a hardy rebel with the thunderbolts of Jupiter . The Greeks first knew the gods when the gods were n d angry . Our gloomy divinity, the fatherla d , bloo as of old thirsty the gods , first becomes fully known to

us o f . n in time war Unless fate lowers , man rarely thi ks h o r of these hostile forces ; he despises t em forgets them , while they lurk in the darkness , awaiting the advent of

a n their day . A peaceful, a l odicean era had no i terest in tragedies foreshadowing the opposition of the forces which were twenty years later to engage in deadly strug n d gle in the bloodstained European are a . What shoul those care who strayed into the theater from the Parisian o f boulevards , members an audience skilled in the geom

1 3 0 ROMAIN R OLLAND understanding as do the tragedies which lay for years h in obscurity, and were t en overshadowed by the fame ? t - bom e hr t h of heir late brother, J an C is op e These as dramas , parerga it seemed , were aimed , in an hour of when peace still ruled the world , at the center our n un contemporary co sciousness, which was then still n f wove by the looms o time . The stone which the build of ers the stage contemptuously rejected , will perhaps

o f con become the foundation a new theater, grandly ceived of , contemporary and yet heroical , the theater the free European brotherhood , for whose sake it was fash ioned in solitude decades ago by the lonely creator . PART THREE

THE HEROIC BIOGRAPHIES

I prepare mys elf by the s tudy of r his tory and the practice o f w iting. O do in w e ome a wa s in m S g, I lc l y y soul the memory o f the bes t and mo st wned f m n Fo heneve the reno o e . r w r enforced ass o ciations o f daily life a ou se wo rt es s e vi o r i n o e r hl , l, g bl fee in s am a e to re e t ese l g , I bl p l h feelings and to keep them at a dis tan e dis ass ionate tu rnin m c , by p ly g y thoughts to c ontemplate the brightest

examples .

PL UTAR CH Preamble to the Li e , f o imo eon f T l .

13 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Public life was lukewarm and torpid as of old. The world was in search of profit instead of faith and spirit ual force .

His private life likewise lay in ruins . His marriage,

a entered into with high hopes, was one more dis ppoint x e ment . During these years Rolland had individual e p rience o f a tragedy whose cruelty his work leaves u n fo r noticed , his writings never touch upon the narrower f o o wn . troubles his life Wounded to the heart, ship in wrecked all his undertakings, he withdrew into soli tude . His workroom , small and simple as a monastic cell , became his world ; work his consolation . He had now to fight the hardest fight on behalf of the faith o f his youth , that he might not lose it in the darkness of despair . f In his solitude he read the literature o the day . And o f own since in all voices man hears the echo his , Rol n land found everywhere pain and loneli ess . He studied of o : the lives the artists , and having done s he wrote “ The further we penetrate into the existence o f great creators , the more strongly are we impressed by the magnitude of the unhappiness by which their lives were enveloped . I do not merely mean that, being subject

the n to ordinary trials and disappoi tments of mankind , their higher emotional susceptibility rendered these smarts exceptionally keen . I mean that their genius , placing them in advance of their contemporaries by t twenty, thir y, fifty, nay often a hundred years, and n thus maki g o f them wanderers in the desert , condemned them to the most desperate exertions if they were but to DE PROFUNDIS 1 3 5

sa of . live, to y nothing winning to victory Thus these n t great ones among manki d , those towards whom posteri y n fo r looks back with ve eration , those who will all time bring consolation to the lonely in spirit, were themselves “ ” du — pauvres vaincus, les vainqueurs monde the con

uerors o f . q the world , but themselves beaten in the fray An endless chain of perpetually repeated and unmeaning torments binds their successive destinies into a tragical “ n - unity. Never, as Tolstoi poi ted out in the oft men “ ’ tioned n letter, do true artists share the common ma s ” power o f contented enjoyment . The greater their na And tures , the greater their suffering . conversely, the greater their suffering the fuller the development of their own greatness . Rolland thus recognizes that there is another great n ness, a profou der greatness , than that of action , the a of ff n n gre tness su ering . Unthi kable would be a Rolla d did not n ho w who draw fresh faith from all experie ce,

n n one own ever pai ful ; u thinkable who failed , in his f nd of th ff o su fering, to be mi ful e su erings f others . As n ff a sufferer, he exte ds a greeting to all su erers on

. of of n earth Instead a fellowship enthusiasm , he ow of of looks for a brotherhood the lonely ones the world , as he Shows them the meaning and the grandeur of all

. o f sorrow In this new circle, the nethermost fate, he “ u L t rns to noble examples . ife is hard . It is a con tinu ou s struggle for all those who cannot come to terms d Fo r with me iocrity . the most part it is a painful strug n a n gle, lacking sublimity, lacki g h ppi ess , fought in solitude and silence . Oppressed by poverty, by domes 1 3 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

tic cares , by crushing and gloomy tasks demanding an of aimless expenditure energy , joyless and hopeless, e most p ople work in isolation , without even the comfort o f being able to stretch forth a hand to their brothers in ” u misfort ne . To build these bridges between man and ’ ff n ff n man , between su eri g and su eri g, is now Rolland s ff task . To the nameless su erers, he wishes to show those in whom personal sorrow was transmuted to become gain C for millions yet to come . He would , as arlyle phrased “ a it, make manifest the divine rel tion which at all times unites a Great Man to other men The million solitaries have a fellowship ; it is that of the o f ff t great martyrs su ering, those who , hough stretched on the rack of destiny, never foreswore their faith in f life, those whose very su ferings helped to make life “ Let no richer for others . them t complain too piteously,

the o f . the unhappy ones , for best men share their lot It is fo r us to grow strong with their strength . If we feel

ou r u s on . weakness, let rest their knees They will give solace . From their spirits radiate energy and good ness . Even if we did not study their works , even if we

a of did not he rken to their voices, from the light their the t countenances, from fac that they have lived , we should know that life is never greater, never more fruit ” — — ful never happier than in suff ering . for It was in this spirit, his own good , and for the of t consolation his unknown bro hers in sorrow, that Rol land undertook the composition of the heroic biographies .

13 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

o r whether by ideas by physical force . By heroes I mean those who were great through the power of the ‘

. one heart As of the greatest (Tolstoi) has said , I recognize no other sign of superiority than goodness . h not Where the c aracter is great, there is neither a great artist nor a great man of action ; there is nothing but one of the idols of the crowd ; time will shatter them to

h . get er What matters, is to be great, not to seem ’ great . A hero does not fight for the petty achi evements of fo r life, success , for an idea in which all can partici he fo r for pate ; fights the whole, life itself . Whoever turns his back on the struggle because he dreads to be ff alone , is a weakling who shrinks from su ering ; he is one who with a mask of artificial beauty would conceal f t from himself the tragedy o mor al life ; he is a liar.

True heroism is that which faces realities . Rolland “ fiercely exclaims : I loathe the cowardly idealism of those who refuse to see the tragedies o f life and the To weaknesses o f the soul . a nation that is prone to of the deceitful illusions resounding words, to such a r to sa nation above all , is it necessa y y that the heroic of one falsehood is a form cowardice . There is but ” — heroism on earth to kn ow life and yet to love it . ff ’ Su ering is not the great man s goal . But it is his “ ordeal ; the needful fil ter to eff ect purification ; the ” swiftest beast of burden bearing us towards perfection , “ S f as Meister Eckhart s aid . In u fering alone do we rightly understand art ; through sorrow alone do we learn those things which outlast the centuries, and are THE HEROES OF SUFFERING 13 9

fo r stronger than death . Thus the great man , the painful experiences of life are transmuted into knowl is t edge, and this knowledge fur her transmuted into the ff uff f power of love . Su ering does not s ice by itsel to produce greatness ; we need to have achieved a triumph is o f over suffering . He who broken by the distresses who the i life, and still more he Shirks troubles of l fe, is th o his stamped with e imprint f defeat, and even noblest work will bear the marks of this overthrow . None but he who rises from the depths, can bring a message to the heights of the spirit ; paradise must be reached by a path u E that leads thro gh purgatory . ach must discover this path for himself ; but the one who strides along it with own head erect is a leader, and can lift others into his “

ul ik u n s . world . Great so s are l e mo ntai peak Storms lash them ; clouds envelop them ; but on the peaks we a breathe more freely than elsewhere . In that pure t mos here o f p , the wounds the heart are cleansed ; and cloudbanks of man when the part, we gain a view all ” kind . To such lofty outlooks Rolland wishes to lead the sufl erers who are still in the darkness of torment . He desires to Show them the heights where suffering grows one with nature and where struggle becomes heroic . “ ” o f Sursum corda , he sings, chanting a song praise as u he reveals the s blime pictures of creative sorrow. CHAPTER III

BEETHOVEN

EETH OVEN of , the master masters , is the first figure sculptured on the heroic frieze of the in ’ visible temple . From Rolland s earliest years, since his beloved mother had initiated him into the magic of t world music, Bee hoven had been his teacher, had been at once his monitor and consoler . Though fickle re to other childish loves, to this love he had ever “ of mained faithful . During the crises doubt and de n one of Beetho pression which I experie ced in youth, ’ one ven s melodies, which still runs in my head , would ” reawaken in me the spark of eternal life . By degrees the admiring pupil came to feel a desire for closer ac quaintance with the earthly existence o f the object o f oum e in his veneration . J y g to Vienna , he saw there the in demol room the House of the Black Spaniard , since ished , where the great musician passed away during a

. 1901 storm At Mainz, in , he attended the Beethoven a festival . In Bonn he s w the garret in which the mes o f the was siah language without words was born . It a shock to him to find in what narrow straits this universal genius had passed his days . He perused letters and other documents conveying the cruel history o f Bee 140

1 42 ROMAIN ROLLAND the i of intox cation spirit which God himself feels . ? What victory is comparable to this What conquest o f ’ Napoleon s ? What sun of Austerlitz can compare in

f o f refulgence with this superhuman e fort, this triumph i n the spirit, ach eved by a poor and u happy man , by a lonely invalid , by one who , though he was sorrow in u o carnate, tho gh life denied him j y, was able to create on the joy that he might bestow it world . As he himself out of own misfor proudly phrases it, he forges joy his n tu es . The device of every heroic soul must be ” o f f n Out su feri g cometh joy . n Thus does Rolland apostrophize the unk own .

Finally he lets the master speak from his own life . He “ ” re opens the Heiligenstadt Testament, in which the tiring man confided to posterity the profound grief which b e concealed from his contemporaries . He recounts the o confession f faith of the sublime pagan . He quotes letters showing the kindliness which the great musician vainly endeavored to hide behind an assumed acerbity . Never before had the universal humanity in Beethoven so our been brought near to the Sight of generation , never before had the heroism of this lonely life been s o magnificently displayed for the encouragement of a countless observers , as in this little book, with its p of peal to enthusiasm, the greatest and most neglected human qualities . The brethren of sorrow to whom the message was ad

a t dressed , sc t ered here and there throughout the world , gave ear to the call . The book was not a literary tri umph ; the newspapers were silent ; the critics ignored Romain Rolland at the time o f w riting Be ethoven

CHAPTER IV

MICHELANGELO

EETH OVEN is for Rolland the most typical o f of the controllers sorrow . Born to enjoy the of to fullness life, it seemed to be his mission n n reveal its beauties . Then destiny, ruini g the se se f f organ o music, incarcerated him in the prison o deaf his ness . But spirit discovered a new language ; in the darkness he made a great light, composing the Ode to af Joy whose strains he was unable to hear . Bodily fliction one o f f , however, is but of the many forms su fer “ ering which the heroism of the will can conquer . Suf

ferin . g is infinite, and displays itself in myriad ways

Sometimes it arises from the blind things of tyranny, or coming as poverty , sickness , the injustice of fate, the wickedness of men ; sometimes its deepest cause lies in f ’ the su ferer s own nature . This is no less lamentable, no less disastrous ; for we do not choose ou r own dispo s itions , we have not asked for life as it is given us, we ” have not wished to become what we are .

Such was the tragedy of Michelangelo . His trouble was not a sudden stroke of misfortune in the flower o f his

fir - ff . st w days . The a liction was inborn From the da n of of ing his consciousness, the worm discontent was 144 MICHELANGELO 145

his th gnawing at heart, e worm which grew with his growth throughout the eighty years of his life . All his feeling was tinged with melancholy . Never do we hear so from him, as we often hear from Beethoven, the o o n golden call f j y. But his great ess lay in this , that S i C he bore his orrows l ke a cross, a second hrist carry ing the burden of his destiny to the Golgotha of his

' d of not aily work, eternally weary existence, and yet is weary of activity . Or we may compare him with S y hus u p ; but whereas Sisyph s for ever rolled the stone, it ’ was Michelangelo s fate, chiseling in rage and bitterness, of Fo r to fashion the patient stone into works art . of Rolland , Michelangelo was the genius a great and C un n vanished age ; he was the hristian, happy but patie t, whereas Beethoven was the pagan , the great god Pan n in the forest of music . Michela gelo shares the blame ' for own sufl erin a his g, the blame that att ches to weak ’ of n d ness, the blame those dam e souls in Dante s first “ d ” circle who voluntarily gave themselves up to sa ness .

We must Show him compassion as a man , but as we show to one compassion mentally diseased , for he is the para “ ” dox of a heroic genius with an unheroic will . Bee thoven is the hero as artist, and still more the hero as man ; Michelangelo is only the hero as artist . As man , n Michelangelo is the vanquished , u loved because he does not give himself up to love , unsatisfied because he has

n . satum ine no longi g for joy He is the man , born un one der a gloomy star, who does not stru ggle against melancholy, but rather cherishes it, toying with his own “ e L — depr ssion . a mia allegrezz a e la malincolia mel 146 ROMAIN ROLLAND

hol n anc y is my delight . He fra kly acknowledges that “a thousand joys are not worth as much as a single ” n of sorrow . From the begi ning to the end his life he to seems be hewing his way, cutting an interminable hi s dark gallery leading towards the light . This way is greatness, leading us all nearer towards eternity . Rolland feels that Michelangelo ’ s life emb races a d great heroism , but cannot give irect consolation to those ' fl r su e . who In this case, the one who lacks is not able own f or to come to terms with destiny by his strength , d he needs a mediator beyon this life . He needs God , “ the refuge of all those who do not make a success o f life here below ! Faith which is apt to be nothing other t tu han lack of faith in life, in the fu re, in oneself ; a f lack of courage ; a lack o joy . We know upon how l ” many defeats this painful victory is u pbu i ded . Rol land here admires a work, and a sublime melancholy ; so but he does with sorrowful compassion , and not with the intoxicating ardor inspired in him by the triumph o f Beethoven . Michelangelo is chosen merely as an ex ample of the amount of pain that may have to be en r dured in ou mortal lot . His example displays great con ness, but greatness that conveys a warning . Who quers pain in producing such work , is in truth a victor . Yet only half a victor ; for it does not suffice to endure “

. i life We must, this is the h ghest heroism , know life, ” and yet love it .

1 48 ROMAIN ROLLAND

m be : A id the torment, blessed doubt, saying We must t Go hank d if we be discontented with ourselves . A cleavage between life and the form in which it has to be of n lived , is the genuine sign a true life , the preco dition o f all that is good . The only bad thing is to be con tented with oneself . d the r For Rollan , this apparent cleavage is t ue Tolstoi , just as for Rolland the man who struggles is the only man truly alive . Whilst Michelangelo believes himself to see a divine life above this human life , Tolstoi sees a

o f genuine life behind the casual life everyday, and to attain to the former he destroys the latter . The most in celebrated artist Europe throws away his art , like a

n - knight throwi g away his sword , to walk bare headed ’ along the penitent s path ; he breaks family ties ; he u m dermines his days and his nights with fanatical ques n tio s . Down to the last hour o f his life he is at war with himself, as he seeks to make peace with his con

he for n science ; is a fighter the i visible, that invisible n so which mea s much more than happiness, joy, and God ; a fighter fo r the ultimate truth which he can share one with no . of This heroic struggle is waged , like that Beethoven and Michelangelo , in terrible isolation , is waged like theirs in airless spaces . His wife, his children , his n n h frie ds , his enemies, all fail to u derstand him . T ey D on n see consider him a ! uixote , for they can ot the opponent with whom he wrestles, the opponent who is himself . None can bring him solace ; none can help

. be him Merely that he may die at peace , has to flee TOLSTOI 149

hi on from s comfortable home a bitter night in winter, to perish like a beggar by the wayside . Always at this n eam in l supreme altitude to which manki d looks y g y up ,

- the atmosphere is ice bound and lonely . Those who for s o of create all must do in solitude, each one them a f savior nailed to the cross , each suffering for a di ferent faith ; and yet suffering every one of them for all man kind . CHAPTER VI

TH E UNWRITTEN BIOGRAPHIES

the Beethoven R0 1 N cover of the , the first of ’ a n n o f land s biographies , was an n ou cement f the lives of a number o heroic personalities . w a f f There s to be a life o Mazzini . With the aid o Malwida Me senbu had n von y g, who know the great had revolutionist , Rolland been collecting relevant docu n for n me ts years . Amo g other biographies , there was

one of one of to be General Hoche ; and the great utopist, a of Thomas Paine . The original scheme embr ced lives n N o f ma y other spiritual heroes . t a few o the biog ’ raphies had already been outlined in the author s mind .

Above all, in his riper years , Rolland designed at one time to give a picture of the restful world in which Goethe moved ; to pay a tribute of thanks to Shake speare ; and to discharge the debt of friendship to one b Malwida Me sen u . little known to the world , von y g “ ” These vies des hommes illustres have remained nu d written . The only biographical stu ies produced by Rolland during the ensuing years were those of a more t scientific character, dealing wi h Handel and Millet, and the minor biographies of Hugo Wolf and Berlioz . Thus the third grandly conceived creative cycle like 1 5 0

15 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

all experienced this tragical struggle. How often has the artist been filled with distress when contemplating a

u Fo r tr th which he will have to describe . this same and healthy virile truth , which for some is as natural at n as the air they bre he , is absolutely i supportable to

a f others , who are we k through the tenor o their lives or

u d n r ? thro gh Simple kin li ess . What a e we to do Are we to suppress this deadly truth , or to utter it unspar ? ingly Continually does the dilemma force itself upon ” o r L ? us , Truth ove Such was the overwhelming experience which came

U a pon Roll nd in mid career . It is impossible to write

a men n the history of gre t , both as historian recordi g

of n ad truth , and as lover manki d who desires to le his d To n fellows upwar s towards perfection . Rolla d , the ’ n n m d e thusiast , the historian s functio now see e the less

of Fo r t important the two . what is the tru h about a ? “ man It is so diffi cult to describe a personality . fo r Every man is a riddle , not others alone , but for him It to k self likewise . is presumptuous claim a nowledge o f ne o who is not known even by himself . Yet we can on s o not help passing judgments character, for to do is ne of a necessary part o f life . Not o those we believe of n not one ourselves to know, not one our frie ds, Of

se . ut those we love, is as we e him In many cases he is terl ff o y di erent from u r picture . We wander amid the phantoms we create . Yet we have to judge ; we have to ” act . be Justice to himself, justice to those whose names honored , veneration for the truth, compassion for his THE UNWRITTEN BIOGRAPHIES 1 5 3

— fellows all these combined to arrest his half- completed

the . design . Rolland laid aside heroic biographies He would rather be silent than surrender to that cowardly ideali sm which touches up lest it Should have to re s pudi te . He halted on a road which he had recognized “ to be impassable, but he did not forget his aim to de n on fe d greatness earth . Since these historic figures ul n of t wo d not serve the e ds his faith , his fai h created n a figure for itself . Si ce history refused to supply him W I th of the image the consoler, he had recourse to art ,

a n n f shio i g amid contemporary life the hero he desired , creating out o f truth and fiction his own and our own

Jean Christophe .

CHAPTER I

SAN C TUS CHRISTOPHORUS

of PON the last page his great work , Rolland

- nd C relates the well known lege of St . hristo The d n a pher . ferryman was rouse at ight by

a a little boy who wished to be carried cross the stre m .

With a smile the good - natured giant shouldered the light Bu t burden . as he strode through the water the weight and he was carrying grew heavy heavier, until he felt n n he was about to sink i the river . Musteri g all his

d on . a d strength, he continue his way When he re che the

n for man d a other shore , gaspi g breath , the recognize th t n n of he had been carryi g the e tire meaning the world .

C u . Hence his name , hristophor s an n Roll d has known this long night of labor . Whe the a u u d n n he assumed f tef l b r e , whe he took the work upon his shoulders , he meant to recount but a single life . n As he proceeded , what had bee light grew heavy . He found that he was carrying the whole destiny o f his gen n w f cration , the meaning of the e tire orld , the message o f a o . saw love, the prim l secret creation We who him the n making his way alone through ight, without recog nition u u u , witho t helpers , witho t a word of cheer, witho t d n a frien ly light wi king at him from the further shore , I S7 1 5 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

t m o imagined hat he must succu b . Fr m the hither bank the unbelievers followed him with Shouts o f scom ful be laughter . But pressed manfully forward during t d hese ten years , what time the stream of life swirle ever more fiercely around him ; and he fought his way in n o the end to the u known shore f completion . With d bowed back , but with the radiance in his eyes undimme , fi L did he nish fording the river . ong and heavy night of ! travail, wherein he walked alone Dear burden, which he carried for the sake of those who are to come d hearin our afterwar s, g it from shore to the still untrod den shore o f the new world . Now the crossing had been safely made . When the good ferryman raised his eyes ,

d . the night seemed to be over, the darkness vanishe o full Eastward the heaven was all aglow . J y y he wel comed the dawn of the coming day towards which he had carried this emblem of the day that was done . Yet what was reddening there was naught but the

d - of of Eu rO e bloo y cloud bank war, the flame burning p , the flame that was to consume the spirit o f the elder ou r be world . Nothing remained of sacred heritage d yon this , that faith had bravely struggled from the shore of yesterday to reach ou r again distracted world . The conflagration has bum ed itself out ; once more night our s ou has lowered . But thank speed towards y , ferry d man , pious wanderer, for the path you have trod en k through the darkness . We than you for your labors , Fo r which have brought the world a message of hope . the sake of us all have you marched on through the

CHAPTER II

RESURRECTION

OMAIN ROLLAND was now in his fortieth

. f year His life seemed to be a field o ruins . to The banners of his faith , the manifestoes the French people and to humanity, had been torn to

- o f rags by the storms reality . His dramas had been

on n . of buried a si gle evening The figures the heroes , which were designed to form a stately series of historic bronzes , stood neglected , three as isolated statues , while

- the others were but rough casts prematurely destroyed .

Yet the sacred flame still bu m ed within him . With heroic determination he threw the figures once more into o f the fiery crucible his heart , melting the metal that it n might be recast in new forms . Si ce his feeling for truth made it impossible for him to find the supreme n be co soler in any actual historical figure , resolved to n of create a ge ius the spirit, who Should combine and f typify what the great ones of all times had su fered , a hero who should not belong to one nation but to all n peoples . No lo ger confining himself to historical be for confi truth , looked a higher harmony in the new g u ration of of truth and fiction . He fashioned the epic an imaginary personality RESURRECTION 16 1

A S b now re if y miracle, all that he had lost was f n . o gai ed The vanished fancies his school days, the boy ’ artist s dream of a great artist who should stand erect ’ a i on ag inst the world , the young man s v sion the Jani culum of d , surged up anew . The figures his ramas , Aért and n the Girondists , arose in a fresh embodime t ; of the images Beethoven , Michelangelo, and Tolstoi , n of emergi g from the rigidity history , took their places ’ n d amo g our contemporaries . Rolland s isillusionments had lad been but precious experiences ; his trials , but a der n h d to higher thi gs . W at had seeme like an end ean became the true beginning, that of his masterwork, J hri he C stop . CHAPTER III

TH E ORIGIN OF TH E WORK

EAN CHRISTOPHE had long been beckoning the

poet from a distance . The first message had

come to the lad in the Normal School . During u of those years , yo ng Rolland had planned the writing a

the of - romance, history a single hearted artist shattered on the rocks of the world . The outlines were vague ; the only definite idea was that the hero was to be a musi cian whose contemporaries failed to understand him . so f The dream came to nothing, like many o the dreams of youth . ’ But the vision returned in Rome, when Rolland s poetic fervor, long pent by the restrictions of school life, Mal id v on broke forth with elemental energy . w a Mey s enbug had told him much concerning the tragical strug gles of her intimate friends Wagner and Nietzsche .

Rolland came to realize that heroic figures, though they of may be obscured by the tumult and dust the hour, belong in truth to every age . Involuntarily he learned to associate the unhappy experiences of these recent heroes with those of the figures in his vision . In Parsi fal , the guileless Fool, by pity enlightened , he recog nized an emblem of the artist whose intuition guides him 1 6 2

THE ORIGIN OF TH E WORK 16 3 t hrough the world , and who comes to know the world through experience . One evening, as Rolland walked on aniculum of C the J , the vision Jean hristophe grew

- suddenly clear . His hero was to be a pure hearted n musician , a German , visiting other la ds , finding his od L g in ife ; a free mortal spirit, inspired with a faith and nk in greatness , with faith even in ma ind , though n d ma kind rejecte him . The happy days of freedom in Rome were followed o f d w d by many years arduous labor, uring hich the uties of d n n aily life thrust the image i to the backgrou d . n o f and Rolla d had for a season become a man action , n had no time for dreams . The came new experiences n n hi to reawake the slumbering visio . I have told of s ’ n of f visit to Beethoven s house in Bo n , and the e fect produced on his mind by the realization of the tragedy ’ of n the great composer s life . This gave a ew direction to his thoughts . His hero was to be a Beethoven redivi n vus , a German , a lo ely fighter, but a conqueror . had im Whereas the immature youth idealized defeat, a InIn a n d g g that to f il was to be va quishe , the man of “ u to riper years perceived that tr e heroism lay in this , ” n and k ow life, yet to love it . Thus splendidly did the new horizon open as setting for the long cherished o f figure , the dawn eternal victory in ou r earthly strug

. C gle The conception of Jean hristophe was complete . nd Rolla now knew his hero . But it was necessary ’ d a that he shoul learn to describe th t hero s counterpart , ’ h e t at hero s eternal enemy, lif , reality . Whoever wishes to b delineate a com at fairly , must know both champions . 1 6 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND Rolland became intimately acquainted with Jean Chris ’ tophe s opponent through the experiences of these years of n of disillusionme t, through his study literature , through his realization o f the falseness of society and of

n ff a the i di erence of the crowd . It was necess ry for him to pass through the purgatorial fires of the years in

Paris before he could begin the work of description .

n had a At twe ty, Rolland m de acquaintance only with s and him elf, was therefore competent to describe no more than his own heroic will to purity . At thirty he had become able to depict likewise the forces of resist had ance . All the hopes he cherished and all the dis appointments he had suff ered jostled one another in the n of cha nel this new existence . The innumerable news ll t paper cuttings, co ected for years, almost wi hout a fi as de nite aim , magically arranged themselves material for the growing work . Personal griefs were seen to ’ have been valuable experience ; the boy s dream swelled to the proportions of a life history .

