Weird Tales Volume II Part 19

"So far about business; and now the earnest request that you will keep in mind and constantly before your eyes who and what I am, and let our business even be inspired with that spirit of cheerfulness and good-humour which always marked our intercourse with each other, and even in money matters prevented the dead, stiff, frosty mercantile style from coming to the surface. I am sure it was quite foreign to both of us, and could only excite in us such fear as we feel when set upon by an angry 'wauwau,' at which afterwards we can only laugh to each other."

This unwillingness, nay almost repugnance to look at things from their serious side, was quite characteristic of him. "But these are _odiosa_"

was a frequent phrase in his mouth.

On 9th December Seconda and his opera company once more repaired to Leipsic, and Hoffmann of course along with them. There on New Year's Day he was struck down by a severe attack of inflammation in the chest, aggravated by gout, in consequence of a violent cold caught in the theatre; the case was so severe and grave that his life was at times in danger. "Podagrists are generally visited by an especial humour--brilliant fancies; this comforts me; I experience the truth of it, since often when I feel the sharpest pangs I write _con amore_," he states in a letter to Kunz (24th March). And during his illness one of his friends "found him in one of the meanest rooms in one of the meanest inns, sitting on a wretched bed, but ill protected against the cold, and with his feet drawn up by gout." A board was lying in front of him, and he appeared to be busy doing something upon it. "G.o.d bless me!" exclaimed his friend, "whatever are you doing?" "Making caricatures," replied Hoffmann laughing--"caricatures of the cursed Frenchman; I am inventing them, drawing them, and colouring them." He also wrote about this time the _Vision auf dem Schlachtfelde bei Dresden_ and other pieces, and finished his _Undine_; further, whilst in this distressing condition, he began the _Elixiere des Teufels_, the first volume of which was completed in less than a month. This work he intended to be an ill.u.s.tration, or ill.u.s.trative exposition of his own notions, of "a man who even at his birth was an object of contention between the powers divine and demoniacal, and his tortuous wonderful life was intended to exhibit in a clear and distinct light those secret and mysterious combinations between the human spirit and all those Higher Principles which are concealed in all Nature, and only flash out now and again--and these flashes we call chance." That he succeeded in his purpose cannot be maintained. His own individuality was too strong for him: he failed to handle his subject from a sufficiently independent standpoint. He was not the artist creating a work that was quite outside himself; he was rather the silk-worm spinning his entangling threads round about himself. The book can scarcely be read without shuddering; the dark maze of humane motion and human weakness--a mingling of poetry, sentimentality, rollicking humour, wild remorse, stern gloom, blind delusion, dark insanity, over all which is thrown a veil steeped in the fantastic and the horrible--all this detracts from the artistic merits of the work, but invests it with a corresponding proportion of interest as a revealer of some of the deepest secrets and hidden phases of the human soul, if one only has the courage to wade through it. The dreamy mystifications and the wild insanity and mystic pa.s.sion of Brother Medardus are not unrelieved by scenes and characters which bear the stamp of bright poetic beauty and rich comic humour (_e.g._, the character of the Abbess of the Cistercian convent, the _jager_, the description of the monastery, the scenes with Mr. Ewson and Belcampo _alias_ Schonfeld).

For some reason which cannot be quite made out for certain, either in consequence of his continued illness or because of a quarrel with Seconda, Hoffmann found himself once more adrift in the world without an anchor to hold fast by in February, 1814. In striking contrast with his treatment by the Bamberg public, his talents as director whilst with Seconda's company were fully and adequately appreciated, both by the artistes and the orchestra, as well as by the general public. This may have been due to two causes; first, the actors and actresses were not embarra.s.sed by his directing from the pianoforte instead of with the violin as those in Bamberg were, and in the second place his criticisms and essays on musical subjects in Rochlitz's _Musicalische Zeitung_ had gained him a certain reputation as an authority in musical matters. After having refused the offer of a post as music-director in his native city of Konigsberg in February (1814), he was agreeably surprised by Hippel's promise to secure his return into official life.

Accordingly towards the end of September in that same year he set out for Berlin.

Here ends what may be termed the second act of this very unsettled, eventful life. That this wandering aside from the career he first started upon--viz., that of law and public life to tread the th.o.r.n.y precarious path of art was fraught with greater consequences than can be estimated upon the unfortunate man's character, will be evident from what has been already stated. These dark years were those mainly instrumental in stifling the good germs that had once been in him, and yet more did they result in encouraging and bringing out prominently all his less praiseworthy qualities. As his works and his life are so intimately interwoven, and as his works were nearly all written subsequent to this disastrous period, it seemed desirable to dwell somewhat upon the events and circ.u.mstances of the earlier part of his life. With the view of showing that Hoffmann himself fully understood the nature and tendency of his existence in Bamberg, the following pa.s.sages are quoted from a letter written to Dr. Speyer in that town in July, 1813:--

