The type of girl who ripens to a premature sexuality, and who, though physically still intact, is spiritually corrupt, has been made widely known by Marcel Prévost’s “Demivierge.” A companion novel to this is “Nixchen,” by Hans von Kahlenberg. Nobler types of girls playing with this vice are described by Clara Eysell-Kilburger in “Dilettanten des Lasters.”
Diametrically opposed to these are the “Vera” characters, so called after the book by Vera, “Eine für Viele. Aus dem Tagebuche eines Mädchens” (“One for Many. From the Diary of a Girl”), which demands from the man before marriage the same purity and chastity that man himself demands from his future wife. Svava, in Björnsen’s drama “Der Handschuh,” is a similar type. Regarding this problem an entire literature has sprung into being, which associated itself with Vera’s above-mentioned book, such as “Eine für sich Selbst” (“One for Herself”), by “Auch Jemand” (“Somebody Else”); “Einer für Viele” (“One Man for Many”); “Eine für Vera. Aus dem Tagebuche einer jungen Frau” (“One for Vera. From the Diary of a Young Wife”)—these in favour of Vera’s demand—and Christine Thaler’s “Eine Mutter für Viele” (“One Mother for Many”); by Verus, “Einer für Viele” (“One Man for Many”), and “Kranke Seelen. Von einem Arzte” (“Morbid Souls. By a Physician”)—these in opposition to Vera’s demand—for masculine abstinence from sexual intercourse before marriage.[797]
Next we may mention certain novels glorifying misogyny, such as Strindberg’s “Beichte eines Toren” (“Confessions of a Fool”) and “Vergangenheit eines Toren” (“The Past of a Fool”); and Tolstoi’s “The Kreutzer Sonata,” in which absolute asceticism is demanded. These ideas, which in Weininger found a pseudo-scientific apologist, have been contested in an interesting autobiography in the form of a romance, “Das Weib vom Manne erschaffen: Bekenntnisse einer Frau” (“Woman created from Man: Confessions of a Woman”), translated from the Norwegian by Tyra Bentsen. Zola’s magnificent hymn in favour of fruitfulness in “Fécondité” is also a refutation of this extreme ascetic-malthusian standpoint.
The “intimacy” and “free love” are to-day the subject of innumerable romances and novels. Tovote discusses the problem in “Im Liebesrausch” (“In the Intoxication of Love”), and in other novels, more superficially from the grossly sensual side; the ideal free love, ending indeed in marriage, is described in Peter Nansen’s “Maria.”[798] Similarly, Frenssen, in “Hilligenlei,” deals with the preconjugal sexual intercourse so common in country districts, and he reproves in powerful words the repression of natural impulses by conventional morality.[799]
In “Martin Birks Jugend,” Hjalmar Söderberg has described the great difficulties of ideal-minded young men who are not in a position to marry, and who are repelled by the idea of intercourse with common prostitutes.
In contrast to this, Camille Lemonnier, in “Die Liebe im Menschen,” describes the great danger of an overgrowth of the sexual; and Arthur Schnitzler, in his admirable “Reigen,” describes the utter misery of irregular sexual intercourse, of true “wild love,” and displays vividly before our eyes the results of sexual promiscuity.
The social contempt and the other disastrous consequences which to-day follow free love, in the form of illegitimate motherhood, have been described in dramas, such as Sudermann’s “Heimat” and Gerhart Hauptmann’s “Rose Bernd,” and in romances such as Gabriele Reuter’s “Aus guter Familie,” Johann Bojer’s “Eine Pilgerfahrt,” and Ernst Eberhardt’s “Das Kind.” The manifold conflicts resulting from free love and illegitimate motherhood are also described by Marcelle Tinayre in “La Rebelle.”
In belles-lettres we also find numerous accounts of the burning question of our day—that of coercive marriage. Above all, Ibsen, in “Ghosts,” “A Doll’s House,” “The Lady from the Sea,” “Hedda Gabler,” and “Little Eyolf,” has exposed the manifold injuries resulting from modern conventional marriage, and has propounded the ideal of a new marriage, based upon a deeply subjective conception of love and upon life’s work in common. The influence of Ibsen is further shown in numerous dramas and romances dealing with the marriage problem. Of these, it will suffice to mention a few of the most successful, such as “Die Sklavin,” by Ludwig Fulda; “Fanny Roth: eine Jungfrauengeschichte,” by Grete Meisel-Hess; and “Was siehst du aber den Splitter,” by Karl Larsen.
The important question of differences in class and social position in married life is considered by Ernst von Wildenbruch in his drama, “Die Haubenlerche.”
The classical novels of adultery are, and will remain, Erneste Feydeau’s delightful “Fanny,” and Gustave Flaubert’s “Madame Bovary.” In French literature in general, in dramas as well as romances, adultery is a favourite motive.[800]