understands the thesis numerically and so conscientiously that she believes that an impression in her eighth year is decisive for her whole life. She understands the next thesis, one loves only once, in the same way. This thesis is just as sophistical and just as elastic. One loves several times and each time denies the va- lidity of the previous times, and in this way one still insists on the rightness of the thesis that one loves only once.*?
So Emmeline maintains her numerically qualified thesis. No one can refute her, for anyone who risks it she declares to be devoid of sympathy. She must now learn by experience, and the experience refutes her. The question is how the poet is to be understood at this point. It turns out that she loves Rin- ville, not Charles. The answer to this question will be crucial The First Love 255 in determining whether the play is infinitely comic or finitely moralizing. As is known, the play ends with Emmeline’s turn- ing away from Charles, extending her hand to Rinville, and saying, “It was a mistake; I confused the past with the fu- ture.” Now, if the play is moralizing in the finite sense, as it probably is generally understood to be, then it is the poet’s in- tention to depict in Emmeline a childish, mixed-up girl who has the fixed idea that she loved no one except Charles but who now knows better, is healed of her sickness, makes a sensible match with Mr. Rinville, and lets the spectator hope for the best for her future, that she will become a diligent housewife etc. etc. If this is the intention, then The First Love is changed from a masterpiece to a theatrical triviality, on the assumption that the poet has somewhat motivated her improvement. Since that is not the case, the play, regarded as a whole, be- comes a mediocre play, and it must be lamented that the bril- liant details in it are wasted.
That Scribe in no way has motivated her improvement, | shall now show. Rinville resolves to pass himself off as Charles. He manages to deceive Emmeline. He enters com- pletely into the sentimentality of the supposed Charles, and Emmeline is beside herself with joy. Therefore, it is not with his own person that Rinville charms her but with Charles’s Sunday best. Indeed, even if it had been the real Charles in- stead of the pretended one, even if he had looked exactly like Rinville, the entrance of this character would have provided no new motive for loving. On the contrary, she loves him with an objective, mathematical love, because he fits the image she herself has formed. Rinville, then, has really made no impression at all on Emmeline. How powerless he is becomes manifest in her not loving him when he does not have the ring and loving him again when he does have it, from which it seems probable that for Emmeline this ring is a magic ring and that she would love anyone who showed up with this ring. When Emmeline finally learns that Charles is married, she de- cides to marry Rinville. Now, if this step is in any way sup- posed to suggest a change in her—indeed, even more, a change for the better—then, on the one hand, Rinville would have to 228 I 229 256 Either/Or, I have succeeded in pleasing her with his own charm, which in the play would have to be seen to be of better quality than Charles’s; on the other hand, he would have to have succeeded in dissipating and transfiguring her theoretical stubborness about the absolute validity of the first love. Neither of these is the case. Rinville appears as Charles and pleases her only be- cause he resembles him. And her picture of Charles is not a grandiose fantasy piece that only a poetic character could sat- isfy—no, her ideal Charles is identified by a host of inciden- tals, especially by a ring on the finger. Rinville appeals to her only because of his resemblance to Charles, and he does not exhibit a single charm of his own that could make an impres- sion on Emmeline. She does not see Rinville at all but only her own Charles. She is at the point where she loves Charles and detests Rinville; she does not decide which of them is more at- tractive by seeing them—that was decided long before. When Charles appears as Rinville, she finds him “‘disgusting.””1 The spectator must agree that she is right in this judgment, but it does not seem to be the poet’s intention to make much of this. She knows that he is disgusting before she looks at him; she has only to look at him and finds it confirmed. Instead, the poet wants to show her judgment about the supposed Rinville to be arbitrary and therefore lets it be parodied continually by the father’s judgment. The father finds nothing at all appealing in the supposed Charles, but he finds the supposed Rinville very attractive—the daughter just the reverse. He finds it so because he wants it to be so, as she does also. That she is right is apparent to the spectator, but her judgment is nonetheless sheer arbitrariness, and the situation thereby acquires so much comic power.
Rinville does not succeed in triumphing over her theory, either. Charles is married, and consequently she cannot have him* unless he wants to grapple with the authorities. She mar- * Another way out, perhaps, would be for Emmeline to have the idea that she would be content with half of Charles’s love. We have, of course, seen something like this in novels, and it is not inconceivable that the idea could dawn on Emmeline in all its clarity. It is altogether remarkable that there is no female counterpart to Don Quixote in all European literature. Is the age not The First Love 257 ries Rinville for two reasons—partly to have revenge on Charles, partly to obey her father. These reasons do not seem to indicate a change for the better. If she does it to have revenge on Charles, this indeed shows that she continues to love Charles. The theme is altogether in keeping with the logic of the novel, and she can by no means be regarded as healed. If she does it to obey her father, then either a seriousness must have entered her soul, repentance and deep sorrow over hav- ing allowed herself to make fun of a father who had only one weakness, that of being too good to her, but this would con- tradict the whole play—or her obedience is based on the coin- ciding of her father’s will and her whim, and then again she has not changed.