During the year 1 8 95 the broad lines were finished . n As prelude, Rolland gave a few scenes from Tea h h ’ 1 8 9 C risto e s . 7 p youth During , in a remote Swiss hamlet , the first chapters were penned , those in which s o the music begins as it were spontaneously . Then ( definitely was the whole design now Shaping itself in his mind) he wrote Some of the chapters for the fif th and L fol ninth volumes . ike a musical composer, Rolland lowed up particular themes as his mood directed , themes which his artistry was to weave harmoniously into the great symphony . Order came from within, and was

CHAPTER IV

TH E WORK WITHOUT A FORMULA

ean Christo he ? a AT, then , is J p C n it be properly spoken of as a romance ? This

book, which is as comprehensive as the o f ou r world , an orbis pictus generation , cannot be de

a - scribed by Single all embracing term . Rolland once “ said : Any work which can be circumscribed by a ” e definition is a dead work . Most applicable to J an Christophe is the refusal to permit so living a creation of n to be hidebound by the restrictions a name . Jea Christo he p is an attempt to create a totality, to write a

! book that is universal and encyclopedic , not merely nar rative ; a book which continually returns to the central

o - i problem f the world all . It comb nes insight into the soul with an outlook into the age . It is the portrait of an entire generation , and simultaneously it is the biog h f Grautoff rap y o an imaginary individual . has termed “ ” it a cross - section of our society ; but it is likewise the

o f t . a religious confession its au hor It is critic l , but at of the same time productive ; at once a criticism reality, and a creative analysis o f the unconscious ; it is a sym

in o f . phony words, and a fresco contemporary ideas It de E of is an o to solitude, and likewise an roica the great 1 6 6 THE WORK WITHOUT A FORMULA 1 6 7

E n at uropean fellowship . But whatever defi ition we d a w tempt, can eal with a p rt only, for the hole eludes

d fi . of e nition In the field literary endeavor, the nature

o nn d f a moral o r ethical act ca ot be precisely specifie . ’ Rolland s sculptural energies enable him to shape the inner humanity o f what he is describing ; his idealism

a n n a n o f . is a force th t stre gthe s f ith , a to ic vitality His

ean Christo he J p is an attempt towards justice, an attempt d a d . is t to underst n life It also an attempt towar s fai h, an attempt to love life . These coalesce in his moral demand (the only one he has ever formulated for the “ ” a w and free hum n being) , to kno life , yet to love it . The essential aim of the book is explained by its hero when he refers to the disparateness of contemporary nn has n life , to the ma er in which its art been severed i to “ a nd E o f - n thousa fragments . The urope to day no lo ger

no no possesses a common book ; it has poem, prayer, no

of a n f all act f ith which is the commo heritage o . This

a a o T o l ck is f tal to the art f our time . here is no ne who ” n one has writte for all ; no who has fought for all . an d d d Roll d hope to reme y the evil . He wishe to write d n an a d . for all natio s , not for his f therlan alone N ot and o f artists men letters merely, but all who are eager a and o wn to le rn about life about their age , were to be su pplied with a picture o f the environment in which n they were livi g . Jean Christophe gives expression to ’ “ a n : his cre tor s will , sayi g Display everyday life to — everyday people the life that is deeper and wider than n the ocea . The least among us bears infinity within him Describe the Simple life of one of these simple 1 6 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND men describe it simply, as it actually happens . Do not trouble about phrasing ; do not dissipate your en e r ies so g , as do many contemporary writers , in straining for artistic effects . You wish to speak to the many, and you must therefore speak their language . Throw yourself into what you create ; think your own thoughts ; own L et set feel your feelings . your heart the rhythm ” to the words . Style is soul .

ean Christo he was J p designed to be, and actually is, a and not of work of life , a work art ; it was to be, and is , “ ’ a book as comprehensive as humanity ; for l art est la ” é n ff vie dompt e ; art is life broke in . The book di ers from the majority o f the imagin ative writings of ou r day in that it does not make the erotic problem its cen at tral feature . But it has no central feature . It tempts to comprehend all problems, all those which are “ t n a part of reality, to contemplate them from wi hi , from ” the spectrum of an individual as Grauto ff expresses it . The center is the inner life o f the individual human being . The primary motif of the romance is to expound or how this individual sees life, rather, how he learns

s ee to it . The book may therefore be described as an educational romance in the sense in which that term ap he l M n plies to Wil m eister . The educatio al romance how and aims at showing , in years of apprenticeship

o f years travel , a human being makes acquaintance with o f the lives others , and thus acquires mastery over his own life ; how experience teaches him to transform into individual views the concepts he has had transmitted to of how be him by others , many which are erroneous ; he

1 70 ROMAIN ROLLAND aim at giving an analysis of the world ; he desires also of to expound the mystery creation , the primal secret of life .

Furthermore, the book furnishes an outlook on the universe, thus becoming a philosophic, a religious ro

. for the mance The struggle totality of life, signifies for Rolland the struggle to understand its significance and ’ Go d fo r n origin , the struggle for , o e s own personal o God . The rhythm f the individual existence is in search o f an ultimate harmony between itself and the t of n t rhy hm the u iversal existence . From his earthly fi Sphere, the Idea flows back into the in nite in an exultant canticle . Such a wealth of design and execution was unpreces ’ one War and Peace dented . In work alone, Tolstoi s , had Rolland encountered a similar conjuncture o f a his torical picture of the world with a process o f inner puri fi ation c and a state of religious ecstasy . Here only had be discerned the like passionate sense of responsibility towards truth . But Rolland diverged from this splendid example by placing his tragedy in the temporal environ

of of - of of ment the life to day, instead amid the wars Napoleonic times ; and by endowing his hero with the

not of heroism , arms, but of the invisible struggles which i the artist is constra ned to fight . Here, as always , the of most human artists was his model , the man to whom art was not an end in itself, but was ever subordinate to an of Tol ethical purpose . In accordance with the spirit ’ stoi s ean hr to he teaching, J C is p was not to be a literary ’ For s m work , but a deed . this reason, Rolland s great y THE WORK WITHOUT A FORMULA 1 71 phony cannot be subjected to the restrictions of a con v n e ient formula . The book ignores all the ordinary a f canons, and is none the less a char cteristic product o its n r time . Sta ding outside literature, it is an ove whelm n l n i g y powerful literary ma ifestation . Often enough it m ignores the rules of art, and is yet a ost perfect ex

of . not bu t not pression art It is a book , a message ; it is

of . a history , but is nevertheless a record our time More of of than a book, it is the daily miracle revelation a

the i . man who lives truth , whose whole l fe is truth CHAPTER V

KEY TO TH E C HARACTERS

ean Christo he no S a romance, J p has prototype in literature ; but the characters in the book

have prototypes in real life . Rolland the his torian does not hesitate to borrow some of the linea ments of his heroes from the biographies of great men . too In many cases , , the figures he portrays recall per Sonalitie n ann s in co temporary life . In a m er peculiar to himself, by a process of which he was the originator, he combines the imaginative with the historical , fusing n i dividual qualities in a new synthesis . His delinea n n im tions te d to be mosaics , rather tha entirely new i a inat ve . g creations In ultimate analysis , his method of literary composition invariably recalls the work o f a musical composer ; he paraphrases thematic reminis o f cences , without imitating too closely . The reader

ean Christo he - J p often fancies that, as in a key novel , he has recognized some public personality ; but ere long he finds that the characteristics of another figure intrude . Thus each portrait is freshly constructed out of a bun d dred iverse elements . C Jean hristophe seems at first to be Beethoven . Seip pel has aptly described La vie de Beethoven as a preface 172

1 74 ROMAIN ROLLAND

on of social life . He insisted calling a spade a spade, and twenty times a day he aroused annoyance in all who ” o f had to associate wi th him . The life history Wagner had much influence upon the delineation of Jean Chris o ri inat tophe . The rebellious flight to Paris , a flight g “ as of ‘ ing, Nietzsche phrases it, from the depths in ” stinct ; the hack - work done fo r minor publishers ; the sordid details of daily life— all these things have been transposed almost verbatim into Jean Christophe from ’ Wagner s autobiographical Sketches Ein deutscher Mu s ik r in Paris e . ’ Decse s Ernst y life of Hugo Wolf was , however, de oisive in its influence upon the configuration of the lead ’ in ing character Rolland s book , upon the almost violent N ot departure from the picture of Beethoven . merely ’ do we find individual incidents taken from D ecsey s book , such as the hatred for Brahms , the visit paid to

Hassler (Wagner) , the musical criticism published in “ ” “ D ionysos ( Wiener the tragi - comedy of Penthes ilea the unsuccessful overture to , and the memo rable visit to Professor Schulz (Emil Kaufmann ) Fur ’ thermore d , Wolf s whole character, his metho of musical C creation , is transplanted into the soul of Jean hristophe. f His primitive force o production , the volcanic eruptions d flooding the world with melo y, shooting forth into eter of nity four songs in the space a day, with subsequent t o f t the mon hs inactivi y, the brusque transition from joyful activity o f creation to the gloomy brooding of inertia— this form of genius which was native to Hugo Wolf becomes part of the tragical equipment of Jean KEY TO THE CHARACTERS

Christophe . Whereas his physical characteristics re us of mind Handel, Beethoven , and Gluck, his mental type is assimilated rather in its convulsive energy to that

- ff of the great song writer . With this di erence, that to C Jean hristophe, in his more brilliant hours , there is

d of supera ded the cheerful serenity, the childlike joy, ha Schubert . He s a dual nature . Jean Christophe is the classical type and the modern type of musician com bined n s i to a single personality, o that he contains even many of the characteristics of Gustav Mahler and César

. d u Frank He is not an in ividual musician , the fig re of one living in a particular generation ; he is the sublima o tion f music as a whole . ’ Christo he s Nevertheless, in Jean p life we find inci dents deriving from the adventures of those who were ’ G ahr e not musicians . From oethe s W h it und D ichtung comes the encounter with the French players ; I have ’ already said that the story of Tolstoi s last days was ’ represented in Jean Christophe s flight into the forest of (though in this latter case, from the figure a benighted ’ n n mo traveler, Nietzsche s counte a ce glances at us for a ment) Grazia typifies the well -beloved who never dies ; ’ Antoinette is a picture of Renan s sister Henriette ; Fran E coise Oudon , the actress , recalls leanora Duse, but e in certain respects she reminds u s of Suzanne D epr s . n d are Emma uel contains , in a dition to traits that purely

n a a imagi ary, lineaments th t are dr wn respectively from Charles Louis Philippe and Charles Peguy ; among the d s ee minor figures, lightly sketche , we seem to Debussy, h er n r lace er a e . L a o ire s u la V , and Moreas When f p 176 ROMAIN ROLLAND

of Lév was published , the figures Roussin the deputy, y C oeur, the critic , Gamache the newspaper proprietor, and o n t Hecht the music seller, hurt the feelings f o a few persons against whom no shafts had been aimed by

Rolland . The portraits had been painted from studies o f t e the commonplace, and typified the incessantly curring mediocrities which are eternally real no less than are figures of exquisite rarity .

One portrait, however, that of Olivier, would seem to For have been purely fictive . this very reason , Olivier is felt to be the most living of all the characters, pre cisely because we cannot but feel that in many respects ’ we have before us the artist s own picture , displaying not so much the circumstantial destiny as the human es of L sence Romain Rolland . ike the classical painters , he has , almost unmarked , introduced himself slightly descri disguised amid the historical scenario . The p o f own n tion is that his figure , slender, refi ed , slightly s ee own stooping ; here we his energy, inwardly directed , ’ and consuming itself in idealism ; Rolland s enthusiasm ’ d n of is displayed in Olivier s luci se se justice , in his n d resignation as far as his personal lot is concer e , though he never resigns himself to the abandonment of his cause . o f It is true that in the novel this gentle spirit, the pupil of Tolstoi and Renan , leaves the field action to his friend , and vanishes , the symbol of a past world . But C Jean hristophe was merely a dream , the longing for energy sometimes felt by the man of gentle disposition .

- f Olivier Rolland limns this dream o his youth , designing upon his literary canvas the picture of his own life .

1 78 ROMAIN ROLLAND

rhythm , no typical hue in his wording, no diction pe culi ar to himself . His personality does not obtrude itself, since he does not form the matter but is formed thereby . He possesses an inspired power of adaptation h o f to the rhyt m the events he is describing, to the mood ’ o f tu the si ation . The writer s mind acts as a resonator .

In the opening lines the tempo is set . Then the rhythm on surges through the scene, carrying with it the epi s odes , which Often seem like individual brief poems each sustained by its own melody— songs and airs which ap pear and pass , rapidly giving place to new movements . Some of the preludes in Jean Christophe are examples of

- pure song craft, delicate arabesques and capriccios, islands of tone amid the roaring sea ; then come other moods , gloomy ballads , nocturnes breathing elemental ’ out energy and sadness . When Rolland s writing is the of one of come musical inspiration , he shows himself

of . the masters language At times , however, he speaks

to of . us as historian , as critical student the age Then and the splendor fades . Such historical critical pas sages are like the periods of cold recitative in musical drama , periods which are requisite in order to give t t continui y to the story, and which hus fulfill an intel our lectual need , however much aroused feelings may make us regret their interpolation . The ancient conflict between the musician and the historian persists unrecon ’ ciled in Rolland s work . Only through the spirit of music can the architectonic o f h Jean Christop e be understood . However plastic the ff elaboration of the characters , their e ective force is dis A HEROIC SYMPHONY 1 79 played solely in so far as they are thematically ’ n n n d n d i terwove into the resou i g ti e of life s modulations . The essential matter is always the rhythm which these

and u characters emit, which iss es most powerfully of all

n C as f o . stru c from Jea hristophe, the m ter music The

n n of ture, the i ner architectural co ception the work, can not be understood by those who merely contemplate its d obvious subdivision into ten volumes . This is dictate f by the exigencies o book production . The essential o f caesuras are those between the lesser sections , each n ff which is writte in a di erent key . Only a trained n one can musicia , familiar with the great symphonies , foll ow in detail the way in which the epic poem Jean Christo he n n E p is co structed as a sympho y, an roica ; only a musician can realize how in this work the most com prehensive type of musical composition is transposed n i to the world of speech .

L e - t the reader recall the chorale like undertone , the

n of th n booming ote e Rhine , We seem to be listeni g to

a of in some prim l energy, to the stream life its roaring n A d progress through eter ity . little melo y rises above n C n the general roar . Jea hristophe, the child , has bee

ou t of of born the great music the universe, to fuse in turn with the endless stream of sound . The first figures make a dramatic entry ; the mystical chorale gradually subsides ; the mortal drama of childhood begins . By d l egrees the stage is fi led with personalities , with melo dies ; voices answer the lisping syllables of Jean Chris

na C tophe ; until , fi lly, the virile tones of Jean hristophe and the gentler voice of Olivier come to dominate the 1 8 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

theme . Meanwhile, all the forms of life and music are unfolded in concords and discords . Thus we have the tragical outbreaks of a melancholy like that of Beetho ven ; fugues upon the themes of art ; vigorous dance L e bu isson ardent scenes, as in ; odes to the infinite and songs to nature, pure like those of Schubert . Wonder o f ful is the interconnection the whole, and marvelous is the way in which the tide of sound ebbs once more . The dramatic tumult subsides ; the last discords are re

e . solved into the gr at harmony In the final scene , the n of invis openi g melody recurs, to the accompaniment ible choirs ; the roaring river flows out into the limitless

sea.

ean Christo he Thus J p , the Eroica , ends in a chorale to n the the i finite powers of life , ends in undying ocean f f o music . Rolland wished to convey the notion o these eternal forces of life symbolically through the imagery of the element which for us mortals brings us into closest contact with the infinite ; he wished to typify these forces in the art which is timeless , which is free , of which knows nothing national limitations , which is eternal . Thus music is at once the form and the con “ of tent the work, simultaneously its kernel and its ” of a shell , as Goethe said nature . N ture is ever the law of laws fo r art .

18 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

of o r of in the sphere the body in the sphere the spirit . E are n a ver, in creation, we seeki g to esc pe from the of d of prison the bo y, to throw ourselves into the storm ”

d . d . life, to be as go s To create is to slay eath of Creation , therefore , is the meaning life, its secret,

n a its innermost ker el . While Rolland lmost always chooses an artist for his hero , he does not make this choice in the arrogance of the romance writer who likes to contrast the melancholy geniu s with the dull crowd . His aim is to draw nearer to the primal problems of ex i ten In n s ce . the work of art , transcendi g time and of a ou t o f t space, the eternal miracle gener tion no hing or o ut of d n the ( the all) is ma e ma ifest to senses , while simultaneously its mystery is made plain to the intelli For n gence . Rolland , artistic creatio is the problem of problems precisely because the artist is the most human f E nd d o men . verywhere Rolla threa s his way through

o f the obscure labyrinth creative work , that he may draw near to the burning moment of spiritual receptivity, to h o f n t e painful act givi g birth . He watches Michel angelo shaping pain in stone ; Beethoven bursting forth in melody ; Tolstoi listening to the heart - beat of doubt ’ own a an re in his laden breast . To e ch, Jacob s gel is

f for e sctatic vealed in a di ferent form , but all alike the n force of the divine struggle conti ues to burn . Through ’ out n the years , Rolla d s sole endeavor has been to dis of cover this ultimate type artist, this primitive element of creation , much as Goethe was in search of the arche typal plant . Rolland wishes to discover the essential of creator, the essential act creation , for he knows that THE ENIGMA OF CREATIVE WORK 1 8 3 in this mystery are comprised the root and the blossoms ’ n a of the whole of life s e igm . As historian he had depicted the birth of art in hu n N ow a ma ity . , as poet , he was pproaching the same in d f and problem a i ferent form , was endeavoring to of in on n i depict the birth art e i dividual . In his H s ’ to ire de l o éra avant L ull et S carlatti and p y , in his ’ “ Mus iciens d autre o is had how f ,he shown music , blos somin u u n g thro gho t the ages , begi s to form its buds and a and how, gr fted upon different racial stems upon f d . be i ferent periods , it grows in new forms But here E nn gins the mystery o f creation . very begi ing is wrapped in obscurity ; and since the path of all mankind nd in n the is symbolically i icated each i dividual , mystery ’ n n recurs in each i dividual s experience . Rolla d is aware that the intellect can n ever unravel this ultimate not a of n mystery . He does sh re the views the mo ists , for whom creation has become trivialized to a mechani cal eff ect which they would explain by talking of primi and n a tive gases by similar verbiage . He k ows th t na d and of ture is mo est , that in her secret hours genera tion she wou ld fain elude observation ; he kn ows that we are unable to watch her at work in those moments when n a and w crystal is joi ing to cryst l, when flo ers are spring nt n eal ing O of the buds . Nothi g does she hide more j ousl t n the y han her i most magic , everlasting procreation , n n t very secret of i fi i y . C reation , therefore, the life of life, is for Rolland

d n and a mystic power, far transcen i g human will human

. d w intelligence In every soul there lives , side by si e ith 18 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

’ the . conscious individuality, a stranger as guest Man s chief endeavor since he became man has been to build up dams that shall control this inn er sea by the powers o f reason and religion . But when a storm comes (and those most plenteously endowed are peculiarly subject ”

n set . to such storms) , the eleme tal powers are free of u n Hot waves flood the soul , streaming forth out the

out of the out conscious ; not will , but against the will ; “ - of l o f a super will . This dualism the sou and its ” daimon cannot be overcome by the clear light of rea

o of s n . The energy the creative spirit surges from the of depths the blood , often from parents and remoter not progenitors, entering through the doors and windows o f the normal waking consciousness, but permeating the whole being as atmospheric spirits may be conceived to do . Of a sudden the artist is seized as by intoxica of tion, inspired by a will independent the will, sub “ jected to the power of the ineffable riddle of the world ” o f and life, as Goethe terms the daimonic . The divine breaks upon him like a hurricane ; o r opens before him “ ” like an abyss, dieu abime , into which he hurls himself ’ r fle tin l un e c . sa g y In Rolland s sense , we must not y t that the true artist has his art , but hat the art has the artist . Art is the hunter, the artist is the quarry ; art is i the v ctor, whereas the artist is happy in that he is again and again and forever the vanquished . Thus be fore creation we must have the creator . Genius is pre in of destined . At work the channels the blood , while s the senses still lumber, this power from without pre pares the great magic for the child . Wonderful is Rol

18 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND human being nothing more remains but the eternal thirst ’ a nd and the torment o f cre tion . In Rolla s sense the Fo . r artist does not will to create, but must create him , ’ production is not (as Nordau and N ordau s congeners an ab fancy in their simplicity) a morbid outgrowth , of un roducti normality life, but the only true health ; p v has in ity is disease . Never the torment of the lack of spiration been more splendidly described than in l ean h C ristophe . The soul in such cases is like a parched sun land under a torrid , and its need is worse than of death . No breath wind brings coolness ; everything withers ; joy and energy fade ; the will is utterly relaxed . Suddenly comes a storm out of the sw iftly overcast

of n heavens , the thunder the burgeoni g power, the light ning of inspiration ; the stream wells u p from inexhau sti

t a ble springs, carrying the soul along wi h it in etern l de sire ; the artist has become the whole world , has become h t e n . eu God , creator of all the eleme ts Whatever he “ n u counters , he sweeps alo g with him in his r sh ; tout lui ” est prétexte a s a fécondité intarissable ; everything is

fo r h n material his inex austible fertility . He tra sforms the whole of life into art ; like Jean Christophe be trans forms his death into a symphony . en In order to grasp life in its entirety , Rolland has deavored to describe the profoundest mystery o f life ; to of all describe creation , the origin the , the development of art in an artist . He has furnished a vivid descrip of and tion the tie between creation life, which weak n C lings are so eager to avoid . Jea hristophe is simul taneously the working genius and the suffering man ; he THE ENIGMA OF CREATIVE WORK 1 8 7

f ff . suf ers through creation , and creates through su ering l For the very reason that Rolland is himse f a creator, na of C the imagi ry figure Jean hristophe, the artist, is transcendently alive . CHAPTER VI II

J EAN CHRISTOPHE

has al RT many forms, but its highest form is ways that which is most intimately akin to na

ture in its laws and its manifestations . True genius works elementally, works naturally, is wide as out of the world and manifold as mankind . It creates

own out . its abundance, not of weakness Its perennial ff t e ect, therefore, is to create more streng h, to glorify nature, and to raise life above its temporal confines into infinity .

Jean Christophe is inspired with such genius . His C ff name is symbolical . Jean hristophe Kra t is himself energy (Kraft) , the indefatigable energy that springs

a from peas nt ancestry . It is the energy which is hurled into life like a projectile, the energy that forcibly over n comes every obstacle . Now, as long as we ide tify the of concept life with quiescent being , with inactive ex

tence of is , with things as they are , this force nature must For n be ever at war with life . Rolla d , however, life is not the quiescent, but the struggle against quiescence ; it im is creation, poiesis , the eternal , upward and onward “ ” n o f - - puls e agai st the inertia the perpetual as you were . one Among artists , who is a fighter, an innovator, must 1 8 8

1 90 ROMAIN ROLLAND

s apostle of force . We discern in him omething barbaric of o r n and elemental, the power a storm of a torre t o wn k w which , obeying not its will but the un no n laws n of nature, rushes down from the heights i to the lower levels of life . His outward aspect is that of a fighter . l He is tal and massive, almost uncouth , with large hands n and brawny arms . He has the sa guine temperament, of n and is liable to outbursts turbule t passion . His foot fall is heavy ; his gait is awkward , though he knows noth ing of fatigue . These characteristics derive from the crude energy of his peasant forefathers on the maternal side ; their pristin e strength gives him steadfastness in “ of the most arduous crises existence . Well is it with him who amid the mishaps of life is sustained by the

of so o f power a sturdy stock, that the feet father and grandfathers may carry forward the s on when he grows

so m weary, that the vigorous growth of ore robust fore ” r bears may relift the crushed soul . The power of e silence again st the oppression of existence is given by n C such physical energy . Still more helpful is Jea hris ’ u and n d n tophe s trust in the f ture, his healthy u yiel i g “ n Optimism, his invincible confide ce in victory . I have ” u an centuries to look forward to , he cries ex ltantly in “ ” of n ! hour disillusionme t . Hail to life Hail to joy ! ’ From the German race he inherits Siegfried s confidence and in success , for this reason he is ever a fighter . He “ ’ ’ ” le é l obsta le l obstacle le é knows , g nie veut c , fait g nie

- n genius desires obstacles, for obstacles create ge ius .

Force, however, is always wilful . Young Jean Chris not tophe, while his energies have yet been spiritu JEAN CHRISTOPHE 191

ally enlightened , have not yet been ethically tamed , can

s ee no one . u but himself He is unj st towards others , and n nd ff deaf bli d to remonstrance , i i erent as to whether a n ma a d L i his ctio s y ple se or isplease . ke a woodcutter, ax in nd u th ha , he hastes stormfully thro gh e forest, striking right and left, simply to secure light and space fo r himself . He despises German art without under

scom s k a standing it , and French art without nowing ny “ n it n d thi g about . He is e dowe with the marvelou s ” impudence of opinionated youth ; that of the under d “ d gra uate who says , the worl did not exist till I cre ” in n u n ated it . His strength has its fling co tentio s ess ; for n d only when struggli g oes he feel that he is himself, hi n then only can he enjoy s passio for life . These struggles of Jean Christophe continue through out fo r n no cons icu the years , his maladroit ess is less p

hi t u d o ou s than s streng h . He does not nderstan his p n n o f and po e ts . He is slow to learn the lessons life ; it so w is precisely because the lessons are learned slo ly,

k and piece by piece, each stage besprin led with blood so and watered with tears, that the novel is impressive o ul no s f l of help . Nothing comes easily to him ; ripe is fruit ever falls into his hands . He simple like Parsi n fal, naive, somewhat boisterous and provincial . I stead of rubbing off his angularities upon the grindstones of

u n . social life, he bruises himself by his cl msy moveme ts

He is an intuitive genius , not a psychologist ; he fore n n sees nothi g, but must endure all thi gs before he can “ not of know . He had the hawklike glance Frenchmen of and Jews , who discern the most trifling characteristics 192 ROMAIN ROLLAND

t all that they see . He silently absorbed every hing he i came in contact with , as a sponge absorbs . Not unt l days or hours had elapsed would he become fully awa re ” of what had now become a part of himself . Nothing was real to him so long as it remained objective . To be f o use, every experience must be , as it were, digested and worked up into his blood . He could not exchange ideas and concepts one for another as people exchange bank notes . After prolonged nausea , he was able to free himself from all the conventional lies and trivial notions

a which h d been instilled into him in youth , and was then at length enabled to absorb fresh nutriment . Before he could know France, he had to strip away all her masks “ on the e after another ; before he could reach Grazia , ” - well beloved who never dies , he had to make his way through less lofty adventures . Before he could discover to himself and before he could discover his god , he had live the whole of his life through . Not until he reaches the other shore does Christophorus recognize that his burden has been a message . “ one He knows that it is good to suffer when is strong, t n and he herefore loves to encounter hindra ces . “ d of Everything great is goo , and the extremity pain bor on n ders enfranchisement . The only thi g that crushes n irremediably, the o ly thing that destroys the soul, is

u mediocrity of pain and joy . He grad ally learns to

a recognize his enemy, his own impetuosity ; he le rns to be just ; he begins to understand himself and the world . of The nature passion becomes clear to him . He real

is not izes that the hostility he encounters aimed , at him

194 ROMAIN ROLLAND

’ What makes Jean Christophe s struggle supremely heroic is that he aspires solely towards the greatest, to wards life as a whole . This striving man has to upbuild everything for himself ; his art , his freedom, his faith , his

God . , his truth He has to fight himself free from every thing which others have taught him ; from all the fellow

of and . ships art , nationality, race, creed His ardor

end for or never wrestles for any personal , success for “ ’ ll n et pleasure . y a aucun rapport entre la passion ’ Christo he s le plaisir . Jean p loneliness makes this on his own struggle tragical . It is not behalf that he

u t n tro bles to attain to tru h , for he k ows that every man own has his truth . When , nevertheless, he becomes a of own helper mankind , this is not by words , but by his essential nature, which exercises a marvelously harmon n o izi g influence in virtue of his vigorous goodness . Wh ever comes into contact with him— the imaginary person alities in the book, and no less the real human beings who d — rea the book is the better for having known him . The power through which he conquers is that of the life which we all share . And inasmuch as we love him , we grow enabled to cherish an ardent love for the world of n i ma k nd . CHAPTER IX

OLIVIER

E o EAN CHRISTOPH is the portrait f an artist . But every form and every formula of art and the

- d nd one . artist must necessarily be side Rolla , “ C in therefore, introduces to hristophe mid career, nel ” a n mezzo del c mmin, a counterpart, a Fre chman as foil

of to the German , a hero thought as contrast to the hero of C action . Jean hristophe and Olivier are comple a n one o f ment ry figures, attracti g another in virtue the

of ff law polarity . They were very di erent each from and t d one on n of the other, hey love another accou t this ” — n difference, being of the same species the oblest . of Olivier is the essence spiritual France, just as Jean Christophe is the offspring of the best energies of Ger d many ; they are i eals, alike fashioned in the form of and the highest ideal ; alternating like major minor, they transpose the theme of art and life into the most wonder ful variations . extem als In the contrast between them is marked , both of n in respect physical characteristics and social origi s .

