Octave Mirbeau’s passionate 1890 review proclaiming Maurice Maeterlinck’s ‘Princess Maleine’ a masterpiece superior to Shakespeare. A landmark piece of literary criticism that launched the Belgian symbolist’s career.
I know nothing about M. Maurice Maeterlinck. Where he is from, what he looks like – haven’t a clue. Whether he is old or young, rich or poor, I couldn’t tell you. All I know is that no man is more unknown than he; and I also know that he has created a masterpiece – not one of those pre-packaged “masterpieces” our young masters churn out daily, sung to the skies by every squawking lyre (or rather, every squawking flute) of our contemporary chorus – but an admirable, pure, and eternal masterpiece that alone would immortalise a name and see it blessed by all who hunger for beauty and greatness; a masterpiece of the sort that honest, tormented artists sometimes dream of writing in their moments of enthusiasm, and which they have never yet managed to write. In short, M. Maurice Maeterlinck has given us the most brilliant work of our time, the most extraordinary, and the most innocent too, comparable to – dare I say it? – superior in beauty to the finest of Shakespeare. This work is called Princess Maleine. Are there twenty people in the world who know it? I doubt it.
Before Princess Maleine, M. Maurice Maeterlinck had published Hothouse Blooms, strange and often admirable poems. All the art so perfectly realised in Princess Maleine can be found there in its raw state, like ore – but ore of incredible abundance and excessive richness. There are truly, amongst much that is perhaps unnecessary and overgrown, sensations never before expressed in literature; there is truly the inexpressible made manifest. Should some critic ever happen to crack open this book, he will no doubt accuse the author of being obscure, even decadent. And he will trot out those ancient jokes whose vulgar ease never fails to delight fools and people of good sense alike. The truth is that no one writes with greater clarity than M. Maeterlinck. To understand the intimacy of his thought and the strangeness of his analogies, one must, in a sense, marry oneself to his states of mind and live within him as he lives within things. It’s merely a matter of intelligence; a matter of soul too – not a soul that’s twin to his, but a soul that has sometimes felt as his does. Then this book lights up and illuminates us with dazzling clarity. And one is astonished only by this: that one couldn’t oneself give these thoughts, these visions, these sensations – so familiar and simple do they seem – the unexpected, luminous, and supremely delicious form they constantly assume under the pen of this vibrant sensitive who is, at the same time, a marvellous and unique artist.
I would love to quote, for the joy of some distant, unknown reader, many poems from this Hothouse Blooms, for the impression of unease and delight they leave on the mind is better felt than expressed in empty phrases. “The Hospital”, where reality is described, evoked, resurrected – with what mystery, what melancholy and tragic precision! – through the wandering nightmares of a patient; or that other poem, “Diving Bell”, which is, in its chosen and painful analogies, the most poignant cry of despair from a man imprisoned in his materiality whilst around him pass the dreams he will never reach. Unfortunately, I haven’t the space I would need. It’s especially in “Glances” that M. Maeterlinck’s talent best presents itself with all its characteristics of intense, profound, novel sensitivity:
Oh these poor, weary glances!
Both yours and mine,
And those no longer here, and those yet to come,
And those that will never arrive yet exist all the same.
Some seem to be visiting the poor on a Sunday,
Some are like homeless invalids.
Some are like lambs in a meadow covered with sheets;
And these strange glances,
Some beneath whose vault one witnesses a virgin’s execution in a closed chamber;
And those that make one think of unknown sorrows;
Of peasants at factory windows;
Of a gardener turned weaver;
Of a summer afternoon in a wax museum…
[…]
Pity those who emerge, with tiny steps, like convalescents into the harvest;
Pity those who look like children lost at dinnertime;
Pity the wounded man’s glances at the surgeon,
Like tents in a storm;
Pity the glances of the tempted virgin
And the virgin who succumbs…
And these eyes where illuminated ships sail away at full sail in the tempest,
And the picturesque quality of all these glances that suffer from not being elsewhere,
And those that no one will ever understand,
And these poor glances almost mute,
And these poor glances that whisper,
And these poor suffocated glances.