In the play, then, there is not the slightest perceptible sug- gestion that her choice of Rinville is supposed to be more sen- sible than anything else she has done. Essentially, Emmeline is infinitely silly, and she is just as silly at the end as at the begin- ning, and therefore one can be unreservedly entertained by the comic effect of the play, an effect that originates in the contin- ual opposition of the situation against her. She is no more im- proved at the end of the play than Holberg’s Erasmus Mon- tanus.‘? She is too much a theoretician, too good a dialectician (for every person who has a fixed idea is a virtuoso on one string), to allow herself to be persuaded empirically. Charles has been untrue to her, and she marries Rinville, but her ro- mantic conscience does not reproach her. If Aunt Judith were still alive, Emmeline would dare to come up to her and calmly declare, ‘I do not love Rinville, I have never loved him; I love only Charles, and I still say that one loves only once and the first love is the true love; but I do respect Rinville, and that is why I have married him and obeyed my father’’ (see scene 14).*° Then Judith would answer, “You are so right, my child; in a footnote, the textbook sanctions this step. It says: When the lovers cannot have each other, they should go on living quietly, and even though they do not have each other their reyet mature enough for that; has not the continent of sentimentality yet been discovered?
I 230 231 258 Either/Or, I lationship should have the same meaning as if they did have each other, and their lives should be just as beautiful and in all respects be regarded as a life together. This I know from my own experience. My first love was a teachers college graduate, but he could not find a position. He was my first love and be- came my last; I died unmarried and he without a position. But when one party is untrue to the other, then the other has per- mission to marry, but in such a way that she does it on the ba- sis of respect.”
Therefore, since there is the choice between reducing Scribe’s play to a triviality by insisting that there is something in it that cannot be established or delighting in a masterpiece by being able to explain everything, the choice seems easy. The play is not moralizing in a finite sense but witty in an in- finite sense; it has no finite purpose but is an infinite jest with Emmeline. Therefore, the play does not end. Since the new love for Rinville is motivated only by a mistaken identity, it is altogether arbitrary to have the play terminate. Now, this is either a defect in the play or a merit. Here again the choice is easy. When the spectator thinks the play is over and that he has secured a good foothold, he suddenly discovers that what he is stepping on is not something firm but, so to speak, the end of a see-saw, and as he steps upon it he tilts the whole play up and over himself. An infinite possibility for confusion becomes manifest, because Emmeline, on the basis of her novel-educa- tion, is tibergreifende [encroaching] upon every qualification of actuality. That the real Charles was not her Charles, she has learned, but she will soon convince herself, when Rinville be- comes Rinville, that he is not that, either. Clothes make the man, and it is the romantic attire that she looks at. A new char- acter who resembles Charles may put in his appearance—and so on. If the play is interpreted in this way, then her concluding lines are even profound; whereas in the other case, to me at least, it is impossible to find any meaning in them. She de- notes, then, a change in movement. Previously, her illusion lay behind her in the past; now she will seek it in the world and in the future, for she has not given up the romantic Charles; but whether she travels forward or backward, her expedition The First Love 259 in search of the first love is comparable to the journey one takes in search of health, which, as we say, is always one post house ahead.
It will also be found appropriate that Emmeline provides no elucidation of her theory, which could otherwise be rightfully demanded. Ifa man changes his belief, an explanation is asked for; if he is a theoretician, one has a right to ask for it. Emme- line is no lay person; she is well read; she has a theory. By vir- tue of this she has loved Charles; she has advanced the thesis that the first love is the true love. How will she make her way out of this? If she says that she has never loved Charles but that Rinville is her first love, then she contradicts herself, since she actually believes that Rinville is Charles. If she says: The first love was a childish game; the second love is the true love— then one readily perceives that she slips away only through a sophism. If she says: It has nothing to do with numbers, whether it is number one or number two; true love is some- thing else entirely—then one must ask what attraction she has found in Rinville, since the alert observer has not discovered anything other than that he was so courteous as to impersonate Charles in order to please her. If the play is really over, then it is reasonable to ask for an explanation of all this. If, however, it is the poet’s intention that the play be endless, then it is un- reasonable to ask for an explanation from Emmeline, since she herself has not yet arrived at a clear understanding of these things.