Olivier is slightly built, pale and delicate . Whereas

Jean Christophe springs from working folk, Olivier de e an and ff riv s from old somewhat e ete bourgeois stock, 195 1 96 ROMAIN ROLLAND and despite all his ardor he has an aristocratic aloofness from vulgar things . His vitality does not come like that o f his robust comrade from excess of bodily energy, from muscles and blood , but from nerves and brain , from will n and passio . He is receptive rather than productive . “ s He was ivy, a gentle oul which must always love and ” be loved . Art is for him a refuge from reality, whereas Jean Christophe flings himself upon art to find in it life ’

. of many times multiplied In Schiller s sense the terms ,

Olivier is the sentimental artist, whilst his German brother is the naive genius . Olivier represents the “ beauty of a civilization ; he is symbolic o f la vaste ” culture et le génie psychologique de la France ; Jean of Christophe is the very luxuriance nature . The ac Frenchman represents contemplation ; the German, tion . The former reflects by many facets ; the latter has “ the genius which shines by its own light . Olivier trans fers to the sphere of thought all the energies that he has d C drawn from action , pro ucing ideas where hristophe radiates vitality, and wishing to improve, not the world , ffi ou t but himself. It su ces him to fight within himself f the eternal struggle o responsibility . He contemplates on unmoved the play of secular forces , looking with the skeptical smile of his teacher Renan , as one who knows o f in advance that the perpetual return evil is inevitable , that nothing can avert the eternal victory of injustice and out wrong . His love, therefore, goes to humanity, the u abstract idea , and not to actual men , the nsatisfactory realizations of that idea . as At first we incline to regard him as a weakling,

198 ROMAIN ROLLAND

n en o f pe d ce judgment which nothing could overcome . t When he loved any hing, he loved it in defiance of the world . Justice is the only pole towards which the needle of his will points unerringly ; justice is his sole

L Ai-i . t t form of fanaticism ike , his weaker prototype,

e he has la faim de justice . Every injustice, ev n the n of i justices a remote past, seem to him a disturbance f no o . the world order He belongs, therefore , to party ; he is unfailingly the advocate on behalf of all the un happy and all the oppressed ; his place is ever with the ” vanquished ; he does not wish to help the masses S ocially, but to help individual souls , whereas Jean Christophe desires to conquer for all mankind every paradise of art and freedom . For Olivier there is but one true freedom , that which comes from within , the freedom which a man must win for himself . The illu o f sion the crowd , its eternal class struggles and national do struggles for power, distress him , but not arouse his

. men sympathy Standing quite alone, he maintains his tal poise when war between Germany and France is immi nent, when all are shaken in their convictions, and when even Jean Christophe feels that he must return home to “ ” fo r fight his fatherland . I love my country , says the “ Frenchman to his German brother . I love it just as you love yours . But am I for this reason to betray my ? be conscience, to kill my soul This would signify the tra al y of my country . I belong to the army of the ” to of spirit, not the army force . But brute force takes its is revenge upon the man who despises force, and he killed in a chance medley . Only his ideals, which were OLIVIER 199

of r his true life, survive him , to renew for those a late

generation the mystic idealism of his faith . Marvelously delineated is the answer made by the advocate o f mental force to the advocate o f physical

of of . force , by the genius the Spirit to the genius action The two heroes are profoundly united in their love for art, in their passion for freedom , in their need for spirit “ ” E his own ual purity . ach is pious and free in sense ; they are brothers in that ultimate domain which Rolland “ ” of — in finely terms the music the soul goodness . But ’ Jean Christophe s goodness is that of instinct ; it is ele mental , therefore, and liable to be interrupted by pas ’ a d sion te . relapses into hate Olivier s goo ness, on the nd n other ha , is intellectual and wise, and is ti ged merely n n at times by iro ical skepticism . But it is this co trast is between them , it the fact that their aspirations towards n good ess are complementary, which draws them together . ’ Christophe s robust faith revives joy in life for the lonely C Olivier . hristophe, in turn, learns justice from

Olivier . The sage is uplifted by the strong , who is him ’ self enlightened by the sage s clarity . This mutual ex change of benefits symbolizes the relationship between their nations . The friendship between the two indi viduals is designed to be the prototype of a spiritual alli h ance between the brot er peoples . France and Germany “ n o f E n are the two pinio s the west . The uropea spirit is to soar freely above the blood - drenched fields of the past . CHAPTER X

GRAZIA

EAN CHRISTOPHE is creative action ; Olivier is creative thought ; a third form is requisite to com

lete of of p the cycle existence, that Grazia , cre

ative being, who secures fulfillment merely through her

beauty and refulgence . In her case likewise the name C f n is symbolic . Jean hristophe Kra ft , the embodime t

o f e virile energy, re ncounters , comparatively late in life,

a o f Grazia , who now embodies the calm be uty woman hood . Thus his impetuous spirit is helped to realize the

final harmony . a C Hitherto, in his long march towards peace, Je n hris

- tophe has encountered only fellow soldiers and enemies . In Grazia he comes for the first time into contact with a n huma being who is free from nervous tension , with one characterized by that serene concord which in his music r n he has unconsciously been seeking fo ma y years .

Grazia is not a flaming personality from whom he him ‘

‘ o self catches fire . The warmth f her senses has long ere

o f this been cooled , through a certain weariness life, a “ gentle inertia . But in her, too , sounds that music of ” the soul ; she too is inspired with that goodness which h i ’ is needed to attract Jean C r stophe s liking . She does 200

202 ROMAIN ROLLAND

she dle . When vanishes, her radiance still lingers, ing this book of exuberance and struggle with a lyrical melancholy, and transfusing it with a new beauty, of that peace . CHAPTER XI

J EAN CHR ISTOPHE AND H IS FELLOW MEN

OTWITHSTANDING the intimate relationships

described in the previous chapters, the path o f is one Jean Christophe the artist a lonely . He walks by himself, pursuing an isolated course that leads

deeper and deeper into the labyrinth of his own being . hi ou infi The blood of s fathers drives him along, t of an f of nite o confused origins, towards that other infinite ’ creation . Those whom he encounters in his life s jour ney are no more than shadows and intimations, mile of of c stones experience , steps as ent and descent, epi s odes and adventures . But what is knowledge other than a sum of experiences ; what is life beyond a sum of en counters? Other human beings are not Jean Chris ’ tophe s destiny, but they are material for his creative work . They are elements of the infinite, to which he feels himself akin . Since he wishes to live life as a

of . whole, he must accept the bitterest part life, mankind All he meets are a help to him . His friends help him n much ; but his e emies help him still more, increasing his vitality and stimulating his energy . Thus even those sh his the who wi to hinder work, further it ; and what is true artist other than the work upon which he is engaged? 203 204 ROMAIN ROLLAND

of his In the great symphony passion , his fellow beings are high and low voices inextricably interwoven into

a the swelling rhythm . M ny an individual theme he dis w ff misses after a hile with indi erence , but many another C ’ he pursues to the end . Into his hildhood s days comes

old man o r Gottfried , the kindly , deriving more less from of the spirit Tolstoi . He appears quite incidentally, never for more than a night, shouldering his pack, the n undyi g Ahasuerus, but cheerful and kindly, never

un s mutinous , never complaining, bowed but splendidly flinchin in g, as he wends his way Godward . Only pass ’ Christo he s ing does he touch p life , but this transient con s ufli ces set n Con tact to the creative spirit in moveme t . sider, again , Hassler, the composer . His face flashes C be upon Jean hristophe, a lightning glimpse, at the ’ n gi ning of the young man s work ; but, in this instant, Jean Christophe recognizes the danger that he may come to resemble Hassler through indolence, and he collects n — his forces . I timations , appeals , signs such are other

to . E one men him very acts as a stimulus , some through love, some through hatred . Old Schulz , with sympa

of . thetic understanding, helps him in a moment despair The family pride of Frau von Kerich and the stupidity of the Gothamites drive him anew to despair, which cul

minates his . this time in flight, and thus proves salvation

Poison and antidote have a terrible resemblance . But n fo r to his creative spirit nothing is unmeani g, he stamps o wn his significance upon all, sweeping into the current of his life the very things which were imposing them selves as hindrances to the stream . Suffering is need

206 ROMAIN ROLLAND

pilgrimage . It leads us to his last confession , which old runs as follows , with a slight alteration from his “ : description of true heroism To know men, and yet to ” love them . CHAPTER XII

J EAN CHRISTOPHE AN D TH E NATIONS

n n OUNG Headstrong, looki g upo his fellow men d n with passion and preju ice, fails to understa d their natures ; at first he contemplates the f nd n and families o manki , the ations , with like passion o f our prejudice . It is a part inevitable destiny that to o f n begin with , and for many us throughout life , we k ow ' o nd n our wn la from within o ly, foreign lands only from N ot see our without . until we have learned to own coun t try from wi hout, and to understand foreign countries from within as the n atives of these countries understand u E can them , can we acq ire a uropean outlook , we realize that these various countries are complementary parts of

n C for a si gle whole . Jean hristophe fights life in its

n a e tirety . For this reason he must pursue the p th by which the nationalist becomes a citizen of the world and “E ” acquires a uropean soul .

n C re u As must happen , Jea hristophe begins with p j h . e d dice At first overvalues France . I eas have been d d n impresse upon his min concerni g the artistic, cheer

- and ful , liberal spirited French , he regards his own Ger of H i many as a land full restriction . s first sight of n see Paris brings disillusionme t ; he can nothing but lies , 207 208 ROMAIN ROLLAND

. be clamor, and cheating By degrees , however, dis covers that the soul of a nation is not an obvious and

- superficial thing, like a paving stone in the street, but that the observer o f a foreign people must dig his way to that soul through a thick stratum of illusion and false Ere n a o f hood . lo g he we ns himself the habit which o f leads people to talk the French , the Italians , the Jews, as of h n the Germans, if members t ese respective natio s o r of d and races were all a piece, to be classifie docketed

E ~ in so simple a fashion . ach people has its own meas ure, its own form, customs , failings, and lies ; just as own each has its climate, history, skies, and race ; and these things cannot be easily summarized in a phrase

n ou r of or two . As with all experie ce, experiences a country must be built up from within . With words n n f alo e we can build nothi g but a house o cards . “ Truth is the same to all nations , but each nation has its E own lies which it speaks o f as its idealism . very mem ber of each nation inhales the appropriate atmosphere of lying idealism from the cradle to the grave , until it o becomes the very breath f his life . None but isolated can geniuses free themselves by heroic struggle, during which they stand alone in the free universe o f their own ” thought . We must free ourselves from prejudice if we are to judge freely . There is no other formula ; there no are other psychological prescriptions . As with all creative work , we must permeate the material with which we have to deal , must yield ourselves without reserve .

o f In the case of nations as in the case individual men, he who woul d know them will find that there is

210 ROMAIN ROLLAND

of of To the citizen the world , at the end his pilgrim

e . ag , all nations are alike In each his soul can make of sub itself at home . The musician in him dreams a of lime work, the great European symphony, wherein of the voices the peoples, resolving discords , will rise th of in the last and highest harmony, e harmony man kind . CHAPTER XIII

TH E PICTURE OF FRANCE

HE picture of France in the great romance is notable because we are here shown a country

from a twofold outlook, from without and from of a t within , from the perspective a Germ n and wi h the eyes of a Frenchman . It is likewise notable because ’ Christophe s judgment is not merely that of one who

of who . sees, but that one learns in seeing ’ in In every respect, the German s thought process is n tentionally presented i a typical form . In his little native town he had never known a Frenchman . His o f feelings towards the French , whom he had no con n o f n a crete experie ce whatever, took the form a ge i l , but “ somewhat contemptuous, sympathy . The French are ” l lot l sum good fel ows , but rather a slack , wou d seem to d up his German preju ice . They are a nation of spine of less artists , bad soldiers , corrupt politicians, women n and easy virtue ; but they are clever, amusi g, liberal

d d . t o min e Amid the order and sobrie y f German life, he feels a certain yearning towards the democratic free dom of France . His first encounter with a French ac ’ C nn on tress , ori e, akin to Goethe s Philine, seems to c

firm this facile judgment ; but soon, when he meets 2 1 1 ROMAIN ROLLAND

to Antoinette, he comes realize the existence of another “ You so n France . are serious , he says with asto ish

d - ment to the emure , tongue tied girl , who in this foreign land is hard at work as a teacher in a pretentious , parvenu household . Her characteristics are not in keeping with d his tra itional prejudices . A Frenchwoman ought to n be trivial, saucy, and wa ton . For the first time France “ presents to him the riddle of its twofold nature This initial appeal from the distance exercises a mysterious lure . He begins to realize the infinite multiplicity of L these foreign worlds . ike Gluck , Wagner, Meyerbeer, of and Offenbach, he takes refuge from the narrowness

German provincial life, and flees to Paris, the fabled of home universal art . on one im His feeling arrival is of disorder, and this i pression never leaves him . The first and last mpres sion , the strongest impression , to which the German in n him co tinually returns, is that powerful energies are of being squandered through lack discipline . His first guide in the fair is one of those spurious real Pari ” one of who sians , the immigrants are more Parisian in their manners than those who are Parisian by birth , a of Jew German extraction named Sylvain Kohn , who i here passes by the name of Ham lton , and in whose hands all the threads of the trade in art are centered . He C shows Jean hristophe the painters , the musicians, the C politicians, the journalists ; and Jean hristophe turns away disheartened . It seems to him that all their works ” exhale an unpleasant odor femininus, an oppressive a m t osphere laden with scent . He sees praises showered

2 14 ROMAIN ROLLAND

At length comes the rencounter which is a turning i ’ point in his fate ; he meets Oliv er, Antoinette s brother, a the true Frenchman . Just s Dante, guided by Virgil, of wanders through new and ever new circles knowledge , so Jean Christophe, led by Olivier, learns with astonish

o f ment that behind this veil noise, behind this clamorous of facade, an elite is quietly laboring . He sees the work persons whose names are never printed in the newspa pers ; sees the people, those who , remote from the hurly nd burly, tranquilly pursue their daily rou . He learns to know the new idealism of the France whose soul has l been strengthened by defeat . At first this discovery fi ls ” ou him with rage . I cannot understand y all, he cries “ to You the gentle Olivier . live in the most beautiful of countries, are marvelously gifted , are endowed with the highest human sensibilities, and yet you fail to turn ll these advantages to account . You a ow yourselves to be dominated and to be trampled upon by a handful o f rascals . Rouse yourselves ; get together ; sweep your ” house clean ! The first and most natural thought of for the German is for organization , the drawing together of the good elements ; the first thought of the strong on man is to fight . Yet the best in France insist holding of of aloof, some them content with a mysterious clarity r si vision , and others giving themselves up to a facile e g nation . With that tincture of pessimism in their sagacity to n which Renan has given such lucid expressio , they k is shrin from the struggle . Action uncongenial to of them , and the hardest thing all is to combine them “ or l f joint action . They are over cautious, and visua ize THE PICTURE OF FRANCE 21 5

L defeat before the battle begins . acking the optimism th n d of e Germans , they remai isolated indivi uals , some

n . from prude ce, others from pride They seem to be

o f of affected with a spirit exclusiveness , the operation which Jean Christophe is able to study in his own dwell in On g. each story there live excellent persons who could combine well, but they will have nothing to do . For on with one another . twenty years they pass the n staircase without becomi g acquainted , without the least ’ ne h concern about o anot er s lives . Thus the best among n n the artists remai stra gers . Jean Christophe suddenly comes to realize with all its merits and defects the essential characteristic o f the f r n o . Fre ch people, the desire liberty Each one wishes f or . to be free himself, free from ties They waste enor mous quantities of energy because each tries to wage n the time struggle u aided , because they will not permit themselves to be organized , because they refuse to pull t together in harness . Although their activities are hus t paralyzed by heir reason , their minds nevertheless re n main free . Consequently they are e abled to permeate every revolutionary movement with the religious fervor of l the solitary, and they can perpetual y renew their own

. n revolutionary faith These things are their salvatio , preserving them from an order which would be unduly rigid , from a mechanical system which would impose excessive uniformity . Jean Christophe at length un derstands that the noisy fair exists only to attract the un thinking, and to preserve a creative solitude for the really active spirits . He sees that for the French temperament 2 16 ROMAIN ROLLAND

n this clamor is indispe sable , is a means by which the French fire o ne another to labor ; he sees that the appar ent inconsequence of their thou ghts is a rhythmical form o f n nu n co ti ous re ewal . His first impression , like that f o f so n n . ma y Germa s , had been that the French are e fete But after twenty years he realizes that in truth they are n w always ready for e beginnings , that amid the appar ent n n d co tradictio s of their spirit a hidden or er reigns, d ff k a i erent order from that nown to the Germans, just d ff n as their free om is a di ere t freedom . The citizen o f d the worl , who no longer desires to impose upon any

of own n ow other nation the characteristics his , con d n templates with elight the eter al diversity of the races . As the light of the world is composed o f the seven colors o f so the spectrum , from this racial diversity arises that n of wo derful multiplicity in unity , the fellowship all mankind .

2 18 ROMAIN ROLLAND been transformed into grandiose ideas o f the national future . In art, it had been sentimentalized . In its new l manifestations , it was signal y displayed in the cheap E optimism of mperor William . The defeat which had u spirit alized French idealism , had , from the German side, as a victory, materialized German idealism . “ ?” What has victorious Germany given to the world hi o asks Jean Christophe . He answers s wn question by “ saying : The flashing of bayonets ; vigor without mag nanimity ; brutal realism ; force conjoined with greed for ” profit ; Mars as commercial traveler . He is grieved n z to recog i e that Germany has been harmed by victory . “ ’ H e suffers ; for one expects more of one s own coun h f of try t an o another, and is hurt more by the faults ’ ”

own . C one s land Ever the revolutionist, hristophe de

e - t t sts noisy self assertion , militaris arrogance , the chur n lishness of caste feeling . In his co flict with militarized

Germany, in his quarrel with the sergeant at the dance a eru in the Alsatian vill ge inn , we have an elemental p

of for n b r the tion the hatred discipli e felt y the a tist , lover of freedom ; we have his protest against the brutal of ization of thought . He is compelled to shake the dust ff Germany o his feet . h W en he reaches France, however, he begins to realize ’ “ Germany s greatness . In a foreign environment his ” judgment was freed ; this statement appli es to him as to f all o us . Amid the disorder of France he learned to value the active orderliness of Germany ; the skeptical resignation of the French made him esteem the vigorous optimism of the Germans ; he was impressed by the con THE PICTURE OF GERMANY 219

trast between a witty nation and a thoughtful one . Yet he was under no ill usions about the optimism of the new he Germany, perceiving that it is often spurious . He came aware that the ideali sm often took the form of in idealizing a dictatorial will . Even the great masters , ’ “ he saw, to quote Goethe s wonderful phrase, how read ” ily in the Germans the ideal waxes sentimental . His of passionate sincerity , grown pitiless in the atmosphere

French clarity, revolts against this hazy idealism , which compromises between truth and desire, which justifies of of abuses power with the plea civilization , and which f considers that might is su ficient warrant for victory . of In France he becomes aware the faults of France, in

Germany he realizes the faults of Germany, loving both s ff f countries because they are o di erent . Each su fers

of . from the defective distribution its merits In France, is f liberty too widely di fused and engenders chaos, while a few individuals comprising the elite keep their

d . e i ealism intact In G rmany, idealism, permeating the a wa m sses, has been sugared into sentimentalism and tered into a mercantile optimism ; and here a still smaller elite preserves complete freedom aloof from the crowd . Each suffers from an excessive development of national “ s peculiarities . Nationali m , as Nietzsche says , has in F rance corrupted character, and in Germany has cor ” ru te C p d spirit and taste . ould but the two peoples draw together and impress their best qualities upon one ul d find another, they wo rejoice to , as Christophe him d “ h self had foun , that the richer e was in German dreams, the more precious to him became the clarity 220 ROMAIN ROLLAND

L o f n . C the atin mi d Olivier and hristophe, forming a pact of friendship , hope for the day when their personal sentiments will be perpetuated in an alliance between s ad their respective peoples . In a hour of international dissension , the Frenchman calls to the German in words “ d : o ut n still unfulfille We hold our ha ds to you . De

a . spite lies and hatred , we cannot be kept ap rt We one have mutual need of another, for the greatness o f an our Spirit d of ou r race . We are the two pinions of

. one n the west Should be broke , the other is useless for n flight . Eve if war should come, this will not unclasp ou r u s hands, nor will it prevent from soaring upwards ” together .

222 ROMAIN ROLLAND incessant change ; here he finds a nation with a clear se uence q of tradition , a nation which need merely be true own n to its own past and to its la dscape, in order to fulfill

to the most perfect blossoming of its nature, in order realize beauty . It is true that Christophe misses the element which is o f to him the breath life ; he misses struggle . A gen tle drowsiness seems universally prevalent, a pleasant “ n fatigue which is debilitati g and dangerous . Rome is too full of tombs , and the city exhales death . The fire kindled by Mazzini and Garibaldi , the flame in which

United Italy was forged , still glows in isolated Italian souls . Here, too , there is idealism . But it differs from the German and from the French idealism ; it is not yet of r directed towards the citizenship the world , but e “ mains purely national ; Italian idealism is concerned solely with itself, with Italian desires , with the Italian h . t e a race, with Italian renown In calm southern tmos here t so p , his flame does not burn fiercely as to radiate a light through Europe ; but it burns brightly and beau ifull t y in these young souls, which are apt for all pas not or sions, though the moment has yet come f the intens s e t ardors . a ns But as soon s Jean Christophe begi to love Italy, he grows afraid of this love . He realiz es that Italy is his also essential to him , in order that in music and in his life the impetuosity of the senses shall be clari neces fied to a perfect harmony . He understands how is sary the southern world is to the northern, and now of F aware that only in the trio Germany, rance, and THE PICTURE OF ITALY 223

f c Italy does the full meaning o each voice be ome clear .

In Italy, there is less illusion and more reality ; but the land is too beautiful , tempting to enjoyment and kill a as n ing the impulse towards ction . Just Germany fi ds own a danger in her idealism , because that idealism is too widely disseminated and becomes spurious in the av erage man ; just as to France her liberty proves disas trous because it encourages in the individual an idea of absolute independence which estranges him from the

s o for community ; Italy is her beauty a danger, since it

- s fie T atis d . o makes her indolent, pliable , and self every n n d natio , as to every i ividual , the most personal of char acteristics r n the or , the ve y things that comme d nation the individual to others , are dangerous . It would seem , therefore , that nations and individuals must seek salva tion by combining as far as possible with their own op i os tes . p Thus will they draw nearer to the highest ideal, of n that European u ity , that of universal humanity . In

Italy, as aforetime in France and in Germany, Jean Christophe redreams the dream which Rolland at two

- n d on and twe ty had first dreame the Janiculum . He E foresees the uropean symphony, which hitherto poets a lone have created in works transcending nationality, but which the nations as yet have failed to realize for them selves . CHAPTER XVI

TH E J EWS

of N the three diversified nations, by each which

Christophe is now attracted , now repelled , he finds

a unifying element, adapted to each nation , but not “ — e completely merged therein the J ws . Do you no “ on one tice, he says occasion to Olivier, that we are always running up against Jews? It might be thought that we draw them as by a spell, for we continually find

our and them in path , sometimes as enemies sometimes ” as all ies . It is true that he encounters Jews wherever n he goes . In his native tow , the first people to give him own o f a helping hand (for their ends , course) were the “ ” wealthy Jews who ran Dionysos ; in Paris , Sylvain

Le - C foe Kohn had been his mentor, vy oeur his bitterest , In Weil and Mooch his most helpful friends . like man u n ner, Olivier and Antoinette freq e tly hold converse on of d o r on with Jews , either terms frien ship terms of

- enmity . At every cross roads to which the artist comes , they stand like signposts pointing the way, now towards an good d now towards evil . ’ Al Christophe s first feeling is one of hostility . though he is too open - minded to entertain a sentiment of has s hatred for Jews , he imbibed from his piou 224

226 ROMAIN ROLLAND

for uttered words which invigorated me the struggle, t o showing me hat I was underst od . Nevertheless, these friends are my friends no longer ; their friendship was ! n but a fire of straw. No matter A passi g sheen is You welcome in the night . are right, we must not be ” ungrateful . n He finds a place for them , these folk without a cou in his o f try, picture the fatherlands . He does not fail

s ee of Eu to the faults the Jews . He realizes that for rope an civilization they do not form a productive ele ment in the highest sense of the term ; he perceives that in essence their work tends to promote analysis and decomposition . But this work of decomposition seems to for n n d him important, the Jews u dermi e tra ition , the

o f n hereditary foe all that is ew. Their freedom from “ the ties of country is the gadfly which plagu es the mangy ” beast of nationalism until it loses its intellectual bear ings . The decomposition they effect helps us to rid “ ” of of ourselves the dead past, the eternal yesterday ; detachment from national ties favors the growth of a new spirit which it is itself incompetent to produc These Jews without a country are the best assistants of “ E ” the good uropeans of the future . In many respects

Christophe is repelled by them . As a man cherishing faith in life , he dislikes their skepticism ; to his cheerful t disposition , heir irony is uncongenial ; himself striving

n a towards i visible go ls , he detests their materialism , their E canon that success must be tangible . ven the clever “ ” m for Judith Mannhei , with her passion intelligence, not understands only his work, and the faith upon which THE JEWS 227

of that work is based . Nevertheless, the strong will the own Jews appeals to his strength , their vitality to his “ of vigorous life . He sees in them the ferment action , ” o i the yeast f life . A homeless man , he finds h mself most intimately and most quickly understood by these “ ” f s ans atries . o p Furthermore, as a free citizen the d on worl , he is competent to understand his side the tragedy of their lives, cut adrift from everything, even from themselves . He recognizes that they are useful as means to an end , although not themselves an end . He sees that, like all nations and races , the Jews must “ n be harnessed to their co trast . These neurotic beings must be subjected to a law that will give them sta i n bil t . y Jews are like wome , splendid when rid on r den the cu b , though it would be intolerable to be ” ruled either by Jews or by women . Just as little as n or the Fre ch Spirit the German spirit, is the Jewish

Spirit adapted for universal application . But Chris tophe does not wish the Jews to be diff erent from what E a . is they are very r ce necessary , for its peculiar char acteristics are requisite for the enrichment of multi licit n p y, and for the consequent e largement of life . C his Jean hristophe, now in later years making peace n with the world , fi ds that everything has its appointed E place in the whole scheme . ach strong tone contributes n to the great harmo y . What may arouse hostility in n d isolatio , serves to bin the whole together . Nay more, it is necessary to pull down the old buildings and to clear the ground before we can begin to build anew ; the In analytic spirit is the precondition of the synthetic . 228 ROMAIN ROLLAND all countries Christophe acclaims the folk without a country as helpers towards the foundation of the u ni versal fatherland . He accepts them all into his dream o f Eu rO e the New p , whose still distant rhythm stirs his responsive yearnings .

23 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND before ; here there is no possibility of retracing our foot has own steps ; each generation its own laws, its form ,

own t own . its e hic , its inner meaning And the tragedy of out such compulsory fellowship arises of this, that a generation does not in friendly fashion accept the n of not achieveme ts its predecessors, does gladly under o f n L n take the development their acquisitio s . ike i di vidual human beings, like nations , the generations are animated with hostile prejudices against their neigh bors . Here, likewise, struggle and mistrust are the abiding law . The second generation rejects what the first has done ; the deeds o f the first generation do no t secure approval until the third o r the fourth genera tion . All evolution takes place according to what Goethe “ ” termed a spiral recurrence . As we rise, we revolve on narrowing circles round the same axis . Thus the n n struggle between generation and ge eratio is unceasing . Each generation is perforce unjust towards its prede “A d cesso rs . s the generations succee one another, they become more strongly aware of the thi ngs which divide them than they are o f the things which unite . They feel impelled to affirm the indispensability, the impor own of in us tance, of their existence, even at the cost j ” L hu tice or falsehood to themselves . ike individual “ one un man beings , they have an age when must be ” f out just i one is to be able to live . They have to live own own ecul their lives vigorously, asserting their p

iarities o f . in respect ideas, forms, and civilization It is just as little possible to them to be considerate to as for wards later generations, it has been earlier gen THE GENERATIONS 23 1

erations to be considerate towards them . There pre

-a n o f vails in this self ssertio the eternal law the forest, where the young trees tend to push the earth away from and sa the roots of the older trees, to p their strength , s o that the living march over the corpses of the dead . n nu The generations are at war, and each i dividual is n n o n of own witti gly a champio behalf his era, even though he may feel himself out of sympathy with that era . C Jean hristophe, the young solitary in revolt against o f his time, was without knowing it the representative and his n a fellowship . In through him , ge eration de clared n w as in war against the dying ge eration , unjust

u in - his inj stice, young his youth , passionate in his pas o ld n sion . He grew with his generation , seei g new

n him and N o . w waves risi g to overwhelm his work , n a n d havi g g i ed wisdom , he refuse to be wroth with s a those who were wroth with him . He w that his ene mies were displaying the inj u stice and the impetuosity had d d o f which he himself isplaye yore . Where he had n n fa cied a mecha ical destiny to prevail , life had now s e taught him to e a living flux . Those who in his youth had been fellow revolutionists , now grown conservative, were fighting against the new youth as they themselves in n old youth had fought agai st the . Only the fighters new were ; the struggle was unchanged . For his part,

C d new Jean hristophe had a frien ly smile for the , since

d n he love life more than he loved himself . Vai ly does n E d his frie d mmanuel urge him to efend himself, to pronounce a moral judgment upon a generation which 23 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND declared valueless all the things which they of an earlier day had acclaimed as true with the sacrifice of their C “ ? whole existence . hristophe answers : What is true We must not measure the ethic o f a generation with the ” o f E n : yardstick an earlier time . mma uel retorts for Why, then , did we seek a measure life, if we were ? ” not to make it a law for others Christophe refers n : him to the perpetual flux, sayi g They have learned from us , and they are ungrateful ; such is the inevitable ff o f . o ur ad succession events Enriched by e orts , they n vance further than we were able to advance, realizi g the conquests which we struggled to achieve . If any of of m the freshness youth yet lingers in us , let us learn fro is be them , and seek to rejuvenate ourselves . If this ou r old so yond powers , if we are too to do , let us at ” least rejoice that they are young .

