Forum Modernes Theater
fmth
0930-5874
Narr Verlag Tübingen
Es handelt sich um einen Open-Access-Artikel, der unter den Bedingungen der Lizenz CC by 4.0 veröffentlicht wurde.http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/1201
2008
232
BalmeThe Reception of Melodrama in Flanders 1800–1914
1201
2008
Frank Peeters
fmth2320109
The Reception of Melodrama in Flanders 1800-1914. A Tentative Investigation of the Critical Discourse in Reviews, Literary Journals and a Manifesto Frank Peeters (Antwerp) The political situation 1795-1830 Both in the Netherlands and Belgium the debate over and the attitude towards melodrama are closely linked with the experience of the French occupation from 1795 till 1813 and 1814 respectively. Both nations were in a different way marked by a strong sense of nationalism. In Holland this craving for a national identity stood in direct relationship with the Batavian Revolution (1795) and found its strongest expression between 1800 and 1813. It was far and foremost culturally determined and found its expression in the poetry of Helmers, Loots and Tollens which showed a firm and active interest in the safeguarding of the Dutch language and its culture, taking Holland’s Golden Age as a benchmark for a typical Dutch national taste and identity. The relationship with the French was much less tense than in Belgium/ Flanders: the Batavian Republic was considered as a ‘sister’nation, and was treated accordingly by the French, who had a keen interest in keeping Holland as an indispensable ally in its conflict with England. In Belgium and Flanders, things were quite different. The frenchification of public life, the imposition of a statereligion upon the Catholic clergy and churchgoers (Pope Pius VII had been arrested in 1809) as well as compulsory military service (for the poor), were the most important reasons for the fierce opposition against the French. Moreover, where the Netherlands regained full control of their national territory after 1813, Belgium had to wait another 17 years before it would liberate itself from Dutch rule in the Revolution of 1830, marking the birth of the Belgian nation. The Flemish/ Belgian situation between 1795-1830 requires closer inspection. Flanders became part of France on 1 October 1795 after the defeat of the Austrian army at Fleurus in June 1794. It was invaded for the first time by the French revolutionary army in November 1792. During French rule, Flanders was divided into four départements each named after a river and centered around a major city: Lys (Leie, Bruges); L’Escaut (Schelde, Ghent), Deux-Nethes (Twee Neten, Antwerp) and Dyle (Dijle, Brussels). During the Years of Terror (1795-1799) there was a fierce defense of the ‘national’ symbols and ‘Catholic’ became the generic term for all protest against the invader. It was probably the only period when nearly all Belgians/ Flemings, felt ‘occupied’, and the French and their atheist revolution were seen as a threat both to Belgian nationality and to morality and religion. With the rise of Napoleon I (1799-1814), these oppressive times came to an end and economic prosperity (steel, coal, cotton and linen industries) even won the French a certain support from the capitalist upper class that did good business; the same group would also welcome the Dutch in 1815 and would form the so-called Orangists - people in favor of Dutch rule and for economic reasons skeptical of Belgium’s independence in 1830. In July 1814 the European victors of Napoleon, England, Prussia and Russia, decided in the First and Second Treaty of Paris (1814, 1815 resp.) that the Belgian territory would be handed over to the King- Forum Modernes Theater, Bd. 23/ 2 (2008), 109-119. Gunter Narr Verlag Tübingen 110 Frank Peeters dom of the Netherlands and that both nations would become “the most complete amalgam” and “an intimate and complete union”. 1 By this diplomatic decision, the population of Willem’s Kingdom almost tripled from 2 million to 5,5 million; Belgium counted at that time 3,5 million inhabitants, The Netherlands only 2 million. The theatre 1795-1830 Under French rule, the organization of the theatre was, both in Holland and in Belgium, arranged according to national prescriptions, with Paris as the center of the empire and an example for all other cities. The most important decrees or laws for our purpose are the ones from 6 May 1795 and 8 January 1796 stipulating that at each performance the cherished songs of the Revolution were sung, such as La Marseillaise, Ça Ira, Le Chant du Départ etc, and also between each act a republican song was to be sung. Disregard of these prescriptions could lead to the closing of the theatre by the authorities. Another important decree is that which tried to classify the theatre landscape by linking specific theatrical genres to specific theatres. In the Arrêté of 25 April 1807 that stipulates the practical arrangements of the Decree of 8 June 1806, art. 3, 3°, melodrama is assigned to the Théâtre de la Porte Saint-Martin, to the exclusion of “historical and noble ballets which can only be performed at the Grand Opéra”. 