The interest centers on Emmeline and her illusion. To bring about a collision is easy enough. I shall now place three char- acters, Charles excepted, in relation to one another for a mo- ment and see how far we are able to go in this way. The father wants to see Emmeline married and cared for. She refuses every proposal. Finally, he suggests young Rinville, recom- mends him more warmly than anyone else, even pretends to have made up his mind. Emmeline admits that she loves an- other, namely, Charles. Rinville comes, receives the letter, hits upon the idea of passing himself off as Charles.
So far, the play could manage with three characters, and we would not lose one of the most comic situations in the play— 232 233 260 Either/Or, I the recognition scene. Here I can promptly take the opportu- nity to show how Scribe has everything come out in the situ- ation. Emmeline never airs her sentimentality in a monologue but always in dialogue and situation. We do not hear her rave in solitude about Charles. Not until the father presses her hard must she confess, which contributes to making her sentimen- tality appear in a better light. We do not hear her in a mono- logue repeating to herself her reminiscences of love; that takes place only in the situation. Her feelings tell her at once that Rinville is Charles, and now she goes through with him all the old memories. A more comic situation can scarcely be imag- ined. Rinville is a man of the world, and with the help of some very few particulars about Emmeline’s state of mind he quickly sees that her cousin Charles is a very nebulous and mythical character. In her imagination, she has painted a pic- ture of Charles that can match everyone, just as the faces painted by one of the several Wehmiillers** match every Hun- garian. The portrait of Charles is just as abstract as that paint- er’s National-Gesichter [national facial types]. This portrait, some broad formulas, not to forget a little verse,* are the re- sult of her novel-education. Thus the imposture is made fairly easy for Rinville and is inordinately successful.
A comedy could be constructed around these three charac- ters and their relation to one another. Rinville had perceived that, although as Rinville he stood in high favor with the fa- ther, it was nevertheless more important to please the daugh- ter, whose beck and call everyone in Derviére’s house obeyed. So he would go on passing himself off as Charles. In that way he would secure a foothold in the family and would have the opportunity to enthrall the girl for himself. He dared to count on Emmeline’s control over her father, and when she had ex- torted her father’s consent, he would so enthrall her that she would not hesitate again.
The defect in this plot is obvious. To bring his daughter to confess her secret, Derviére must have exerted great pressure on her, for otherwise she could just as well have confessed it the first time he spoke to her at all about marriage. Conse- quently, the father has had many reasons for desiring Rinville The First Love 261 The First Love 261 as ason-in-law. The more zealous he is, the more tense the re- lationship becomes and the less probable it is that he will con- sent to her taking Charles. On the other hand, there must be a dramatic probability of Emmeline’s making a mistake. This the poet has achieved by having Charles expected and has so arranged things that she herself brings the news—and at the very same moment the supposed Charles is there. Her father’s dilemma and eagerness to conceal Charles’s arrival strengthen even more her belief that it really is Charles.
Now I shall pick up the fourth character to show the excel- lence of the structure and how the one situation surpasses the other in the comic.
Charles hurries home as the prodigal son in order to cast himself into his uncle’s arms, to get rid of his cousin, and to have his debt paid. But to accomplish all this, he must be in- cognito. Just as almost every situation is an infinitely witty mockery of Emmeline’s sentimentality, so almost every situ- ation is also an equally witty mockery of Charles’s mystifica- tion. He arrives home full of confidence in his talent for mys- tifying. He believes that it is he who is carrying on the intrigue, he who mystifies, and yet the spectator sees that the intrigue was afoot before Charles appeared, for Rinville has al- ready passed himself off as Charles. So the intrigue includes Charles; Rinville’s mystification forces Charles into his mys- tification, and yet Charles thinks that it originates with him. Now the play is in full swing, a crisscrossing of situations al- most mad in mischievousness. All four characters are mu- tually mystified. Emmeline wants to have Charles; Charles wants to be rid of her; Charles the mystifier does not know that Rinville is impersonating him and trying in every way to enthrall the girl. Rinville is not mindful that Charles as Rin- ville is disparaging him in every way; Derviére prefers Rin- ville, but the person he prefers is Charles; Emmeline prefers Charles, but the person she prefers is Rinville. Thus the whole operation disintegrates into nonsense. What the play revolves around is nothing; what comes out of the play is nothing.
