"But," said Lothair, "to return to Ottmar's Novella. The principal fault which I have to find with it is that, instead of a story rounding itself into a whole in all its parts, he has merely given us a series of pictures, although they are often delightful enough."
"Can I do otherwise than fully agree with you?" said Ottmar. "Still, you will all admit that it requires very skilful navigation to keep clear of the rocks upon which I have run."
"Perhaps," said Sylvester, "the rocks in question are more dangerous to dramatic writers. Nothing--at least in my opinion--is more annoying than, instead of a Comedy, in which all that happens is necessarily and closely attached to the thread which runs through the piece, and should appear to be indispensably necessary to the picture represented, to see merely a series of arbitrary incidents, or even unconnected, detached situations; and indeed, the ablest dramatic author of recent times has set the example of this thoughtless (or 'frivolous') treatment of Comedy. Does the 'Pagen-streiche,' for example, consist of anything but a series of ludicrous situations strung together apparently by chance, and at random? In former days, when, on the whole (at all events as regards the drama), one cannot complain of the want of due seriousness, every writer of a Comedy took much pains to construct a regular plot, and out of that plot all the comic element, the drollery, nay, the very absurdity, duly evolved itself, of itself; because it seemed the natural thing for it to do. Jünger (although he but too often seems very 'flat') always did this, and even Brenner--utterly prosaic as he was on the whole--was by no means deficient in the power of making the comic element flow out from his plots, and his characters have often real force and vividness of life, derived from actuality; as, for instance, in his 'Eheprokurator.' Only those ladies of his, with their grand phrases, are completely unenjoyablo by us nowadays. Notwithstanding this, I have a very high opinion of him, for the reasons I have given."
"In my mind," said Theodore, "his Operas put him out of court altogether. They may serve as examples how an opera ought not to be written."
"For the simple reason," said Vincenz, "that the departed (peace to his ashes, as Sylvester very properly said) did not show many signs of having much poetry in his constitution; so that in the romantic realm of opera he could not find the slightest indication of a track to go upon. However, as you are talking in this strain on the subject of Comedy, I might do worse than point out that you are wasting your time in discussing a nonentity--a thing which does not exist; and cry out to you, as Romeo did to Mercutio--
'Peace, peace, good people, peace,
Ye talk of nothing.'
What I mean is that, taking them altogether, we never see a single German Comedy presented on the stage, for the simple reason that the old ones cannot be swallowed or digested (by reason of the weakness of our stomachs), and new ones are no longer written. The reason of the latter I might establish, very briefly, in a treatise of some forty sheets or so; but, for the moment, I let you off with a play-upon-words. What I say is, that we have no comic plays, because we have none of the comic which plays with itself; nor the sense for it."
"Dixi," cried Sylvester, laughing. "Dixi, and the name 'Vincenz' thereunder, with due stamp and seal. I happened, at the moment, to be thinking that in the lowest class of dramatic performances, or rather of productions destined to be represented on the stage, perhaps those should be included in which some clever farceur mystifies and befools some good uncle--a theatre director, or some such person. And yet it is not so very long ago that shallow, stupid stuff of this description constituted almost the daily bread of every stage. Just at present there seems to be more or less an intermission in this."
"It will never come to an end," said Theodore, "as long as there are actors to whom nothing in the world can be more delightful than to let themselves be wondered at and admired as chameleontic marvels, in that they change their costume and appearance in the most varied manner in the course of the same evening. Right out of the very depths of my being have I been compelled to roar with laughter over the self-apotheosis of self-sufficiency with which, after passing through a marvellous series of soul-transmigrations, the true ego of the performer takes its enfranchised flight, like a beautiful insect. Generally speaking, this is done in the shape of a pretty, elegant night-moth, dressed in black, with silk stockings, and a three-cornered hat under one arm, having, from the moment of its appearance as such, only to deal with the admiring public, not troubling itself about that which previously had been doing it soccage-service. As (vide Wilhelm Meister's 'Lehr-jahren') a special line of parts may so bind and enslave to it some given actor, who, for instance, plays all the characters who have to be cudgelled, or otherwise maltreated, every stage must possess a sujet who undertakes all the parts of the character of souffre douleur, and consequently plays those indispensable theatre managers, &c.; at all events, every starring actor has a part of the kind in his pocket, by way of entrance-pass, or letter of credit."