"I felt in my own mind perfectly convinced that I must get out of Bamberg as soon as possible if I was not to be ruined altogether. Call vividly to mind what my life in Bamberg was from the first moment of my arrival, and you will allow that everything co-operated like an hostile demoniacal power to thrust me forcibly from the path I had chosen, or rather from art, to which I had devoted my entire existence, my very self with all my activities and energies. My position under Cuno, and even all those unbargained-for duties which were thrown upon me by Holbein, notwithstanding their many seductive attractions, but above all those scenes with----which I shall never forget and never overcome, the old man's miserable stupid plat.i.tudes, which yet in another respect had a pernicious influence, those wretched, terrible scenes with----and last of all with----, whom I always thought a parvenu ill-bred imp,--in a word, everything that went against all effort and doing and work in the higher life, in which a man raises himself on alert wing above the stinking mora.s.s of his miserable crust-begging life, engendered within me an inward dissension--an inward strife, which much sooner than any external commotion around me would have caused me to perish. Every harsh and undeserved indignity I had to suffer only increased my secret rancour, and whilst accustoming myself more and more to wine as a stimulant and so stirring up the fire to make it b.u.m more merrily, I heeded not that this was the only way by which good could come out of the ruinous evil. In these few words, in this brief statement, I hope you will find the key to many things which may have appeared to you contradictory, if not enigmatical But _transeant c.u.m ceteris._"[22]

Again, it can scarcely be doubted that we have a description of his own state when he writes in the _Elixiere_ (Part II.), "I am what I appear to be, and do not appear as what I really am; to myself an unsolvable riddle, I am at variance with my own self."

The change of residence to Berlin did little to improve Hoffmann's circ.u.mstances. During the first ten months he was, according to the conditions imposed, labouring to make himself acquainted with the changes that had taken place in legal procedure, and to fit himself for entering the service of the state again and resuming his interrupted career; but he received no compensation for his pains; he had to support himself as best he could by the fruits of his pen. On July 1, 1815, he was appointed to a clerkship in the department of the Minister of Justice, which post he exchanged on 1st May, 1816, for that of Councillor in the Supreme Court, being also restored to all his rights of seniority as though no break had ever taken place in his official career. The duties attaching to this office he continued to discharge with his accustomed diligence and skill until promoted in the autumn of 1821 to be a member of the Senate of Higher Appeal in the same court.

Notwithstanding his sad and disappointing experiences, and the tempestuous times of his "martyr years" at Bamberg, he was not yet disgusted with the life of an artist. His hopes were not yet alienated from the calling that hovered before his mind as an ideal for so many years. Whilst battling, with somewhat less of reckless high spirits and humour, against the embarra.s.sments and pecuniary difficulties which he had to encounter during these ten months, he was also dreaming of an appointment as _Kapellmeister_ (orchestral director) or as musical composer to a theatre. He says upon this point in a letter to Hippel, of date March 12, 1815, "I cannot anyhow cease to interest myself in art; and had I not to care for a dearly beloved wife, and were it not my duty to try and procure her a comfortable life after what she has gone through with me, I would rather become a music schoolmaster again than let myself be stamped in the juristic fulling-mill."[23] After more than one disappointment in his efforts to secure permanent and remunerative employment, in which efforts he was a.s.sisted by his influential friend Hippel, he became a clerk, as already stated, in the department of the Minister of Justice.

In his social relations Hoffmann was more fortunate. He now enjoyed the close companionship of Hitzig again, and through Hitzig was introduced into a select circle which counted amongst its members such men as Fouque (author of _Undine_), Chamisso (of _Peter Schlemihl_ fame), Contessa, Koreff, Tieck, Bernhardi, Devrient, and others. The hara.s.sing tumultuous days he had pa.s.sed through during the last eight years had now begun to make him gentler and more modest; his character was more tempered, and his behaviour more subdued. His good-nature too took such a prominent place in the qualities he displayed that Hitzig's children were quite delighted with their father's newly arrived friend; for them Hoffmann wrote the pleasant little fairy tale _Nussknacker und Mausekonig_ (Nutcracker and the King of the Mice). Before the end of 1815 he had finished the second part of the _Elixiere des Teufels_, to which he himself attached no value, since its connection with the first part was broken; its author's ideas had got into another track; feelings and circ.u.mstances were changed. Still less than Schiller with _Don Carlos_. did Hoffmann succeed in making an artificial junction between the two parts of his work atone for its breach of artistic unity; he even said later of the first part, "I ought not to have had it printed." Besides this second part of the _Elixiere_, he also wrote the concluding pieces of the _Fantasiestucke_, namely, _Die Abenteuer der Sylvesternacht_, which owes its existence to Chamisso's _Peter Schlemihl_ and to Chamisso himself, who is portrayed in the work; and also _Die Correspondenz des Kapellmeisters Kreisler mit dem Baron Wallborn_, that is Hoffmann himself and Baron von Fouque. With the latter Hoffmann spent a happy fortnight in 1815 at his seat of Nennhausen near Rathenow; Hitzig was also of the party. In August of the following year the opera _Undine_ was put upon the stage. Though Fouque's libretto did not pa.s.s without some adverse criticism, all voices were unanimous in praise of the music. Von Weber the musician especially expressed himself warmly in admiration of it, affirming that it was "one of the most talented productions of recent times;" and he especially singled out for attention its truth, its smooth-flowing melodies, and its instrumentation; it was "in truth _one_ gush" of music. The opera was repeated more than a score of times, when unfortunately the theatre was burnt down, and Hoffmann, who lived immediately adjoining it, was almost burnt out of house and home at the same time.

Through the success of this opera as well as through that of his _Fantasiestucke_, Hoffmann found himself celebrated. He was invited as the hero of the evening to the fashionable tea circles of Berlin, where ignorant or half-educated _dilettanti_ affected an interest in art matters, that was over-strained and wanting in sincerity when it was not ridiculous. For what was there the man could not do? He wrote books about which all Germany was talking, he could improvise on the pianoforte, compose operas, sketch caricatures, and streams of wit gushed from him so soon as he opened his mouth. The homage showered upon him at these gatherings flattered Hoffmann's vanity for a time, but he soon saw the motives for which he was asked to be present--to amuse the guests with his wit, to accompany the daughter or lady of the house on the piano, to discuss art matters in a becoming way now with an old grandmother, now with a grave professor, to tell diverting anecdotes, to tickle the lazy minds of those who listened with some spicy satire upon their enemies--in fact to be made a useful show of.