Generations must grow and die as men grow and die . ’ is Everything on earth subject to nature s laws , and the man strong in faith, the pious freethinker, bows himself to the law . But he does not fail to recognize (and herein we see one of the profoundest cultural acquire

o f transvalua ments the book) that this very flux, this

of own . tion values , has its secular rhythm In former times, an epoch, a style , a faith, a philosophy, endured for a century ; now such phases do not outlast a genera tion , endure barely for a decade . The struggle has become fiercer and more impatient . Mankind marches to a quicker measure, digests ideas more rapidly than “ of of old . The development European thought is pro ceedin n g at a livelier pace , much as if its acceleratio

23 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

o f I have written the tragedy a vanishing generation . I have made no attempt to conceal either its vices or its virtues , to hide its load of sadness, its chaotic pride , its ff heroic e orts , its struggles beneath the overwhelming burden of a superhuman task— the task of remaking an a hu entire world , an ethic, an esthetic , a faith , a new

ur . manity . Such were we in o generation “ - o f . Men to day, young men , your turn has come ur March forward over o bodies . Be greater and hap pier than we have been . “

sa . For my part , I y farewell to my former soul I L cast it behind me like an empty shell . ife is a series L et C of deaths and resurrections . us die, hristophe, ” that we may be reborn . CHAPTER XVIII

DEPARTURE

E r EAN CHRISTOPH has reached the further sho e. of enci He has stridden across the river life, r

cled by roaring waves o f music . Safely carried across seems the heritage which he has borne on hi s Shoulders through storm and flood— the meaning of the world , faith in life . Once more he looks back towards his fellows in the h Al l as . land he has left . grown strange to him He can no longer understand those who are laboring and suffering amid the ardors of illusion . He sees a new in ff own generation , young a di erent way from his , more energetic, more brutal , more impatient, inspired with a ff d of di erent heroism . The chil ren the new days have fortified their bodies with physical training, have steeled “ of their courage in aerial flights . They are proud their o muscles and their broad chests . They are proud f of their country, their religion , their civilization , all that they believe to be their own peculiar appanage ; and from each o f these prides they forge themselves a ” weapon . They would rather act than understand .

They wish to Show their strength and test their powers . The dying man realizes with alarm that this new gen eration w , which has never kno n war, wants war . 23 5 23 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

He looks Shudderingly around : The fire which had been smouldering in the European forest was now break one ing forth into flame . Extinguished in place , it t promptly began to rage in ano her . Amid whirlwinds o f of smoke and a rain sparks , it leaped from point to point, while the parched undergrowth kindled . Out n post skirmishes in the east had already begu , as pre o f ludes to the great war of the nations . The whole and Europe , that Europe which was still skeptical apa onfla rati n thetic like a dead forest, was fuel for the c g o .

The fighting spirit was universal . From moment to mo fle . Sti d ment, war seemed imminent , it was continually reborn . The most trifling pretext served to feed its t o f streng h . The world felt itself to be at the mercy chance, which would initiate the terrible struggle . It o f was waiting . A feeling inexorable necessity weighed upon all , even upon the most pacific . The ideologues ,

Sheltering in the shade of Proudhon the titan , hailed ’ war as man s most splendid claim to nobility . “ h It was for this , then, that t ere had been effected a physical and moral resurrection of the races of the west ! It was towards these butcheries that the streams of action and passionate faith had been hastening ! None but a Napoleonic genius could have directed these blind im pulses to a foreseen and deliberately chosen end . But nowhere in Europe was there any one endowed with the for genius action . It seemed as if the world had singled out the most commonplace among its sons to be gover of nors . The forces the human spirit were coursing in ” other channels .

PART FIVE

INTERMEZZO SCHERZOSO

(Colas Breugnon)

“ u n on mauvais a on tu ris Br g , g rc , , ’ ” “ n as tu as onte ? — ue veu x tu p h ! , ? mon ami Je s u is ce q ue je suis . ’ Rire ne m empéche pas de s ouff rir ; ’ mais so uffrir n empéche ra jamais un ’ Et u i rie b on Francais de rire . q l ’ ’ ou armoie il faut d abord u il l , q ”

vo ie . A RE COL S B UGNON.

242 ROMAIN ROLLAND matic romance belonging to the same intellectual and cultural category as Jean Christophe .

- five Now of a sudden , as had happened twenty years earlier when the vision of Jean Christophe had come to on aniculum him the J , in the course of sleepless nights n he was visited by a stra ge and yet familiar figure , that of a countryman from ancestral days whose expansive t personality thrust all o her plans aside . Shortly before,

C a old Rolland had revisited l mecy . The town had of s awakened memories his childhood . Almo t una wares , home influences were at work , and his native son province had begun to insist that its , who had de so scribed many distant scenes , Should depict the land so of his birth . The Frenchman who had vigorously and passionately transformed himself into a European , the man who had hom e his testimony as European be fore the world , was seized with a desire to be , for a creative hour, wholly French , wholly Burgundian , wholly Nive ai n m s . The musician accustomed to u ite all voices in his symphonies , to combine in them the deepest ex of d pressions feeling, was now longing to iscover a new h n r rhyt m , and after prolonged te sion to relax into a mer y For mood . ten years he had been dominated by a sense of strenuous responsibility ; the equipment o f Jean Chris u tophe had been , as it were, a burden which his so l had had to bear . Now it would be a pleasure to pen a scherzo , free and light, a work unconcerned with the stresses of politics, ethics , and contemporary history .

It should be divinely irresponsible, an escape from the of exactions the time spirit . TAKEN UNAWARES 243

During the day following the first night on which the d had i ea came to him, he exultantly dismissed other n n was ff plans . The rippli g curre t of his thoughts e ort

flow . own less in its Thus, to his astonishment, during n of 19 13 the summer mo ths , Rolland was able to com

lete - d Colas Bre u n n p his light hearte novel g o , the French intermezzo in the European symphony . CHAPTER II

TH E BURGUNDIA N BROTHER

T seemed at first to Rolland as if a stranger, though

one of own from his native province and his blood , n had come cra king into his life . He felt as though , out sk of the clear French y, the book had burst like a ff meteor upon his ken . True, the melody is new ; di erent are the tempo , the key, the epoch . But those who have acquired a clear understanding of the author’ s inner life cannot fail to realize that this amusing book does not constitute an essential modification of his work . It is but a variation , in an archaic setting, upon Romain ’ - Aert Rolland s leit motif of faith in life . Prince and

King Louis were forefathers and brothers of Olivier . C 1 In like manner olas Breugnon , the j ov al Burgundian ,

- the lusty wood carver, the practical joker always fond o f his old- glass , the droll fellow, is , despite his world C costume, a brother of Jean hristophe looking at us adown the centuries .

As ever, we find the same theme underlying the novel . The author shows us how a creative human being (those who are not creative, hardly count for Rolland) comes to terms with life , and above all with the tragedy of his l r Christo he own . Co B e non ean life as ug , like J p , is the 244

246 ROMAIN ROLLAND wrestle with the problems of passion and the Spiritual was life, he content to strive for that supreme simplicity of craftsmanship which has a perfection of its own and thus brings the craftsman into touch with the eternal . The primitive artist - artisan is contrasted with the com paratively artificialized artist of modern days ; H ephais n tos, the divine smith, is co trasted with the Pythian ’ Apollo and with Dionysos . The simpler artist s sphere it is perforce narrower, but is enough that an artist Should be competent to fill the sphere for which he is pre ordained . C Nevertheless, olas Breugnon would not have been ’ of n had the typical artist Rolland s creatio , not struggle of his not been a conspicuous feature life , and had we been Shown through him that the real man is always E C stronger than his destiny . ven the cheerful olas ex pe riences a full measure of tragedy . His house is of burned down , and the work thirty years perishes in the flames ; his wife dies ; war devastates the country ; envy and malice prevent the success of his last artistic o f creations ; in the end , illness elbows him out active life . The only defenses left him against his troubles , “ against age, poverty, and gout, are the souls he has ”

one . made, his children , his apprentice , and friend t Yet his man , Sprung from the Burgundian peasantry , has an armor to protect him from the bludgeonings of n fate, armor no less effectual than was the i vincible German optimism of Jean Christophe o r the inviolable faith of Olivier . Breugnon has his imperturbable cheer “ fulness . Sorrows never prevent my laughing ; and THE BURGUNDIAN BROTHER 247

when I laugh , I can always weep at the same time . d d d n Epicure , gorman izer, eep ri ker, ever ready to leave is n misfor work for play, he one the less a stoic when

e u n . tune comes , u complaining hero in adversity When “ u u ° t e his ho se b rns, he exclaims The less I have, h ” of more I am . The Burgundian craftsman is a man t of lesser sta ure than his brother the Rhineland , but the ’ Burgundi an s feet are no less firmly planted on the be ’ ChristO he s loved earth . Whereas p daimon breaks forth in C a storms of rage and frenzy, olas reacts ag inst the visitations of destiny with the serene mockery of a w healthy Gallic temperament . His himsical humor

a a helps him to f ce dis ster and death . Assuredly this mental qu ality is one of the most valuable forms of

u Spirit al freedom .

Freedom , however, is the least important among the ’ n characteristics of Rolla d s heroes . His primary aim is always to Show us a typical example of a man armed

n d and a n agai st his oom ag i st his god , a man who will

to of not allow himself be defeated by the forces life . now n n In the work we are co sideri g, it amuses him a o f r to present the struggle as a comedy, inste d po tray

n u d i g it in a more serio s dramatic vein . But the come y wa transfi ure is al ys g d by a deeper meaning . Despite n old C un the lighter touches, as whe the forlorn olas is ’ n in a o r willi g to take refuge his d ughter s house, as when he boastfully feigns indifference after the destruc tion of his home (lest his soul should be vexed by hav his ing to accept the sympathy of fellow men) , still amid 248 ROMAIN ROLLAND this tragi - comedy he is animated by the unalloyed desire to stand by his own Strength .

C . Before everything, olas Breugnon is a free man is That he is a Frenchman , that he a burgher, are sec

ondar . so y considerations He loves his king, but only long as the king leaves him his liberty ; he loves his wife , but follows his own bent ; he is on excellent terms with of the priest a neighboring parish , but never goes to n church ; he idolizes his childre , but his vigorous indi a vidu lity makes him unwilling to live with them . He is to friendly with all, but subject none ; he is freer than the king ; he has that sense o f humor characteristic o f the free spirit to whom the whole world belongs . Among all nations and in all ages, that being alone is truly alive who is stronger than fate , who breaks through the seine o f men and things as he swims freely down the great f S stream o life . We have een how Christophe, the “ : ? ! Rhinelander, exclaimed What is life A tragedy ” Hurrah ! From his Burgundian brother comes the re ” s onse : . p Struggle is hard , but struggle is a delight

Across the barriers of epoch and language, the two look on one another with sympathetic understanding . We realize that free men form a spiritual kinship independ ent of the limitations imposed by race and time .

25 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Th the thence the entire book takes its pitch . roughout, same lively melody is sustained . The writer employs a be peculiarly happy form . His style is poetic without ing actually vers ified ; it has a melodious measure with

o n . n as u t bei g strictly metrical The book, pri ted prose ,

an is written in a sort of free verse, with occasional o f n rhymed series lines . It is possible that Rolla d adopted the fundamental tone from Paul Fort ; but that which in the Ballades fran gaises with their recurrent of n burdens leads to the formation canzo es, is here n the hras punctuated throughout an e tire book , while p ing is most ingeniously infused with archaic French of Rabelas locutions after the manner .

Here , Rolland wishes to be a Frenchman . He goes the has to the very heart of French spirit, recourse to “ ” u of gauloiseries, and makes the most successf l use

an the new medium , which is unique, and which c not be compared with any familiar literary form . For the

first time we encounter an entire novel which , while ’ written in old- fashioned French like that of Balzac s

Contes drolat i ues q , succeeds in making its intricate dic “ ’ ” tion musical throughout . The Old Woman s Death “ and The Burned House are as vividly picturesque as s rh th ballads . Their characteri tic and spiritualized y mical quality contrasts with the serenity of the other pic tures, although they are not essentially different from these . The moods pass lightly, like clouds drifting across the sky ; and even beneath the darkest of these of clouds, the horizon the age smiles with a fruitful ex u i cleam ess . Never was Rolland able to give such q GAULOISERIES 25 1 site expression to his poetic bent as in this book wherein

w th an n a he is holly e Frenchm . What he prese ts to us s

and a d a a n a whimsical sport c price, ispl ys more pl i ly th n anything else the livin g wellspring of his power : his of French soul immersed in its favorite element music . CHAPTER IV

A FRUSTRATE MESSAGE

EAN CHRISTOPH E was the deliberate divergence

Cola Br from a generation . s eugnon is another n ff divergence, unco sciously e ected ; a divergence from the traditional France, heedlessly cheerful . This “ ” bourgu inon salé wished to show his fellow countrymen of a later day how life can be salted with mockery and yet be full o f enjoyment . Rolland here displayed all n n the riches of his beloved homela d , displayi g above all

of . the most beautiful these goods, the joy of life

o f - A heedless world , our world to day, was to be awak ened by the poet singing of an earlier world which had been likewise impoverished , had likewise wasted its ener gies in futile hostility . A call to joy from a Frenchman , w of echoing do n the ages , was to answer the voice the

German , Jean Christophe . Their two voices were to mingle harmoniously as the voices mingle in the Ode to ’ o o f J y Beethoven s Ninth Symphony . During the tran quil summer the pages were stacked like golden sheaves .

The book was in the press , to appear during the next 19 14 summer, that of .

But the summer of 19 14 reaped a bloody harvest . ’ Christo he s The roar of the cannon , drowning Jean p 25 2

PART SIX

THE CONSCIENCE OF EUROPE

O ne who is aware of values which he regards as a hundredfold m o re p re “ cious than the w ellbeing of the fa ” therlan d o f s o iet o f the inshi s , c y, k p o f o d and a e va ues whi h bl o r c , l c s tand a ove fat er ands and r a es b h l c , i nternation a va ues su h a man l l , c w o uld pro ve himself hypo c rite u d h r a h tri t t Sho l e t y to pl y t e pa o . I is a degradation of m ankind to eh o u a e n ationa at ed t admire c r g l h r , o

it o r to exto it . , l

' ‘ NIE I Z CHE Vorreden Material im S ,

N achlass . L a voc ation n e peut étre c onnue et prouvée que par le sac rifice que fait ’ le s avant et l artiste de s on repos et

- r a i n s on bien etre pour suiv e s e voc t o . LETTER DE TOLSTOI A ROMA IN

ROLLAND .

4 O to e 188 7. , c br ,

25 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND time had come for him to do what Jean Christophe had ’ s done for Olivier s on . He must guard the sacred flame ; he must fulfil what his hero had prophetically fore The shadowed . way in which Rolland fulfilled this obligation has become for us all an imperishable exam of ple spiritual heroism , which moves us even more t strongly han we were moved by his written words . We saw his life and personality taking the form of an actu ally living conviction . We saw how, with the whole of of power his name, and with all the energy his artistic his n temperament , he took stand agai st multitudinous d in adversaries in his own lan and other countries, his hi gaze fixed upon the heaven of s faith . Rolland had never failed to recognize that in a time of widespread illusion it would be difficult to hold fast to

- his convictions , however self evident they might seem . 19 14 But, as he wrote to a French friend in September, , “ We do not choose our own dutie s . Duty forces itself of upon us . Mine is , with the aid those who share my of ideas, to save from the deluge the last vestiges the European spirit Mankind demands o f us that those who love their fellows Should take a firm stand , and

d n a . Shoul eve fight, if needs must, ag inst those they love Fo r five years we have watched the heroism of this its of fight, pursuing own course amid the warring the ’ n one natio s . We have watched the miracle of man s of one keeping his senses amid the frenzied millions, ’ man s remaining free amid the universal slavery of pub lic opinion . We have watched love at war with hate, war the European at war with the patriots , conscience at THE WARDEN OF TH E INHERITANCE 25 9

with the world . Throughout this long and bloody night, when we were often ready to perish from despair at the n of on n con meaningless ess nature, the e thi g which has soled u s and sustained us has been the recognition that the mighty forces which were able to crush towns and annihilate empires, were powerless against an isolated individual possessed o f the will and the courage to be free . Those who deemed themselves the victors over

n find one millio s , were to that there was thing which they not a could m ster, a free conscience . w Vain , therefore, was their triumph , hen they buried d o f E the crucifie thought urope . True faith works C d o f d miracles . Jean hristophe had burst the bon s eath , hi own had risen again in the living form of s creator . CHAPTER II

FOREARMED

E do not detract from the moral services of n Romai Rolland , but we may perhaps ex

cuse to some extent his opponents , when we insist that Rolland had excelled all contemporary imagi native writers in the profun dity of his preparato ry studies of - war and its problems . If to day, in retrospect, we contemplate his writings , we marvel to note how, from

o f the very first and throughout a long period years , they combined to build up , as it were, a colossal pyramid , culminating in the point upon which the lightnings of

. the au war were to be discharged For twenty years , ’ un thor s thought, his whole creative activity, had been intermittently concentrated upon the contradictions be tween spirit and force, between freedom and the father land , between victory and defeat . Through a hundred variations he had pursued the same fundamental theme, treating it dramatically, epically, and in manifold other ways . There is hardly a problem relevant to this ques C tion which is not touched upon by hristophe and Olivier, d by Aert and by the Giron ists, in their discussions . In ’ tellectuall maneu y regarded , Rolland s writings are a vering ground for all the incentives to war . He thus had 26 0

26 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

hour of the war was Roll and in opposition to other writ

ters and artists of the day . This opposition dated from

the very inception of his career, and hence for twenty n years he had been a solitary . The reason why the co trast between his outlook and that of his generation had

not cl hitherto been conspicuous, the reason why the eav n of age was not disclosed u til the actual outbreak war, ’ not lies in this, that Rolland s divergence was a matter s o of a al much mood as of character . Before the poc yp of tic year, almost all persons artistic temperament had recognized quite as definitely as Rolland had recognized that a fratricidal struggle between Europeans would be xce a crime, would disgrace civilization . With few e p fis s aci t . tions , they were p It would be more correct to s ay that with few exceptions they believed themselves to ifis t a fism ac s . ci be p For p does not Simply mean , to be a n of frie d to peace , but to be a worker in the cause peace ,

f i vom ufs‘ an pn , as the New Testament has it . Pacifism of f signifies the activity an ef ective will to peace, not merely the love of an easy life and a preference fo r re I pose . t signifies struggle ; and like every struggle it

of - sacrifice and demands , in the hour danger, self hero “ ” N ow acifists ism. these p we have just been consider ing had merely a sentimental fondness for peace ; they

were friendly towards peace , just as they were friendly

towards ideas of social equality, towards philanthropy,

towards the abolition of capital punishment . Such faith f as they possessed was a faith devoid o passion . They

wore their opinions as they wore their clothing, and when the time of trial came they were ready to exchange their FOREARMED 26 3

h o f w ar- a pacifist ethic for the et ic the m kers, were ready n a o f n to don a natio al uniform in m tters opinio . At bot tom n d , they k ew the right just as well as Rollan , but ’ n they had not the courage o f their opinio s . Goethe s saying to Eckermann applies to them w ith deadly force . “ All the evils of modern literature are due to lack of n character in individual investigators a d writers . did nd n n Thus Rolland not sta alo e in his k owledge , which was shared by many intellectuals and statesmen . n d re But in his case, all his knowledge was ti ge with ligiou s fervor ; his beliefs were a living faith ; his w thoughts ere actions . He was unique among imagina ive writers for the Splendid vigor with which he remained true to his ideals when all others were deserting the standard ; for the way in which he defended the European spirit against the raging armies of the sometime European n n n i tellectuals now tur ed patriots . Fighti g as he had fought from youth upwards on behalf o f the invisible n d of d d agai st the worl reality, he isplaye , as a foil to

of n l . the heroism the tre ches , a higher heroism stil h n n o f W ile the soldiers were ma ifesti g the heroism blood , d of Rollan manifested the heroism the spirit , and showed of d the glorious spectacle one who was able, ami the

- n intoxication of the war madde ed masses , to maintain the of sobriety and freedom an unclouded mind . CHAPTER III

THE PLACE OF REFUGE

of T the outbreak the war, Romain Rolland was n in Vevey, a small and ancie t city on the lake f o Geneva . With few exceptions he Spent his s m um ers in Switzerland , the country in which some O f his best literary work had been accomplished . In

Switzerland , where the nations join fraternal hands to C E form a state, where Jean hristophe had heralded uro O f pean unity, Rolland received the news the world dis aster . Of a sudden it seemed as if his whole life had become meaningless . Vain had been his exhortations , vain the twenty years o f ardent endeavor . He had feared this disaster since early boyhood . He had made Olivier cry “ O f : s o in torment soul I dread war greatly, I have

for s o . dreaded it long It has been a nightmare to me, ’ ” C N ow and it poisoned my hildhood s days . , what he had prophetically anticipated had become a terrible real of ity for hundreds of millions human beings . The agony of the hour was nowise diminished because he had foreseen its coming to be inevitable . On the contrary, while others hastened to deaden their senses with the Opium of false conceptions of duty and with the hashish ’ of dreams victory, Rolland s pitiless sobriety enabled 26 4

26 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

was knew that it incumbent upon him to defend France , but to do SO in another sense than that Of the combatants “ o f n and that the i tellectuals clamorous with hate . A great nation , he wrote more than a year later, in the “ A u - d ss us de la melee not n preface to e , has o ly its fron tiers to protect ; it must also protect its good sense . It must protect itself from the hallucinations, injustices , and follies which war lets loose . To each his part . To the r f o o . a mies, the protection the soil f their native land To its t the thinkers , the defense of thought . The spiri ’ is by no means the most insignificant part of a people s ” o f r not patrimony . In these opening days mise y, it was yet clear to him whether and how he would be called upon to speak . Yet he knew that if and when he did on o f speak , he would take up his parable behalf intel u lect al freedom and supranational justice .

But justice must have freedom of outlook . Nowhere except in a neutral country could the observer listen to all voices , make acquaintance with all opinions . From such a country alone cou ld be secure a view above the

o f - field smoke the battle , above the mist of falsehood , f above the poison gas o hatred . Here he could retain f ean freedom o judgment and freedom of Speech . In J Christo he a p , he had shown the d ngerous power of mass “ ” “ its in suggestion . Under influence , he had written , every country the firmest intelligences felt their most ” N O o ne cherished convictions melting away . knew bet “ - ervad ter than Rolland the spiritual contagion , the all p ”

o f . n ing insanity, collective thought K owing these

s things o well, he wished all the more to remain free THE PLACE OF REFUGE 26 7

o f to from them , to Shun the intoxication the crowd , avoid the risk of having to foll ow any other leadership than had that of his conscience . He merely to turn to his u w o wn writings . He co ld read there the ords of Olivier “ n the I love France, but I ca not for sake Of France kill n my soul or betray my conscience . This would i deed be to betray my country . How can I hate when I feel no ? ? ” hatred How can I truthfu lly act the comedy o f hate “ a d n ° Or, ag in , he coul read this memorable confessio I

to . will not hate . I will be just even my enemies Amid of all the stresses passion, I wish to keep my vision clear, that I may understand everything and thus be able to ” in inde en love everything . Only in freedom , only p

of aid n . a dence spirit , can the artist his natio Thus lone n can he serve his generation , thus alo e can he serve t L t humani y . oyalty to truth is loyal y to the fatherland . What had befallen through chance was now confirmed u o f by deliberate choice . D ring the five years the war ’ n w nd E Romain Rolland remai ed in S itzerla , urope s “ d h t a heart ; remaine t ere h t he might fulfil his task, de

ce et . dire qui est juste humain Here, where the w n breezes blow freely from all other lands , and he ce a co uld voice pass freely across all the frontiers , here d where no fetters were imposed upon speech , he followe d C n n the call o f his invisible uty . lose at ha d the e dless waves o f blood and hatred emanating from the frenzy o f war were foaming against the frontiers o f the cantonal t u d state . But hrougho t the storm , the magnetic nee le of one intelligence continued to point unerri ngly towards o f — the immutable pole life to point towards love . CHAPTER IV

TH E SERVICE OF MAN

N Rolland ’ s view it was the artist’s duty to serve his atherland f by conscientious service to all mankind , to play his part in the struggle by waging war against the suff ering the war was causing and against r the thousandfold torments entailed by the war . He e “ ect n j ed the idea of absolute aloof ess . An artist has no ” right to hold aloof while he is still able to help others .

