‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’:’ THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS

BY DAVID HORTON

Grabbe’s presentation of large numbers of ‘Volk’ on stage as an active element in drama has long been recognized as one of his most significant contributions to dramatic art . Many contemporary reviewers of Grabbe’s plays pointed to the bold originality of this aspect of his work, and several of the earliest theses and disserta- tions on the playwright focused specifically on the remarkable mass-scenes of his historical dramas.: Subsequent generations of critics, aware that an increased dependence on collective groups of figures represents an essentially modern development in drama, have devoted much attention to Grabbe’s ‘Volksszenen’ . Indeed, it is largely the celebrated rnass-scenes of plays like Napoleon, acclaimed by Hermann Pongs as ‘das erste Massendrama der Weltliteratur’, that have promp- ted critics to regard Grabbe as a forerunner of modern dramatic techniques.’ Grabbe’s tendency to undermine the traditionally dominant position of the dramatic hero by integrating him into a broad historical background, it is argued, leads directly to the experimental, ‘open’ form of his later dramas.

Critical opinion on the function of the masses in Grabbe’s plays is, however, sharply divided. This is hardly surprising, for the role of the ‘Volk’ in the motiva- tion of the action of Grabbe’s works touches on the very essence of the playwright’s concept of history and its expression through the medium of drama. A particularly violent divergence in views is to be witnessed in the debate on the signhcance of the masses in relation to the other outstanding component of Grabbe’s drama, the grossly overinflated heroic individual. At the centre of the discussion stands the question of whether, in view of the ambivalent relationship between hero and ‘Volk’ in Napoleon, HannibaL and Die Hermannsschlacht, the underlying conception of hjstoricai causation in Grabbe’s’ works is fundamentally heroic-individualistic or democratic-collectivistic in nature. Are the civilian masses of Paris and Carthage, for example, to be regarded as a genuine counterweight to the towering and apparently omnipotent presence of the mighty titular heroes of the dramas in question? Does the dynamic historical personage pursue his aims with the active support of, or rather in spite of, the masses? The majority of com- mentators have resolved such problems, largely in the wake of von Wiese’s chapters on Grabbe in his influential Die dezttsche Tragodie uon Lessing bis Heb- be/. by locating the central conflict in Grabbe’s dramas in precisely this duality of historical forces. The antagonism between isolated creative individualism on the one hand and the blind collective will of the masses on the other has come to be recognized as the prime source of dramatic tension in Grabbe’s oeuvre.d While such conflict is generally regarded as indicative of Grabbe’s pessimistic apprehen- sion of history in Napoleon and Hannibal, the apparent removal of destructive tensions between hero and masses in the playwright’s final drama, Die Hermanas- schfucht, is commonly viewed as evidence‘of a new, more affirmative understanding

‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS 15

of historical processes. The relationship between the hero and the ‘Volk’ is thus frequently identified as the central theme of Grabbe’s history plays.

There seems little doubt that Grabbe’s paradoxical combination of an in- dividualistic with a collectivistic view of historical progression is largely responsible for the curious imbalance and inconsistency of his work. The playwright is unable, even in his most accomplished dramas, to reconcile his emotionally conditioned (and well-documented) fascination with the great men of history, who at times ap- pear to act autonomously in a semi-mythical realm beyond historical reality, with an ever increasing rational awareness of the potency of ‘objective’ social forces, which relativize and even destroy the hero. Nowhere is this clash of interests more apparent than in the Napoleon-drama, a work torn between the centralizing tendencies which arise from Grabbe’s desire to retain the heroic presence of his charismatic protagonist on the one hand, and the decentralizing formal character- istics which result from his attempt to present Napoleon as the product and victim of his historical situation on the other. Yet, as this discussion aims to demonstrate, it is not wholly legitimate to view Grabbe’s interest in the tension between the in- dividual and the collective either as the essence of his concept of history or as the central theme of his creative work.

In order to attempt a more precise definition of the role of the masses in Grabbe’s dramas it is necessary at the outset to make an important distinction be- tween the two types of collective encountered in his work. The civilian ‘masses’ of Grabbe’s history plays-the Romans of Marills a n d Sulla, the Parisians of Napoleon, the Cathaginians of Hannibal-should by no means be equated with the soldiers of the armies of Barbarossa, Heinrich VI, Napoleon or Hannibal. The ‘Burger’ and the military unit are characterized in these plays by entirely distinct functions, and the failure to differentiate sufficiently clearly between the two groups has led to considerable confusion in some discussions of Grabbe’s dramas.’ The strict segregation of the ‘Volk’ in its heroic capacity as an ordered military community from the chaotic mobs who are viewed purely negatively by the dramatist is essential to a more thorough understanding of the nature of dramatic fonflict in Grabbe’s work.

