2. DE QUINCEY AND TIECK.

De Quincey's only service to Tieck was a translation of his Liebeszauber under the title of The Love Charm, with a slight note introducing the author.

His characteri

zation of Tieck sounds at this time like exaggerated praise. "There was in Tieck's early works the promise, and far more than the promise of the greatest dramatic poet. whom Europe had seen since the days of Calderon . . . . the uncontrollable, exuberant joyousness. . . . the incarnation, so to say, of the principle of mirth, in Shakespeare and Cervantes, and Aristophanes; and, as a wreath of flowers to crown the whole, the heavenly purity and starlike loveliness of his Genoveva."? Had illness not. interfered with his productiveness, he would have been the second poet of Germany. "Goethe would have invited. Tieck to sit beside him upon his throne." It is interesting to note this criticism of Goethe, written only a year after his review of Wilhelm Meister; but it is only a passing opinion; what De Quincey's real estimate was has already been shown. He mentions further Tieck's Phantasus, his novels, the prefaces to Shakespeare's Vorschule and Alt-englisches Theater. Tieck's criticisms on Shakespeare's dramas in the Abend Zeitung1 show that "no one was ever so able to trace out the most secret

3

1 Knight's Quarterly Magazine, Extra Number 1825. Not re-printed by De Quincey; cf. Works XII, 434 ff.

2 Ib. 464 f.

3 De Quincey refers also to English translations from Tieck The Pictures and The Betrothing; the originals were Die Gemälde, 1821 und Die Verlobung, 1822. He mentions, too, a beautiful tale of magic and, in a general way, the longer novels.

4 Herausgegeben von Th. Hill u. Fr. Kind. Tieck's contributions are collected under the title: Dramaturgische Blätter etc. 1826.

workings of the great master's mind, or to retain full, calm self-possession when following him in his highest flights. No one ever united in such perfection the great critic with the great poet; one may look forward, therefore, with confidence to the greatest work in aesthetical criticism that even Germany has ever produced".1 The remainder is an extravagant eulogy of the Love Charm, its deep poetry, its power of characterization etc.

This only shows again how little De Quincey had attempted to get any final principles of criticism. It is not often that he speaks from a higher level than his own personal taste, which fortunately for his work was both by nature and cultivation, fine and strong. But it leaves his work as a whole fragmentary and unequal.

3. OTHER GERMAN STORIES.

De Quincey translated other tales from the German in the early period of his literary work, especially in the year 1823. The translations were as follows:

a) The Fatal Marksman, published originally in Popular Tales and Romances of the Northern Nations, London 1823, Vol. III. Reprinted by De Quincey. cf. Works XII, 286 ff. The original was Der Freischütz, eine Volkssage, by A. Apel. See Gespensterbuch, herausgegeben von A. Apel und F. Laun, Leipzig 1810—1812; I, 1 ff.

b) Mr. Schnackenberger, or Two Masters for One Dog, London Magazine, May and June 1823. Not reprinted by De Quincey. cf. Works XII, 314 ff.

c) The Dice, London Magazine, August 1823. Reprinted by De Quincey. cf. Works XII, 364 ff.

1 Works XII, 465.

d) The King of Hayti, London Magazine, Nov. 1823. Reprinted by De Quincey. cf. Works XII, 391 ff.2

e) The Incognito or Count Fitz-Hum, Knight's Quarterly Magazine, July 1824. Reprinted by De Quincey, cf. Works XII, 417 ff. The original was by Friederich Schulze (Fr. Laun). (No complete edition of Fr. Laun's works is accessible. De Quincey knew also Laun's Lustige Erzählungen.)

Of these Mr. Schnackenberger, The King of Hayti and The Incognito are in a light vein of farce. The Fatal Marksman and The Dice are tales of mystery and witchcraft, with a tragic ending. On none of these does De Quincey make the slightest comment except on The Incognito by Fr. Laun. A translation of Laun's stories, says De Quincey, would be valuable "as reflecting German domestic life among the middle classes; as showing, perhaps better than any writer except Kotzebue the purely popular taste, and as having some merit in themselves as light and comic tales." 4

humorous and

These stories are of two kinds, extravagant or mysterious and tragic, with witchcraft or some other dark agency, and perhaps a moral allegory. It is interesting to note these tastes of De Quincey in German romance, for they correspond perfectly with his own original efforts in fiction. Murder as a Fine Art, is his nearest approach to the first type; but in the stories of The Household Wreck, The Avenger and the

1 The originals of these I have not been able to trace. It is possible that Mr. Schnackenberger at least is not a translation. De Quincey's rendering is embellished with quotations from Shakespeare, with English slang and phrases that would be more natural to an Englishman than to an German, e. g.: “A Paul Jones of a marauder"; "A Kentucky marauder".

1 Works XII, 417.

1

novel Klosterheim, there is the same attempt at a tragedy which passes easily into mere melodrama; there is the same use of witchcraft and mysterious agency, the same lack of originality either in scene or action. The Avenger and Klosterheim have their scenes in Germany; the first is a story told by a university professor; the second is laid in a university town in the time of the Thirty Years War. In neither, however, is there any attempt to create a really German atmosphere or German characters. They are people of no land or clime; they are mere figures for the story, with the conventional. virtues and vices. The value of the stories is to be found in the narrative and the descriptive parts. It is characteristic of De Quincey to find in the The Avenger the old recollection of the Williams murders in London, an experience which he has described in the postscript to Murder as a Fine Art.

Between De Quincey's stories and German romances of the same time there is much similarity. We do not feel justified, however, in attributing to them any formative influence upon him. The same type of fiction. had been in a measure the vogue in England. De Quincey had read Monk Lewis very early. But with or without any foreign influence De Quincey could have written no other kind of fiction. He had no real dramatic feeling, no sense for characterization.

1 Klosterheim; or the Masque. By the English Opium-Eater. Edinburgh, London, MDCCCXXXII, cf. Works XII, 5-156. The Household Wreck appeared in Blackwood's Jan. 1838. cf. Works XII-157 ff. The Avenger appeared in Blackwood's. Aug. 1838. cf. Works XII-234 ff.

XIII. CONCLUSION.

It is difficult to estimate precisely the influence of De Quincey as an interpreter of German literature. It is evident that, in Edinburgh and in the Lake Circle at least, his opinions were treated with great respect. Wilson (Christopher North) writes to him (Nov. 12, 1825) in connection with some contributions to the Quarterly. "A noble review of Kant, would, in good time, be valuable to him and you; and, master as you are of German, literature and philosophy, I do indeed hope that you may become a contributor. . . . John Paul should certainly now have justice done him."1 Gillies, whose house was one of the literary centres of Edinburgh refers to the brilliancy of De Quincey's conversation on all subjects, among them German philosophers. A Mr. Woodhouse, writing of conversations with De Quincey in London in 1821, shows deep reverence for his knowledge of German literature and thought. Mr. J. R. Findlay, who visited De Quincey in 1854, evidently looked upon his criticism of Goethe as final. It must be remembered, however, that most of

4

1 Page's Life I, 271.

2 Page's Life I, 190.

3 De Quincey and his Friends, 74 ff.

4 Ib. 144.