But this aid , this participation , must not take the form of fostering the murderous hatred which already animated the millions . The aim must be to unite the millions t nfi further, where unseen ties already existed , in heir i ff nite su ering . He therefore took his part in the ranks

Of the helpers , not weapon in hand , but following the o f example Walt Whitman , who , during the American

Civil War, served as hospital assistant . Hardly had the first blows been struck when cries o f z anguish from all lands began to be heard in Swit erland . of Thousands who were without news fathers , husbands, and sons in the battlefields, stretched despairing arms o f into the void . By hundreds, by thousands, by tens thousands , letters and telegrams poured into the little

House of the Red Cross in Geneva , the only international 26 8

2 70 ROMAIN ROLLAND onciliation the of , to alleviate torment a fraction among the countless sufferers by such consolation as the circum

n . nor occu stances re dered possible He neither desired , d n of C pied , a lea i g position in the work the Red ross ; but so , like many other nameless assistants, he devoted himself to the daily task of promoting the interchange of news . His deeds were inconspicuous , and are therefore all the more memorable . h e W en he was allotted the Nobel p ace prize, he , re own and fused to retain the money for his use, devoted the whole sum vto the mitigation of the miseries of Eu rope , that he might suit the action to the word , the word ! to the action . Ecce homo ! Ecce poeta CHAPTER V

TH E TRIBUNAL OF TH E SPIRIT

0 one had been more perfectly forearmed than The Romain Rolland . closing chapters o f Jean Christophe foretell the coming mass illu n d the sion . Never for a moment had he entertai e vain hope of certain idealists that the fact ( o r semblance) of o f civilization, that the increase human kindliness which of C we owe to two millenniums hristianity, would make n TO O a future war, comparatively huma e . well did he know as historian that in the i nitial outbursts o f war passion the veneer Of civilization and Christianity would be rubbed o ff ; that in all nations alike the naked bestial ity of human beings would be disclosed ; that the smell Of the Shed blood would reduce them all to the level of n wild beasts . He did not co ceal from himself that this strange halitus is able to dull and to confuse even the

n n the . ge tlest, the ki dliest, most intelligent Of souls The n f nd rending asu der o ancient frie ships , the sudden soli d arity among persons most opposed in temperament now eager to abase themselves before the idol of the father

a d d a n O f n n l n , the total is ppeara ce co scie tious convie tion at the first breath of the actualities o f war— in Jean Christophe these things were written no less plainly than 271 272 ROMAIN ROLLAND when o f old the fingers of the hand wrote upon the palace wall in Babylon . t n er ti Never heless , even this prophetic soul had u d es n f mated the cruel reality . During the openi g days o the n war, Rolland was horrified to ote how all previous wars n of in were bei g eclipsed in the atrocity the struggle, its in and material and spiritual brutality , its extent, in the n in te sity of its passion . All possible anticipations had n f . o been outdo e Although for thousands years , by

o f al twos or variously allied , the peoples Europe had most unceasingly been warring one with another, never n before had their mutual hatreds , as ma ifested in word and deed , risen to such a pitch as in this twentieth cen o f tury after the birth Christ . Never before in the his tory o f mankind did hatred extend so widely through the populations ; never did it rage so fiercely among the in tellectuals ; never before was Oil pumped into the flames as it was now pumped from innumerable fountains and O f n of tubes the spirit, from the ca als the newspapers, f n from the retorts o the professors . All evil insti cts n o f were fostered amo g the masses . The whole world a feeling, the whole world of thought, became milit rized . The loathsome organization for the dealing o f death by material weapons w as yet more loathsomely reflected in the organization o f national telegraphic bureaus to scat n sea ter lies like Sparks over la d and . For the first and e no time, science , poetry, art, philosophy becam less subservient to war than mechanical ingenuity was sub servient . In the pulpits and professorial chairs , in the ffi research laboratories, in the editorial o ces and in the

2 74 ROMAIN ROLLAND

of science, Germany, France , and England , who for cen tu ries n coO eratin had bee p g for discoveries , advances, l ideals , cou d combine to form a tribunal of the spirit n which , with scie tific earnestness, Should devote itself to extirpating the falsehoods th at were keepi ng their re s ective d n p peoples apart . Transcen i g nationality, they Fo r could hold intercourse on a higher plane . it was Rolland ’s most cherished hope that the great artists and great investigators would refuse to identify themselves with the crime of the war, would refrain from abandon ing their freedom o f conscience and from entrenching “ ”

or . themselves behind a facile my country, right wrong fo r With few exceptions, intellectuals had centuries recognized the repulsiveness of war . More than a thou C n sand years earlier, when hi a was threatened by ambi Li : tious Mongols, Tai Peh had exclaimed Accursed be war ! Accursed the work of weapons ! The sage has ” nothing to do with these follies . The contention that the sage has naught to do with such follies seems to rise like an unenunciated refrain from all the utterances of western men O f learning Since Europe began to have a L L common life . In atin letters (for atin, the medium o f of intercourse, was likewise the symbol supranational fellowship ) , the great humanists whose respective coun ff tries were at war exchanged their regrets , and O ered mutual philosophical solace against the murderous illu n sio s of their less instructed fellows . Herder was speak ing for the learned Germans of the eighteenth century “ when he wrote : For fatherland to engage in a bloody struggle with fatherland is the most preposterous barbar THE TRIBUNAL OF TH E SPIRIT

ism. Goethe, Byron , Voltaire, and Rousseau , were at one in their contempt for the purposeless butcheries of ’ d w n intellec war . To ay, in Rolland s vie , the leadi g tuals a n u , the gre t scie tific investigators whose minds wo ld perforce remain unclouded , the most humane among the imaginative writers, could join in a fellowship whose members would renounce the errors o f their respective na n tio s . He did not , indeed , venture to hope that there would be a very large number o f persons whose souls

u wo ld remain free from the passions Of the time . But spiritual force is not based upon numbers ; its laws are ’ o f d et a not those armies . In this fiel , Go he s saying is p “E plicable : verything great, and everything most worth n a n d havi g comes from a minority . It c n ot be suppose that reason will ever become popular . Passion and n se timent may be popularized , the reason will always

of . remain a privilege the few This minority, how

h . ever, may acquire authority t rough spiritual force n Above all, it may constitute a bulwark agai st falsehood . and n of If men Of light leadi g, free men all nationalities , were to meet somewhere , in Switzerland perhaps , to make n common cause agai st every injustice, by whomever com mitted , a sanctuary would at length be established , an asylum for truth which was now everywhere bound and E of gagged . urope would have a span soil for home ;

a mankind would have spark Of hope . Holding mutual of one converse , these best men could enlighten another ; and the reciprocal illumination on the part of such un prejudiced persons could not fail to diffuse its light over the world . 2 76 ROMAIN ROLLAND Such was the mood in which Rolland took up his pen for the first time after the outbreak of war . He wrote an open letter to Hauptmann , to the author whom among Germans he chiefly honored for goodness and humane

. o erhaeren ness Within the same hour he wrote t V , ’ n Germany s bitterest foe . Rolla d thus stretched forth ‘ d both his hands , rightward and leftwar , in the hope that n n so he could bri g his two corresponde ts together, that at least within the domain o f pure spirit there might be n a first essay towards spiritual reconciliatio , what time upon the b attlefields the machine - guns with their infernal of clatter were mowing down the sons France, Germany,

- Belgium , Britain , Austria Hungary, and Russia .

2 78 ROMAIN ROLLAND

o f ness your mighty race . I know all that I owe to the n of Old thi kers Germany ; and even now, at this hour, I recall the example and the words of o ur Goethe— for he belongs to the whole o f humanity— repudiating all na tional hatreds and preserving the calmness of his soul ‘ on those heights where we feel the happiness and the o f u r on misfortunes other peoples as o own . He goes with a pathetic self- consciousness fo r the first time notice in able the work of this most modest of writers . Recog n izin g his mission , he lifts his voice above the contro “ l versies of the moment . I have labored all my ife to bring together the minds of our two nations ; and the

o f atrocities Of this impious war in which , to the ruin E uropean civilization , they are involved, will never lead ” t me to soil my spirit wi h hatred .

Now Rolland sounds a more impassioned note . He does not hold Germany responsible for the war . War ” springs from the weakness and stupidity of nations .

He ignores political questions , but protests vehemently of against the destruction Of works art, asking Haupt “ n ou ma n and his countrymen , Are y the grandchildren ” of o r of ? Goethe Attila Proceeding more quietly , he implores Hauptmann to refrain from any attempt to of justify such things . In the name of our Europe, which you have hitherto been one of the most illustrious champions , in the name Of that civilization for which of the the greatest men have striven all down the ages , in

o f th f u name e very honor o yo r Germanic race , Gerhart ou Hauptmann , I adjure y , I challenge you , you and the of intellectuals Germany, among whom I reckon so many CONTROVERSY WITH HAUPTMANN 279

friends , to protest with the utmost energy against this ” o h crime which will t erwise recoil upon yourselves . ’ d the Rollan s hope was that Germans would , like him

of - self, refuse to condone the excesses the war makers , would refuse to accept the war as a fatality . He hoped for n n a public protest from across the Rhi e . Rolla d was no t aware that at this time no one in Germany had

a or could have any inkling of the true political situ tion . He was not aware that such a public protest as he de w as sired quite impossible . ’ Gerhart Hauptmann s answer struck a fiercer note than ’ n a Rolland s letter . I ste d of complying with the French ’ n n ad a ma s plea , i ste Of repudiating the Germ n militarist of u n d eu policy frightf l ess, he attempte , with sinister thu siasm , to justify that policy . Accepting the maxim , “ ” a d d d war is war, he, somewhat prem turely, efen e the “ The n re right of the stronger . weak aturally have o n d d o f c urse to vituperatio . He eclare the report the d u L d a estr ction of ouvain to be false . It was, he sai , matter Of life or death fo r Germany that the German “ ” troops Should eff ect their peacefu l passage through n n o f Belgium . He referred to the pronou ceme ts the n ff d the ge eral sta , and quote , as highest authority for d f “ E o . truth , the wor s the mperor himself Therewith the controversy passed from the Spiritual to d t the political plane . Rollan , embit ered in his turn , d rejected the views of Hauptmann , who was len ing his ’ moral authority to the support of Schlieff en s aggressive “ theories . Hauptmann , declared Rolland , was accept ing responsibility for the crimes o f those who wield 28 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

n authority . Instead of promoti g harmony, the cor respondence was fostering discord . In reality the two d t had no common groun for discussion . The attemp

- d ran was ill time , passion still too high ; the mists of pre n a d vale t f lsehoo still obscured vision on both Sides . d n The waters of the floo continued to rise , the infi ite d deluge of hatre and error . Brethren were as yet un able to recognize one another in the darkness .

28 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

: haeren wrote Sadness and hatred overpower me .

The latter feeling is new in my experience . I cannot of one of rid myself it, although I am those who have always regarded hatred as a base sentiment . Such love

is fo r as I can give in this hour reserved my country, o r rather for the heap of ashes to which Belgium has ’ been reduced . Rolland s answer ran as foll ow s f Rid yourself o hatred . Neither you nor we should L et give way to it . us guard against hatred even more than we guard against ou r enemies ! You will see at a later date that the tragedy is more terrible than peo ple can realize while it is actually being played SO stupendous is this European drama that we have no or right to make human beings responsible f it . It is a convulsion o f nature L et us build an ark as did those who were threatened with the deluge . Thus we can f ” o . save what is left humanity Without acrimony, r Ve haeren rejected this adjuration . He deliberately chose to remain inspired with hatred , little as he liked the Be l i l e d . L a ue s an ant feeling In g q g , he declare that hatred brought a certain solace , although , dedicating his ” his work to the man I once was , he manifested yearn ing for the revival of his former sentiment that the world n d n was a comprehensive whole . Vai ly did Rollan retur “ : to the charge in a touching letter Greatly, indeed ,

f . must you have su fered , to be able to hate But I am confident that in your case such a feeling cannot long endure, for souls like yours would perish in this atmos

here s not p . Justice mu t be done, but it is a demand of justice that a whole people should be held responsible CORRESPONDENCE WITH VERHAEREN 28 3

of u for the crimes a few hundred individ als . Were there one ou but just man in Israel , y would have no right to d s pass ju gment upon all Israel . Surely it i impossible n for you to doubt that many in Germa y and Austria , a n f and oppressed and g gged , co tinue to su fer struggle . Thousan ds o f innocent persons are being every where sacrificed to the crimes of politics ! Napoleon ‘ was not far wrong when he said : Politics are for us ’ what fate was for the ancients . Never was the destiny o f L . et Verhaeren classical days more cruel us refuse, , m L et to make com on cause with this destiny . us take o ur n d d sta d beside the oppresse , beside all the oppresse , ma d n two n wherever they y well . I recognize o ly ations on of t ff earth , that hose who su er, and that Of those who ” n cause the sufferi g .

Verhae ren . , however, was unmoved He answered as “ saw follows If I hate, it is because what I , felt , and d a a now hear , is h teful I admit th t I cannot be just , am that I am filled with sadness and burn w ith anger . I n n not simply sta ding ear the fire, but am actually amid ff n so . ca the flames , that I su er and weep I no other ” wise . He remained loyal to hatred , and indeed loyal ’ - - of d to the hatred for hate Romain Rollan s Olivier . Notwithstanding this grave divergence of view between Verhaeren and on Rolland , the two men continued terms o f friendship and mutual respect . Even in the preface ’ be n L o son s Iftes - vous co tributed to y inflammatory book, neutre devant le crime Verhaeren be , distinguished and tw een the person the cause . He was unable, he said , “ ’ ” not to espouse Rolland s error, but he would repudiate 28 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

his friendship for Rolland . Indeed , he desired to al emphasize its existence, seeing that in France it was “ ” ready dangerous to love Romain Rolland .

In this correspondence, as in that with Hauptmann , two strong passion s seemed to clash ; but the opponents d ou t f o . in reality remaine touch Here, likewise , the appeal was fruitless . Practically the whole world was given over to hatred , including even the noblest creative of artists , and the finest among the sons men .

28 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

of alone in the utterance his celebrated outcry, I can no ” n longer keep Silence . At that time his cou try was at d war . He arose to defen the invisible rights of human

n a a beings , utteri g protest gainst the command that men

u u d Sho ld m r er their brothers . Now his voice was no longer heard ; his place was empty ; the conscience o f n n d d n ma ki d was umb . To Rollan , the co sequent d Silence , the terrible silence of the free Spirit ami the

- of hurly burly the slaves , seemed more hateful than the roar of the cannon . Those to whom he had appealed f r had n u o help refused to a swer the call . The ltimate

of n had no n truth , the truth conscie ce , orga ized fellow N o one ship to sustain it . would aid him in the struggle fo r of E the freedom the uropean soul , the struggle of of u n truth against falsehood , the struggle h ma loving nd kindness against frenzied hate . Rolla once again was n t alone with his faith , more alone than duri g the bit er O f est years solitude . But Rolland has never been one to resign himself to In who loneliness . youth he had already felt that those are passive while wr ong is being done are as criminal as the very wrongdoer Ceux qui subissent le mal sont l ” aussi criminels que ceux qui e font . Upon the poet , n find d fo r above all , it seemed to him i cumbent to wor s not thought, and to vivify the words by action . It is enough to write ornamental comments upon the history ’ r of n of one s time . The poet must be pa t the very bei g o f his time , must fight to make his ideas realize them i of selves n action . The elite the intellect constitutes THE EUROPEAN CONSCIENCE 28 7 an aristocracy which would fain replace the aristocracy of to of birth . But the aristocracy intellect is apt forget a that the aristocr cy of birth won its privileges with blood . For hundreds of years men have listened to the words of d f n wis om , but seldom have they seen a sage o feri g him u self p to the sacrifice . If we would inspire others with faith we must show that ou r o wn faith is real . Mere fi words do not suf ce . Fame is a sword as well as a n laurel crown . Faith imposes obligatio s . One who had made Jean Christophe utter the gospel of a free con science, could not , when the world had fashioned his f n L o . cross, play the part Peter de ying the ord He a a must t ke up his apostolate, be re dy Should need arise to face martyrdom . Thus , while almost all the artists ’ o f d abdi uer the day, in their passion q , in their mad t not desire to shout wi h the crowd , were merely extolling and of force victory as the masters the hour, but were actually maintaining that force was the very meaning of a of civiliz tion , that victory was the vital energy the n world , Rolland stood forth agai st them all, proclaiming “ o the might f the incorruptible conscience . Force is ” to always hateful to me , wrote Rolland Jouve in this “ on decisive hour . If the world cannot get without a force, it still behooves me to refrain from m king terms n one with force . I must uphold an opposi g principle, E u which will invalidate the principle o f force . ach m st play his own part ; each must obey his own inward moni r did n of to . He not fail to recognize the titanic ature n the struggle into which he was e tering, but the words 28 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

he had written in youth still resounded in his memory .

Our first duty is to be great, and to defend greatness ” on earth .

Just as in those earlier days, when he had wished by his means of his dramas to restore faith to nation , when he had set up the images of the heroes as examples to d of f a petty time, when throughout a ecade quiet e fort he had summoned the people towards love and freedom,

SO n . now, Rolla d set to work alone He had no party, no newspaper, no influence . He had nothing but his pas sionate enthusiasm , and that indomitable courage to which the forlorn hope makes an irresistible appeal . Alone he began his onslaught upon the illusions of the E n n multitude , when the uropean conscie ce, hu ted with and scorn hatred from all countries and all hearts , had taken sanctuary in his heart .

290 ROMAIN ROLLAND

fully considered and fully elaborated . Addressed to the widest possible public, but Simultaneously hampered by consideration for the censorship (seeing that to Rol land it was all important that the articles published in “ ” the Journal de Geneve should be reproduced in the

French press) , the ideas had to be presented with meticulous care and yet at the same time to be hastily produced . We find in these writings marvelous and

- f ever memorable cries of su fering, sublime passages of f indignation and appeal . But they are a discharge o n so passio , that their stylistic merits vary much . Often , too , they relate to casual incidents . Their essential n value lies in their ethical beari g, and here they are of ’ incomparable merit . In relation to Rolland s previous work we find that they display, as it were, a new rhythm . They are characterized by the emotion of one who is of aware that he is addressing an audience many millions . The author was no longer speaking as an isolated indi vidual . For the first time he felt himself to be the o public advocate f the invisible Europe . i O f W ll those a later generation , to whom the essays have been made available in the volumes A u - des s us de

‘ la melee L es récurseurs and p , be able to understand what they signified to the contemporary world at the ? time of their publication in the newspapers The mag nitu de of a force cannot be measured without taking the resistance into account ; the significance of an action cannot be un derstood without reckoning up the sacrifices it has entailed . To understand the ethical import, the of heroic character, these manifestoes , we must recall to TH E MANIFESTOES 29 1

n mind the frenzy of the ope ing year of the war, the Spirit E n ual infection which was devastating urope, tur ing the whole continent into a madhouse . It has already become difficu lt to realize the mental state Of those days . We have to remember that maxims which now seem com mon lace n p , as for instance the conte tion that we must not hold all the individuals of a nation responsible for

“ o f n n the outbreak a war, were the positively crimi al , ff that to utter them was a punishable O ense . We must

A u - dess us de la mélée n al remember that , whose tre d d u s f rea y seems to a matter of course , was o ficially d n d u d and e ounce , that its a thor was ostracise , that for a considerable period the circul ation of the essays was dd u at forbi en in France, while numero s pamphlets n tacki g them secured wide circulation . In connec tion with these articles we must always evoke the atmos heric n O f p environme t, must remember the Silence

d - their appeal ami a vasty spiritual silence . To day, readers are apt to think that Rolland merely uttered self ’ n r t so c n evide t t u hs , that we recall S hope hauer s mem “ o rable : saying On earth , truth is allotted no more than tw one of a brief triumph be een two long epochs , in which it is scouted as paradoxical , while in the other it is ” - . for despised as commonplace To day, the moment at any rate, we may have entered into a period , when many ’ Of Rolland s utterances are accounted commonplace be n cause, since he wrote, they have become the small cha ge o f n of n thousa ds other writers . Yet there was a day whe

a - e ch of these words seemed to cut like a whip lash . The excitement they aroused gives us the historic measure 292 ROMAIN ROLLAND

o f the need that they should be spoken . The wrath of ’ of Rolland s opponents , which the only remaining record of of is a pile pamphlets , bears witness to the heroism “ ” him who was the fir st to take his stand above the battle . “ L et u S not forget that it was then the crime of crimes, de ” ce st et n dire qui e juste humai . Men were still so drunken with the fumes of the first bloodshed that they d would have been fain , as Rolland himself has phrase it, “ to crucify Christ once again sho u ld he have risen ; to

L one . crucify him for saying, ove another

294 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Those years o f skepticism and gay frivolity in which we in France grew up are avenged in you Conquerors ! ” or conquered , quick or dead , rejoice But after this ode t to the fai hful, to those who believe themselves to

n a be dischargi g their highest duty, Roll nd turns to con

a ostro sider the intellectual leaders of the nations, and p “ hises : n p them thus For what are you squanderi g them , e of these living riches , th se treasures heroism entrusted ? to you r hands What ideal have you held up to the devotion of these youths s o eager to sacrifice themselves? Mutual slaughter ! A European war ! ” He accuses the leaders of taking cowardly refuge behind an idol they term fate . Those who understood their responsibilities s o to ill that they failed prevent the war, inflame and poison it now that it has begun . A terrible picture . In all countries, everything becomes involved in the torrent ; among all peoples , there is the same ecstasy for that “ Fo r which is destroying them . it is not racial passion alone which is hurling millions of men blindly one of against another All the forces of the Spirit, rea son of of , faith, poetry, and of science , all have placed h themselves at the disposal of t e armies in every state . There is not one among the leaders of thought in each country who does not proclaim that the cause of his o f of people is the cause of God , the cause liberty and ” human progress . He mockingly alludes to the pre posterous duels between philosophers and men of sci ence ; and to the failure of what professed to be the two l f C great intem ationa ist forces o the age , hristianity and “ socialism , to stand aloof from the fray . It would seem , R main o Rolland at the time of writing A bove the Battle

29 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

a n city ever igner and stronger, that it may ominate the th d injustice and e hatre of the nations . Then Shall we have a refuge wherein the brotherly and free spirits from ” out all the world may assemble . This faith in a lofty

a s ea- f ideal soars like mew over the ocean O blood . Rolland is well aware how little hope there is that his words can make themselves audible above the clamor of “ I n thirty million warriors . . k ow that such thoughts

- not have little chance of being heard to day . I do speak to convince . I speak only to solace my conscience . And I know that at the same time I Shall solace the hearts of o f thousands others who, in all lands , cannot and dare ” on not speak for themselves . As ever, he is the side f o o o n f . the weak, the side the minority His voice n is grows stro ger, for he knows that he speaking for the silent multitude . CHAPTER XI

TH E CAMPAIGN AGAINST HATRED

HE essay A u - des s us de la melee was the first ’ stroke o f the woodman s axe in the overgrown o f n a n n forest hatred ; thereupo , a ro ri g echo thu d a u an in dere from all Sides , reverber ting rel ct tly the a d a d an u . d n nu newsp pers Un ism ye , Roll resol tely co ti ed

a n n his work . He wished to cut a cle ri g i to which a few sunbeams of reason might shine through the gloomy and n n a suffocati g atmosphere . His ext ess ys aimed at n an E illumi ating open space of such a character . spe ciall n Inter A rma Caritas 3 0 y otable were (October , 19 14 L es ido les 4 1 9 14 N otr rochain ) (December , ) e p ’ l ennemi 1 5 L e meutre des élit s n (March , e (Ju e 14 a , These were ttempts to give a voice to the “ L et ! n silent . us help the victims It is true that we ca In w not do very much . the everlasting struggle bet een

and a . good evil , the bal nce is unequal We require a

fo n of century r the upbuildi g that which a day destroys . n da Nevertheless , the frenzy lasts no more tha a y, and a n n ur d d the patient l bor of reco structio is o aily brea . This work goes on even during an hour when the world ” is perishing around us .

The poet had at length come to understand his task . 297 298 ROMAIN ROLLAND

It is useless to attack the war directly . Reason can ef t n n b feet no hi g agai st the elemental forces . But e re gards it as his predestined duty to combat throughout the war everything that the passions of men lead them to

of a undertake for the deliberate increase horror, to comb t of the spiritual poison the war . The most atrocious

o f one n feature the present struggle , which disti guishes

n n it from all previous wars , is this deliberate poiso i g . That which in earlier days was accepted with simple resignation as a disastrous visitation like the plague, was “ n now prese ted in a heroic light, as a Sign of the gran f ” f o the . o of o deur age An ethic force, an ethic destru n f tion , was bei g preached . The mass struggle o the na tions was being pu rposely inflamed to become the mass

. not hatred Of individuals Rolland , therefore , was , as many have supposed , attacking the war ; he was attack of a ing the ideology the war, the artificial idoliz tion of A S brutality . far as the individual was concerned , he attacked the readiness to accept a collective morality constructed solely for the duration of the war ; he at tacked the surrender of conscience in face of the pre vailing universalization of falsehood ; he attacked the suspension o f inner freedom which was advocated until the war Should be over .

His words, therefore, are not directed against the

not . a masses , against the peoples These know not wh t they do ; they are deceived ; they are dumb driven cattle .

The diffusion Of lying has made it easy for them to hate . “ ' ” Il est Si commode de hair sans comprendre . The of fault lies with the inciters , with the manufacturers lies,

3 00 ROMAIN ROLLAN D

driven millions to death , sacrificing their fellows to the ” have phantoms which they, the intellectuals, created . n The persons to whom blame attaches are those who k ow, o r w who might have kno n ; but who , from Sloth , coward or ice, weakness , from desire for fame or for some other

ad an a personal v tage , h ve given themselves over to lying . The hatred brea thed by the intellectuals w as a false n hood . Had it been a truth , had it been a ge uine pas w sion , those who were inspired with this feeling ould have ceased talking and would themselves have taken up arms . Most people are moved either by hatred or by

not . n love, by abstract ideas For this reaso , the attempt to s ow dissension among millions o f unknown individ “ ” u als the a , attempt to perpetuate hatred , was crime n n against the spirit rather tha agai st the flesh . It was a

a ud d and d deliber te falsification to incl e lea ers led , rivers in n and driven , a Si gle category ; to generalize Germany

n one as an i tegral Object for hatred . We must join fel lowshi o r O f tru thtellers o r of p the other, that the that the n or o f men liars , that of the men of conscie ce that the e hri o he n o r o f . u an C st phrase J st as in J p , Rolla d , in n had der to Show forth the u iversally human fellowship , be distinguished between the true France and the false, tween the old Germany and the new ; SO now in wartime did he draw attention to the ominous resemblance be n tween the war fa atics in both camps, and to the heroic isolation o f those who were above the battle in all the n did belligere t lands . Thus he endeavor to fulfill Tol ’ sto i a n of a s dictum , th t it is the functio the im ginative writer to strengthen the ties that bind men together. In THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST HATRED 3 01

’ ” d Liluli r u enchai nés Rolland s come y , the ce vea x ,

d in u n u n da the dresse vario s natio al iforms , nce same

nd - d n nd a O f a I ian war a ce u er the l sh P triotism , the

a - d a an negro sl ve river . There is terrible resembl ce be

w and o f n t een the German professors those the Sorbo ne . All o f them turn the same logical somersaults ; all join a in the same chorus of h te . But the fellowship to which Rolland w ishes to draw

ou r a n w a . a tte tion , is the fello ship of sol ce It is true th t the hum anizing forces are not s o well organized as the d d . n n a w a forces of estruction Free opi io is g gge , here s

a a n f lsehood bellows through the meg pho es Of the press .

u w a n u a fo r Truth has to be so ght out ith p i f l l bor, the

a a n d ru . h st te m kes it its busi ess to hi e t th Nevert eless, those who search perseveri ngly can discover tru th among In a n and n . a Ro l all n tio s amo g all races these ess ys , n an a wn n la d gives m y ex mples , dra equally from Fre ch and u w n n in from German so rces , Sho i g that eve the

n na a in n u and tre ches , y, th t especially the tre ches , tho s s n u an an a d w n upo tho s ds are im te ith brotherly feeli gs .

u an d d d He p blishes letters from Germ sol iers , Si e by si e n d d in m with letters from Fre ch sol iers, all couche the sa e f u nd n f phraseology o h man frie li ess . He tells o the ’ n n n fo r n n and w wome s orga izatio s helpi g the e emy, Sho s that amid the cru elty of arms the same lovingkindness is displayed on both sides . He publishes poems from w x a n n n either camp , poems hich e h le a commo se time t . Just as in his Vie des ho mmes illus tres he had w ished to

u ff o f d not a n Show the s erers the worl that they were lo e ,

ut b that the greatest minds Of all epochs were with them , 3 02 ROMAIN ROLLAND s o now does he attempt to convince those who amid the ’ general madness are apt to regard themselves as out casts because they do not share the fire and fury of the w and ne spapers the professors, that they have everywhere

. of ld silent brothers of the spirit Once more, as o , he of wishes to unite the invisible community the free . I feel the same jo y when I find the fragile and valiant flow ers o f human pity piercing the icy crust of hatred that E covers urope, as we feel in these chilly March days s ee when we the first flowers appear above the soil . They Show that the warmth of life persists below the sur ” a n f ce, and that soo nothing will prevent its rising again . “ n d n n on e e U dismaye he co ti ues his humble p l rinage , “ n endeavori g to discover, beneath the ruins , the hearts of those who have remained faithful to the old ideal o f t human bro herhood . What a melancholy joy it is to ” For o f for come to their aid . the sake this consolation , the sake of this hope, he gives a new significance even to has war, which he hated and dreaded from early child “ w ar owe one hood . To we painful benefit, in that it has served to bring together those of all nations who refuse to Share the prevailing sentiments of national hatred . It has steeled their energies , has inspired them with an indefatigable will . How mistaken are those who imagine that the ideas of human brotherhood have been stifled Not for a moment do I doubt the coming unity of the European fellowship . That unity will be realized . The war is but its baptism of blood . en Thus does the good Samaritan , the healer of souls, deavor to bring to the despairing that hope which is the