Only in a military capacity is the ‘Volk’ in Grabbe’s dramas able to exert any decisive influence on the course of history. The much-discussed glorification of heroism in the plays, which assumes grotesque proportions and is often identified as an immature ‘Heroenkult’ , culminating in what Friedrich Sengle has recently described as ‘das standige, den heutigen Leser ermudende Gerassel der Grab- beschen Schlachten’ , 6 does not stem merely from Grabbe’s seemingly unqualified admiration for the titanic individuals of history. It arises largely, perhaps chiefly, from the playwright’s unmistakable idealization of the protagonist’s entire heroic environment. Those characters in Grabbe’s dramas who display a truly historical consciousness by joining the dynamic hero in his struggle against the stifling mediocrity of the everyday world undergo an elevating experience; they are raised high above worldly restrictions and allowed access to an ideal realm of heroism and comradeship. The intense identification between Marius and his Marians, be- tween Heinrich der Liiwe and his Saxons or Napoleon and his grande arme’e, serves a dual function. Firstly it provides the hero, who is always political leader and

16 ‘DIE MENGE IST ElNE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS

military general at one and the same ;he, with the power to conduct his megalomaniac assault on the world. Equally importantly, however, it creates an insoluble bond between leader and led, who are fused together in a ‘utopian com- munity’ which Manfred Schneider, in a most incisive study of Grabbe’s work, has interpreted as a diluted, substitute form of Schillerean idealism.’ Transcendence takes place here not beyond, but within, the bounds of worldly reality: the great individual is able to transform his entourage into a quasi-mystical union of souls.

Grabbe never tires in his dramas of placing the glory of the idealized battle ex- perience in stark contrast to the banal. unheroic social world. Largely, no doubt, as a reaction against the Restoration age in which he lived, a world which seemed to him devoid of outstanding figures and heroic qualities, ignorant of truly historical values, he developed a profound yearning for the glory of the magnificent past, for Imperial Rome, mediaeval Germany, Napoleonic France. Grabbe’s obsession with history, which is actested not only by his series of six historical dramas, but also by many utterances in his letters, essays and reviews, has frequently been in- terpreted as the expression of his deep frustration with conditions in ‘Vormiirz’ Germany.& In a famous passage in his polemical essay ‘Etwas iiber den Brief- wechsel zwischen Schiller und Goethe’ (1830) Grabbe voices his contempt for the mediocrity of post-Napoleonic Europe:

Die Guillotine der Revolution steht still und ihr Beil rostet,-mit ihm ver- rostet vielleicht auch manches Grosse, und das Gemeine, in der Sicherheit, dass ihm nicht mehr der Kopf abgeschlagen werden kann, erhebt gleich dem Unkraut sein Haupt ( IV, 93).

The dramatist is painfully aware that the splendour of the recent past, familiar to him both from his voracious reading and from the reports of contemporaries, has been swept away by the ‘Uberzahl der Schwachen und Elenden’ (111, 350). The idea that a world without heroes is a world without meaning (‘Mit Napoleons Ende ward es mit der Welt, als ware sie ein ausgelesenes Buch’ IV, 93) is echoed by Grabbe elsewhere, not least in the words of Napoleon in his moment of defeat. The playwright’s convicticn that a world of ‘Schlachttaten und Heroen’ is infinite- ly preferable to the ‘Geistesschlaf‘ he sees in his own ‘sehr irdene, zerbrockliche’ age is reflected in a number of passages of Grabbe’s plays which ridicule cowardly bourgeois complacency and underline the superiority of the sphere of heroic ac- tivity. Cambronne’s farewell to the farmer Lacoste, whose rustic idyll has been destroyed by the raging Battle of Waterloo (‘Weh, meine Frau und meine Kinder!’ 111. 440) is full of disdain:

Herr Pachter Lacoste, leben Sie nun recht wohl und laufen Sie von hier was Sie konnen-Griissen Sie die Frau und die lieben Kinder, und wenn Sie nach zehn jahren mit denselben wieder zum tausendsten Male einen Kuchen essen oder Ihren Tochtern neue Kleider schenken, so freuen Sie sich ja von neuem iiber Ihre Existenz und Ihr Gliick--Wir gehen jenen Kanonenmiindungen entgegen und bediirfen Ihrer Elendigkeit nicht mehr! (11, 454)

‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS 17

A variety of other episodes and figures in Grabbe’s work-the fisherman in Mar& zknd Sulla, the gardener in Napoleon, the Carthaginian traders in Hannz’al-illustrate the apathetic, escapist mentality which the playwright scorns. Ignorant of the ‘world-historical hour’ in which they live, these figures re- main immersed in their private sphere and strive only to protect the narrow con- fines of their own domestic world: ‘Wir haben ein kleines Dasein . . . wir konnen nichts tun als auf die Seite springen, wenn die Grossen fallen’ (I, 344). The vulnerability of this idyllic, ahistorical realm to the pressure of heroic forces is one of Grabbe’s favourite themes: it finds its most forceful expression in the sadistic destruction of the merchant town of Bardewick by Heinrich der Liiae and his army in Kairer Heznnch VZ (Act 11, sc. iv).

