In Rome had met with severe, though not altogether unjust criticism in another paper. His earlier play, The Freethinker, had been printed and published anonymously through the kind offices of a friend. It fell into the hands of a hostile journalist who ridiculed it. Strindberg now underwent the painful experience of mental dissection at the hands of a ruthless critic. However willingly we may condemn ourselves and indulge in the bitter-sweet contemplation of the follies of yesterday's ego, the rude touch of another's flail arouses every fibre of self-defence.
Though he had promised his father to turn his face against the temptations of authorship and to give single-minded attention to studies, the creative impulse could not be quelled. He wrote Blotsven, a tragedy in five acts, which reiterated the religious rebellion of The Freethinker, depicting the struggle between the spirit of the Viking and proselytising Christianity. The old Icelandish tales which he now read in the original, and the influence of Oehlenschläger, had helped to mould the form.
At this time he became absorbed in the mentality of the Danish writer Sören Kierkegaard. His book Enten-Eller—Either Or—which treats of the struggle between the flesh and the spirit, and which preaches the life-fearing asceticism of the helpless sensualist, stirred Strindberg's doubts and self-reproaches. An elder friend by the runic name of "Is," whose real name was Josef Linck, managed, by the simulation of much learning, culminating in intellectual nihilism, to persuade August that his stand-point was untenable. The friend talked philosophy, æsthetics, world-history, dished up Kant, Schopenhauer, Thackeray and George Sand, and dyed August's soul with impotent scepticism.
The result was that Strindberg burnt the MSS. of his Blotsven. The friend had shown that he was not a poet, and the tears which he shed over the ashes were embittered by the knowledge that he had deceived his father.
He hurriedly decided to pass his examination in Latin compositions. He had not made the requisite preparation, called on the Professor in a state of after-dinner exaltation, demonstrated his independence of spirit, and was promptly turned out.
The suicide of a student brought the supernatural to the door of the already over-visited mind. Strindberg had met the unhappy man some days before and avoided his company. On visiting the place of the tragedy, he was completely unnerved by the sight of blood and the gruesome associations. He felt half guilty of murder, could not sleep and was haunted by the dead man. The Runic brethren watched over him, but his friend "Rejd" nevertheless found him with a bottle of prussic acid and sinister intentions. The friend shrewdly suggested a preparatory sacrificial rite of four "toddies" before the fatal poison was drained. The desired effect was soon apparent. August had to be carried home, but as the gate of the house was closed his friends threw him over the fence. He remained in a snow-drift until he had recovered sufficiently to find his room. But his ghost-ridden soul did not find peace until he quitted Upsala a few days later.
He confessed his sins to his father and obtained permission to remain at home, and to prepare for his degree in a less disturbing atmosphere. He now "felt protected as if he had landed after a night's stormy voyage," and slept calmly in his old truckle-bed. Blotsven rose from the ashes. He re-wrote it in a fortnight. It was now condensed into one act under the title The Outlaw, and was sent to the theatre.
Being thus relieved of the supreme duties to his dramatic daimon, he again descended to Latin compositions and passed his examen in spite of continued defiance of the Professor's rules of procedure. The æsthetic thesis, which he submitted shortly afterwards, was promptly returned to him by the Professor, with the remark that its contents were more suitable for the fair readers of an illustrated weekly than for an academical discourse. This was indeed injustice. August had poured out his most mature views on realism versus idealism, utilising the Danish dramatist Oehlenschläger as a buffer between his new and his old self. The essay is re-printed in full in the autobiography, and is well worth reading. The style is rich in imagery and analogy, the conclusions audacious, though a gentle world-weariness pervades every argument. Strindberg's later style as an incisive essayist is discernible in spite of the periphrastic treatment of dramatic problems from Sophocles to Shakespeare. The desire to show erudition is apparent on every page, and the author confesses that the wish to show the Professor his profound knowledge of Danish literature was one of his motives in choosing the subject. The Professor's unsympathetic attitude towards his review of Danish literature was, therefore, mortifying.
His quiet life at home had begun well. The earlier struggle against poverty had been superseded by well-ordered home-life. August's sisters were now grown up; he was impressed and felt sanctified by their unostentatious discharge of daily duties which contrasted so sharply with his own wild and worthless past. The stem father had been mellowed by time, and August spent many evenings with him in friendly talk on great subjects.
But rebellion soon drove the son away. August resented some trifling interference with his liberty, borrowed a few hundred kronor, and settled for the summer in a fisher-man's cottage on one of the Baltic islands outside Stockholm. With three of the Runic brethren he now threw himself into a healthy outdoor life, bathing, sailing, fencing. The body was to be taught natural goodness, and the counsels of Satan were to be unheeded. He studied philology, avoided alcohol, and dwelt with Dante, Shakespeare and Goethe. Natural asceticism and the mental discipline of classifying root-words would curb his vigorous fantasy and help him to acquit himself with honour at Upsala. He could expect no further help from the father.