[…]
Oh! to have seen all these glances!
To have admitted all these glances
And to have exhausted mine in meeting them
And, henceforth, to be unable to close one’s eyes.
Do you know, even in Edgar Poe’s poetry, so admirably translated by M. Stéphane Mallarmé, anything as rare and sublime? And all these glances that henceforth haunt you – isn’t this, in miniature, the most complete, the most multiple, the most disturbing evocation of life’s infinite sadness, its infinite pity?
I hesitated for a long time before speaking of Princess Maleine. To leave her in her scrupulous obscurity, not to expose her – so frail, so chaste, so adorably beautiful – to the brutalities of the crowd, to the snickering of wits, to be just a few to enjoy her, that seemed better. And then I thought that there are, after all, somewhere, unknown souls to whom such a work would bring joy, and who would love me for revealing it to them – unknowns like those we encounter in our souls, who pass by in the distance without showing themselves, through our lives, and who are neither men of letters, nor painters, nor society people, nor anything we ordinarily revere, who are quite simply, I think, a distant and ignored emanation of our thought, our love, our suffering. It’s to them alone that I point out Princess Maleine.
Princess Maleine is a drama written, as the author declares, for a puppet theatre. Recount this drama in detail? I cannot. It would spoil its immense charm, diminish the immense terror into which it plunges souls. One must read it and, having read it, read it again. I believe that, for my part, I shall always reread it. Never, in any tragic work, has the tragic reached such vertiginous heights of horror and pity. From the first scene to the last, it’s a crescendo of horror that doesn’t slacken for a second and constantly renews itself. And when you close the book, it haunts you, leaves you bewildered and panting, and charmed too by the infinite grace, by the sad and pretty sweetness that circulates through this terror. To achieve this impression of total terror, M. Maurice Maeterlinck employs none of the means commonly used in theatre. His characters deliver no tirades. They are complicated in nothing – not in crime, nor in vice, nor in love. They are all little embryonic souls that whimper little complaints and emit little cries. And it turns out that the little complaints and little cries of these little souls are the most terrible, most profound, and most delicious thing I know, beyond life and beyond dreams. This is why I believe Princess Maleine superior to any of Shakespeare’s immortal works. More tragic than Macbeth, more extraordinary in thought than Hamlet, it possesses a simplicity, a familiarity – if I may say so – through which M. Maurice Maeterlinck shows himself a consummate artist beneath the admirable instinctive that he is: and the poetry that frames each of these scenes of horror is utterly original and new; more than that: truly visionary.
The subject of Princess Maleine is like the subjects of tales that nurses tell little children in the evening. It’s the story of a little princess, daughter of a king, betrothed to a prince, son of a king, and who, after a series of incredible misfortunes, dies strangled by a wicked queen. Before the absolute beauty of this work, I can say no more. To prove I have exaggerated nothing in my admiration, I would need to quote, quote again, any scene at random, for all offer surprises and incomparable grandeurs. To my regret, this is impossible. I will content myself with reproducing the last scene, which will give an idea of what this drama is in its entirety.
Princess Maleine is dead, strangled by Queen Anne, and old King Hjalmar has been forced by his wife to witness the strangling and help with it. His son, betrothed to Maleine, has avenged her by killing Queen Anne, and has stabbed himself. Nothing remains for old Hjalmar, nothing but these three corpses and the horror of this night of murder.
THE KING Oh oh oh! I haven’t wept since the deluge… But now I’m in hell up to my eyes. But look at their eyes… They’re going to leap at me like frogs.
ANGUS He’s mad.
THE KING No, no… but I’ve lost courage… And it’s enough to make the pavements of hell weep.
ANGUS Take him away… He can no longer bear to see this.