The individual who chooses not to remain a spectator when the monumental figures of history fall, but rather to assert himself as a member of a selfless heroic community, receives the full affirmation of the dramatist, for: ‘In des Gefechtes Wut und Graus/Ist wahre Frelheit und Gleichheit zu Haus!’ (I, 150). Here an ethos of regenerative heroic elitism, which exists beyond the constraints of the op- pressive and corrupt social world, is born. However uncertain life on the march might be, it is inherently superior to the monotony of an anonymous civilian ex- istence. The remarkable battle-scenes of Grabbe’s dramas, developed to their ut- most in the second half of Napoleon and the ‘Genre- und Bataillenstuck’ Die Hermannsschlacht, not only provide the vital moments of historical decision in the playwright’s work, but also represent the culmination of his heroic idealism in as far as they offer a practical demonstration of the transforming powers of the mystical ‘Fronterlebnis’ . Uttering rhetorical assurances of the unsurpassable pleasure of the heroic experience, scores of men sacrifice themselves in an orgy of death and destruction: ‘Donner, welch ein Kugelregen-Die Melodie! ’ (11, 454). Absurd acts of loyalty abound. War is by no means a purely destructive phenomenon: its world-shaping powers offer the individual an opportunity to participate in historical affairs and open the way to a higher order. Bulow, significantly, defines the battle as a ‘Jakobsleiter zum Himmel’ (11, 437). Self- immolation in a heroic cause is a constructive and rewarding act: ‘0, wie suss ist der Tod!’ (11, 454).

The relationship between the great historical individual and his fanatical military following in Grabbe’s drarnas is wholly unambiguous. In these works, as in literary tradition as a whole, armies serve merely as the extension of their leader’s personality and act exclusively in accordance with instructions from above.” Having little will of their own, these men follow their master blindly, ex- pressing their allegiance in acts of the most extreme subservience. Without excep- tion the great individuals of Grabbe’s plays are able to call on the undivided loyalty of their men, who act as a mirror for the magnlficent actions of the hero.“’ Marius’ supporters, for example, literally worship their general, echoing his words in choral harmony: their dedication to Marius is absolute, and they ‘kummern sich weder urn Rom, noch um die Welt, sie hangen lediglich an der Personlichkeit des Marius’ (I, 398). Marius, stressing the reciprocity of this bond, is able to refer to them as his children. This untroubied harmony between the leader and his troops is to be witnessed in all Grabbe’s historicai dramas, and even Hannibal, whose

18 ‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS

army consists of a multi-racial band of mercenaries, can depend on the unques- tioning loyalty of his followers.

Although Grabbe’s battle-scenes are of a scope unparalleled in the tradition of German historical drama, his presentation of the heroic military experience can hardly be regarded as a genuine innovation. The true originality of Grabbe’s manipulation of large numbers of figures on stage only becomes evident in the urban mass-scenes of Maribs und Sulla, Napoleon and Hannibal, of which the dramatist was himself justlfiably proud.” These scenes, which are generally held to constitute the most signlficant manifestation of Grabbe’s celebrated ‘historical realism’, present the citizen ‘Volk’ and are characterized by an entirely different function. ‘?

Yet attempts to attribute a central role to the historical potential of the civilian ‘Volk’ in Grabbe’s dramas have encountered great difficulties. O n closer examina- tion it becomes evident, in fact, that the much-discussed relationship between individual and masses in these dramas is not as crucial to an understanding of the playwright’s art as is generally argued. It is interesting to note initially that, from a purely quantitative point of view, Grabbe devotes less attention to such scenes than one might be led to believe by critics who view his main concern as ‘die Erfassung historischer Prozesse unter dem Aspekt des Verhaltnisses von Individuum und Volksrnassen’ . ‘ j Only in the three dramas mentioned above do we encounter the civilian masses which have become,such a focal point of atten- tion. Grabbe first experiments with crowd-scenes in Manks undSulla, particularly in the expanded second version: but here Act 11, sc. iii is the only major example, while the prose sketches for Act 11, v show this, too, to have been conceived as a ‘Volksszene’ and Act 11, sc. ii (‘Sitzung des Senats’) might be partially considered as such. The seeds sown in this first attempt at historical drama bear fruit in Napoleon, above all in Act I , sc. i (‘Unter den Arkaden des Palais Royal’) and Act 111, SC. i (‘GrPveplatz’), where the political and social tensions within post- Revolutionary Paris are depicted in some depth. In Hannibal, on the other hand, the masses seem to have disappeared altogether: in this drama the playwright’s portrayal of historical conditions is restricted to two brief scenes in the market place (I, ii and IV, ii), both headed ‘Grosser Marktplatz in Karthago’, which can hardly be considered crowd scenes at all.

An examination of the signlficance of these scenes in terms of the dramatic ac- tion raises further doubts about the alleged ‘Vertrauen Grabbes in die historische Kraft der Volksmassen’.i‘ The conception that the depiction of collective forces in Grabbe’s dramas demonstrates an increasing awareness of the masses as ‘die ent- scheidende politische Macht’ has been promoted chiefly by Marxist critics, who see the centre of Grabbe’s art in the ‘Dialektik zwischen Individuum und Gesell- schaft’. i 5 In search of a tradition for their own ideological principles, and partly, no doubt, in an effort to correct the distorted picture of Grabbe propagated by the National Socialists, they have been concerned to produce an image of the playwright as a forerunner of democratic-plebeian literature and a father of modern realism. The notion that the masses in Grabbe’s plays are to be understood as a historical force equal, if not superior, in power to the creative in- dividual is, however, by no means restricted to the Grabbe scholarship of the

‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS 19

German Democratic Republic. It is echoed in a number of other interpretations of Grabbe’s work which have appeared during recent years.I6