CHAPTER XII

OPPO NENTS

ROM the first Rolland knew perfectly well that

u in a time when party feeling r ns high , no task can be more ungrateful than that o f o ne who “ advocates impartiality The comb atants are tod ay

one n d fo r united in thing o ly, in their hatre those who n n n o refuse to joi in a y hym f hate . Whoever does n ot A n d . d wada Share the common elirium , is suspect no ys, when justice cannot spare the time for thorough investiga

n r n to a . tio , eve y suspect is considered tantamou t a tr itor nd a a d nd a on a He who u ert kes in w rtime to efe pe ce e rth , n must realize that he is staki g his faith , his name , his

n and n . tra quillity, his repute , even his frie dships But O f what valu e would be a conviction on behalf o f which ? ” a man would take no risks Rolland w as likewise aware that the most dangerous of all positions is that be

n the bu t n an w as twee fronts , this certai ty Of d ger but “ d u n . a to ic to his conscience If it be really nee f l, as

w ar in o f the proverb assures us , to prepare for time

no peace, it is less needful to prepare for peace in time In a n d w ar. Of my view, the l tter role is assig e to those and n a who stand outside the struggle , whose me t l life has brought them into unusu ally close contact with the

- f the o f world all . I Speak o members that little lay 3 04 OPPONENTS 3 05

of church , those who have been exceptionally well able n to mai tain their faith in the unity of human thought, of n of the those for whom all men are so s same father. If it shoul d chance that we are reviled for holding this tru conviction , the reviling is in th an honor to us, and we may be satisfied to know that we shall earn the ap ” probation o f posterity . It is plai n that Rolland is forearmed against opposi fierceness o f tion . Nevertheless , the the onslaughts ex de d a n of the cee all expect tion . The first rumbli gs storm

L e er r came from Germany . The passage in the tt to Ge “ art H au tmann n of of h p , are you the so s Goethe or ” a n d and . Attila , Simil r uttera ces, arouse angry echoes A dozen or s o professors and scribblers hastened to “ ” “ of ie chastise French arrogance . In the columns D ” Deutsche R undschau - n an erman dis , a narrow mi ded p g closed the great secret that under the mask Of neutrality Jean Christophe had been a most dangerous French at m tack upon the Ger an spirit . French champions were no less eager to enter the lists as soon as the publication of the essay A u - dess us de la ffi melee was reported . Di cult as it seems to realize the

- da n fact to y, the Fre ch newspapers were forbidden to n n n n repri t this manifesto , but fragme ts became k ow to the public in the attacks wherein Rolland was pilloried n a and as an a tip triot . Professors at the Sorbonne his to rians of renown did not Shrink from leveling such ao

u ations a d . c s . Soon the camp ign was systematize

a w d and Newsp per articles were follo e by pamphlets, ultimately by a large volume from the pen o f a carpet 3 06 ROMAIN ROLLAND

hero . This book was furnished with a thousand proofs, with photographs, and quotations ; it was a complet dos sier, avowedly intended to supply materials for a prose

cution . a of a n There was no l ck the b sest calum ies . It was asserted that since the beginning of the war Rolland “ ” had joined the German s ociety Neues Vaterland ; that he was a contributor to German newspapers ; that his a American publisher w s a German agent . In one pam phlet he was accused Of deliberately falsifying dates . Yet more incriminatory charges could be read between o f the lines . With the exception of a few newspapers advanced tendencies and comparatively small circula o f n n tion , the whole the Fre ch press combi ed to boycott

N ot one o f t Rolland . the Parisian journals ven ured to publish a reply to the charges . A professor triumph “ antly announced : Cet auteur ne se lit plus en ” in France . His former associates withdrew alarm

O ne o f from the tainted member o f the flock . his Old “ ” de e est friends , the ami la premi re heure, to whom

Rolland had dedicated an earlier work , deserted at this

u and o f decisive ho r, canceled the publication a book n u pon Rolla d which was already in type . The French n government likewise began to watch Rolla d closely, “ ” dispatching agents to collect materials . A number “ ” o f defeatist trails were obviously aimed in part at n Rolla d , whose essay was publicly stigmatized as “ ” L Mornet of abominable by ieutenant , the tiger these hi n . o s prosecutio s Nothing but the authority f name, of the inviolability his public life, and the fact that he was a lonely fighter (this making it impossible to show

3 08 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Rolland ’s second crime was that he desired to be just to all mankind , that he continued to regard the enemy as n d w human beings , that amo g them he distinguishe bet een

and not a u guilty guilty, th t he had as m ch compassion f fo r did for German su ferers as French , that he not hesi n d tate to refer to the Germa s as brothers . The ogma of patriotism prescribed that for the duration of the war the

n o f u feeli gs humanitarianism should be stifled . J s on to tice Should be put away the top shelf, keep com pany there, until victory had been secured , with the not O ne of divine command , Thou shalt kill . the pam “ hlets p against Rolland bears as its motto , Pendant une ’ ’ ’ ce de l humanité guerre tout qu on donne l amour a , on ” le vole a la patrie — though it must be observed that ’ of from the outlook those who share Rolland s views, the order o f the terms might well be inverted . ff um The third crime, the o ense which seemed most one pardonable Of all, and the most dangerous to the r state, was that Rolland refused to regard a milita y of tory as likely to furnish the elixir morality, to pro

n . mote spiritual rege eration , to bring justice upon earth ’ Rolland s Sin lay in holding that a j u st and bloodless of peace, a complete reconciliation , a fraternal union E l n the uropean nations, wou d be more fruitful of blessi g n than an enforced peace , which could o ly sow the ’ dragon s teeth of hatred and of new wars . In France at this date, those who wished to fight the war to a finish,

the had to fight until enemy been utterly crushed , coined the term “defeatist” for those who desired peace to be based upon a reasonable understanding . Thus was OPPONENTS 3 09

of paralleled the German terminology, which spoke “ ” “ ” Flaumachern (slackers) and of Schmachfriede a had d (shameful pe ce) . Rolland , who devote the whole of his life to the elucid ation of moral laws higher n than those of force, was stigmatized as o e who would “ ’ l initiateur du poison the morale Of the armies, as ” dé To d faitisme . the militarists, he seeme to be the “ ” of d Renanism last representative ying , to be the cen for en ter of a moral power, and this reason they deavored a a d to represent his ide s as nonsensic l , to epict n d him as a Fre chman who desired the efeat of France . “ Yet his words stood unchallenged : I wish France to

a not be loved . I wish Fr nce to be victorious, through force ; not solely through right (even that would be too harsh) but through the superiority of a great heart . I wish that France were strong enough to fight without hatred ; strong enough to regard even those whom she

as h n must strike down , her brot ers , as erri g brothers , to whom she must extend her fu llest sympathy as soon as ” n She has put it beyo d their power to injure her . Rol land made no attempt to answer even the most calumni u the n n Ous of attacks . He q ietly let i vectives pass, k ow ing that the thought which he felt himself commissioned

n i and . to annou ce, was nviolable imperishable Never had he fought men , but only ideas . The hostile ideas , in this case, had long since been answered by the figures o f a n n his own cre tio . They had been a swered by Oli a vier, the free Frenchman who h ted hatred ; by Faber, the Girondist, to whom conscience stood higher than the Lux who arguments of the patriots ; by Adam , compas 3 10 ROMAIN ROLLAND

“ ’ s ionatel y asked his fanatical opponent, N es tu pas ” é Teulier and fatigu de ta haine ; by , by all the great characters through whom during more than two decades he had been giving expression to his outlook Upon the o f struggle the day . He was unperturbed at standing alone against almost the entire nation . He recalled ’ “ Chamfort s n saying, There are times when public opi ion ” of immeasu r is the worst all possible opinions . The

of con able wrath , the hysterical frenzy his opponents,

firmed his conviction that he was right, for he felt that their clamor for force betrayed their sense of the weak ness of their own arguments . Smilingly he contem plated their artificially inflamed anger, addressing them “ in the words of his own Clerambault : You say that yours is the better way ? The only good way ? Very

own . well, take your path , and leave me to take mine

I make no attempt to compel you to follow me . I merely show you which way I am going . What are you ? so excited about Perhaps at the bottom of your hearts ” you are afraid that my way is the right one ?

3 12 ROMAIN ROLLAN D ultimately to be dispersed in the morass of oblivion) ; his friends crystall ized slowly and secretly around his ideas , but they were steadfast . His enemies were a regiment advancing fiercely to the attack at the word of command ; his friends were a fellowship , working tran n quilly, and united o ly through love .

The friends in Paris had the hardest task . It was m barely possible for them to co municate with him. of t o f openly . Half their letters o him and half his

on n replies were lost the fro tier . As from a beleaguered fortress , they hailed the liberator, the man who was freely proclaiming to the world the ideals which they d were forbi den to utter . Their only possible way Of

n an defe ding their ideas was to defend the m . In Rol ’ d own nd ede n Fe m and lan s fatherla , Am e Du ois, Des

e Pioch Renaitou r Rou anet pr s , Georges , , , Jacques Mes Thiess on e e nil , Gaston , Marcel Martinet, and S v rine, d a n u n n boldly champione him gai st cal m y . A valia t Ca nd woman , Marcelle py, raised the sta ard , naming

‘ i an mele her book Une vo x de femme d s la e . Separ

d - s ea ated from him by the bloo stained , they looked to a wards him as towards distant lighthouse upon the rock, of and Showed their brothers the Signal hope . In Geneva there formed round him a group of young writers, disciples and friends , winning strength from Vo us etes des his strength . P . J . Jouve author of hommes D an s morts and e des , glowing with anger and o f ff with love goodness, su ering intensely at witnessing of the injustice the world , Olivier redivivus , gave expres é s sion in his poems to his hatred for force . Ren Arco , FRIENDS 3 13 who like Jouve had realized all the horror of war and who hated war no less intensely, had a clearer compre hension of d the ramatic moment, was more thoughtful d u . than Jouve , but eq ally simple and kindhearte Arcos extolled the European ideal ; Charles Baudouin the ideal Maser el n of . e eternal goodness Franz , the Belgia ar tist d of , develope his humanist plaint in a series mag nificent woodcuts . Guilbeaux, zealot for the social rev olution au , ever ready to fight like a gamecock against “ ” thorit y, founded his monthly review demain , which was a faithfu l representative of the European spirit for n d of for a time, u til it succumbe because its passion u C d the R ssian revolution . harles Baudouin foun ed the “ ” n L e C of mo thly review, armel , providing a city refuge E a for the persecuted uropean spirit, and a pl tform upon which the poets and imaginative writers of all l ands nd a could assemble u er the b nner of humanity . Jean “ ” D ebrit in L a Feuille combated the partisanship of the L n a C ati Swiss press and att cked the war . laude de “ ” Ma net n L es g fou ded Tablettes , which , through the boldness of its contributors and through the drawings o f

Masereel , became the most vigorous periodical in Swit zerlan of n d . A little oasis indepe dence came into ex istence , and hither the breezes from all quarters wafted greetings from the distance . Here alone was it pos sible to breathe a European air . of The most remarkable feature this circle was that, thanks to Rolland , enemy brethren were not excluded from spiritual fellowship . Whereas everywhere else people were infected with the hysteria Of mass hatred 3 14 ROMAIN ROLLAND or were terrified lest they should expose themselves to suspicion , and therefore avoided their sometime inti mates o f enemy countries like the pestilence should they of chance to meet them in the streets some neutral city, at a time when relatives were afraid to exchange letters of enquiry regarding the life o r death of those o f their own d bloo , Rolland would not for a moment deny his

e . had be G rman friends Never, indeed , shown more

an love to those among them who remained faithful , at epoch when to love them was dangerous . He made himself known to them in public , and wrote to them freely . His words concerning these friendships will “ : m d never be forgotten Yes , I have Ger an frien s ; just En as I have French , glish , and Italian friends ; just as I have friends among the members of every race . They O f and are my wealth , which I am proud , which I seek s o a en to preserve . If a man has been fortun te as to counter loyal souls , persons with whom he can share his most intimate thoughts, persons with whom he is con nected by brotherly ties, these ties are sacred , and the hour of trial is the last of hours in which they should be rent asunder . How cowardly would be the refusal to recognize these friends, in deference to the impudent demand of a public opinion which has no rights over our n feelings . How painful , how tragical , these frie d e ships are at such a moment, the l tters will Show when is they are published . But it precisely by means of such friendships that we can defend ourselves against for hatred , more murderous than war, it poisons the

3 16 ROMAIN ROLLAND

This little troop was all that then constituted Europe . of Our unity, a grain dust in the storm which was rag o f ing through the world , was perhaps the seed the coming fraternity . How strong, how happy, how grate F r w n . o ful did we Ofte feel ithout Rolland , without n his d the ge ius of frien ship , without the connecting link d at constituted by his disposition , we shoul never have f tained to freedom and security . Each o us loved him ff of in a di erent way, and all us regarded him with

. F equal veneration To the rench , he was the purest spiritual expression of their homeland ; to us , he was the wonderful counterpart of the best in our own world . In this circle that formed round Rolland there was the Sense of fellowship which has always characterized a be religious community in the making . The hostility

u r n o f tween o respective natio s , and the consciousness

ou r exa era danger, fired friendship to the pitch Of gg tion ; while the example Of the bravest and freest man

out a . we had ever known , brought all th t was best in us

n When we were ear him , we felt ourselves to be in the Wh heart of true Europe . oever was able to know Rol ’ in n land s inmost essence , acquired , as the ancie t saga , new energy for the wrestle with brute force . CHAPTER XIV

THE LETTERS

LL that Rolland gave in those days to his friends and E n collaborators of the uropea fellowship , d a all that he gave by his imme i te proximity, a nd was but a p rt of his n ature . For beyo these per d ff u n d n and in sonal limits, he i sed a co soli ati g helpful flu nc e e . u n Whoever t rned to him with a questio , an

o r n d an . anxiety, a distress , a suggestio , receive answer In hundreds upon hundreds Of letters he spread the mes O f d sage brotherhood , splen idly fulfilling the vow he had ad a t o f a m e quar er a century e rlier, at the time ’ n ha n whe Tolstoi s letter d brought him spiritual heali g . ’ In had n a Rolland s self there come to life, not o ly Je n C L eo hristophe the believer, but likewise Tolstoi , the

a gre t consoler . n u Unk own to the world , he shouldered a stupendo s d n For bur e during the five years of the war . whoever found himself in revolt against the time and in con

n a o f d fliet with the prevaili g mi sma falsehoo , whoever d d neede counsel in a matter of conscience , whoever wante

n w fo r . aid , k ew here he could turn what he sought Who ? else in Europe inspired such confidence The unknown of C i friends Jean hr stophe , the nameless brothers of 3 17 3 18 ROMAIN ROLLAND

out- o f- - Olivier, hidden in the way parts, knowing no one to whom they could whisper their doubts— in whom could they better confide than in this man who had first brought

d of dn ? sub them ti ings goo ess They sent him requests , mitted d proposals , isclosed the turmoil of their con sciences . Soldiers wrote to him from the trenches ; mothers penned letters to him in secret . Many of the n n writers did not ve ture to give their ames , merely wish ing to send a message of sympathy and to in scribe them “ ” selves citizens of that invisible republic o f free souls which the author of Jean Christophe had founded amid n the n n the warring nations . Rolla d accepted i fi ite labor o f being the centralizing point and administrator of all o f these distresses and plaints , of being the recipient all n of of these co fessions, being the consoler a world di vi ded against itself . Wherever there was a stirring of E o f n uropean , u iversally human sentiment, Rolland did his best to receive and sustain it ; he was the crossways towards which all these roads converged . At the same time he was continuously in commun ication with leading f of representatives o the European faith, with those all lands who had remained loyal to the free Spirit . He studied the periodicals Of the day for messages of rec n ili ion o r o c at . Wherever a man a work was devoted l ’ to the reconsolidation of Europe, Ro land s help was ready . These hundreds and thousands of letters combine to form an ethical achievement such as has not been paral leled by any previous writer . They brought happiness to countless solitary souls , strength to the wavering, hope

CHAPTER XV

TH E COUNSELOR

n URING these years , many people, you g for the n most part , came to Rolla d for advice in mat f t o . ers conscience They asked whether, see in g that their convictions were opposed to war, they ought to refuse military service, in accordance with the teaching of Tolstoi , and following the example Of the conscientious objectors ; or whether they should obey

e . the biblical pr cept, Resist not evil They enquired whether they should take an Open stand again st the in

n o r justices committed by their cou try, whether they should endure in Silence . Others besought spiritual wh counsel in their troubles of conscience . All o came seemed to imagine that they were coming to one who n n n u possessed a maxim , a fixed pri ciple concerni g co d ct in - n relation to the war, a wonder worki g moral elixir which he could dispense in suitable doses . To all these enquiries Rollan d returned the same an

n out own swer : Follow your co science . Seek your

- truth and realize it . There is no ready made truth , no

u one n an rigid form la , which person can ha d over to E other . ach must create truth for himself, according of to his own model . There is no other rule moral con 3 20 THE COUNSELOR 3 21 duct than that a man should seek his own light and n Should be guided by it even agai st the world . He n and n n who lays dow his arms accepts impriso me t , does the n rightly when he follows in er light , and is not prompted by vanity or by simple imitativeness . He no n n likewise is right, who takes up arms with i te tion u se to them in earnest , who thus cheats the state that he may propagate his ideal and save his inner freedom provided always he acts in accordance with his own ” d one a nature . Rolland eclared that the essenti l was

a that a man should believe in his own f ith . He ap of n for n proved the patriot desirous dyi g his cou try, and be approved the anarchist who claimed freedom n from all governme tal authority . There was no other ’ maxim than that o f faith in one s own faith . The only man who did wrong, the only man who acted falsely, was he who allowed himself to be swept away by an ’ other s ideals, he who , influenced by the intoxication of w n i the cro d , performed actio s which confl cted with his L own nature . A typical instance was that of udwig

d o f - n Frank , the socialist , the a vocate a Franco Germa n n n u dersta di g, who , deciding to serve his party instead o f n wn d a servi g his o i eal , volunteered at the outbre k of and of for the war, died for the ideals his opponent, the

a o f ide ls militarism . ’ one Rolland s answer There is but truth , such was to n all . The o ly truth is that which a man finds within himself and recognizes as his very own . Any other

- - would be truth is self deception . What appears to be “ egoism, serves humanity . He who would be useful to 3 22 ROMAIN ROLLAND

others , must above all remain free . Even love avails n one for othing, if the who loves be a slave . Death the fatherland is worthless unless he who sacrifices himself believes in his fatherland as in a god . To evade mili tary service is cowardice in one who lacks courage to s ans atri proclaim himself a p e . There are no true ideas other than those which spring from inner experience ; there are no d eeds worth doing other than those which of are the outcome fully responsible reflection . He who would serve mankind , must not blindly obey the argu ments of a stranger . We cannot regard as a moral act anything which is done simply through imitativeness, or ’ c o f or in consequen e another s persuasion , (as almost universally under modern war stresses) through the sug “ ’ e i e f g st v influence o mass illusion . A man s first duty to he f of is himsel , to remain himself, at the cost self ” sacrifice . n not e ffi Rolla d did fail to r cognize the di culty, the ’ o f E n : rarity, such free acts . He recalled merson s sayi g “ n Nothi g is more rare in any man , than an act of his ” o n w . But was not the unfree, untrue thinking Of the of e masses , the inertia the mass conscienc , the prime ? cause of ou r present troubles Would the war between European brethren have ever broken out if every towns t man , every countryman , every artist, had looked wi hin to enquire whether the mines of Morocco and the swamps ? of Albania were truly precious to him Would there have been a war if every one had asked himself whether he really hated his brothers across the frontier as ve hemently as the newsp ape rs and the professional poli

CHAPTER XVI

TH E SOLITARY

OLLAND’S life was now in touch with the life of the whole world . It radiated influence in

all directions . Yet how lonely was this man of during the five years voluntary exile . He dwelt G apart at Villeneuve by the lake of eneva . His little room resembled that in which he had lived in Paris . of Here, too , were piles books and pamphlets ; here was of a plain deal table ; here was a piano , the companion

of . his hours relaxation His days , and often his nights were spent at work . He seldom went for a walk, and fo r ff rarely received a visitor, his friends were cut o

11 18 i from him , and even his parents and S ster could only n get across the fro tier about once a year. But the worst feature o f this loneliness was that it was loneli ness in a glass house . He was continually spied upon his least words were listened for by eavesdroppers ; pro s vocative agents ought him out, proclaiming themselves revolutionists and sympathizers . Every letter was read before it reached him ; every word he spoke over the telephone was recorded ; every interview was kept under

i n - Obsrv at o . Romain Rolland in his glass prison house was the captive of unseen powers . 3 24 ’ Rolland s Mother

3 26 ROMAIN ROLLAND

than that he was no whit embittered by his experience,

and that the ordeal has served but to strengthen his faith . Fo r thi s utter solitude among men was a true fellowship a with m nkind . CHAPTER XVII

TH E DIARY

E was one H RE , however, companion with whom Rolland could hold converse daily— his inner da consciousness . Day by y, from the outbreak of d n n his the war, Rolland recorde his se time ts, secret d c . thoughts, and the messages he re eive from afar His very silence was an impassion ed conversation with the t time Spirit . During hese years , volume was added to end o f volume, until by the the war, they totaled no less

- than tw enty seven . When he was able to return to b e t France, naturally hesitated to take his confidential document to a land where the cen sors would have a legal right to study every detail of his private thoughts . He has n shown a page here and there to i timate friends, but for the whole remains as a legacy to posterity, those who will be able to contemplate the tragedy of ou r days with purer and more dispassionate views . It is impossible for us to do more than surmise the of our n real nature this document, but feeli gs suggest o f to us that it must be a Spiritual history the epoch , and f ’ one o incomparable value . Rolland s best and freest in thoughts come to him when he is writing . His most spired moments are those when he is most personal . 3 27 3 28 ROMAIN ROLLAND

C onsequently, just as the letters taken in their entirety may be regarded as artistically superior to the pub lished SO essays, beyond question his diary must be a human document supplying a most admirable and pure minded commentary upon the war . Only to the chil dren of a later day will it become plain that what Rol land so ably showed in the case of Bee thoven and the other heroes , applies with equal force to himself . They will learn at what a cost of personal disillusionment his message o f hope and confidence was delivered to the world ; they will learn that an idealism which brought help to thousands, and which wiseacres have often de rided m as trivial and commonplace, sprang fro the dark o f ff est abysses su ering and loneliness , and was ren f dered possible solely by the heroism o a soul in travail .

All that has been disclosed to us is the fact of his faith . These manuscript volumes contain a record of the ran o f som with which that faith was purchased , the pay ments demanded from day to day by the inexorable cred L itor we name ife .

3 3 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

l desire reason and truth . To his inte ligence now grown clearer it was plain that men dread truth more than n a ything else in the world . He began , therefore , to settle accounts with his own mind by writing a satirical romance, and by other imaginative creations , while con a fo r tinning his v st private correspondence . Thus a o f time he was out of the hurlyburly . But after a year

so u silence , when the crim n flood contin ed to swell, and when falsehood was raging more furiously than ever, he “ a re felt it his duty to reopen the c mp aign . We must ” n to peat the truth again and agai , said Goethe Scher “ w h mann , for the error with hich trut has to contend is n n n re reached not co ti ually bei g p , by individuals , but by a s o n the m ss . There was much lo eliness in the world that it had become necessary to form new ties . Signs of discontent and revolt in the various lands were more too plentiful . More numerous , , were the brave men in active revolt against the fate which was being forced n w as o n them . Rolla d felt that it incumbent upon him to give what support he could to these dispersed

. fighters , and to inspirit them for the struggle La ro ute en lacets In the first essay of the new series ,

ui monte an q , Roll d explained the position he had reached “

19 1 6 . : in December, He wrote If I have kept silence for a year, it is not because the faith to which I gave expression in Above the Battle has been Shaken (it stands firmer than ever) ; but I am well assured that it a is useless to Speak to him who will not hearken . F cts alone will speak , with tragical insistence ; facts alone o f will be able to penetrate the thick wall obstinacy, ' TH E FORERUNNERS AND EMPEDOCLES 3 3 1

pride, and falsehood with which men have surrounded their minds because they do not wish to see the light .

But t of be we, as be ween brothers all the nations ; as tween those who have known how to defend their moral n u freedom , their reaso , and their faith in h man solidar ity ; as between minds which continue to hope amid — we Silence, Oppression , and grief do well to exchange, to of ff as this year draws a close, words a ection and one solace . We must convince another that during the

d - d bloo renched night the light is still burning, that it never has been and never will be extinguished . In the of f n n abyss su feri g into which Europe is plu ged , those ' who wield the pen must be careful never to add an ad i i nal of d d t o pang to the mass pangs alrea y endured , and never to pour new reasons for hatred into the f burning floo d o hate . Two ways remain open for those

a o f r re free spirits which , athwart the mountain crimes and n a follies , are endeavori g to bre k a trail for others, n to find for themselves a egress . Some are courage ou sly attempting in their respective lands to make

- their fellow countrymen aware o f their own faults . I f My task S di ferent , for it is to remind the hostile breth of E not of o f ren urope, their worst aspects but their n for best, to recall to them reaso s hoping that there will ” n one day be a wiser and more loving huma ity . s The essays of the new series appeared , for the mo t in part, in various minor reviews , seeing that the more fluential and widely circulated periodicals had long Since ’ closed their columns to Rolland s pen . When we study Les them as a whole, in the collective volume entitled 3 3 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND vrécurseurs t , we realize hat they emit a new tone . Anger s t has been replaced by inten e compassion, his corre sponding to the change which had taken place at the

fighting front . In all the armies , during the third year of o f the war, the fanatical impetus the opening phases had vanished , and the men were now animated by a tranquil but stubborn sentiment of duty . Rolland is perhaps even more impassioned and more revolution ary in his outlook, and yet the essays are characterized of l by greater gentleness than o d. What he writes is no longer at grips with the war, but seems to soar above the war . His gaze is fixed upon the distance ; his mind ranges down the centuries in search of like experiences ; looking for consolation , he endeavors to discover a meaning in the meaningless . He recurs to the idea Of f Goethe, that human progress is e fected by a spiral as a cent . At higher level men return to a point only a l little above the o d . Evolution and reversion go hand in hand . Thus he attempts to show that even at this tragical hour we can discern intimations of a better day . The essays comprising L es précurseurs no longer at tack adverse Opinions and the war . They merely draw our attention to the existence in all countries of persons who are fighting for a very different ideal, to the exist ence of those heralds o f spiritual unity whom Nietzsche “ ” of athfinders of speaks as the p the European soul .

