Identifier: germanclassicsof18fran (find matches)
Title: The German classics of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; masterpieces of German literature
Year: 1913 (1910s)
Authors: Francke, Kuno, 1855-1930 Howard, William Guild, b. 1868 Singer, Isidore, 1859-1939
Subjects: German literature German literature English literature
Publisher: Albany, N. Y. : J. B. Lyon company
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Internet Archive

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another novel Vita somniumbreve (Life a Short Dream), which was published ten yearslater. Here also, the leading motive is, ^ Oh life, ohbeauty! And the end of the story, like that of Ursleu^is chaos instead of beauty. In both of these novels resig-nation is the last note. These books may be contrasted with two other novels:From the Triumphgasse (1902), the best knowm of RicardaHuchs works, and Of the Kings and the Crown (1902),which is the authors most symbolic novel. In the Tri-umphgasse we are led into a totally different atmosphereof life: the slums of a large Italian town. The owner ofa crowded tenement in the poorest part of the city describesthe fates and frailties of his tenants. The most interestinggroup of figures is formed around the old woman Farfallaand her sons and daughters — all of them children of physi-cal and moral wretchedness. Only the crippled Ricardoknows of a better life, where his soul dreamingly wandersabout in blossoming gardens of eternal beauty. But he,
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RICARDA HUGH RICARDA HUGH 337 too, is no victor over circumstances, for the title ofTriiwiphgasse (the street of triumph) is mere mockery.He dies * a fettered slave in the procession of life. What the novelist portrays in these two books shows herchanged attitude toward the humbler classes. In the twofirst mentioned novels, she is rather remote from the lifeof the toiling many; e. g., all the Ursleus * wear life likea beautiful garment or ornament. Then, when living inTrieste, as she told in a letter, Ricarda Huch saw whatwomen and children had to suffer, and what it meant to bea social outlaw. Now, after this experience, she feels howa common man feels who has lost his happiness or, worsestill, his self-respect and honor. And with subtle obser-vation she pictures wildgrown human beings, men blindedwith passion or even raging maniacs. She does not, how-ever, raise her characters from the despair of drudgeryand brutality to confidence in life. She is no Jane Addams,nor does she want to

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