INTRODUCTION ' XVII

characters, they strengthen the main thesis by theïr example. The "reasoner" type, common in Dumas, is rare, though Maravon, in La course du flambeau, approximates it. The characters are carefully worked out and cover a fairly wide range. But owing to his inability to get out of hïs own skin, to identify himself with his créations, Hervieu has created no living, vivid character comparable with the créations of the jjreatest dramatists."

d. Style. — Partly for the same reason, the style is not always felicitous ; the characters talk too much Uke each othcr and too much like the a uthpr. The resuit of effort," the style sometimes smells of the lamp. It is not sufficiently simple and natural, the sentences are of over-perfect construction; it is, in short, a written rather than a spoken style. The dialogue is usually in the form of real conversation between two people, rather than the broken talk of a number; not infrequently it becomes, as sometimes in Corneille, a sort of mathematical démonstration.' 1 The talk of the minor characters is more natural, and under the stress of passion even that of the protagonists may become lifelike. .

Final Estimate. — Hervieu's greatest works are properly tragédies, though on the title-page he almost uniformly styled his plays by the colorless term piète." Critics hâve pointed out the essential resemblance to the classic tragedy of the seveateenth century: « the unity of plot, the logical structure, the simplicity of style, the absence of comic éléments, the clash of wills and passions, the power of fate." On the other hand,

« lb„ p. 113.

» "Je suis le contraire de l'improvisateur," Quoted in Bînet, loc. cil., p. 95. "Je travaille par volonté, parce que je m'en suis donné la consigne." It., p. ioz. Aller compoaing the scénario, Hervieu spent about one hnndred days in writing La couru du jlambcau.

n Dargan, loc. cit.

■ La patoUs rrtkiU is caUed " comédie dramatique" ; Bagatelle, "comMïe."

» Ct. Estève, tac 'it » 138.

" " L'esthétiqu

XVÏiî INTRODUCTION

Hervieu's plays do not, with £ew exceptions, observe the old unities of time and place; they are in prose, not verse; they are located in contemporary France, not in antiquîty ; they deal with private citizens, not royalty or heroes. M

Tn t^i's "domestic tragedy," Hervieu had had predecessors among the eighteenth-century writers of drame, Diderot and his contemporaries. But while Diderot's théories bear a striking resemblânce to Hervieu's, his plays are insufierably dull and undramatic. Hervieu was the first to succeed in this field of domestic tragedy. Brunetière said truly, in his welcoming address at the Académie: "You had assured yourself the honor of marking an epoch in the history of contemporary drama." " He early won popularity and retained ît to the end; it is said that none of his plays ever failed. While the twenty years between the death of Dumas fils, in 1895, and that of Hervieu, in 1915, was marked in France by a galaxy of brilliant dramatic authors, it may probably be said with truth that in that period two or three of Hervieu's plays were superior to any of his rivais' works." Just after his death, ît was said of him: "By the accuracy of his observation, by his keenness of moral insight, as well as by the vigorous sobriety of fais art, he is in Une with the great classic tradition. He has not confined himself to présent reality; beyond the customs of his times, he has perceived those gênerai laws that govern men of ail times. "" It is probable that the best of his work will- survive.

•* Hervieu himself demanded "la tragédie telle que les conditions modernes en suggèrent le renouvellement: non plus superbement drapée, mais contemporaine, raisonneuse, prosaïque, — non plus sanglante." /&., P- 734-

" Lee, cit., p. 318.

« Ségur, foc. cit., p. 101.

» Doumic, Revue des deux mondes, 15 novembre, 1015, p. 45t.