Commentators concerned to present Grabbe as a progressive social realist with insight into the might of the proletariat have been faced with considerable pro- blems in their discussion of Grabbe’s mass-scenes. The playwright’s treatment of the ‘Volk’ in his historical dramas is, in fact, hardly flattering to the democratic ideal. From the very outset Grabbe’s attitude to the historical value of the masses, who are characterized in M a n k and S d a by inconstancy, gullibility and selfish- ness, is negative. The people of Rome in this play are governed by a crude revolu- tionary instinct which knows no goal other than violence for its own sake; their desire for an improved standard of living is not guided by any sense of policy, organization or purpose. Intent only on the overthrow of the present system of government (‘. . . der Staat wird faul auf der einen kite,-er sol1 umgekehrt werden!’ I, 374), they have no suggestions for an alternative system and bandy around empty, pseudo-revolutionary slogans: ‘Einer fur Alle, Alle fur Einen! ’ (I,

The chaotic, unthinking masses of Rome prove easy prey for skilled demagogues like Saturninus, an eloquent anarchist and accomplished manipulator of the moods and passions of the mob. By playing on their primitive sense of social justice Saturninus is able to incite the crowds to a violent uprising against the crumbling senate. Yet this questionable expression of political will is only short- lived: at one moment the mobs welcome Marius as their champion, shortly after- wards they degrade themselves still further in their attempt to appease the victorious Sulla. They are fickle and are, with apparent justification, held in con- tempt by all who have dealings with them. Sulla, the perceptive observer of historical developments, recognizes the allgemeine Versunkenheit der Menge’ (I, 403) and holds little hope for the political stability of Rome after his abdication. Nothing, therefore, could be more ironic than Sempronius’ statement: ‘Wir sind wieder, was wir waren: ein erhabenes, ein herrliches Volk’ (I, 374). Not only, in- deed, is the ‘Volk’ of Rome entirely devoid of civic idealism and incapable of con- structive action; its impotence in historical terms is so fundamental that even destructive behaviour is beyond its powers:

374).

das Volk ist bang Und hohl: fur Tugend hat es keinen Sinn, Und auch nicht einmal Kraft genug turn Bosen (I, 371).

Any attempt to interpret this drama in terms of co-operation or antagonism be- tween the hero and the masses, in terms of the citizens’ political awareness or their historical role, must fail in face of their capriciousness and lack of direction. At no point in the play is there any direct interactiqn between the titular figures and the urban mobs. Sulla achieves his victory as a result of his military supremacy, and the potential social theme of the drama, indicattd in Marius’ declaration that he has returned to Rome in order to free the oppressed plebeians from the plutocratic rule of the optimates (I, 364), is left unexplored by the dramatist. The dual heroes and the citizen ‘Volk’ move on entirely different levels and have no direct contact.

20 ‘DIE MENGE iST EINE BESTlE’ : THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS __.-_ __

The technically impressive Paris street-scenes of the ‘Massendrama’ Nupoleon grant the ‘Volk’ a much more extensive stage presence, and the ‘Burger’ are depicted here not as a uniform conglomeration of anonymous types, but in their diversity. Various strata of Parisian society, from court to militia, from emigre‘s to small traders, from market women to the suburbanites of St. Antoine, are placed on stage as a seething, heterogeneous mass. The dramatic function of the mobs has, however. undergone little development. The citizens presented to us in this series of mass-scenes are not by any means synthesised into a closely-knit social unit with a collective consciousness or common ideal, but are, as Edward McInnes has recently emphasized, ‘represented only in random collisions of countless in- dividuals’ who defy ‘coherent social diagnosis’.’’ The instability of the crowds in this drama is effectively demonstrated by their ambivalent reactions to King Louis upon his flight from the city (11, 376f.), and the people’s susceptibility to demagoguery and unfounded rumour is displayed in the episodes with the ‘Schneidermeister’ and the ‘Advokat Duchesne’. The ‘Volk’ in the play does not represent anything like a unified entity: the veterans of the grunde arm& cling to memories of their heroic past; the ‘Vorstadter’, under the leadership of the anar- chist Jouve, are interested only in continued violence; the market women retain a sentimental attachment to the monarchy. The crowds of Paris are portrayed as wavering and naive, and their behaviour on the Champs de Mars, where they ecstatically swear in the constitution of a dictatorial emperor who holds them in utter contempt, reveals them to be alarmingly susceptible to political manipula- tion.’

As in Manur und Sulla, there can be no question in Napoleon of any genuine interplay or conflict between the hero and the masses. Napoleon reaches Paris from EIba unimpeded and re-establishes his despotic regime without opposition on the part of the ‘Volk’. The emperor’s might and charisma are such that all ef- forts to thwart his return to power, be they from liberal (Fouche and Carnot) or from revolutionary quarters (Jouve), prove futile. It is important to recognize that Napoleon returns to Paris not as a champion of the Revolution dependent on popular support, as R. C. Cowen has suggested, but rather as its liquidator.1R Once his position is secure he rapidly passes anti-revolutionary measures (‘Die alte Manier, als ware gar kein Elba gewesen’ 11, 393j and strives to reassert his former authority from behind a veneer of liberalism (‘der alte Brei in neuen Schusseln’ 11, 398). Indeed, the noticin that Napoleon is to be viewed primarily as the figurehead of the revolutionary movement, a conception which Grabbe himself encouraged in a famous statement relating to the work (‘Napoleon ist kleiner als die Revolution, und im Grunde ist er nur das Fahnlein an deren Maste’lq)), is con- tradicted by the course of the drama itself, which illustrates most conclusively that the Hundred Days are to be seen purely as the work of a dynamic individual. This and other inconsistencies which are apparent in the drama may well be partly due to a change in Grabbe’s conception of his material during the composition of Napoleon. One thing is, however, clear: the central subject of the completed work is not the Revolution or the masses, but Napoleon himself. Grabbe continues in the same letter: ‘ . . . im Drama werde ich aber aus Klugheit den I’empereur et roi hoch halten’. Nothing in the play is allowed to interfere with the dominant

~~ ~~ ~ ~ ~

‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS 21

position of the hero and, later, that of his relationship with his military en- tourage.