Quickly fathoming these motives, Hoffmann proved himself readily equal to the occasion: as soon as he began to get bored, which very frequently was the case, he made the most hideous grimaces, and when he saw the company were preparing to draw something from him by way of criticism which they could carry further and perhaps repeat again as springing from their own acute judgment, he began to talk the most arrant nonsense he could think of, or to fire off some of his stinging sarcasms steeped in the bitterness of gall, till there were none but blank and embarra.s.sed faces around him--everybody thinking the man was mad; but he went away delighted at the consternation he had been instrumental in causing. The givers of fashionable teas soon ceased to invite Hoffmann to their entertainments, but they had already sufficiently sown the seeds of fresh mischief in him.

To have more money in his pockets than he just required for the immediate wants of the moment was always fatal to him, and no less so was the excitement attendant upon the giddy whirl of pleasure and social popularity, or what stood for such. These were rocks of danger upon which he always struck. The former led him to indulge in his reprehensible habit of drinking, and the latter soon made him upset all the systems of order and regulation. Day he turned into night and night into day. He shunned for the most part the society of Hitzig and his circle of friends, with their stimulating discussions that cultivated the mind whilst unfolding and developing the feelings, and frequented a low wine-shop and the common coa.r.s.e company that was to be met with there. Hence during nearly all the rest of his life, that is, from 1816 to 1821, he spent his mornings in the discharge of his official duties at the Supreme Court (two mornings a week, Monday and Thursday), or in writing; the afternoons he generally slept, or in summer took a walk; and the evenings and nights always found him in the wine-shop of his choice; and he never liked to leave it until morning came, nor did any other engagements prevent him from putting in an appearance at his habitual haunt, even though it were past midnight before he were free.

As already remarked, however, it was not to sit and drink like a sot that he gave way to this degrading habit, but to get himself "exalted"

as he called it, and then when he was duly "exalted" came the firework display of wit and glowing fancy, going on hour after hour without rest or interruption for the s.p.a.ce of five or six hours at once. If his tongue was not the medium through which he discharged the creations of his teeming imagination, his eagle eye was spying out all that was ridiculous or strikingly extraordinary, or even what was possessed of a touch of pathos or deep feeling, or he employed his hand in sketching and drawing inimitable caricatures. He never sat idle and silent, and drank steadily and stolidly as so many confirmed drinkers do. Hitzig, who was deeply grieved at this downward course of his friend and at the estrangement it had brought about between them, contrived to draw him away from his demoralising companions of the wine-shop for at least one night a week. On that evening there was a small gathering at Hoffmann's house, moderation being strictly enjoined as one of the chief regulations of the meeting. This small circle, which consisted of Hoffmann, Hitzig, Contessa, and Koreff,[24] and an occasional friend or two whom one of them introduced, called itself "The Serapion Brethren,"

this t.i.tle being adopted from the fact that the first meeting was held on the night of the anniversary of that saint, according to Frau Hoffmann's Polish almanac. It is interesting to remark that amongst these occasional guests figures the great Danish poet Oehlenschlager in the year 1816. In a letter written to Hoffmann on March 26th, 1821, recommending a young fellow-countryman to him, Oehlenschlager says, "Dip him also a little in the magic sea of your humour, respected friend, and teach him how a man can be a philosopher and seer of the world under the ironical mantle of the mad-house, and what is more an amiable man as well;" and he subscribes himself, "A. Oehlenschlager, Serapion Brother."

In 1817 was published the collection of tales called _Die Nachtstucke_, embracing _Der Sandmann_ (The Sand-man) and _Das Majorat_ (The Entail), which reproduce personages and experiences belonging to the years in Konigsberg; _Die Jesuitenkirche_ and _Das steinerne Herz_, going back to his life in Glogau; _Das Gelubde_, built upon a story related by his wife as connected with her native town of Posen; _Das Sanctus_, which was suggested by an incident in Berlin soon after Hoffmann's arrival there; and _das ode Haus_, this last due to the way in which he was incessantly haunted by the appearance of a closed house in the _Unter den Linden_. These were mostly written in 1816 and 1817; and to them he added _Ignas Denner_, which possesses some merit, but is of too gloomy and darkly unpleasant a cast to be attractive to English readers; it was written during the first days in Dresden, just after his emanc.i.p.ation from the Bamberg thraldom. Whilst in it he gives free rein to sombre melancholy, and dips his pen in "midnight blackness," in _Berganza_, written about the same time, he has poured out the cynical bitterness and scathing scorn which was then undoubtedly gnawing at his heart. _Der Sandmann_, though embodying reminiscences of its author's youth, also contains material derived from an incident which took place during a visit of Hoffmann's to Fouque's country-seat near Ratenow, and Nathanael was recognised by Fouque as meant for himself. _Das Majorat_ is, as already stated, a lasting memorial to his old great-uncle, Vothory; the moral backbone of the story--the evil destiny attaching to the successors of a man whose ambition aimed at founding a powerful family by an act of injustice to his youngest son--reminds the reader forcibly of the purpose that runs through Hawthorne's _House with the Seven Gables_. Of the in many respects admirable story _Das Gelubde_--it is to be regretted that it is marred by the dangerous nature of the subject;[25] it is else poetically treated and invested with a spirit of weird mysticism that would have made it rank higher than what it does. The others in the collection are of lesser merit.

