The vice of the English drama, then, is this: plays of good technical mechanism possess little or no "problem" interest; plays of "problem" or psychological interest possess little or no technical mechanism.
Let us, consequently, glancing first at his plays, and perhaps later at those short stories which stand in the most intimate relation to his one-acters, ascertain to what extent Schnitzler has solved successfully the great "problem of the problem."
Liebelei, which was produced first in 1895, is an excellent example both of Schnitzler's powers and of Schnitzler's limitations. The motif of the play is the problem of the refined middle-class girl, who stands, if we may borrow the terminology of popular melodrama, at the cross-roads. Which turning is it better for her to take—the right turning, or the wrong turning?
Fritz, a sentimental young Viennese student, is discussing in his rooms the affairs of his heart with the saner and more practical Theodor. Fritz is melancholy. He has been sustaining a grand passion for a married woman, but the looming shadow of the husband obsesses him. Are his nerves playing him tricks, or has the husband ascertained?
Theodor advises him to sail in shallower and less troubled waters. "You must go for your happiness where I did—and found it, too—where there are no great scenes, no dangers, and no tragic developments, where the first steps are not particularly hard and the last, again, are not painful, where one receives the first kiss with a smile and parts finally with the softest feeling."
Scruples are out of place on the principle, "Better myself than someone else, and the someone else is as inevitable as Fate."
Theodor, moreover, has not only prescribed the cure, but has ordered the medicine. Enter Mizzi, the actual "happiness" of Theodor, and Christine, the prospective "happiness" of Fritz. Mizzi the practical prepares supper, while the sweet naïveté of the genuinely unsophisticated Christine captivates the jaded soul of our fin de siècle romantic. There ensues a scene of the most delicate gaiety and camaraderie. All is health and goodwill. Even Mizzi the prosaic shows her passion for the picturesque on learning that Fritz is in the Dragoons:
MIZZI. Are you in the yellow or the black?
FRITZ. I'm in the yellow.
MIZZI. (dreamily). In the yellow.
Could there be a more subtle probing into the soul of the novelette-reading shopgirl?
Then, at the zenith of the feast, when glasses are clinking and souls are flowing, enter the skeleton. The company is packed into the next room, and Fritz is left to arrange a duel with the man whom he has wronged. Exit the skeleton, re-enter the revellers; yet the shadow of the looming death casts a gloom even over the unconscious minds of the others. The girls bid a gay farewell to the young men, but the aftermath of the old love is already poisoning the sweets of the new.