The ‘Volk’ in Napoleon, which has, indeed, undergone considerable quan- titative expansion (e.g. in Act 111, sc. i: ‘Volk’; ‘anderes Volk’; ‘andere Umstehende’ ; ‘Volk im Vordergrunde’ ; ‘Volk im Mittelgrunde’, etc.), has little bearing on the plot. Able only to articulate their reactions in unison and to echo the ideas of dominant personalities, often with almost monosyllabic brevity, the masses serve largely as a mirror of the hero’s greatness, as is demonstrated in the scene on the Champs de Mars. Whilst it might be argued that the people of Paris make Napoleon’s return to power possible by witholding their support from the Bourbon regime, it is essential that this influence be recognized as wholly passive and negative. On no occasion does the ‘Volk’ display the ‘aktive Energien’ attributed to it by H.-M. Gerresheim, who argues that a major cause of Napoleon’s downfall is to be found in the ‘Unwillen eines Volkes, noch einmal mit ihm in die goldene Zeit der Heroen und Schlachttaten zuriicktugehen’.2” Napoleon encounters, in fact, no effective resistance within France, and he is ultimately defeated in battle by the allied nations of Europe. The masses themselves have no part in this process. Significantly, the only figures from the Paris street-scenes to reappear in the decisive ‘Schlachtendrama’ are the soldiers Vitry and Chassecoeur, who form a part of the emperor’s military environment and are characterized by features identified above as fundamental to the heroic sphere.

The one work in which the ‘masses’ do exert an influence on the hero’s fate and on the course of history, Hannibal, serves only to confirm the impression that Grabbe never places the tension between individual and collective in the foreground of the dramatic interest. It is interesting to note that the play in which the power of the urban community is most strongly felt relegates the collective to a position of comparative insigndicance in terms of the action on stage. The scope of the street-scenes of Napoleon has here been drastically reduced, a fact which, along with the teichoscopically presented battle-scene, helps to lend the drama the structural unity and compression often missed in its predecessor.

In Hannibd the conflict between an isolated heroic individual, who comes close to realizing his glorious ideal (the defeat of Rome), and an apathetic, fickle mass, which refuses to support his campaign, undoubtedly becomes a theme of some importance. The dramatist’s apparent concern with a ‘konkret-soziale Begriin- dung des tragisch-dramatkchen Konflikts’ makes Lhe play, in the socialist concep- tion, a ‘Musterbeispiel’ of early realism.2’ Indeed, the tension in this drama be- tween the dynamic hero and the blindness of the collective is not to be overlooked, and has frequently been interpreted as the major theme of the work.22 Yet this strand of the action is, like all social themes in Grabbe’s dramas, only barely developed by the playwright: it is forced to vie for our interest with two other areas of tension-one between Hannibal and the scheming triumvirate, the other be- tween Carthage and Rome. Although the three levels of conflict which threaten the hero are interrelated, the struggle between individual and masses cannot be regarded as the sole source of tension in the play. As in Napoleon, the civilian masses in this drama are presented as purely passive and obstructive: at no point is

-

~ ~~~

22 ‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS

the populace of Carthage able to offer any active or effective resistance to the pressure of the hero, and it is swept aside effortlessly when Hannibal finally returns to the city. The hero of this play is not threatened merely by the faceless and stubborn antagonism of his countrymen: he is locked in combat with a hostile historical world. Hannibal’s ignominious end at the court of the absurd king Prusia.- ‘im unendlichen Chaos des Gemeinen’23-is an eloquent and ironic comment on his cruel fate. The heroic ideal in this drama has to contend with more than the apathy of the ‘masses’: it is subjected to the chaotic mediocrity of the world as a whole. The citizens of Carthage are, it is true, to be regarded as one manifestation of the unheroic reality to which all historical activity must eventual- ly succumb. But they represent only one manifestation. No less central to the statement of the work are the machinations of the triumvirate and the final scenes at the court of Prusias. The justification of the Prusias scenes in terms of the inner structure of the play lies in their contribution, in the form of a grotesque varia- tion, to the central subject of the work. The thematic unity of Hannibal derives precisely from the fact that the various forces to which the hero is exposed all represent aspects of a world which fails to understand the dynamic striving of the creative individual. Hannibal fails not merely as a result of the inactivity of the masses; rather, as Prusias recognizes: ‘hohere Verhaltnisse sind gegen ihn’ (111, 149).