THE KING No, no, leave me… I dare not be alone anymore… Where then is beautiful Queen Anne?… Anne? Anne? She’s all twisted… I don’t love her at all anymore… My God, how poor one looks when dead… I wouldn’t want to kiss her now… Put something over her…
THE NURSE And over Maleine too… Maleine, Maleine? Oh oh oh!
THE KING I shall never kiss anyone again, in my life, since I’ve seen all this… Where then is our poor little Maleine? (He takes Maleine’s hand.) Oh! she’s cold as an earthworm… She descended like an angel into my arms… But it was the wind that killed her…
ANGUS Take him away, for God’s sake… Take him away…
THE NURSE Yes, yes…
A LORD Let us wait a moment.
THE KING Have you any black feathers?… We’d need black feathers to know if the queen still lives… She was a beautiful woman, you know… Do you hear my teeth?…
(Dawn enters the chamber.)
ALL What?
THE KING Do you hear my teeth?
THE NURSE It’s the bells, my lord…
THE KING But it’s my heart then… Yes, I loved them well, all three, you see… I should like to drink a little.
THE NURSE (bringing a glass of water) Here is water.
THE KING Thank you. (He drinks avidly.)
THE NURSE Don’t drink like that… You’re all in a sweat.
THE KING I’m so thirsty.
THE NURSE Come, my poor lord… I’ll wipe your brow.
THE KING Yes… Ow, you’ve hurt me…
THE NURSE Come, come… let us go.
THE KING They’ll be cold on the flagstones… She was a mother and then, oh oh oh… It’s a pity, isn’t it? A poor little girl… But it’s the wind… Oh! never open the windows… It must be the wind… There were blind vultures in the wind tonight… But don’t let her little hands trail on the flagstones… You’ll step on her little hands… Oh! oh!… take care.
THE NURSE Come, come. You must get to bed… It’s time… Come.
THE KING Yes, yes, it’s too hot here… Put out the lights, we’ll go to the garden; it will be cool on the lawn, after the rain. I need a little rest… Oh! here’s the sun.
(The sun enters the chamber.)
THE NURSE Come, come, we’ll go to the garden.
THE KING But we must lock up little Allan… I don’t want him coming to frighten me anymore.
THE NURSE Yes, yes, we’ll lock him up. Come, come…
THE KING Have you the key?
THE NURSE Yes, come.
THE KING Help me… I have a little trouble walking… I’m a poor little old man… The legs don’t work anymore… But the head is sound… (Leaning on the nurse.) Am I hurting you?
THE NURSE No, no, lean as hard as you like.
THE KING You mustn’t hold it against me, must you? I who am the oldest, I have trouble dying… There, there… Now it’s finished… I’m happy it’s finished, for I had everyone on my heart.
THE NURSE Come, my poor lord…
THE KING My God! My God! She waits now on the quays of hell.
THE NURSE Come, come.
THE KING Is there anyone here who fears the curse of the dead?
ANGUS Yes, sire, I…
THE KING Well then, close their eyes, and let us go.
THE NURSE Yes, yes, come.
THE KING I’m coming, I’m coming… Oh! how alone I shall be now. And here I am in misfortune up to my ears. At seventy-seven years… Where are you then?
THE NURSE Here, here.
THE KING You won’t hold it against me?… We’ll have breakfast; will there be salad?… I should like a little salad.
THE NURSE Yes… yes… there will be some.
THE KING And I don’t know why, I’m a little sad today… My God, my God, how unhappy the dead look.
(He exits with the nurse.)
And for more than six months since this book appeared, obscure, unknown, neglected, not one critic has honoured himself by speaking of it. They don’t know. And as a character in Princess Maleine says: “The poor never know anything.”
Octave Mirbeau, Le Figaro, 24 August 1890
This is one of 50+ rare French literary texts translated into English for the first time on this site.
Léon Hennique Novel 