It is too late to hope for anything from the masses . In ’ A ux e u les ass ass ines the address p p , he has nothing but for pity the millions , for those who , with no will of ’ own of their , must be the mute instruments others

3 3 4 ROMAIN RO LLAND

of ness the world . Truth , nevertheless , passes down a forever from hand to hand , being thus imperish ble and indestructible . Even acro ss these years of resignation there shines e l to a g ntle light of hope, though manifest on y those who have eyes to see, only to those who can lift their gaze above their own troubles to contemplate the infinite . CHAPTER XIX

LILULI

t URING hese five years, the ethicist , the phi lanthro ist E had n p , the uropean , bee speaking to had a the nations , but the poet app rently n TO bee dumb . many it may seem strange that Rol ’ 1 9 14 land s first imaginative work to be written since , d end of a work complete before the the war, should Liluli n have been a farcical comedy, . Yet this light ess of mood sprang from the uttermost abysses of sorrow . d n n Rollan , stricken to the soul when co templati g his a of the powerlessness gainst the insanity world , turned to irony as a means of abreaction— to employ a term n f introduced by the psychoa alysts . From the pole o repressed emotion , the electric spark flashes across into ’

of . a d the field laughter And here , as in all Roll n s ’ works, the author s essential purpose is to free himself o from the tyranny f a sensation . Pain grows to laugh s o n ter, laughter to bitterness , that in co trapuntal fashion the ego may be helped to maintain its equipoise against the heaviness of the time . When wrath remains power of less , the spirit mockery is still in being, and can be

- Shot like a fire arrow across the darkening world . Liluli is the satirical counterpart to an unwritten trag 3 3 5 3 3 6 ROMAIN RO LLAND

, edy or rather to the tragedy which ( Rolland did not need to write, Since the world was living it . The satire pro of f duces the impression having become, in course o composition , more bitter, more sarcastic , almost more cynical, than the author had originally designed . We feel that the time spirit intervened to make it more

n n . cu lrninat pu ge t, more stinging, more pitiless At the of 19 1 7 ing point, a scene penned in the summer , we two L behold the friends who are misled by iluli , the mischievous goddess of illusion (for her name signifies

wrestling to their mutual destruction . In ’ of these two princes fable, there recurs Rolland s ear lier symbolism of Olivier and Jean Christophe . France and Germany here encounter one another, both hasten ing blindly forward under the leadership Of the same natIonS on of illusion . The two fight the bridge recon ciliation which in earlier days they had built across the n abyss dividing them . In the co ditions then prevail o f ing , so pure a note lyrical mourning could not be its he sustained . As creation progressed , the comedy E . v came more incisive, more pointed , more farcical r thin e y g that Rolland contemplated around him , di loma n p cy, the intellectuals , the war poets (prese ted here of n in the ludicrous form danci g dervishes) , those who

- to acifism of pay lip service p , the idols fraternity , lib ert y, God himself, is distorted by his tearful eyes to of seem grotesques and caricatures . All the madness the world is fiercely limned in an outburst of derisive decom rage . Everything is , as it were, dissolved and posed in the acrid menstruum of mockery ; and finally

3 3 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Breu non g , with its vibrant rhymes , and although in Liluli Colas Breu non of as in g there is a strain raillery,

- nevertheless this satire of the war period , a tragi comedy the Of chaos , contrasts strikingly with work that deals “ the u with happy days of la do ce France . In the earlier book, the cheerfulness Springs from a full heart , but the humor of the later work arises from a heart Col Bre on the . as u n overfull In g we find the geniality, of L iluli m joviality, a broad laugh ; in the hu or is ironi cal, bitter, breathing a fierce irreverence for all that ex ists . A world full of noble dreams and kindly visions of has been destroyed , and the ruins this perished world are heaped between the Old France o f Colas Bre ugnon n o f L iluli and the new Fra ce . Vainly does the farce move on to madder and ever madder caprioles ; vainly ’ o f does the wit leap and o erleap itself . The sadness the underlying sentiment continually brings us back with a thud to the bloodstained earth . There is noth ing else written by him during the war, no impassioned e be appeal , no tragical adjuration , which , to my fe ling, ’ trays with such intensity Romain Rolland s personal suf ferin g throughout those years , as does this comedy with ’ o f its wild bursts laughter, its expression of the author s

- f self enforced mood o bitter irony . CHAPTER XX

CLERAMBAULT

IL ULI - ed , the tragi com y, was an outcry , a groan, a painful burst of mockery ; it was an element ary gesture of reaction against sufferin g that ’ was almost physical . But the author s serious, tranquil, and enduring settlement o f accounts with the times is his ’ ’ Clerambault l histo ire d un e conscience libre en novel, , p d ant la uerre to g , which was slowly brought completion

of . in the space four years It is not autobiography, ’ f L n C but a transcription o Rolland s ideas . ike Jea hris of n tophe , it is simultaneously the biography an imagi ary personality and a comprehensive picture O f the age . Matter is here collected that is elsewhere dispersed in subter manifestoes and letters . Artistically, it is the ’ d ranean link between Rolland s manifol activities . d n d Ami the hi drances imposed by his public uties, and amid the difficulties deriving from other outward circum the stances, author built the work upwards out Of the of depths of sorrow to the heights consolation . It was not d l complete until the war was over, when Rol and had returned to Paris in the summer of 1920 . Just as little as Jean Christophe can Clerambault i s properly be termed a novel . It is someth ng le s than 3 3 9 3 40 ROMAIN ROLLAND

the a novel, and at same time a great deal more . It de of man scribes the development, not a , but of an idea . AS ean Christo he s o in J p , here, we have a philosophy

not - presented , but as something ready made, complete , a finished datum . In company with a human being, we rise stage by stage from error and weakness to wards clarity . In a sense it is a religious book, the r o f of l histo y a conversion , an il umination . It is a modern legend of the saints in the form of the life his

of sub- tory a simple citizen . In a word, as the title f o . phrases it, we have here the story a conscience of o at The ultimate significance the bo k is freedom , the tainment - k of self nowledge, but raised to the heroic plane n inasmuch as k owledge becomes action . The scene ’ is played in the intimate recesses of a man s nature, where he is alone with truth . In the new book, there

’ ‘ is r was fore, there no counte type, as Olivier the counter type to Jean Christophe ; nor do we find in Clerambault t of ean Christo he what was in truth the counter ype J p , ’ ’ lerambault Clerambault s external life . C s countertype, f old antagonist, is himsel ; is the , the earlier, the weak C ul lerambault ; is the Cleramba t with whom the new, the knowing, the true man has to wrestle, whom the ’ new Clerambault has to overcome . The hero s heroism of is not displayed , as was that Jean Christophe, in a Cleram struggle with the forces of the visible world . ’ bault s war is waged in the invisible realm of thought . n At the outset , therefore , Rolla d designed to call the “ ” un - en book roman meditation . It was to have been “ ’ ” L un t of L a titled contre tous, his being an adaptation

3 42 ROMAIN ROLLAND

from what he had chosen in the case of Jean Christophe . C Agenor lerambault is an inconspicuous figure, a quiet of fellow of little account, an author no particular note , one of those persons whose literary work succeeds in pleasing a complaisant generation , though it has no fo Significance r posterity . He has the nebulous idealism of mediocre minds ; he hymns the praises of perpetual peace and international conciliation . His own tepid is goodness makes him believe that nature good , is ’ on man s wellwisher, desiring to lead mankind gently L ward towards a more beautiful future . ife does not torment him with problems , and he therefore extols life

’ x amid the tranquil comforts of his bourgeois e istence .

h - Blessed wit a kindly and somewhat simple minded wife, son and with two children , a and a daughter, he may be considered a modern Theocritus wearing the ribbon o f L of the egion Honor, singing the joyful present and f the still more joyful future o ou r ancient cosmos . The quiet suburban household is suddenly struck as by a thunderbolt with the news of the outbreak of war . Clerambault takes the train to Paris ; and no sooner is he sprinkled with Spray from the hot waves of eu usiasm of th , than all his ideals international amity and perpetual peace vanish into thin air . He returns home

a . Un a f natic , oozing hate, and steaming with phrases der the influence of the tremendous storm he begins to sound his lyre : Theocritus has become Pindar, a war of poet . Rolland gives a marvelously vivid description something every one of us has witnessed , Showing how all Clerambault, like persons of average nature, really CLERAMBAULT 3 43

a t kes a delight in horrors , however unwilling he may be d to a mit it even to himself . He is rejuvenated , his life seems to move on wings ; the enthusiasm o f the masses stirs the almost extinguished flame of enthusiasm in his own breast ; he is fired by the national fire ; he is physi cally and mentally refreshed by the new atmosphere . L so ike many other mediocrities , he secures in these r n days his greatest literary triumph . His wa so gs , precisely because they give such vigorous expression to n of the sentime ts the man in the street, become a national an are d property . Fame d public favor showere upon so him , that (at this time when millions of his fellows

- confident are perishing) he feels well, self , alive as never before . i of His pr de is increased , his joy life accentuated , when his son Maxime leaves fo r the front filled with martial ardor . His first thought , a few months later,

n u n on whe the yo g man comes home leave, is that o Maxime Should retail to him all the ecstasies f war . n Stra gely enough , however, the young soldier, whose t unres on eyes still burn wi h the sights he has seen , is p N ot not sive . wishing to mortify his father, he does ’ positively attempt to silence the latter s paeans, but for Fo r his part, he maintains silence . days this muteness t n stands be wee them , and the father is unable to solve son the riddle . He feels dumbly that his is conceal

d . ing something . But shame bin s both their tongues da of On the last y the furlough , Maxime suddenly pulls “ himself together, and begins, Father, are you quite ” 9 n u t sure But the question remai s unfinished , 3 44 ROMAIN ROLLAND terance is choked . Still silent, the young man returns to the realities Of war . ff A few days later there is a fresh O ensive . Maxime t is reported missing . Soon his fa her learns that he is

C a dead . Now ler mbault gropes for the meaning of n n d those last words behi d the Silence, and is torme te by o f the thought what was left unspoken . He locks him self into his room , and for the first time he is alone with n n to his conscie ce . He begi s question himself in search o f t the tru h , and throughout the long night he com munes with his soul as he traverses the road to Damas o cus . Piece by piece he tears away the wrapping f lies with which he has enveloped himself, until he stands d a own . naked before his criticism “ Preju ices h ve eaten his so deep into Skin , that the blood flows as he plucks d them from him . They must all be surrendere ; the

u o f n o f prej dice the fatherla d , the prejudice the herd , must go ; in the end he recognizes that one thing only is

n n . of true , one thi g o ly sacred , life A fever enquiry consumes him ; the o ld Adam perishes in the flame ; n when the day daw s he is a new man . t and He knows the tru h now, wishes to strengthen his own o f faith . He goes to some his fellows and talks

O f n . t to them . Most them do not u derstand him O hers refuse to understand him . Some , however, among whom Perrotin the academician is notable, are yet more

n . To alarmi g . They know the truth their penetrating vision the nature of the popular idols has long been

n . plai . But they are cautious folk They compress their lips and smile at one another like the augurs Of

3 46 ROMAIN ROLLAND

h on cent wife and daug ter have to suffer his account .

They do not upbraid him , but he feels as if he had aimed a shaft against them . He who has hitherto sunned him self in the warmth of family li fe and has enjoyed the of comforts modest fame , is now absolutely alone .

n on Nevertheless he co tinues his course, although a n of n these st tio s the cross become harder a d harder . C Rolland shows how lerambault finds new friends , only n n H o to discover that they too fail to u dersta d him . w his words are mutilated , his ideas misapplied . How he w d w is over helme to learn that his fello s , those whom he wishes to help , have no desire for truth , but are nourished by falsehood ; that they are continually in

o f d o f search, not free om , but of some new form Slav

nd a ad ery . (In these wo erful p ssages the re er is again ’ n f D os iev k n In u I ito and again remi ded o to s y s Gra d q s r. ) He perseveres in his pilgrimage even when he has lost

a in f ith his power to help his fellow men , for this is m en on no longer his goal . He passes by , marching ward towards the unseen , towards truth ; his love for truth exposing him ever more pitilessly to the hatred f d n n in o men . By egrees he becomes e ta gled a net o f calumnies ; his troubles develop into a Clerambault ” n aff air ; at length a prosecution is i itiated . The state has recognized its enemy in the free man . But while “ t the case is still in progress, the defeatist mee s his ’ Cleramb ault s fate from the pistol bullet of a fanatic . end recalls the opening of the world catastrophe with f a e the assassination o J ur s . Never has the tragedy of conscience been more simply CLERAMBAULT 3 47 and more poignantly depicted than in this account of ’ h a of d t e m rtyrdom an average man . Rollan s ripe spir itu al n a powers , his magical faculty for combi ing m stery a with the hum n touch, are here at their highest . Never w as so his outlook over the world extensive, never was

so as . the view serene, from this last summit And yet, though we are thus led upwards to the consideration of of r the ultimate problems the spirit, we sta t from the d of plain of every ay life . It is the soul a commonplace man n , the soul it might seem of a weakli g, which moves of through this long passion . Herein lies the marvel the moral solace which the book conveys . Rolland was to of the first recognize the defect his previous writings, considered as means of helping the average man . In the n heroic biographies, heroism is displayed o ly by u those in whom the heroic so l is inborn , only by those n hri . ean C sto he whose flight is winged with ge ius In J p , of n the moral victory is a triumph ative energy . But Clerambault in we are Shown that even the weakling, d one of even the me iocre man , every us , can be stronger l than the whole world if he have but the wi l . It is open to every man to be true, open to every man to one con win spiritual freedom , if he be at with his science, and if he regard this fellowship with his con science as of greater value than fellowship with men and For is for with the age . each man there always time, u each man there is always Opport nity, to become master ’ f a Aért of to o . re lities , the first Rolland s heroes show for himself greater than fate, speaks us all when he “ ” says : It is never too late to be free ! CHAPTER XXI

TH E LAST A PPEAL

OR five y ears Romain Rolland was at war with of the madness the times . At length the fie ry chains were loosened from the racked body o f

Europe . The war was over, the armistice had been n signed . Men were no longer murdering o e another ; but their evil passions, their hate, continued . Romain Rolland ’s prophetic insight celebrated a mournful tri umph . His distrust of victory, his reiterated warnings that conquerors are merciless , were more than justified “ n by the reve geful reality . Victory in arms is disas t o trous o the ideal f an unselfish humanity . Men find it extraordinarily difficult to remain gentle in the hour ” of . triumph These forecasts were terribly fulfilled . Forgotten were all the fine words anent the victo ry o f freedom and right . The Versailles conference devoted itself to the installation of a new regime of Wh force and to the humiliation of a defeated enemy . at the idealism of simpletons had expected to be the end f o all wars, proved, as the true idealists who look beyond of men towards ideas had foreseen , the seed fresh hatred and renewed acts of violence . n Once again , at the eleve th hour, Rolland raised his 3 48

3 5 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

o f of ! in virtue the great future America Speak, speak to all ! The world hungers for a voice which will over of f leap the frontiers nations and o classes . Be the arbiter of the free peoples ! Thus may the future hail ” you by the name Of Reconciler ! ’ The prophet s voice was drowned by the clamors for Bis r kism L ma c . revenge . triumphed iterally fulfilled was the prophecy that the peace would be as inhuman as the war had been . Humanity could find no abiding of E place among men . When the regeneration urope n might have been begun , the si ister spirit of conquest “ continued to prevail . There are no victors , but only ” vanquished . CHAPTER XXII

DEC LARATION OF THE INDEPENDENCE OF TH E MIND

ITE all disillusionments , Romain Rolland , d his s the the indomitable, continue addre ses to a o f ultim te court Of appeal , to the Spirit fel lowshi 26 p. On the day when peace was signed , June , “ ’ ” 19 19 H umani é co , he published in L t a manifesto m posed by himself and subscribed by sympathizers of all to nationalities . In a world falling ruin , it was to be n o f n the cornersto e the i visible temple, the refuge of the disillusioned . With masterly touch Rolland sums up d to and . the past, isplays it as a warning the future He issues a clarion call . “ h Brain workers, comrades , scattered throug out the d fo r worl , kept apart five years by the armies, the cen s orshi and a of n p, the mutual h tred the warri g nations, now that barriers are falling and frontiers are being re d a c ou r opene , we issue to you a c ll to re onstitute broth n and erly u ion , to make Of it a new union more firmly founded and more strongly built than that which prev u sl io y existed . “ ou r of in The war has disordered ranks . Most the tellectuals n placed their scie ce , their art , their reason , not at the service of the governments . We do wish to formul ate any accusations, to launch any reproaches . 3 5 1 3 5 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

We know the weakness of the individual mind and the t of elemental streng h great collective currents . The w latter, in a moment, swept the former a ay , for noth ing had been prepared to help in the work of resist L et ance . this experience, at least, be a lesson to us for the future ! “ of out First all, let us point the disasters that have resulted from the almost complete abdication of in telli enc g e throughout the world , and from its voluntary enslavement to the unchained forces . Thinkers, artists , have added an incalculable quantity o f envenomed hate to the plague which devours the flesh and the spirit of o f Europe . In the arsenal their knowledge, their mem o r fo r y, their imagination , they have sought reasons old scien hatred , reasons and new, reasons historical, ifi a t c . , logical , and poetical They have l bored to de stroy mutual understanding and mutual love among defiled men . So doing, they have disfigured , , debased , of degraded , Thought, which they were the representa

v of ti es . They have made it an instrument the pas sions ; and (unwittingly, perchance) they have made it a tool of the selfish interests of a political or social N or . ow clique, of a state, a country, a class , when , from the fierce conflict in which the nations have been at grips, the victors and the vanquished emerge equally stricken , impoverished , and at the bottom of their hearts (though they will not admit it) utterly ashamed of their — eu access o f mania now, Thought, which has been tangled in their struggles, emerges, like them, fallen from her high estate .

3 54 ROMAIN ROLLAND

between nations . Whoever makes his home within this invisible realm becomes a of the world . He is

not of on o of . the heir, e pe ple but all peoples Hence forward he is an indweller in all tongues and in all countries, in the universal past and the universal future . CHAPTER XXIII

ENVO Y

’ T N E e o f RA C has b en the rhythm this man s life, surging again and again in passion ate waves n n n agai st the time, si ki g once more into the abyss n Of disappoi tment, but never failing to rise on the crest o f n d n a n s ee a n faith re ewe . O ce ag i we Rom in Rolla d

of n a as prototype those who are magnifice t in defe t . N ot one d one o f his one of his i eals, not wishes, not

ha o f d . s his reams, has been realized Might triumphed

over right, force over spirit, men over humanity .

n n a Yet ever has his struggle bee gr nder, and never

has his existence been more indispensable , than during recent years ; for it is his apostolate alone which has saved the gospel 'o f crucified Europe ; and furthermore n a a a he has rescued for us a other f ith , that of the im gin

d a tive writer as the Spiritual lea er, the moral spokesm n n n man o f of his own nation and of all atio s . This let ters has preserved us from what would have been an one in ou r imperishable Shame, had there been no days

of u and to testify against the lunacy m rder hatred . To him we owe it that even during the fiercest storm in his tory the sacred fire of brotherhood was never extin u ished f g . The world o the spirit has no concern with 3 5 5 3 5 6 ROMAIN RO LLAND

f o . one the deceptive force numbers In that realm , For individual can outweigh a multitude . an idea never glows so brightly as in the mind of the solitary thinker ; and in the darkest hour we were able to draw consola tion from the signal example of this poet . One great man who remains human can for ever and for all men o in rescue ur faith humanity.

WORKS BY ROMAIN ROLLAND

CRITICAL STUDIES

’ Les o i ines du t eat e ri u e moderne H i i r g h r ly q . ( s to re de l opera en E ro e ant ul et a t i P u av a t . Fontemoin a is p L ly Sc rl ) g, r , 1 9 8 5 .

Cur ars icturae a ud ta o XVI s ac u i deciderit Fontemo p p I l s c l . in P a is 18 95 . g, r ,

i et. D u worth ondon 1902 has a ea ed in En is M ll ck , L , ( pp r gl h

tran s lation only) . e e h i i omme u t . a i Vi de Be t oven . (V e des h s ll s res ) C h ers de la u in ain ri N O 1 0 P i 1 3 H a e e s . a s 90 ett q z , é e IV, , r , ; ch , Paris 1907 anot e edition with w oo d uts b Perrichon , ; h r c y , P e P r n d P rri hon u is au ns . A . au e s an e c ed J . . L r , L , , p bl h by rd e r Edou a Pe tau Pa is 1909 . ll , ,

a a i r la uin aine ie o . Le he t e du Peu e . h e s de s N T r pl C q z , ér V, 4 Paris 1903 H a hette Pa is 1908 en a d dition , , ; c , r , ; l rge e , P r 9 O ff P ri 1 920 H a ette a is 1 13 endor a s . ch , , ; ll , , P a u ardt r in 1905 ha a a i als us i stadt. e s a d r s M k M rq , B l , ( ppe re

in Ge rman translation only) .

- e Vie des ommes i ust es . a ie s La vie de Michel Ang . ( h ll r ) C h r

e la uin aine s i N o . 18 s ie N o . 2 d q z , ér e VII , ; ér VIII , ,

P r 1906 H a hette Paris 1907. a is , ; c , , ’ i on in Les mait es de a t se ies i ai i A nother ed ti r l r r , L br r e ’ de art an ien et mo de ne P on Pa is 1905 . l , c r , l , r , ’ M i ien d autrefo is H a ett Pa is 1908 . us c s , ch e, r , ’ ’ - mie o e a ou a L e a avant o e a. 2. Le e 1 . op r l p r pr r p r j é ’ P i 3 Notes sur u . 4. aris : L O rféo de Lu igi Ross . . L lly

6 o a t. G G e . 5 . t . luck . r ry M z r 3 6 0 ROMAIN ROLLAND

’ ’ M n ourd hui H a e tte Pa i usi s d au s 1908 . cie j , ch , r , 2 Wa ne : ie f ied i 3 1 . io . . a nt Berl z g r S g r ; Tr stan . . S i ’ i n Ind . aens . 4. n e t d 5 Ri ha d t auss . 6 S V c y . c r S r .

f. 7 . D on o en Perosi si o o 8 . u u f an H ug W l L r z o . M q e r

i u e . llé e i a se e mus e a eman d 9 . e c i t q ll P as et M l s ande . 10 L e enouveau : s uis s du mov m en mu i a it Pa i . r e q e e t s c l r s i depu s 18 70. D u in i 190 Pau . e u mus a . . . 8 . l p M rc re c l S J M . l Le maitr m i u P H aende . e d l us . an ar i 10 s s e a A s 19 . ( q e ) lc , , Vi de o s to i Vie es mme t P s c . d o s i ust s . H a e t a i T l ( h ll re ) ch e, r ,

19 1 1 . ’ ’ L humb le vie héroi ue P ns s oisi s e es d un q . e ée ch e t précédé e

int o u i r h San ot Pa is 1912 . d t on a A ons . s r c p lph e Séc é , r , ’ m e r E edo e d A ri ent . Le a m Geneva 1917 La mai p cl g g C el , , ; ’ ’ f an i a t di ion P i 1 s on a s e d et d e t a s 9 18 . r c r , r , m x a i o Voyage u sical au pays du p ss é . W th w odcuts by D .

Ga anis . Edoua d ose Pa is 1919 H ac tt Pa is l r J ph, r , ; he e, r , 9 1 20.

E o des H aut Etude o a 1900 A c n Pa i c le es s S ci les ( l a , r s,

1910.

POLITICAL STUDIES

u - lée O n o ff P is 1915 A dessus de la mé . e d a . ll r , r , ’ 19 L u H manité Pa is 19 . es seu s . L u préc r r , r , ist om d La A ux eu es as sass in s . eunes ses o ia es R an p pl é J S c l es,

- - hau de onds 1917 Ol ndo ff Pa is 1920. C x F , ; le r , r , A ux u e a s assin nd th it i i i ati n Pri pe pl s s és ( u er e t le : C v l s o ) . vatel inted Pa s 1918 y pr , ri , .

A u e u a ass in s A s ontis iec a wood- n av n x p ples ss é . fr p e e gr i g by

ans Masereel R s t d ci cu a i on . O ndo ff Fr . e tric e r l t lle r , Pari 2 s, 19 0.

3 6 2 ROMAIN ROLLAND

P e a to es ui t avai nt imon Bodeve O ndo ff r f ce Cell q r lle by S e , lle r , 19 3 Paris , 1 . P e fa to Une voi de femm dans la mélée a e Ca r ce x e by M rc lle py, ff r Ol endo Pa is 19 16 . l r , ,

Ant o o ie des oétes ont la ue . Le a i Gen a h l g p c re g rre S bl er, ev ,

1920.

DRAMAS

— aint oui 5 act . R u de Pa s a A 18 97. S L s. ( s ) ev e ri , M rch pril, ’

Aert. 3 s Re a t amati ue Paris 1 98 a . u de d 8 . ( ct ) v e l r r q , , G llai Pa is 18 98 Be s . Les ou s . 3 a ts . o s l p ( c ) e rge , r , L t i m i a evu de dra 3 ts . a t e r o phe de la ra s on . ( c ) R e l’r ma i u Pari 1 99 t s 8 . q e, , ’ m i D an n . u d a t d a at u Paris 1900 to 3 a ts . Rev e ( c ) e l r r q e, , ;

ahie s de la uin aine ie N o . 6 1901 . C r q z , Sér II , , l uin n uato ui et. 3 a ts . a i de a a Le q rze j ll ( c ) C h ers q z i e, Série 111 N 1 1 Pa s 1902 o . . , , ri , i de la uin ain i Le t m s viend a. 3 a ts . a e s e p r ( c ) C h r q z e, Sér e dorff i 2 N o 14 Paris 1903 O en Pa s 19 0 . IV, . , , ; ll , r , ’

t i am 3 a ts . R u de a t d amat u Les ro s oureus es. ( c ) ev e l r r iq e, Pa i 1 s 904. r , ’ M nt d amati u Paris La o es an . 3 a s . R u ar p ( ct ) ev e de l t r q e, , 1 904.

e t de l R vo u on Th a re a é l ti .

Le ou . D an on o u i e . s l ps t . Le quat rze j ll t

H a ett Pa is 1909 now t ans fe ed to O ndo ff . ch e, r , ( r rr lle r ) a edis d foi Les tr g e e la .

in i l on . iért . iom e a ais Sa t Lou s . A Le tr phe d r

H a ette Pa s 1909 now t ans f ed to O endo ff . ch , ri , ( r err ll r ) Ma i i with w ood ut an sere l . a i L lul ( c s by Fr s e ) Le S bl er, . Ge 1 19 O f P 20 n va 9 endo f a i 19 . e , ; ll r , r s, BIBLIOGRAPHY 3 6 3

TRA NSLATIONS

ENGLISH

Mi t . rans ated ment na a D on . u wo t L lle T l by Cle i Bl ck ck r h ,

don , 1902 . h r d o . D an on n 7 eet oven . ans ate R 1 t w e do 90 . B T l by F . h ell r , L ,

ethoven . ran t d b on an H u ith ief Be T sla e y C st ce ll . W a br ana sis o f the s onatas s m onies and the uartets ly , y ph , q , fi mu i a llu tration and 4 A . Ea le eld H u l and 24 s i s s by g l , c l at an an in t o du i Edwar a en er e an pl es d r ct on by d C rp t . K g Pau en h r n r n n 19 17 T ub e o do . l , Tr c , , L ,

i o f i ae n r ns t d ede i e s . The L fe M ch l A gelo . T a la e by Fr r c L e H emann n 1912 ein o don . , L , an ated e rna d Mi ll Unwin Lon o sto . s a . is T l y Tr l by B r F her ,

don , 19 1 1 .

om us i ians o f fo me D rans ated ar Blaik S e M c r r ays . T l by M y

o . e an Pau en Trubner ondon 1915 . l ck K g l , Tr ch , , L , n Ea lefield H u P d A . . an au H ande . a s ate l Tr l by g ll Keg l, d 1 en Trubner on on 19 6 . Tr ch, , L ,

us i ians of od a . ran s ated a ai o e M c T y T l by M ry Bl kl ck. K gan Pa n Tr bner on on 1 91 u u d 5 . l , Tre ch, , L , ’ h Peo eate ns ated r t H lar T e s h . a ar e . H o t . t ple T r Tr l by B C k l , i New Yo 19 18 G . A en Unw n ondon 19 19 rk, ; ll , L , .

o to the Ant . Refle tions on r eadin A u us te ore G ( c g g S l . ) D Ka A t anti ont Ma 19 ans at d e . 19 Tr l e by y l c M hly, y, , Y N ew ork . du t o o a . ith int o G w D i Above the B ttlefi eld W an r c i n by . L es ck

ins on owes am rid 1914. , B , C b ge, it n in odu ev i h r A ove th att e d. W ti R a d b e B l fi el h a tr c on by R . c s ’ nds Pe a e o mmi tee n ie t o don 1 . Ro e t M. A . 915 b r s, Fr c C , L , A ov r ns at O d n. G . a d C . . n Ab e the B attle . T l e by K g e lle

Unwin ondon 1916 . , L ,

te O d n e . an a d . . . it a t The Idols . Tr sl by C K g e W h le t r by R 36 4 ROMAIN ROLLAND

Ro and to D . van Eed n on the t o f m a s s nat ons . ll r e righ ll . i owes am id e 1915 B , C br g , . h o re n T e ru n ers . ans ated Eden 81 C a Pa G d u . F Tr l by e r l . A en 81 Unwin ondon 1 20 H a ou a e U A 9 rt . . ll , L , ; rc , Br c , . S ,

1920. The Fourteenth of July and D an ton : tw o plays of the French

Revo ution . ans ated wi h efa a l Tr l t a pr ce by B rrett H . H a e . o t N ew Yo 1 1 G U 9 8 . A en 81 nwin L on Cl rk l , rk, ; ll ,

don , 1919 .

i u i . The Nation ond n o e t 20 to N ov. 29 1919 oni L l l , L , S p . , ; B 81 iv i ht N ew Yo r 1920 L er g , k, . ean h h r C sto e . ans ate Gi e n H ein J ri p T l d by lb rt Canna . e — — mann ondon 19 10 1913 H o t N ew Yo r 19 11 1913 . , L , ; l , k.

o as eu no . a H o t Ne Yo n ns ated i . w C l Br g Tr l by K . M ller l , rk, 19 19 .

l am a u t. an at i r . H e Yo d . o t w k. C er b l Tr sl e by K M lle l , N r

1921 .