Interpretations which view Grabbe’s treatment of the interaction between in- dividual and collective forces as his overriding interest in these dramas must, then, be questioned on both quantitative and qualitative grounds. In terms of the fre- quency of their appearance the so-called ‘masses’, once they have been differen- tiated from the military group, are granted only secondary importance in the dramatist’s vision of history. A mere handful of scenes testifies to any concerted effort on Grabbe’s part to provide a detailed social or historical backcloth for his dramatization of the great individuals of history, and none of these episodes would seem to justify the claim that the playwright places ‘handelnde Volksmassen’ at the ‘Gntrum der Handlung’.24

Throughout Grabbe’s work the civilian collective, variously referred to in the plays as ‘Dreck’, ‘Lumpenzeug’ , ‘das erbarmliche Gesindel’ , ‘Canaille’, ‘Pobei’ and ‘Strassendreck’, is presented in a most unfavourable light. Gullibility, in- constancy, apathy-a complete lack of political consciousness-are the dominant characteristics of the mob in all the plays in question. Grabbe’s wholly negative view of the historical potency of the ‘Volk’ is expressed, furthermore, not merely in the celebrated mass-scenes of the history plays, but is also a significant feature of those episodes which present the ‘common man’ in isolation elsewhere. In- variably in these works the civilian individual chooses to remain apart from mat- ters of far-reaching significance and to withdraw to the apparent security of an unspoilt natural idyll. The fisherman in the opening scene of Marizls undSulla, who shies away from involvement with the exiled Marius; the shepherd in the much-discussed country scene of Kaiser Heinnch Vl (Act V, sc. ii), who prefers to live within the confines of his bucolic realm rather than to trouble himself with major issues; the citizens of Bardewick, who are rudely awakened to the turbulent reality of the historical world (‘ich habe den Speer in der Brust-Unmoglich, es

‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS 23

kann nicht sein, . . .-Ich sass hier eben so ruhig-’ 11, 164); the Pachter Lacoste episode of Napohon: these all testify to the common man’s exclusive concern with his ‘kleines Dasein’, a domestic world which struggles to maintain itself on the fringe of world-historical change.

Historical insight and activity in Grabbe’s dramas are, then, reserved solely for the great individual and his followers, who provide the highlights of history by embarking upon some glorious military adventure. Only where the heroic will and incessant striving of the titanic leader find affirmation in a closely-knit, elitist community of men willing to sacrifice their lives for a great cause is a bond of genuine historical significance forged. It is from Grabbe’s unmistakable glorifica- tion of such communities that the Grabbe critics of National Socialist Germany drew their justification for viewing the playwright as ‘der einzige volkische Visionar seiner Zeir’.25 Where the mighty ‘Fuhrergestalt’ is united with his followers by a ‘heroischer Wille zum Kampf‘ , they argued, a ‘volkisch-staatliche Gemeinschaft’ is founded. This vision of ultimate harmony between the hero and his ‘Schicksalsgemeinschaft’ finds its most perfect expression, allegedly, in Grabbe’s final play, Die Hermannsschlacht, where the creative individual and the ‘Volk’ come together to liberate the Germanic tribes from Roman oppression. More recent commentators, too, see in Grabbe’s final play the resolution of the tension which had hitherto characterized the relationship between hero and masses in his work: now free of contempt for the common man, the great leader is able to transform an entire ‘Volk’, which, for once, becomes aware of its historical mis- sion, into a force capable of crushing even the finest legions of Rome. The ‘Pobel’, ‘Menge’ or ‘Masse’ of the earlier dramas seem to be replaced here by an ideal- istically conceived ‘Gemeinschaft ’ or ‘Volk’ . Die Hermannsschlacht, consequent- ly, is often regarded as the expression of a new, positive concept of history on the part of Grabbe, who appears finally to have overcome the nrhilistic tendencies which pervade his earlier work.26

Yet this view, which has been put forward most persuasively by Manfred Schneider, encounters considerable difficulties in its interpretation of Die Her- mnnsschlacht. Schneider, tracing the parallel themes of heroism and destruction in Grabbe’s dramas, identlfies in this final play an ‘Aufschwung der urspriinglich verachteten Masse der bestialen Burger- und Pobelwelt in eine fest zusammen- geschlossene heroische Gemeinschaft’ .*’ Somewhat tenuously he attributes Grabbe’s new affirmative apprehension of history to the playwright’s reading of Ranke in 1835. At one point in his study, however, which confirms the ‘Volk’ as ‘die entscheidende Kraft der Geschichte’, Schneider is forced to concede that Grabbe’s putative confidence in the historical power of the masses is nowhere ef- fectively realized in dramatic form and remains only intention on the part of the playwright.2* Quite apart from this rather questionable devaluation of the evidence of the completed work in favour of a dramatist’s intentions, the text of Die Hermannsschlacht itself, which was revised five times before Grabbe arrived at a satisfactory version, poses considerable problems for such an approach to the play. While the tensions between the creative heroic genius and the ‘VOW are un- doubtedly alleviated in this work, producing a relationship of mutual dependence (Hermann is led to the conclusion: ‘Welch ein Dummbart ware ich, wollt’ ich