2 By the same Arrêté, the list of cities and departments is added where a permanent theatre company could play (“une troupe stationnaire”): Ghent, Brussels and Antwerp; other cities could only receive a travelling company (“une troupe ambulante”): in the department ‘Deux Nethes’, (Antwerp), it was Mechelen (Malines); in the departments L’Escaut (Ghent) and Lys (Bruges) we find such cities as Bruges, Ostend, Courtrai (Kortrijk) and Ypres. In the department Dyle (Brussels): Leuven and Tienen (Tirlemont). Translations of French and German plays belonging to neoclassicism (the French star neoclassical actor Talma performed in Amsterdam, Brussels, Antwerp and Ghent in 1797, 1802, 1803, 1811, 1817, 1820, 1821, 1824), sentimental comedy (Diderot, Beaumarchais) and melodrama (de Pixerécourt, Ducagne, Pelletier Volmeranges, Kotzebue) dominated the stages both in Flanders and Holland. Faber lists sixteen ‘drames et mélodrames’ performed at the Brussels Théâtre de la Monnaie - primarily an opera house - between 1801-1814, with an average of two per year. 3 Mostly Volmeranges and De Pixerécourt; no Kotzebue. One could relate this to French rule, but also during the Dutch period (1815-1830) only French authors are brought to the Royal Brussels’ stage. This is somewhat surprising taking into account the Kotzebuemania that swept over Europe in the first quarter of the 19th century. His absence is probably due to the taste of the Frenchified public. In Ghent on the contrary, Kotzebue reigns. Ph. Blommaert in his account of the Chamber of Rhetoric De Fonteine lists numerous examples of his plays performed between 1813-1830, next to De Pixerécourt, Volmeranges, and an occasional Voltaire or Beaumarchais. 4 The same holds for the Netherlands. 5 That De Fonteine staged such an overwhelming number of melodramatic plays from French or German origin also after the French had left the country, is noteworthy as this chamber is always associated with the awakening of a Flemish identity and the rise of the Flemish Movement. The play list stands in sharp contrast to the selfproclaimed mission we find echoed in Blommaert’s essay: 6 but my esteem is even greater when I consider that it is this same institution, which, during the last years of suppression, when everything foreign was adulated, remained true to itself [i.e. Flemish literature, F.P.], and, in The Reception of Melodrama in Flanders 1800-1914 111 doing so prevented the total loss of our native tongue. 7 Explicit contemporary comments on melodrama in the French period are rather scant, and, with few exceptions, outspokenly negative. Typical for this anti-melodramatic point of view are the numerous contributions on the Amsterdam stage in De Tooneelkijker (1816-1819), which was published a few years after the French had left Holland. Ruitenbeek deals in great detail with several of the important theatre journals between 1816-1830 in Kijkcijfers; 8 a similar publication, analyzing the poetics and criteria by which early nineteenth-century theatre is judged, is still lacking for Flemish theatre. The repugnance expressed by the editors of De Tooneelkijker to melodrama can easily be transferred to Flanders, where similar arguments were used. Ph. Blommaert cites an opinion from 1785 with its exhortation to: “defy these atrocities, so pestiferous for the nation as for art”. 9 Their main concerns apply to morality (no excess! ) and a correct, i.e. radical conservative, presentation of the political system and the public institutions. Their worst fear were plays that dared to doubt the existing social order or mocked certain functions and professions considered of high moral standing such as judges, notaries, doctors and the like. For this reason they fulminated heavily against De ekster en de dienstmaagd, of de onschuldige diefstal 10 by Vreedenberg (also performed by the Chamber of Rhetoric in Ghent in 1817). In the “Letter of Mister Poodle on Animal Melodramas” 11 we find an ironical review of this play where a judge is portrayed as an unreliable philanderer, whose judgments are corrupt and full of self-interest. 12 This portrait could perhaps fit the frivolous French, but it was unthinkable of the Dutch upper class. These plays corrupted the rabble and would contribute to their mistrust of the upper classes and might incite revolutionary ideas. In their conclusion of the first volume (1816) it reads: “that a Kapitein Paulus, an Ekster, a Rolla etc.etc. were all fit to undermine Nationality, respect for the Government and Christendom” 13 and “these foreign monstrosities denationalize the National Theatre”. 