The next year 1818 saw no important work from Hoffmann's pen; but in 1819 appeared _Die seltsame Leiden eines Theaterdirekters_, a book written in the form of a dialogue, which was due to the example of his favourite, Diderot's "Rameau's Nephew" (by Goethe), and which conveys a tolerably faithful account of Hoffmann's experiences in the capacity indicated whilst in the town on the Regnitz, and indeed is useful as ill.u.s.trating the condition of the German stage generally at that period. This was followed by a kind of fairy tale, _Klein Zaches genannt Zinn.o.ber_; as this book was generally believed to be a local satire upon persons and circ.u.mstances well known, it entailed many severe strictures and much unpleasantness upon its writer. The truth about it seems to be this: the idea--that of a sort of ugly kobold of the Handy Andy type--was suggested by a sudden fancy during an attack of fever, and in a moment of semi-delirium. On recovering his health again, Hoffmann set to work in his impetuous and hasty way, and worked out the idea in probably less than a fortnight. Similarly his _Meister Floh_, one of the last and weakest caricatures he wrote, was likely to have entailed disagreeable consequences upon him, had not his last illness come before any authoritative steps could be taken. For he had made use of incidents which came to his knowledge in the official discharge of his duties, and which were of such a character that they ought to have been guarded as inviolable secrets; and he further employed certain phrases which he took from confidential papers that likewise came into his hands in consequence of his public position. In extenuation of his fault, or perhaps in explanation of it, be it remarked that his conduct does not appear to have been actuated by premeditated or deliberate malice, but to have sprung solely from his recklessness and want of prudence: the ridiculous appealed to his sense of humour so irresistibly that nothing was sacred against it, and so nothing was safe from it.

In the summer of 1819 Hoffmann was ordered by his physician to visit the Silesian baths; and he derived excellent benefit from the prescription, coming home stronger and in a more healthful frame of mind than his friends had seen him for a long time. Soon after his return he was appointed on the commission selected to inquire into those secret societies and other suspicious political organisations which were particularly active about this time (_Burschenschaften_, _Landsmannschaften_ in their political aspect). Towards the end of the year he published the first two volumes of the _Serapionsbruder_, the third volume following in 1820 and the fourth in 1821. These volumes contain all his tales that had appeared in various magazines and serial publications, together with others now first published, and are linked together by a running commentary, or rather they are set into it as into a framework; the Serapion Society are represented as meeting at stated intervals, when one or more of the members relate a tale. The discussions which precede and follow the tales are full of sage remarks about art and art-matters and other ripe practical wisdom, and contain perhaps more matured thought than anything else that proceeded from Hoffmann's pen. Of these numerous stories the best have been selected for translation in these two volumes, namely, _Der Artushof_ (Arthur's Hall), _Die Fermate_ (The Fermata), _Doge und Dogaresse_ (Doge and Dogess), _Meister Martin der Kufner und seine Gesellen_ (Master Martin the Cooper and his Journey men ), _Das Fraulein von Scuderi_ (Mademoiselle de Scuderi), _Spieler Gluck_ (Gambler's Luck), and _Signor Formica_. The remaining twelve tales call for no special mention, except perhaps _Nussknacker_, which has been already alluded to, _Das fremde Kind_, a curious mixture of reality and fairyland, and _Der Zusammenhang der Dinge_, which is not devoid of interest. Several of the things in this collection suggest comparison with Poe's writings for weirdness and bizarre imaginative power, though of course there are wide differences between the styles of the two writers.

In March, 1820, came a letter of good wishes from Beethoven, whose music Hoffmann greatly admired; hence the letter was a source of much real pleasure to him. Spontini, the well-known writer of operas, came to Berlin in the summer of the same year and was received by Hoffmann with every mark of respect. It was indeed maintained that the composer of _Undine_ showed an unworthy servility in the way in which he publicly acknowledged Spontini's talent. Whether this is true would appear doubtful; servility was not one of the author's failings, though vanity was. By Spontini's ministering to his vanity Hoffmann may have been provoked to return him the compliment in his own coin, but it is hardly likely that he went so far as to flatter against his own conviction or against his better judgment. Of his longer and more ambitious works the one which he ranked highest in merit was _Lebensansichten des Katers Murr, nebst Biographie des Kapellmeisters Johannes Kreisler_, the first volume of which appeared in 1820 and the second in 1822. In respect of literary form and execution, as well as of artistic worth, this is undoubtedly Hoffmann's most finished production (_i.e._ of his longer works). It contains a good deal of genial, keen, and subtle satire, conveyed in the doings of Murr the tom-cat; and it is also a useful source for early biographical details, both of facts and of mental development and opinions, contained in the "waste-paper leaves" (treating of Kreisler), inserted at frequent intervals between those which carry on the life and adventures of Murr.

The third volume, which was all ready and completed in the author's head, and only wanted writing down, never came to the birth. The first two volumes present to us a personification of Hoffmann's humoristic self, and the third was to culminate in Kreisler's insanity, a result brought about by the disappointments and baffling experiences he encountered in life--Hoffmann's own career, that is; and the whole was to conclude with the _Lichte Stunden eines wahnsinnigen Musikers_,--a work which had been occupying his mind ever since he was in Bamberg, and which had not yet been executed. In 1821 was published one of his weakest things, a fairy tale, _Prinzessin Brambilla_, which is greatly wanting in clearness of conception, though he himself ranked it highly.