~~ ~~~

24 ‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS

was sein ohne mein Volk!, 111, 346), they are by no means removed. The transfor- mation of an apolitical mass into an active historicai unit takes place only on a most restricted level. Although the decisive battle against Varus is won, the leaders of the Germanic peoples greet Hermann’s suggestion of a future confederation of tribes with suspicion and ignore his plea for an attack on Rome itself. They remark, significantly: ‘Die Unternehmung ist zu weit aussehend’ (111, 376), and prefer to retire to a celebratory feast in Hermann’s castle rather than to assert themselves further. Hermann’s plans for a truly liberated Germany are frustrated, he is forced to compromise his heroic ideal with the historical short-sightedness of his people, and, knowing that the Romans will one day return, he projects his hopes for a strong Germany far into the future (111, 367). His ‘Ach’ is an expres- sion of thwarted idealism, and the discrepancy between the historical con- sciousness of the individual and the blindness of a ‘Volk’ which sees ‘nur ein paar Meilen weit’ (111, 377), a characteristic of Grabbe’s earlier works, remains essen- tially unchanged. Hermann is, like Hannibal, a hero misunderstood, and even the epilogue to the drama, in which the dying Augustus points to the emergence of the ‘Pobel’ and the ‘Volk’ as a signhcant historical force, is unable to undermine the impression that the new harmony between the individual and his people has been achieved only as a result of the sacrifice of the all-important heroic ideal. The view of history which underlies Die Hermannsschlacht is marked not by un- qualified optimism, but by a curious blend of hope and despair. To regard the drama as Grabbe’s ultimate, unequivocal solution to the questions posed in the earlier plays is surely erroneous.

It is excessive attention to the question of the interplay of hero and masses in Grabbe’s dramas which has prompted critics to obscure the problems raised by Die Hemnnsschhcht in their attempts to interpret the work as a last-minute recantation of Grabbe’s historical pessimism. Yet for the reasons put forward above it would seem inappropriate to ascribe too much significance to the inter- action of individual and collective forces as the major area of conflict in Grabbe’s earlier dramas, or to regard the resolution of any such conflict as the central theme of Die Hermannsdlachc. While the mass-scenes of Napoleon undoubtedly repre- sent a genuine innovation in as far as their scope is unparalleled in other dramas commonly mentioned in this context-Gotz von Berlicbingen, Egmont, Wdhelm Tell and Dantons Tod-the civilian ‘Volk’ portrayed in such scenes has little dynamic function in the motivation of plot. The statistical presence of the masses on stage in Grabbe’s works does not stand in any true relation to their dramatic signlficance. Although one arguably does Grabbe an injustice by degrading the ‘Volk’ in his dramas to the level of mere ‘ K u l i s ~ e ’ , ~ ~ there is no denying the fact that the common people are, ultimately, no more than ‘chaotische Masse’.Jo The masses are never permitted to become the major theme of Grabbe’s work, and yet they are present, at times merely as a voice in the background (Manhs undSulla), at times exerting a passive influence on events (Napoleon), at times, anonymously and virtually without appearing, unwittingly playing a negative part in the pro- gression of the action (Honnz’d). Nowhere in Grabbe’s dramas do the mass- scenes seriously threaten to undermine the dominant position of the heroic in- dividual, who remains for the playwright not only the decisive motivating force

‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE’: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS 25

behind historical events, but also the central pillar of dramatic structure. The essence of Grabbe’s art lies not in any actual conflict between hero and masses, but rather in the simple juxtaposition of the creative historical principle with the mediocrity of the unheroic social world. This theme of his work is not resolved, but retained in Die Hermannsschlacht. The ultimate paradox of Grabbe’s art resides in the fact that the playwright upholds a highly utopian notion of heroic activity despite his overwhelming rational conviction that all human effort, even that of the supreme individual, is ultimately futile: ‘Grosse ist im Reich der Phan- tasie nur ewig’ (11, 80).

NOTES

Letter to Kettembeil, 23 September 1827. Quotations from Grabbe’s works and letters are drawn from Christian Dietrich Grabbe, Werke undBFiefe, 6 vols, ed. Alfred Bergmann, Emsdetten 1960-73. References are given by volume and page number.

Contemporary reviews of Grabbe’s works have been published by Alfred Bergmann under the title Grabbes Wcrke zn der zeitgenossischen Kriitk, 6 vols, Detmold 1958-66. Early discussions of Grabbe’s mass-scenes include Samuel Theilacker, ‘Volk und Masse in Grabbes Dramen’, dissertation, Bern 1907; and Walter Lohmeyer, Die Dramaturgie der Massen, Berlin 1913.

Hermann Pong, Das Rleine Lexikon der Weltheratur, Stuttgart 1967, p. 764. Friedrich Sengle in Das birtorircbe Drama in Deutscbland, Stuttgart 1969, p. 172, speaking of the same drama, main- tains: ‘Zum ersten Ma1 in der Geschichte der deutschen Dichtung riickt die Massenszene in den Mittel- punkt des Dramas’.

* See Heinrich Pieper, Volk und Masse im Regiebdd Grabbes, Danzig 1939; Giinther Jahn, ‘Ubermensch, Mensch und &it in den Dramen Chr. D. Grabbes’, dissertation, Gottingen 1951; Peter Michelsen, ‘Die Drarnatik Grabbes’ in Handbuch des deutschen Dramas, ed. W. Hinck, Dusseldorf 1980.