GERMAN

- ans ated . an nese H u . R as e uri Beethoven . Tr l by L L g g ch r, Z ch, 7 191 .

u 81 Loeni Mi an an ated W. H e o . R tt n chel gelo . Tr sl by rz g e g,

an fo t 19 18 . Fr k r ,

i 9 . i e an e o . Ras e u 191 M ch l g l ch r, Z r ch, 81 L oeni an i ans at d W. H e o . Rutt n Tols to . Tr l e by rz g e g, Fr k 920 fo t 1 . r ,

D en in es a tet n Vo lkern t ans at d b te an w i . h g chl ch e , r l e y S f Z e g

Ras e u i h 1918 . ch r, Z r c ,

- k o . u des su de la mélée . Rutten 81 Loenin an t A s g, Fr f r

i an fo t 1920. Le s u s eu s . Riitten 81 oe n préc r r L g, Fr k r , '

ans ated Otto 81 E na Grantofi. Rut Johann Christof. Tr l by r — ten 81 L oenin an fo t 1912 1918 . g, Fr k r , '

M n n ans ated Otto 81 E na Grantofl . eister Breug o . Tr l by r

Riitten 81 osnin ankfo t 1919 . L g, Fr r ,

3 6 6 ROMAIN ROLLAND

DANISH

Vie de o n. ann o n a n 19 Beeth ve Br er, C pe h ge , 15 .

o sto i . anne o n a 19 1 en 7 . T l Br r, C pe h g , ’ ’

usi iens d au ourd hu i . D enma 81 No wa 19 M c j rk r y, 17.

- Au dessus de la mélée . ios o en a n 1 1 9 6 . L , C p h ge ,

- J an isto . H a e u o en a n 19 16 e Chr phe g r p , C p h ge , .

Co as u non. D enma 81 No wa No st dt t l Bre g rk r y ; r e , S ockholm,

1917.

CZECH

Vi de Mi - e e An . n t M P a s a d . Kalass ova. a u ch l ge Tr l e by r g e, 19 12 .

D ant 92 on . 1 0 .

POLISH

Vie de e v ew ski et o n . ac Wa saw 1913 . B h e J , r ,

- d d ean h is t . ans te E wi e i n i o a wi z o s . J C r phe Tr l by g S e k e c . V l 81 Bibl oteka Sfinska Wa s aw 19 10 the mainin I II , j , r , ; re g M i 1 — 1 o s . as a ow 19 7 9 v l , k , Cr c ,

SWEDISH

d Mr n i e o n ans ate s . Akerma n No edt V e d t . st Bee h ve Tr l by , r ,

to h m 1915 . S ck ol . m t V Mi helan e an ated b . Aker ann No st d ie de c . s g Tr l y Mrs , r e ,

1916 . Stockholm . k m nn te n ted Mrs . A er a No s dt i de o stoi . a s a V e T l Tr l by , r ,

19 16 . Sto ckholm.

d ate Mrs kermann No st dt to o m. H an e . ans d . A l Tr l by , r e , S ckh l

19 16 .

M d ermann No sted to k o m. i t. ans at . Ak t lle Tr l e by Mrs , r , S c h l

1916 . BIBLIOGRA PHY 3 6 7

’ ’ Musi i au ourd hui an d rm n ns d . s at . Ake an c e j Tr l e by Mrs , h m No stedt to o . r , S ck l ’

usi iens d autr efois . rans at d . Akermann N or M c T l e by Mrs , ted 1 s t to holm. 19 7 , S ck . o a musi a au a du ass r n at M a s ed . V y ge c l p ys p é . T l by rs Aker m an N edt ho m 1 2 n o st to . 9 0 . , r , S ck l

- . Au des sus de la me e . rans at d Mrs rmann N r . Ake o l e T l e by , m 191 s tedt toc ho . 5 . , S k l an Mr rma d u s eu . s ate N Les s d s . Ake nn o st t préc r r Tr l by , r e , m 1920. S tockhol .

hea de la Revolution . r n t e a s at d . kermann T r T l e by Mrs A , n m 19 17 o nie to o . . B r, S ckh l i i n r d es de l fo . a ated Mr s rm o i a a s . Ake ann nn e T gé Tr l by , B r, m 1917. Stockhol . em vi en a an at Mr Akermann No edt Le t s d . s d s . st p r Tr l e by , r ,

Stockholm .

li . ans at d Mrs . Akermann nnie to m i u o o . L l Tr l e by , B r, S ckh l

1920.

n - d ermann onnie ea isto e . ans ate . Ak J Chr ph Tr l by Mrs , B r, m 1 1 — 1 to 9 3 917 . S ckhol . n r Mr m n o eu on . ans te N o as a d s . Aker an stedt C l Br g T l by , r , m 1 1 9 9 . Stockhol .

m . I ou ho m. a au t n se of a ation . onni to Cler b l c r prep r B er, S ck l

D UTCH

imon Amste dam 1913 ie de eet ov n . V B h e , S , r ,

- r e o t r m 1915 u s da . an isto h . s R t Je Chr p e B , e , ’ di on T eenk i e W. . . illink e au e . ec a ti W wo L b Sp l , F J j , Z ll ,

1916 .

nhoff dam 1919 Meule Amst . a u n on . Col s Bre g , er ,

Seichi N aruse o o 1916 . Tolstoi . , T ky , unautho i ed t ans at ons And many other r z r l i . 3 6 8 ROMAIN ROLLAND

GREEK

e ans at d Niramos . 1920. B ethoven. Tr l e by

WORKS ON ROMAIN ROLLAND

FRENCH

om o an E t ait e ses oeu es c Jean Bonne rot. R ai n R ll d ( x r s d vr ave int odu tion io a i ue ahi s du ent e Ne s r c b gr ph q ) , C er C r , ver ,

1909 .

i i t ai es P r n 1911 L u en Maur . u es it . e i . c y F g r l ér r r , H e in r H i i d la i a u an ai du ro R t e . sto e tt t se I . . g re l ér re fr c mant me 5 ou r G a set is n os s . . s 1911 . j B r , l t les Berta ut ma d n u au Iec e. S anso u . Les n ie s u o v S J ro c r e ,

1912 .

’ i e d mm t Poeu re n e l . o n v O Paul S Romain R a o e . e pp ll , l h e ll 3 dorff , 191 .

ri m o an a s 1914. Mar Elder. P c Ro ain R d . ll , m r i Pé u au Ro bert D re us . ait es onte o a ns . d yf M r c p ( g y, Cl el,

Snares Romain Ro and . Pa is 19 14. , ll ) r , é mait i u Dan iel H al v . ue ue ou eau a y ! lq s n v x res . C h ers d er i i e 1914. entr . u C e F g , sh u rs m o Vu a a t i i D wel a ve . Ro ain R and . e st u e G. ll c r c ér q e d ’ ’ omm t l muvre Ed de la i u i e l h e e de . . Belg q e art stiqu et 3 itt ai e uss s 191 or 1914. l ér r , Br el ,

Paul So uda . Le d me i o o hi ues Ro i Ro la y s ra s ph l s p q de ma n l nd.

Emi e Pau Paris 19 14. l l, , ' ’ a o hs tatter Ess ai s ur l muvre de omai n . R R M x H c n olla d. r 81 1914 ba h Pa is G o o . G e a Fisch c er e C en v . , ; rg , ,

mai o and . ehe r n a H enri Guilbeaux. Pou Ro n R be Ge ev r ll J , , 19 1 5 .

is Mass is m o an n an . ou Pa . Ro ain R d o t la ll c re Fr ce Fl ry, r ,

1915 .

3 70 RO MAIN ROLLAND

W l K h a iib a te r uc ler. ie o t er R . Ro nd H n i Bar V r V r r ge lla , e r u v U ii rzb ur 1919 sse it . n uh. W . b , Fr z r g,

’ MUSIC CONNECTED WITH ROMAIN ROLLAND S WRITINGS

Pa l D u in a - h e ie u . e n isto . ois ou ia o p J C r ph (Tr p ces p r p n . ) ’ 1 L n le tfried dia o h i . o c Go u e t ( l g e av c C r stophe ) . “ ” Medi ti n s ur u a a i 2 . a ta o n p ss ge du M t n .

3 . e e s a B rceus e d Loui . hant u Pe e in ian o et an Pa o de Paul C d l r (p ch t ) . r les

D m e s a i 1907. G a Ed . e P e dt. t s rh r , r ,

- Paul D u in ean h isto e. uit ou u atuo a p . J C r ph (S e p r q r

c ordes . ) m ’ l L a o de l onc e tt i d. 1 . rt Go fr e

2 . i n a ti B e venue u pe t.

danez a is 1908 . Ed . ena t et Rou P S r , r ,

i D ans le a din t . ian o Paul D u n . Pasto a e a ine . 1 . P p r l , S b J r e

an i tion ou ian o et vio on . Ed. et quatuor. Tr scr p p r p l 8 ena t et Roudanez Paris 190 . S r , , en n du l er D o e Le riom e de la i e t . e a A b t y n . T ph L b r é (Sc fi le

ua ui et P i de la vi de Paris 19 13 . o i ! torze J ll ) r x lle , (S l ,

O Ed du Par . eu s . . A . rchestre et Cho r ) Le c, is INDEX

e the Batt e 266 290 291 Biblio ra 3 5 7 Abov l , , , , g phy , ff.

- - 293 6 297 305 3 29 . Bio ra hies heroi 13 3 53 nu , , , g p , c, ; ’ l 12 ritten 15 - bb d onart e 5 . w 0 3 esse e . A J , , , ’ - - t 8 5 7 1 12. Bonn 3 5 140 141 A ér , 66 , 73 , 77 , 83 , 8 , , , , .

- - h 8 2 125 16 1 198 Bra ms 174. Aért, 77 , 8 3 5 , 1 1 , , , , , Bréal Mi hel 244 260 347. 3 5 , , , c , . A ntoinette in ean Chris to e 4 Breu n on Colas in Col reu , J ph , , g , , as B

- 16 5 175 212 224. non 241 5 3 3 19 s iritua , , , g , , ; p l inshi of th ean C i A r os Ren 3 12 3 13 . wi hr s to he c , é , , k p , J p , e f nd l f man in 244-48 s ee Colas Breu non rt lov o a ove o . A , , k d , ; g ’ Brune tiere 1 20 e i ual it in Rollan s 6 . ; p c q y d , , - Bur khar ko 1 6 3 6 6 6 7 moral or e in t a b 6 . , ff ; f c c d , J , ’ ’ B n 2 Rollan s 6 3 If Tols toi s views ro 75 . d , ; y ,

- on 18 20 un iversalit of 26 . , ; y , ' “ ” A u -d ess us de la mélee s ee A bove Cahiers de la uinzaine 20 40 , q , , , l th B tt e . 14 e a 43 , 5 0, 3 .

in s 2. l ux eu l es assas s 3 3 ali u a 73 . A p p é , C g , “ ” Carmel le 1 , , 3 3 .

Ba h Frie emann 173 . Carnot 99 . c , d , , '

B h h bast ian 1 3 245 . C aes in a o ann Se 7 l A ért 8 7. c , J , , , ,

Balla es ran ais es 25 0. Clame birth la e of Ro an 3 d l g , cy , p c ll d , ,

Bal a 6 4 6 5 16 9 177 250. 4 99 . z c , , , , , , B r s M uri e au e ar e a 5 9 6 2. C l Paul 8 9 44 5 9. , c , , l d , , , , ’ ’ B au uin Charle 3 1 r m t l toir o s 3 . C e a baul his e d une con d , , l ,

- Beethoven 50 13 7 ff 140 3 15 0. s ien e l bre endant la uerre , , , , c c i p g , B ethoven 10 18 19 40 45 6 7 e , , , , , , ,

104 140- 143 144 145 147 148 Clerambaul t A enor in G erem , , , , , , , g , l

15 1 16 1 1 172 174 175 18 2 b t 1 - , , 6 3 , , , , , aul , 3 0, 3 3 9 3 47. 245 25 2 2 3 28 es tival 3 5 Cleramb ault Maxime ff 3 5 343 . , , , ; f , , , , ’ influen e of on Rollan s hil Cli f or Genera in A D a Wi c , d c d f d, l , y ll ’ h ff hristo he s oo 5 ean C Come 120 121 125 . d, ; J p , , ,

- res emblan e to 173 . Colas Breu non 241 15 3 3 3 7 as c , g , , ; Be nnin o r e 4 an artis ti ro u tion 249 -5 1 i s e a Th 3 . g g f Op , , c p d c , ; Bel i nt 2 auloise ries in 2496 1 ori in ue s an a e la 28 . g q gl , , g , ; g

- Berlio 10 1 of 241 43 . z, , 50. , 3 D! INDEX

’ Com ie Fran aise 71 74. 130 Peo e s T eate - éd c , , ; pl h r, 8 5 130 nscien s t Co e , or of in Cleram o ems 28 tra e ie s of ai c y , p , ; g d f th,

ult - - ba 3 3 9 47 ; s ee Free om of 76 8 5 unkn own le 71 -75 d ; cyc , . 11 0 0 8 0 10 110 0 . rames hilos o hi ues 125 D p p q , . Co m eille , 91 92. Dre us a fai r 3 8 3 9 106 11 , yf f , , , , 5 ,

Couthon 99 . , 1 19, 13 3 . Credo uia v rum 1 e 6 17. unois A me ee 3 12 q , , D , d , . Corinne in e n Chr t , l a is o he 211 . us e eanore 175 p , D , El , . C es of Rollan 7- 1 ycl , d, 6 7 .

’ ’ ’ Em éclo l r D p c e d Ag ig ente e t i dga Alembert, 8 7. de la haine 72 3 3 3 , , ff . ans e des mo rts 3 12. D , Etes - vous neutre evant le rime d c , - anton 41 101 106 9 113 117. D , , , , ,

- anto n 99 106 9 113 126 . D , , , , Debrit ean 3 13 , J , . eb us s 1 3 5 75 . D y, , Faber in L e triom e de la rais on , ph , eclaration of the in e en en e of 1 D d p d c 11 1 14 3 09 . , , ’ the min 1 - , 3 5 3 54. Fait in Roll an hil h d h, d s p oso p y of D s e ec rnest 174. y, E , i e 77- 79 8 1 16 6 - 71 244 8 l f , , ff, , ; ’ e e at S i nifi an e of in Rollan s , g , tra e ie f 7 - s o 6 8 5 . D f c c d g d , hiloso h of li e 6 1 6 2 8 3 fi p p y f , , , , Fellow s hi of ree s irits urin p, f p , d g 110 13 4 ff 13 9 ff , , . th - e w ar, 273 ff , 3 11 3 16 : 3 5 1, e ti m 297- e a s 3 03 . D f , D e Ma uet C au 1 e 3 3 . g , l d , Fétes d Be t v n e e o e les 141 . h , , “ ” 1 “ ” emain, 3 3 . D Feuille la 3 13 . , , D e s u anne re S 175 . p , z , laubert 1 F , 3 7, 58 , 8 0, 77. m ulin es o s 126 . D , Forerunn ers The 290 3 3 9 -3 34 , , , Des r s ernand 12 é 3 . p , F , ort aul 25 0. F , P , euts her Mus iker in Paris Ein D c , , Fourteenth o ul The 101 -2 f J y, , ,

174. - 103 5 109 . “ ” ,

euts he R unds au Die 305 . D c ch , , Fran e a ter 18 70 5 7 i ture of c , f , ; p c , C l s 01 D on ar o 1 . , in ean hris to he 21 1 - 216 J C p , D ostoievsk 2 3 46 y, , . Fran e A natole 58 84 1 6 9. c , , , ,

o en 105 . y , an C s r 5 D r a 17 . F k, é , ’

D O ron in The Wo ves 1 14. y , l , Fran Lu 1 wi 3 2 . k, d g, ’ rama and the masse s s ee eo le s D , , P p Free om of ons ien e 28 7 ff d , c c c , , Theater e roti vs oliti al ; c . p c , 25 7-9 1 19 274 28 5 8 298 , , , , ff, m he v l n 127 ff : ra a o f t Re o utio , - D 3 20 3 3 9 47 vs . the atherlan ff , ; f d , - - 1 6 9 70 86 99 100 8 . , , , s h m h eas n ee T e Triu p of R o . ramati writin s of Rollan 25 g , , , Fren h literature state of a ter D c d c , , f 3 2 3 9 41 5 7- 130 ; ra tsman , , c f 18 70 3 7 58 E. , , sh of 127- 130 le s 6 7- 71 p , ; cyc , ; Fren h Revolution 6 8 98 3 100 i c , , , rama of he Revolution 100 t , 120 121 122 s ee rama of the D , , ; D

3 74 INDEX

71 ara ters of 172-5 eni ma ev - e ; ch c , ; g L Co ur, in ean C risto he y J h p , of reative wor 18 1 - 7 Fran e 175 205 224 c k, ; c , , , . i ture of in 211 - 16 enera L e 14 uillet s ee Fourte p c , , ; g J , enth of ti ons onfli tin i eas of in ul The , c c g d , J y, .

229 -34 German i tur e of in ib ert ara t ; y, p c , , L , eri ation of Fran e y ch c z c ,

- - 217 220 tal i ture of in 211 16 . ; I y, p c ,

- - L 221 3 ews the, in 2248 ; mes ife of Mic ae An e o The 40 ; J , , h l g l , , ,

- - e of 15 7 15 9 mus i orm 144 46 . sag , ; c , f and ontent of 177-8 0 ori in of Li e o Timol en c , ; g f f i , 13 1.

- - - 16 2 5 writin of 43 44 16 2 5 . L luli 3 00 3 3 5 -3 38 ; g , i , , , 3 3 9. ean Christo he 26 3 1 38 40 42 Lou s les s ee The ol J p , , , , , , p , , W ves . 43 49 50 6 5 6 8 76 97 15 3 L ux A ams 101 111 112 3 09 , , , , , , , , , d , , , , .

- 15 7 23 7, 241 246 25 7 258 260 L eum of Loui s he Grea , , t t 8 . , , , yc ,

3 17 3 36 3 40, 3 42 and Gra ia Ma ame Bovar , , ; z , d y, 6 4. 200- 1 ; and his ellow men 203 - 6 Mahler Gus tave f , ; 3 5 175 . , , , and his eneration 229 -3 6 and g , ; Mannheim u it in C r , J d h, Jean h is he nations 0 - 0 a o stle of t , 2 7 1 ; p to phe, 226 . r e 18 3 as he arti st and o , 9 ; t Marat f c 101 . , reator 188 -94 ara ter of c , ; ch c , Martinet Mar e 3 12 , c l, . 172- 75 ontras t t o livier ; c , Masereel r n O a 3 13 . ' , F z, 1 fi 95 . Mau assant 13 58 5 p , , , 64, 91, 26 , 1 0.

ouve 28 7 3 12 3 13 . , , , M ini 1 1 J a 5 222 . zz , , usti e roblem of onsi ere b J c , p , c d d y Meis ters in r D g e , ie, 92.

R ollan in re us ase 3 9 vs . d D yf c , ; Mesni l ues a 3 12. , J cq ,

the atherlan s ee The Wo ves . f d , l Meun ier, 8 7. l t e Meutre des i es l 297. é , ,

Kau mann Emil 174. f , , ee 212 Meyerb r, .

Keller Go tt rie 16 9 177. , f d , , Mi helan elo 6 7 71 144-6 147 c g , , , , ,

Kleist 73 92. , , 2 4 148 , 15 1 , 16 1 , 18 , 2 5 . ris t Kohn S lvain in ean C op e, , y , J h h h e 1 Mi el t 3 . c , 212, 224. Millet, 8 7, 50. raf t ean C risto e s ee ean K f , J h ph , J Mirbeau, 8 5 . t Chris ophe. Moliere , 92.

ono Gabriel 13 16 26 73 . M d , , , , u a e as obs ta e t o intema Lang g , cl amin 3 Mon O ncle Benj , .

m 29 if . tional is , 2 tes n la 73 1 19. Mon pa , , , La are Bernar 3 9 143 . z , d, , n n Chris to he 224. Moo h, i ea p , L b end eine r I ealistin c J e ens A b d , Moreas , 175 . D er 27 73 . , , ’ Lieutenant 306 . Mornet, , Lég ende d e Saint Julien l H ospi - oun et Sul l 74. M y, tolier, 8 0.

Mo art 5 173 . Letters of Rollan urin war z , , , d, d g , earl infl uen e of on Rol Mus ic, y c , - 3 17 19. INDEX 3 75

an 4 orm and ontent in Parsi al 3 0 8 1 2 6 191 . l d, ; f c f , , , , l ean Chris to he 177-8 0 art of Pé u Charles 14 p ; p g y, , , 20, 3 8 , 3 9, 5 9, ’ R ollan s rama 104 Rol 115 14 d d ff ; , 3 . ’ ’ ’ lan s love of 47 Rollan s eo le s Theater The 41 6 5 13 3 d , ; d P p , , , , , ’ hilo s o h o f 13 2- 3 Tolstoi s 6 8 88 4- 9 p p y , ; , . 9 7. mati t h s ti a ion of 19 . illi e harles L g ouis 44 91 . z P pp , C , , ’ Mus i ens d autr o 3 i e is 34 3 5 18 . Philos o of i e of Roll an ee c / , , , phy l f , d, s A rt of Rolland ; Conscience ; ati onalisti school of writers e eat si nifi an e of Faith N c D f , g c c ; ;

5 9 6 0 6 2 . Free om of Consc ien e G , , d c ; reat

ationalis m 208 3 217- 20 225 n ess will to atre am ai n N , ; , , ; H d , c p g against ; Idealis m ; Internation ali s m us ti e tru men aturalism 15 . S le ele t N , ; J c ; gg , “ l of Su e ri n s i nifi an e of. eues ater an 306 . N V d , ; ff g, g c c Pi uart 9 1 1 iet s he 2 26 3 7 16 2 174 177 c 3 5 . N z c , , , , , , , q , ,

- Perr tin in o lerambault 344. 217 20 25 5 3 3 2. , , , C ,

7 Pioch Geor e s 3 12. N io bé, 3 , 74. , g , Poli hinell in L b e 7 e ilul i 3 3 7. o el a e ri e 2 0. N p c p z , c , , ormal S hool 10 1 1 12- 17 13 Pr curs eurs les s ee The Fare N c , , , , , é , ,

runners . 14, 23 , 29 , 3 2, 16 2. ’ Pretre de N emi le 125 otre ro hain l ennemi 297. , . N p c , ,

Prinz von H ambur D er 92. ovalis 16 9. g, , N , Proven ale Fran e s o 34 z , c c , .

enba h 212. Off c , uesnel in L es Lo 1 1 livier in ean Chris to he 6 1 ! , ups, 4. O , J p , ,

7 17 195 - 9 6 8 , 76 , 78 , 84, 1 6 , 9 , , Ra ine 1 9 92 . 200 201 205 214 if 220 224, c , , , , , , , ' R auber 2 44 246 25 7 26 0 26 4 Die , 9 . 225 , 23 3 , 2 , , , , , , Red Cross in Swit er an 268 ii 26 7 28 3 3 09 3 18 , 336 340 . , z l d, , , , , '

livier Ge or es in ean Chris 26 9 fi. O , g , J

Renai ss an e 24 25 68 71 . tophe, 23 3 . c , , , , Ren aitour 12 i i r 85 . 3 . Ofiz e e, Die, ,

re 72. Renan 12 13 25 3 7 125 if 176 O rati on on Shakespea , , , , , , , , 196 214 3 09 O rfeo, 3 3 . , , . “ ’ n s t atre i ue mod R evue de art ramati ue 3 5 O rigi e du he lyr q l d q , ,

erne , les , 3 2, 183 . 88 . “ 0 ” 74 a 25 141 . O rs ino , 72. , R evue de P ri s , , u on Fran ois e in ean C ris Robes ierre 99 101 108 113 117 O d , c , J h p , , , , , ,

7 . 126 . tophe, 5

Rollan Ma eleine 3 . d , d , a mi li e of Pa ifis m 26 2 H. Rollan R omai n a e c , d, , c d c f , P s 2- 42 a o es en e Paine T omas 150. in ari 3 3 5 , h , , ; d l c c 3 fi5 INDEX

- of, 3 11 an estr of 3 and his Rouss eau ; c y , ; , 275 .

‘ e o h 5 7-6 2 and the ean p c , ; Europ Rous sin in ean Chris to he , J p , 176 . s irit 5 2 5 3 a e a to Pres i p , , ; pp l R oute en a ets ui monte l l c q , a, 33 0. ent Wilson 348 - 50 as e m di d , ; bo ment of uro e an s irit 5 23 E p p , ; St. C risto e 15 7 h ph , .

- art of 6 3 6 at aris 3 2 - , ; P , 5 , 3 6 ; Saint us t s eud 3 1 108 J , p , 9, 84, 01 . . attitu e of urin the war 25 7 d , d g , 1 13 126 . , 3 5 5 am ai of a ains ha re ; p gn , g t t S ai nt Louis 8 - c d 77 80 8 2 8 3 . , , , 297- 303 hil hoo of 3 7 con ; c d d , ; 125 244. , trovers of wit H au tmann 277 y , h p , Sa viati 24. l , on en th 8 0 ; orresp e of, wi Saur s c d c An r 14 15 3 9. é , d é, , , Ve h e - r aer n 28 1 4 ; es of 6 7 S arlatti A less an ro cycl c , d , 3 4. 75 i r n r ; a of, uri g the wa , S herm ann 3 30 . d y d c , 3 27-28 ram a of the ev ution ; d r ol , S heurer Kestner 3 9 115 . c , , , 100-3 0 ramati writin s 25 28 ; d c g , , , S iller 73 86 8 7 90 92 95 97 ch , , , , , , , , 5 7 13 0 re f us ase 38 4 7 , ; y c , , 1 - 1 12 1 D 00 3 15 5 193 96 . , , , , ame 49 50 5 1 48 ather of f , , , , ; f , hube r 17 1 S t 5 80. c , , 6 rien s hi s 13 - 15 25 26 - 28 ; f d p , , , , h S ul ro . in ean hr tO he c z, P f J C is p , 3 11 -3 16 heroi bio ra hi es 133 ; c g p , 4 17 , 204. 15 3 human itari anism of 3 07 3 ; , ; ei el aul S pp , P , 50, 16 5 , 172 . i ealism of 6 0 3 influence of d , ; , in Sever e , 3 12. urin the war 3 20-3 26 3 5 5 6 d g , , ; Sha es eare 5 6 10 14 15 18 k p , , , , , , , ififluence of Tolstoi on 19 - 22 , ; 2 24 15 6 4 9 72 92 100 3 , , , , 6 , , , , e an Christo he 15 7-23 7 etters p , ; l J 123 125 150 . , , of urin the war 3 17-3 19 , d g , ; Si onie in ean Chris to he 213 . d , J p , arria e of 3 5 41 73 134 m g , , , , ; Mantoue l 73 . Sieg e de , e, mas s s uggestion in writings of, Sorbonne , 3 2, 33 . - 26 1 26 6 3 29 47 mother of 3 , , , ; , ’ S ouven irs d enfance et de j eu 27 ; newspaper wr iting of 28 9

nes s e 12. 2 o onents of urin the , 29 pp , d g

S ino a 10 13 18 . w ar 304- 10 ortrait of 46 47 p z , , , , ; p , , ;

r61e of in ellowshi of ree Stendahl 16 9 177. , f p f , , h w ar 273 3 S irits urin t e s u o 3 5 . p d g , ; Straus , H g , Rome 23 28 s hoolin of 5 - 17 ; , , ; g trin b er 2 126 3 . c S d g, , ’ s e lus ion 43 44 45 - 7 48 -49 c , , , , , ru le element of in R o an s St gg , , ll d n ifi n of li e work 3 24 ; sig ca ce f , hiloso h 222 246 3 . p p y, , 2 tra e ies of aith 76 8 5 ; un ; g d f , rin s i n ifi an e of in Rol Su3 e g, g c c , - 1 3 . written biograp ies , 150 5 ’ h hiloso h 133 - 13 6 18 1 land s p p y, , Ros si rnesto 24. , E , - 204 3 heroes of 7, 18 8 94 ;

L i i . Rossi , u g , 3 3 - 13 3 5 3 .

Rostan 1 17. d, t e l re u e of Ro an Swi z r and , f g ll d Rouanet 3 12. , - war 26 4 7. during the ,