The excesses in which Hoffmann had for so long indulged brought at last, as may easily be conceived, their own inevitable retribution. The first herald of the approaching physical troubles was the death (November 30, 1821) of the sagacious cat who was the real hero of _Kater Murr_. Hoffmann was much cut up by the death of his favourite, which he described to Hitzig with truly touching pathos.[26] Soon after this he was suddenly stricken down by disease--_tabes dorsalis_; his body gradually died, beginning at the feet and moving up to the brain, a process which lasted several weeks. But from the autumn of 1821 to April, 1822, he was cheered by the daily visits of the beloved friend of his youth, Hippel, who had come up to Berlin for that s.p.a.ce of time.

Hoffmann celebrated his 46th birthday with this true friend, and with Hitzig and others less dear. Hoffmann and Hippel were dwelling fondly upon the days of their youth and reviving old recollections, when mention was made of death and dying. Hitzig remarked in substance that "life was not the highest of all goods;" this caused the suffering Hoffmann to reply with pa.s.sionate emphasis, such as he did not give way to on any other occasion during the course of the evening, "No, no--let me live, live--let me only live, no matter in what condition." "There was something awful," says. .h.i.tzig, "in the way in which these words burst from his lips." And his wish was fulfilled in terrible wise; one limb after the other failed to perform its office; his feet and hands and certain parts of his inner organism became quite dead. On the day before he died he was virtually a corpse as far as his neck; and so he was full of hope that he should soon be well again, since he "felt no more pain then." Even in this truly pitiable and helpless condition his imagination continued to pour forth a stream of the most whimsical and humorous fancies, and his cheerfulness was even greater than in the days of sound health. Hippel's departure in April was a hard blow to him. About four weeks before his death he underwent the sharp operation of being burned on each side of the spine with red-hot irons. When Hitzig entered the room after the terrible operation was over, Hoffmann cried, "Can you smell the flavour of roast meat?" and he said that whilst the doctors were burning him, the thought entered his mind that the "Minister of Police was having him leaded lest he should slip out as contraband;"--he was shrivelled up to a mummy almost, so that, owing to his small size as well, a woman could carry him in her arms. Though his body was thus a perfect wreck, his mental powers were as brilliant and keen as ever; and when his hands proved useless to him, he engaged the services of an amanuensis and went on dictating until almost the very hour of his death. In fact, the last thing he spoke about was a direction for his writer to read to him the pa.s.sages where he had broken off in _Der Feind_; then he turned his face to the wall; the fatal rattle was heard in his throat; and all Hoffmann's earthly troubles were over (June 25, 1822).

It is very remarkable that the works dictated by this extraordinary man on his deathbed show an almost total departure from the style of most of his previous tales. He no longer records his own experiences,--the events and occurrences, the sentiments and thoughts, that were peculiarly his own,--but he writes from a purely objective standpoint, and _creates_. Of most of his other works it may be said that they are _he_; but of these it can only be said they are _his_ in the sense that they owed their origin to him. _Meister Johannes Wacht_, one of these, is translated in Vol. II. The scene is laid in Bamberg, and the characters of the story were also said to be faithful portraits of actual people in Bamberg; yet we look in vain to find anything like Hoffmann himself in it. _Des Vetters Eckfenster_, though hardly a tale, is yet one of the best things Hoffmann has written. Those who know emile Souvestre's _Un Philosophe sous les Toits_ would find in this thing of Hoffmann's dying days something to their taste; it is a running commentary on personages seen in the market from the writer's own window, and each little scene brings before us a true and lifelike character in a few weighty and well-chosen words. _Die Genesung_, a mere sketch, arose out of the dying man's pathetic longing to see the green of the woods and the meadows. _Der Feind_, a fragment full of promise, is a tale of old Nuremberg of the days of Albrecht Durer, who figures in it. Before being deprived of the use of his hands he had written several other short tales, amongst which may be mentioned _Die Doppeltganger_, as being a favourite theme with Hoffmann, and _Der Elementargeist_, a weird, entrancing story. In _Die Rauber_ he gives us a weak version of Schiller's celebrated work.