Lohmeyer fails to differentiate between the various functions of the collective in Grabbe’s work and arrives at the conclusion: ‘Wahrend die Massen im Henog Theodor von GothLnd noch zuriicktreten, bestehen die spiteren Dramen, besonders Manus u n d Sulla, Barbarossa und Napoleon fast nur aus Massenszenen’ (p. 195). Wilhelm Steffens in Christian Dietricb Grabbe, Velber 1966, is equally in- discriminate in his use of the term and identifies even in Barbarossa ‘einen Realismus, der in Genre- und Massenszenen die volle Wirklichkeit und Wahrheit geben will’ (p. 57).

Friedrich Sengle, Biedermeieneit, vol. 3, Stuttgart 1980, p. 183

’ Manfred Schneider, Destmktion und utopiscbe Gemeinscbaft: Zur Themdk und Dramaturgie des Hemucben im Werk Christian Dietrich Grabbes, Frankfurt a.M. 1973, p. 394.

*See, for example, Alfred Bergmann, ’Grabbes Personlichkeit’, in Vas ist mrr nuher ais das Vaterland?, ed. Heinz Kindermann, Berlin 1939, pp. 12-38.

‘) See Hannerlore Schlaffer, Dramenform und Hassenstruktur, Stuttgarc 1972, p. 13: ‘Soldaten sind ausfiihrende Werkzeuge eines heroischen Willens’.

26 'DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE': THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE'S DRAMAS

lo Sulla, in the first version of Manus undSu//a, says: - 's st doch &on, ein Feldherr sein-Man fiihlt Die Welt, die eigne &aft,-ein jedes Plarzchen 1st wichrig,-jegliche Minute kostbar*- Und unsre Seek spiegelt sich im Tun Von Tausenden! ( I . 311)

With regard to M U ~ ~ U J und Suila Grabbe writes to Kettembeil of 'Volksscenen individualisirr h la Shakspeare' (Letter of 1 June 1827). and some years latet he boasts: 'Die Volksscenen in Napoleon werden kostlich. besser als in Sulla' (letter of 2 October 1830).

I' For an examination of the problem of realism in Grabbe's work see David Horton, 'Aspects of Realism in the Historical Dramas of Chr. D. Grabbe', dissertation. Leicester 1980.

' I Lothar Ehrlich, 'Zur Tradition des epischen Theaters', Weimarer Beitrage, 24 (1978), 153

Hans-Dieter khaefer, 'Christian Dietrich Grabbe: Die Herausbildung seiner Weltanschauung und sein Beitrag zur Enrwicklung des realistischen Dramas', dissertation, Berlin 1965, p. 147.

I5 a a e f e r , op. cit., pp. 43-44. For a discussion of Marxist Grabbe criticism see Horton, op, cit . , pp, 31-38, 87-90,

I" See. for example, Steffens, op. czt.; H.-M. Gerresheim, 'Christian Dietrich Grabbe', in D e u t d e Dtchter des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts, ed. Benno von Wiese. Berlin 1969, pp. 229-254; Roy C. Cowen, 'Grabbe's Napoleon, Biichner's Danton and the Masses', Symposium, 21 (1967), 316-23.

Edward Mclnnes. ' "Die wunderlose Welt der Geschichte": Grabbe and the Development of Historical Drama in the Nineteenth Century'. GLL, 32 (1979). 107.

'' Cowen. op. (it., p. 320

I 9 Letter to Kertembeil. 14 July 1830

*" Gerresheim, op czt . , p. 246. The notion that the masses are to be regarded as the 'heimliche Held' of the play is particularly widespread among Marxist commentators. See, for example, Fritz Battger, Grabbe: Glanz und Eiend eines Dichters. Berlin 1963, p 257.

? ' Erich Kiihne, 'Uber die Anthropologik Grabbes und Biichners und den Realismus ihres Geschichrsdramas: Zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte des Verhaltnisses von Volksbewegung und Einzelpersonlichkeit in der 1. Halfte des 19. Jahrhunderts'. Habilitationsschrift, Berlin 1951, p. 160.

? ? For example by von Wiese. Dze deutsche Tragodie von Lxing bis Hebbei, Hamburg 1948, p . 506; Gerresheim. op. czt.. p. 248.

Letter of 27 January 1835

*' Lothar Ehrlich, 'Christian Dietrich Grabbe und das Verhaltnis unserer Theater zum klassischen Erbe'. K'eimarer Beitrage, 20 (1974). 156.

'' Rainer Schlosser in the Introduction to Was zst mir nahher d r das Vaterland?. See also Rudi Bock, 'Das Verhaltnis von Dichtung und Datenrreue in den historischen Dramen Grabbes', dissertation.

‘DIE MENGE IST EINE BESTIE‘: THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN GRABBE’S DRAMAS 27

Greifswald 1940; F. J. Schneider, ‘Grabbe als Geschichtsdramatiker’ , Zeitschn9 fcr deutsche Geisteswissenschaft, 1 (1939), 539-550.

26 For example by Jahn; Hans-Werner Nieschmidt, ‘Grabbes letztes Geschichtsdrama und die erste Gesamtdarstellung seines Lebens’, in Die Hermannsscb/acht (Fahimile der Erstausgabe), Detmold 1978; Sengle, Biedermeieneit, vol. 3 .

*’ M. Schneider, op. cit., p. 184

29 Dietmar Goltschnigg, ‘Zur Ideologisierung der Literaturwissenschaft-am Beispiel Grabbes’ , Wirkedes Wort, 28 (1978). 239.

)” Schlaffer, op. cit., p. 89