Emmeline and Charles counteract each other, and yet they 234 I 235 262 Either/Or, I both achieve the very opposite of what they wanted: she wins Rinville, and he, who wanted to mystify, betrays everything.
At every theater where The First Love is performed, I dare- say that there is much laughter, but I think I may assure the theater-going public that there is never laughter enough. To recall an old story,® if I were to say of a person who laughed very heartily that either he is mad or he is reading or, perhaps closer to the truth, he is watching The First Love, I do not be- lieve I am saying too much. Sometimes one laughs at some- thing and regrets it at almost the same moment, but the situa- tions in this play are such that the more one becomes absorbed in them the more ludicrous, the more lunatic, they prove to be. Since the situation in itself is extremely ludicrous, the witty lines themselves show up all the more superbly.
That Scribe can write lines is too well known to need say- ing. Admire him for it, but he is to be admired even more for the virtuosity with which he knows how to fit them into the situation so that the lines arise out of the situation and in turn elucidate it. If on a rare occasion one of his lines is a bit less cor- rect, he immediately buys indulgence with its wittiness. It must be remembered, however, that | am not speaking of all the plays by Scribe but only of The First Love.
With the introduction of the fourth character, an utterly dra- matic fermentation commences in the material. One need not fear that the material will lack life but rather that the life will become too giddy and disinclined to obey the reins. Every sit- uation must have its time, and yet the play’s inner agitation must be discerned in it. In conclusion, I shall now show that Scribe is a master at this by going through the particular situ- ations. The reader must forgive me if I become a bit too prolix; it is due to my jealousy on Scribe’s behalf and to my lack of confidence in the reader. My jealousy on Scribe’s behalf whis- pers to me that he can never be adequately understood; my lack of confidence in the reader makes me believe that in cer- tain passages he does not see everything. The comic is com- monly thought to be more a matter of the moment than is the tragic. We laugh at it and forget it, whereas we often turn back to the tragic and become immersed in it. The comic and the The First Love 263 tragic can be either in the lines or in the situation. Some people prefer to linger over the lines, to preserve them in memory, to return to them often. Others prefer to linger over the situation and to reconstruct it for memory. The latter are the contem- plative natures. Nor will they deny that a comic situation has something just as satisfying to the intuition, indeed, that the comic, if, that is, it is artistically correct, tempts one to become absorbed in it more than in the tragic. I have heard and read many tragedies, but I can remember only a very particular line, and this, too, concerns me less; on the other hand, I can sit very quietly and become absorbed in the situation. I shall take an example. When Clarchen in Goethe’s Egmont learns that Egmont is imprisoned, she goes to talk to the Hollanders to incite them to rebellion.*” She is convinced that her elo- quence will agitate them, and yet the Hollanders stand there just like Hollanders, unmoved, thinking only of evading her. I have never been able to remember one word of her lines, but to me the situation has been unforgettable from the first time I saw it. As a tragic situation, it is perfect. The beautiful young girl, poetic in her love for Egmont, animated by Egmont’s whole being—one would think her able to move the whole world, but no Hollander understands her. The soul rests with infinite sadness in a situation like that, but it does rest—contemplation is completely in repose. The comic situation, to be sure, has a similar continuance for contemplation, but at the same time reflection is in motion within; and the more it dis- covers—the more infinite the comic situation becomes inside itself, so to speak—the dizzier one becomes, and yet one can- not stop staring into it.
The situations in The First Love are precisely of this kind. Their first impact already has a comic effect, but when they are reproduced for intuition, the laughter is quieter, yet the smile is more transfigured. One can scarcely keep from thinking about it again because it seems as if there is something even more ludicrous to come. This quiet enjoyment of the situation when one gazes into it, somewhat as a man smoking tobacco gazes into the smoke, is perhaps unfamiliar to some readers.
236 237 264 Either/Or, I That is not Scribe’s fault; if that is the case, the reader himself is at fault vis-a-vis Scribe.
Derviére puts strong pressure on Emmeline to marry Rin- ville; she admits her love for Charles, confesses the very in- nocent understanding on which she has lived with him, per- suades her father with sweet words to write a letter to Rinville containing a refusal. The servant is sent with the letter; the family refuses to see anyone; Rinville appears. Instead of in- structing the servants downstairs, Lapierre has put on his rid- ing boots. As a consequence, Rinville is admitted. Here Scribe, instead of having Mr. Rinville appear and announce himself, has from the outset achieved a not unwitty situation that contains just as much mockery of Derviére as of Emme- line. Rinville has received the letter and reads it. Here again is a situation. The letter is not, as is usually the case, one that is read to draw attention solely to its contents. It is in Mr. Der- viére’s house that the future son-in-law receives the refusal. Rinville makes his plan; Derviére comes in; Rinville poses as Charles.