In Hoffmann we have an instance of a man who nearly all his life long failed to get himself placed amid the circ.u.mstances in the midst of which it was his one burning wish to be placed. He never found his right calling. He is a man ruined by circ.u.mstances (_zerfahren_). He was not wanting in warm natural feeling, as is proved by his close and faithful friendships with Hippel, Hitzig, and Kunz; and more than one instance of spontaneous kindness and of winning amiability are preserved by his biographer.[27] In youth his mind and heart were full of n.o.ble thoughts and aspirations, and he was sincerely desirous to educate himself up to better things. We see it in "May it never happen to me that my heart is not readily receptive of every communication from without, as well as for every feeling within, for the head must never injure the heart, nor must the heart ever run away with the head, that is my idea of culture," and "an excitable heart and a restless nature will never let us be quite happy, but will have a beneficial influence upon our education, upon our striving after greater perfection." His poetic temperament, and such like poetic tendencies, found no responsive sympathy amongst his relatives. Being thrust back upon himself and then having his feelings centred, when at length they did meet with sympathetic appreciation, in such a way as could only bring disappointment and unhappiness, he was early made a fit instrument for circ.u.mstances to play upon, and sorely was he buffeted by them through all the years from going to Posen right down until the day of his death. But this result must also be traced partly to the want of a parent's loving, watchful eye. In those years which are the most important for moulding a boy's character he was practically left to go his own way. True, his uncle Otto held him down to habits of industry and order; but he did nothing to encourage the boy's better and higher nature, or guide it sympathetically along the paths where it was striving to find its own way. Hoffmann had no high idea of the moral dignity of man, and at times even seemed to have but little conception of it. The relations upon which he lived with his uncle Otto and the history of his own father prevented this sense of moral worth from being planted in his mind. The germ which bore fruit in his love for extremes, for what was extraordinary and quite out of the common beaten track of life, was probably engendered in the following way. Not finding the sympathy he needed in his efforts after a better life, he turned in upon himself and began to despise the petty details of everyday existence; and several pa.s.sages in his letters clearly go to show that his unhappiness and discontent were largely due to the fact of his overlooking the real enjoyment to be derived from the small occurrences and events of every day, which rightly viewed are capable of affording such a large fund of real contentment. In a letter to Hippel early in 1815, he himself states, "For my shattered life I have really only myself to blame; I ought to have shown more resolution and less levity in my earlier years. When a youth, when a boy, I ought to have devoted myself entirely to Art and never to have thought of anything else. But of course something also was due to perverse education." It must not be supposed, however, from the above that he was deficient in firmness or strength of will. The perseverance with which he worked through his early examinations, as well as the energy and zeal he brought to bear upon his official duties, contradict such supposition. Specific instances might also be quoted did s.p.a.ce permit; it will be enough to recall his resolve never to gamble. It is stated that he avowed his intention to amend his ways if he recovered from his last fatal illness. The real key to his wayward character lies in the fact just alluded to, that he had no conception of the supreme importance of moral worth. This was the backbone wanting in his character; and for this reason we fail to detect any steady sterling course of action through all the vicissitudes of his life. If he had a ruling motive it was capricious humour; at any rate it swayed him more than anything else. On one day he would laugh at what had annoyed him on the day preceding, or be delighted to-day at what he had greeted yesterday with irony. n.o.body knew better than himself how he was tyrannised over by his changeable moods. "My capricious humour (_Laune_) is the first weather-prophet I know, and if I had the good-will and were bored I could make an almanac," is one of his expressions; and another runs, "You know that my capricious humour is often _Maitre de Flaisir_."

Besides being thus the creature of caprice, he was also impulsive, impetuous, and wont to act with impa.s.sioned haste. These qualities were revealed in his restless vivacious eyes, in his movements and gestures, and even broke out in extraordinary grimaces, as already remarked. And just in the same fervid eager way he often seized upon an idea or a pleasing fancy, till it took complete possession of him; he could not rid himself of it. With this was combined his remarkable quickness of perception and comprehension; a single gesture or phrase was often sufficient to enable him to grasp a character. What he hated above all things was dulness--_ennui_; this never failed to provoke his keenest irony and bitterest sarcasms. In his last years he even became cynical and rugged and vulgar, in which we may of course trace the influence of his tavern a.s.sociates. It is to his credit that he did not sink into Byronic misanthropy and bitter self-lacerating scorn, or even into Heine's irreverence and persiflage.

An old German poet says, "Seht das Loos der Menschheit--Heute Freude, Morgen Leid;"[28] but with Hoffmann joy and pain were frequently more closely allied than this even: whilst the jest was on his lips the sting would be in his heart. In this, as well as in several other features of his stormy career, he did indeed resemble his countryman Heine. One of the necessities of his nature was human society--not simply society, however, but people who could appreciate him, who could fall in with his moods, and either follow intelligently when he led, or lend him a stimulating and helping hand to keep the ball of wit and jollity rolling. An ill.u.s.tration of this is found in the fact that he "did not love the society of women. If he could not mystify them, or draw them into the circle of his fantasies, or discover in them any decided talent for comicality, he preferred the society of men."

Amongst women, however, after those of the cla.s.s just named, he was most interested in young and pretty girls, being attracted by the charm of their fresh beauty, not by the charm of their mind. Learned women he hated.

Hoffmann was, as already observed, the child of extremes. These were revealed not only in his life and action, but also in his writings; for his writings are the man. Indeed German critics have said that his works, particularly the _Fantasiestucke_, are "lyrics in prose." What they mean by this phrase is chiefly that the things he wrote exhibit subjective phrases of his nature, and are disconnected, or rather not connected, not balanced parts of a systematic whole. This is true so far as it is true that Hoffmann never did complete a long work, except the _Elixiere_, and this work, as there has been occasion to point out, consists of two disjointed parts. One of the things that strike us most in reading his books is the peculiar mixture of the real and the unreal, of matters appertaining to actual life and of fantasies born only of the imagination. Very often the imagination would be called by most people a diseased imagination; but it is not always so, sometimes it is the poet's imagination. Hence, from this blending or close alternation of reality with what is not of the earth--hence came his love for fairy tales, tales in which we meet with kobolds, imps, witches, little monsters of all kinds--the spirits and apparitions in fact which used to haunt his excited fancy in such a strange way.

Several of these are poetic creatures, whom he handles in a light, graceful, and pleasing style (_Goldener Topf_, _Nussknacker_, _Das fremde Kind_, &c.); others, on the other hand, are drawn in horrible and unearthly colours and awaken the sentiments of awe and dread. What he loved especially to dwell upon was the "night side of natural science," the puzzling relations between the psychic and the physical principles both in man and in Nature. Hence such states as somnambulism, magnetism, dreams, dark forebodings of the terrible, inhuman pa.s.sions, and such things as automata and vampyres, had for him an insuperable attraction. Insanity was a mystery that haunted his thoughts for years: it figures largely in _Die Elixiere_ and _Der Sandmann_; and in the third part of _Kater Murr_ it was his intention to represent Kreisler's battle with adverse circ.u.mstances as culminating in insanity. Handling these, and states and situations equally hideous, fantastic, and grotesque, with extraordinary clearness and precision both of thought and of language, considering the often misty nature of the subjects he treats of, and pouring upon the vivid pictures he conjures up the brightness of his wit and the exuberant gaiety and grace of his fancy, he succeeds in creating scenes, situations, and characters which seem verily instinct with real life.

