The most important of these young reviews is Die Weissen Blätter; important on account of the variety of questions it deals with, and the value and number of its contributors, as well as for the [{161}]broad-mindedness of its editor—René Schickele. An Alsatian by birth, he belongs to those who feel most acutely the bitterness of the present struggle. After an interval of three months Die Weissen Blätter, which almost corresponds to our Nouvelle Revue Française, reappeared in January last with the following declaration, akin to that of the Revue des Nations, at Berne. "It seems good to us to begin the work of reconstruction, in the midst of the war, and to aid in preparing for the victory of the spirit. The community of Europe is at present apparently destroyed. Is it not the duty of all of us who are not bearing arms, to live from today onwards according to the dictates of our conscience, as it will be the duty of every German when once the war is over?"
By the side of these disinterested manifestoes about actual politics, appear lengthy historical novels (Tycho Brahé by Max Brod) and satirical comedies by Carl Sternheim, who continues to scourge the upper classes of German society, and the capitalists, for Die Weissen Blätter is open to all questions of the day. But in spite of the actual differences which must necessarily exist between a German and a French review, we cannot but point out the frankly hostile attitude of these writers to all the excesses of Chauvinism. The articles of Max[{162}] Scheler, "Europe and the War," show an impartial attitude which is entirely praiseworthy. The review opens its columns to the loyal Annette Kolb, who, as the daughter of a German father and of a French mother, suffers keenly in this conflict between the parts of her nature, and has lately raised a tempest in Dresden, where in a public lecture she had the courage to admit her fidelity to both sides, and to express her regret that Germany should fail to understand France. In the February number, under the title "Ganz niedrich hängen!" there appeared a violent repudiation of the Krieg mit dem Maul (the war of tongues); "If journalists hope to inspire courage by insulting the enemy, they are mistaken—we refuse such stimulants. We dare to maintain our opinion, that the humblest volunteer of the enemy, who from an unreasoned but exalted sentiment of patriotism, fires upon us from an ambush, knowing well what he risks, is much superior to those journalists who profit by the public feeling of the day, and under cover of high-sounding words of patriotism do not fight the enemy but spit upon him."
Of all these young writers who are striving to preserve the integrity of their minds against the force of national passions, the one whose personality has been most exalted by this tempest, the most[{163}] eloquent, courageous, and decided of all is Wilhelm Herzog. He is the editor of the Forum at Munich, and like our own Péguy, when he began to publish his Cahiers de la Quinzaine, he fills almost the whole of his review with his own burning articles. The enthusiastic biographer of H. von Kleist, he sees and judges the events of his own time with the eyes of that indomitable spirit. The German censor attempts in vain to silence him and to forbid the publication of the lectures of Spitteler and of Annette Kolb; his indignation and cries of vengeful irony spread even to us. He attacks bitterly the ninety-three intellectuals who "fancy they are all Ajaxes because they bray the loudest," those politicians of the school of Haeckel, who make a new division of the world, those patriotic bards who insult other nations; he attacks Thomas Mann mercilessly, scoffs at his sophistry, and defends France, the French Army,[33] and French civilization against him; he points out that the great men of Germany (Grünwald, Dürer, Bach, and Mozart amongst others) have always been persecuted, humiliated, and calumniated.[34] In an article entitled "Der neue Geist,"[35] after having scoffed at the[{164}] banality that has reappeared in the German theaters, and the literary mediocrity of patriotic productions, he asked where this "new spirit" may be found, and this gives him an opportunity to demolish Ostwald and Lasson.
"Where is it to be found? In the Hochschulen? Have we not read that incredibly clumsy (unwahrscheinlich plumpen) appeal of the 99 professors? Have we not appreciated the statements of that double centenarian (des zweihundertjährige Mummelgreises) mummy Lasson? When I was studying philosophy as an undergraduate at the University of Berlin, the theatre in which he lectured was a place of amusement (Lachkabinett) for us—nothing more. And today people take him seriously! English, French, and Italian papers print his senile babblings against Holland, as typical of the Stimmung of the German intellectuals. The wrong that these privy councillors and professors have done us with their Aufklärungsarbeit can hardly be measured. They have isolated themselves from humanity by their inability to realize the feelings of others."
In opposition to these false representatives of a nation, these cultured gossips and political adventurers, he extols the silent ones, the great mass of the people of all nations who suffer in silence;[{165}] and he joins with them in "the invisible community of sorrow."
"One who is suffering and knows that his sorrow is shared by millions of other beings, will bear it calmly; he will accept it willingly even, because he knows that he is enriched thereby, made stronger, more tender, more humane."[36]
And he quotes the words of old Meister Eckehart: "Suffering is the fastest steed that will bear you to perfection."
* * *
At the close of this summary review of the young writers of the war, a place must be found for those whom the war has crushed—they counted amongst the best. Ernst Stadler was an enthusiastic admirer of French art and of the French spirit. He translated Francis Jammes, and on the eve of his death, in November, he was writing to Stefan Zweig from the trenches about the poems of Verlaine, which he was translating. The unfortunate George Trakl, the poet of melancholy, was made lieutenant of a sanitary column in Galicia, and the sight of so much[{166}] suffering drove him to despair and death. And there are many hidden tragedies, still unrevealed. When they are made known, humanity will tremble in contemplating its handiwork.
I reflected, as doubtless many of my French readers have also done, in reading through these German writings inspired by the war—writings through which from time to time there passes a mighty breath of revolt and sorrow—that our young writers are not writing "literature." Instead of books they give us deeds, and their letters. And in re-reading some of their letters I thought that ours had chosen the better part. It is not for me now to point out the position that this heroic correspondence will occupy, not only in our history but also in our literature. Into it the flower of our youth has put all its life, its faith and its genius: and for some of those letters I would give many of the finest lines of the noblest poems. Whatever be the result of this war, and the opinion as to its value later, it will be recognized that France has written on paper, mud-stained and often blotted with blood, some of its sublimest pages. Assuredly this war touches us more nearly than it does our adversaries, for who of us would have the heart to write a play or a novel whilst his country is in danger and his brothers dying?[{167}]