Here we have a thoroughly comic situation. There could, of course, be no guest more unwelcome to Mr. Derviére than Charles. Rinville has no inkling of this. His whole intrigue, then, turns out to be a very unfortunate idea. The situation is a consequence not of Rinville’s posing as Charles but of his having made the most unfortunate choice he could make, even though he must of necessity believe that he has chosen the best. In the next place, the situation is a consequence of Der- viére’s having the excellent young Rinville in his house with- out suspecting it.
If one now pays attention to the lines, in and by themselves poetically fitting, one will again and again come to relish the situation in a higher potentiation, because in them the ludi- crousness of the situation becomes more and more apparent. Rinville starts out in a sentimental and emotional style. Whether this is artistically correct could seem doubtful. He is not acquainted with Charles and therefore cannot know which way would work the most deceptively. But he does have some conception of Derviére’s household and dares to deduce from The First Love 265 The First Love 265 that the character of the rest of the members of this family. If the beginning is regarded as incorrect, it cannot be denied that Scribe compensates for this weakness with the wittiness of the lines and the suspicion aroused in the spectator about the real Charles. What is incorrect about it is that Rinville’s first words* are so emotional that it seems as if he feared being not welcome, whereas Rinville, in accordance with what has pre- ceded, ought to believe he would be. Therefore, Rinville probably resembles the real Charles a bit too much.
Despite his stupidity otherwise, the uncle seems to have ap- praised Charles rather well; he thinks that with money he can rid himself of Charles and offers him six thousand francs a year instead of the earlier three thousand. This makes us involun- tarily think of the real Charles. He would have deemed himself very fortunate and would have gladly accepted this offer. The whole scene would have ended just as emotionally as it began; he would have thrown himself into his uncle’s arms and cried out: Yes, the bonds of nature and blood are sacred. But that is not good enough for Rinville; he continues in the tone in which he began, just as Charles would have expressed himself if he had not needed the six thousand francs. The uncle now decides to approach him amicably and win him over; he can- didly tells him the true state of affairs, gives a eulogy on Rin- ville, which because of the situation becomes a parody. The situation reaches its consummate peak when Derviére confides to Rinville that he has been trying to devise some scheme for making Emmeline aware of Rinville without awakening her suspicions.* The contrast is superb. Derviére wants to devise a scheme, and Rinville has already devised this scheme. Rin- ville’s scheme shapes the situation, and in this situation Der- viére’s lines are heard. Derviére himself admits that he is not » Perhaps an alert reader might think the play could properly end here. For what would be simpler than that Rinville would now identify himself to old Derviére and thus sail with a double wind, being taken for Charles by Emme- line and having Derviére know who he really is—Rinville. But we cannot blame Rinville for maintaining his incognito before Derviére, since just a few words from him are sufficient to show him that, if one is going to engage in an intrigue, one should never have Derviére a party to it.
238 266 Either/Or, I very ingenious; his scheme is very simple, if Charles will only be so kind as to leave. If this scheme were to succeed, Derviére would have done just about the most stupid thing he could do.
Rinville, however, does not leave; on the other hand, Emmeline enters with the news that a certain Mr. Zacharias* wishes to speak with her father about Charles, who is expected any moment. Her father’s embarrassment betrays everything, and she recognizes Charles. With this design, the poet gains a great deal. The first person the pretended Charles encounters is the uncle; he must be regarded as the one who is easiest to deceive. He is stupid, uneasy because Charles is coming, and therefore is all too disposed to believe the certainty of this dis- tressing event; he would never dream that anyone could think of passing himself off as Charles. As far as he is concerned, then, Rinville can be rather daring. But with regard to Emme- line it would be all too daring a venture, for she is always a good deal more sly. Moreover, it would be unseemly for Rin~ ville to disregard decorum altogether, and no less unseemly for Emmeline. Now, however, she has in her father’s embar- rassment the most reliable evidence that it is Charles. The rec- ognition takes place in her father’s presence, and Rinville does not have to do anything; instead of guarding his role, he can remain quite calm, for now Emmeline has had her eyes opened. She almost compels Rinville to be Charles, and to that extent he is without blame, and she herself is without blame, since her father is the one who has compelled her to take him for Charles. With this design, the poet has diffused over the situation a certain delicacy that removes anything objectiona- ble and makes it an innocent jest.