This end was attained princ.i.p.ally by the true genius he displayed in perception, apprehension, and description. His graphic descriptive power is that which mainly procured him his wide-reaching fame during his own lifetime, not only in Germany but also in France, and is that which princ.i.p.ally gives to his works whatever permanent value they may possess. With a painter's eye he grasps a character or a scene by a few of its more prominent and essential features, and with a painter's hand and eye he sketches them in a few telling strokes. The reader must not look to find in Hoffmann any clever or subtle a.n.a.lysis of the deeper motives that work towards the development of character; all that Hoffmann can give him will be talented _pictures_. He himself lays down his canon of literary spirit in the introduction to the first volume of the _Serapionsbruder_--

"Vain are an author's efforts to bring us to believe in what he does not believe in himself, in what he cannot believe in, since he has not made it his own by _seeing_ it (_erschauen_). What else are the characters of such an author, who, to borrow the old phrase, is no true seer, but deceitful marionettes, painfully glued together out of alien materials?... At least let each one of us [the Brethren] strive earnestly and truly to grasp the image that has arisen in his mind in all its features, its colours, its lights and its shades, and then when he feels himself really enkindled by them let him proceed to embody them in an external description."

Hoffmann has mostly succeeded in acting up to his canon and has written in its spirit; and in so far true genius cannot be denied him. And he possessed in no less eminent a degree the true art of the born story-teller. The interest seldom if ever flags; and the curious anomalies of men and of men-creatures (_Mensch-Thiere_), whom he mingles amongst his winning heroines and his delightful satiric characters, oftener than not quite enthrall the mind or afford it true enjoyment as the case may be, and this they do in spite of the fact that, owing to their own nature, they frequently stand outside the ordinary sphere of human sympathies. Of course it may readily be conceived that the danger which he was liable to fall into was want of clearness in conception and sentiment, but he has avoided this rock for the most part with wonderful skill. One of his latest productions, _Prinzessin Brambilla_, is the one where this fault is most markedly conspicuous; nor is the _Elixiere_ free from it.

German critics have not failed to notice the sweet grace and winning loveliness which hover about the characters of most of his heroines.

They are nearly all presented in colours impregnated with real poetic beauty; see, for instance, Seraphina (_Das Majorat_), Annunciata (_Doge_), Madelon and Mdlle. de Scudery (_Scuderi_), Rose (_Meister Martin_), Cecily (_Berganza_), and others.

Carlyle, whose brief and for the most part truthful essay upon Hoffmann (in vol. ii. of his _German Romance_, 1829) appears to have been based largely upon others' opinions rather than upon first-hand acquaintance with his author, says that in him "there are the materials of a glorious poet, but no poet has been fashioned out of them." And when we seek for poetic elements in Hoffmann's works, we are not altogether disappointed. We have just stated that his heroines are creations of a poet's fancy; and in the scene between Father Hilarius and Kreisler in _Kater Murr_, and in the pa.s.sages and characters already alluded to in _Die Elixiere_, in the sunny cheerful _Marchen_--_Der goldene Topf_ (which Hoffmann calls his "poetic masterpiece"), in _Das Gelubde_, _Nussknacker_, &c., we enter the world of higher imagination. Again, whilst in _Doge und Dogaresse_ we are arrested by the poetic charm of the island life of the Lagune in the golden days of Venice's splendour, in _Meister Martin_ we are no less, perhaps still more impressed by the rich romantic beauty of life in the old mediaeval town of Nuremberg. In _Die Scuderi_ we are made acquainted with the cold glittering court of Louis XIV. through the lovable character of Mdlle. de Scudery; and whilst on the one hand following with deep interest the fate of Brusson and his love, on the other we are led to contrast the subtilty of the plot with the fine a.n.a.lytic power of Poe in The _Murders in the Rue Morgue_. When visiting with Hoffmann the weird castle of _Das Majorat_, we are made to hear the cold shrill blasts of the Baltic whistling past our ears, and to feel the storm and the sea-spray dashing in our faces.

These four tales are unquestionably the best that Hoffmann has written; to them must be added _Meister Wachte_, on account of its excellent characterisation of the hero. In striking contrast with the majority of the things he has written, these five tales show him when he is most objective; in them he has wielded his powers with more wise restraint than in any of the others, and introduced less of his strange fantastic caricatures. Next after these tales must be named, though on a lower level, and simply because they best ill.u.s.trate his peculiar genius, the two books of _Kater Murr_, the fairy tale _Der goldene Topf_, and _Des Vetters Eckfenster_, In the works here named we have the best fruits of Hoffmann's pen. And if instead of asking in the mistaken spirit of compet.i.tion which is now so much in vogue. What is Hoffmann's position in literature? we ask rather, Has he written anything that deserves to be read? we shall have already had our answer. The works here singled out are worthy of being preserved and read; and of them _Das Majorat_ and _Meister Martin_ are perhaps ent.i.tled to be called the best, though some German critics have mentioned _Meister Wacht_ along with the former as having a claim to the first rank.

