But other powers were at work undermining the solidifying influence of application to science. In the doctor's house he met writers and artists. Conversation generally turned on plays, pictures, books, authors and actors. There was a fine library, offering the world's literary treasures. There was a collection of pictures and there were valuable engravings. The intellectual atmosphere was international, and afforded a pleasant change from the vulgar patriotism which had been sacred to the pedagogues of the board-school.
The Dramatic Theatre was near at hand. Here a new and gaily attractive world was opened to him. Standing in the gallery he listened to the badinage of French comedy and saw the types of the Second Empire in aristocratic setting. Thus he spent several evenings every week. The life of the actor seemed strangely interesting, for he was allowed to express himself, to speak unwelcome truths without losing popularity. The theatrical profession seemed outside and above the petty rules of society—a privileged class. It offered special and glorious opportunities for artistic self-expression.
Meanwhile the experiences of his medical education had become distasteful. The old physician brought his pupil to see patients, rich and poor, providing him with diverse "clinical material." He was asked to assist at early morning operations and to hold the patients. Whilst Strindberg held the patient's head, the doctor "removed glands with a fork." The assistant's thoughts were soaring high above the surgery, in the regions of Goethe's Faust and Wieland's novels; they were with George Sand, Chateaubriand and Lessing. During cauterisation the smell of human flesh rose in his nostrils and spoilt his appetite for breakfast. He describes his state of mind in the following words: "Imagination had been set in motion and memory would not work; reality with its bums and blood clots was ugly; æstheticism had seized the youth, and life seemed dull and repulsive."
A futile attempt to pass a preliminary medical examination at Upsala precipitated his decision not to enter a profession which was exclusively occupied with the aches of the body. In spite of the disappointment of his medical benefactor, he announced his intention of becoming an actor.
He now lived for some months in an ideal stage-world. After making arrangements for obtaining practical instruction in the autumn, he devoted the summer to private studies of the art which appeared to be his true and only vocation in life. Schiller's lecture, "On the Theatre as an Institution for Moral Education," saturated his mind with a lofty and idealistic conception of the ethical and æsthetic mission of the stage. Was not this the greatest of all human arts? Was it not a calling worthy of the finest talent and the most devoted labour? He buried his past restlessness in faithful search for knowledge of the actor's gifts and graces. Goethe taught him how to stand, sit down, carry himself, how to enter and leave a room gracefully. He studied the pose of antique sculpture and practised to walk with uplifted head and expanded chest, whilst the arms were trained to swing easily and the hand to be lightly closed with the fingers forming a beautifully shaped curve. He tried to conquer his shyness and his fear of crossing open places, and paraded his new artful self in the most frequented promenade in Stockholm.
The doctor's house was made the scene of his dramatic exercises. Here he prepared the performance of Die Räuber and appeared himself as Karl Moor. When his vocal practices disturbed the peace of the house, he repaired to Ladugårdsgärdet, the vast fields and hills, on the east side of Stockholm, which for many years past have been used for military manœuvres. They now also serve as a starting-point for aerial flights. But no mechanical wings of flight could equal those, on which Strindberg's imagination soared towards the realisation of his mission as an artist and a social reformer.
Here, he tells us, he stormed against heaven and earth. The city, the church spires of which were visible, represented Society, whilst he belonged to Nature. "He shook his fist at the palace, the churches, the barracks, and snarled at the troops which during the manœuvres sometimes came too near him. There was something fanatical in his work, and he spared no pains to make his reluctant muscles obedient."
The keen resentment of injustice and the irrepressible sympathy with the poor and the down-trodden, which the later misanthropy of the man could never quell, showed forth in an episode of this time, connected with the unveiling of a statue of Charles XII. Though the statue had been erected through public donations, the arrangements for the unveiling were such as to exclude the people from a view of the proceedings. The people threatened to pull down the stands for paying spectators which obscured the view, and the troops were called out to restore order. August was seated at a gay dinner-party at the doctor's house in honour of some Italian operatic stars, when the sounds of the battle reached the ears of the company.
"What is that?" asked the prima donna.
"It is the noise of the mob," said a professor.