It is now time to take a glance at Hoffmann's satiric power. This was launched princ.i.p.ally against two cla.s.ses of society; the one is that of which his uncle Otto was a type, the man who is unreasonably obstinate in defence of the conventionalities of life, and no less so in their steady observance: the second cla.s.s was that whose representatives aroused Hoffmann's ire so greatly at Bamberg and Berlin "tea-circles,"

or "tea-sings"--those who coquetted with art in an unworthy or frivolous manner. Against this latter cla.s.s his irony and satiric wrath were especially fierce, as may be read in _Berganza_, _Die Irrungen_, the _Kreisleriana_, _Kater Murr_, _Signor Formica_, &c. Perhaps the most amusing, for quiet humour, of the former cla.s.s is _Die Brautwahl_.

The force of his satiric power lay in the skilful use of sudden contrast. Hence it plays more frequently upon or near the surface, and lacks the depth and pathos of true humour; but it is idle to expect from a man what he hasn't got.

In so far as this author had any serious philosophical belief, it would appear to have been that man was a slave of Chance, or Fate, or Destiny, or whatever it may be called. Sometimes he is the plaything of circ.u.mstances; sometimes a defenceless victim under "Fate's brazen hand," or of "that Eternal Power which rules over us." The real significance of life is summoned up in the statement that it is a struggle between contending powers of good and evil, against both of which man is equally helpless. He believed that whenever any good fell to a man's lot there was always some evil lurking in ambush behind it, or, to borrow his own expressive phrase, "the Devil must put his tail upon everything." His further views are here quoted from _Der Magnetiseur_:--

"We are knitted with all things without us, with all Nature, in such close ties, both psychic and physical, that the severance from them would, if it were indeed possible, destroy our own existence. Our so-called intensive life is conditioned by the extensive; the former is only a reflex of the latter, in which the figures and images received, as if reflected in a concave mirror, often appear in changed relations that are wonderful and singularly strange, notwithstanding that these caricatures again And their real originals in life. I boldly maintain, that no man has ever thought or dreamt anything the elements of which were not to be found in Nature; nohow can he get out of her."

Was this the cause or the result of the visions he used to see?

From his conception of strife between good and evil as interpreting the significance of existence arose that dissonance which lies at the root of nearly all his most characteristic works--that sense of want, that failure to find final satisfaction which may be only too readily detected. For the conflict within himself he knew no real mediatory: he was baffled to discover a higher category in which to unite the conflicting principles. Religion he never willingly talked about; hence it could not give him the satisfaction he lacked. He thought he found it in Art, however; since for Art he battled with all the strength of his genius, and in the sacred mission of Art he believed with all his soul. He has many enthusiastic bursts on the subject, agreeing in some respects with the views laid down by Schiller in his _Aesthetische Erziehung des Menschen_:--

"They alone are true artists who devote themselves with undivided love and enthusiasm to their G.o.ddess; to them alone is true Art revealed....

There is no Art which is not sacred.... The sacred purpose of all Art is apprehension of Nature in that deepest sense of the word which enkindles in the soul an ardent striving after the higher life.... I do not ask about the artistes life; but his work must be pure, in the highest degree respectable, and if possible religious. It has no need, therefore, to have any so-called moral tendency; nay, it ought not to have such. The truly beautiful is itself moral, only in another form.... Art is eternally clear. The mists of ignorance are as inimical to her as the life-destroying carbonic acid gas of immorality. Art is the highest perfection of human power. Heart and Understanding are her common parents."

Music was his favourite art. It first taught him to feel; and not only was it his unfailing solace in hours of trouble, but it brought him messages of deeper import: it disclosed to him glimpses of another world--it was the "language of heaven." Here again a pa.s.sage from his own works expresses his opinions upon this point better than any other pen can express them:--

"No art, I believe, affords such strong evidence of the spiritual in man as music, and there is no art that requires so exclusively means that are--purely intellectual and aetherial. The intuition of what is Highest and Holiest--of the Intelligent Power which enkindles the spark of life in all Nature--is audibly expressed in musical sound; hence music and song are the utterance of the fullest perfection of existence--praise of the Creator! Agreeably to its real essential nature, therefore, music is religious cultus; and its origin is to be sought for and found, simply and solely, in religion, in the Church."[29]

Treating of Hoffmann's position with respect to music, Wilibald Alexis says, "We do not know any other man who has expressed in words such a real true enthusiasm for an art [as Hoffmann for music]; and specialists a.s.sure us that few have thoroughly grasped the nature of music so admirably."

As far as a foreigner may presume to judge of Hoffmann's language and literary style, it would appear to be chiefly distinguished by strong grace, ease, naturalness, and nervous vigour. German critics acknowledge its charms, calling it a model of clearness and masterly skill and elegance. Perhaps its beauties are best seen, that is in a more chastened form, in _Kater Murr_. Repet.i.tions, however, and exaggerations in description of sentiment tend, at times, to mar the reader's pleasure. Signs of haste, too, are not wanting, as Carlyle pointed out. This was chiefly due to the very large number of commissions he received from publishers and others, who keenly competed for the productions of his pen. At the date of his death he had as many commissions on hand as would, if he accepted them all, have kept him fully employed for several years.

To those who love a good story, well told, the five specially mentioned may be recommended; and for those who desire to explore the dark by-paths (_Irrwege_) of the human spirit, to penetrate to some of its rarest comers, and to know all its ins and outs, as well as for those who aim at studying German literature, Hoffmann is a writer who ought to be read at greater length.