14 Intellectuals in Holland and Flanders alike reacted strongly against these un-nationalistic melodramatic plays that undermined the coming about of a national theatre (see also later), but, whereas De Tooneelkijker still praises the great neoclassical plays of Corneille, Racine, Voltaire etc., in Flanders the dislike of French was more general. Famous are the verses of the poet Prudens Van Duyse in his De wanorde en omwenteling op de Vlaamschen Zangberg 15 (1830) where he castigates the love of foreign, i.e. German and French theatre: ‘t Ontneêrlandscht vlaamsch Tooneel, nog Kotzebue ten prooi, Nog door ‘t vertalersgild gedoscht in franschen tooi, Aan dichters even arm, als rijk aan oefenaren, Schuilt in een duisternis, door gaz niet op te klaren, De fransche schouwburg heft ‘t ontzaggelijk hoofd, De vaderlandsche treurt, van glans - en geld - beroofd. Verpestend schouwburgspel der tuimelzieke Gallen, Dat deugd en zeden hoont, en ‘t eigenaardigst volk Tot apenras herschept en schandelijk doet vervallen 16 And also Jan Frans Willems, in his play Quinten Matsys, of wat doet de liefde niet? (1816) introduces a dialogue between father and daughter on the one hand (Floris and Emilia) and the pompous and gallicized Wildert, who competes for Emilia’s hand, on the other. Willems ridicules the way he jabbers a mixture of Dutch and French. To make 112 Frank Peeters things clear, all the gallicisms are printed in italics: “Een Beauté die zoo veel delicieuse sentimenten inspireert als gy, zou pourtant moeten sensible zijn voor de veneratie van iemand als ik”. 17 However, in his famous Verhandeling over de Nederduytsche tael-en Letterkunde opzigtelyk de Zuydelyke Provintien der Nederlanden (1819), he adds an interesting nuance, when he says: “whatever one may pretend, I dare say that the times of the French occupation, were not necessarily as detrimental as is often proclaimed”. 18 Willems aims here at the writers who were provoked by the gallomania and started to write in Dutch and gained pride in their mother tongue. Matthijs Siegenbeek finds something similar in his Beknopte geschidenis der Nederlandsche letterkunde, when he writes: The upheaval and civic disputes, which marked the end of that century [the 18 th , F.P.] so unfavorably, the number of great disasters, which struck the Dutch State in those days, an which eventually would lead to the total destruction of the State, had at least one benevolent result, namely that through all this the spirit awoke as from a deadly slumber and resuscitated new forces. 19 Explicit praisal for (early) melodrama in the way Nodier would do with the publication of Pixerécourt’s complete works in 1841, is hard to find among contemporaries in Holland or Flanders. What we did find was a similar plea for the theatre as an institution that softens people’s manners. When in 1806 the préfect of the department L’Escaut (Ghent), monsieur Faipoult had ordered the closing of all theatres in the province, J. Ferrary in his Petit almanach sans prétention dédié aux jolies femmes (1809) pronounces a clear warning as to the consequences: Dans l’état actuel des moeurs, il faut aux citoyens d’une grande ville un spectacle où ils puissent se délasser et passer noblement ces trois ou quatres heures terribles qui séparent l’instant du travail de celui du sommeil. Si le théâtre est fermé, la débauche et le jeu vont s’emparer, l’étranger fuira au plutôt une ville qui n’offre aucun appât, aucun plaisir public à sa curiosité. [...] des amusemens utiles et agréables. 20 Before we deal with one of the few exceptions where romantic drama or melodrama is treated favorably, it is important to notice that sometimes - even in a conservative journal like De Tooneelkijker - critics made a difference between ‘pure’ melodrama of, for instance De Pixerécourt, Ducagne, Pelletier Volmeranges on the one hand and sentimental comedy, the Rührstücke of Kotzebue and Iffland on the other. At times both categories were treated equally unfavorably, but David De Simpel, who like De Tooneelkijker advocates Boileau’s Art Poétique, refers to Kotzebue in a very favorable way: “The plays of Kotzebue are renowned; this great writer has gauged the human heart perfectly and depicted the bourgeois characters in a natural and pleasant way”, 21 and even De Tooneelkijker, at times, appreciates Kotzebues work: “This [The Silver Wedding, F.P.], amongst the plays of Kotzebue favorably distinguishing drama by the regular treatment, the observance of the [Aristotelian, F.P.] laws and the moral tendency, belongs certainly amongst all nations, and deserves most certainly to be kept [on the repertoire]”. 22 Similar praise for Kotzebue in Letter - en staetkundig dagblad, voor het zuidelijke gedeelte van het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden for his play De lasteraar (The Slanderer): Without touching upon the question of the three unities, we have to admit that Kotzebue has depicted the terrible fruits of the slandering tongue in a perfect way; these plays can make a healthy impression on the morality of the audience, especially when they are interspersed with brief, powerful and meaningful proverbs that are easily remembered [...]. 23 And also H.J. Schimmel, editor of the reputed literary journal De Gids takes the defense of The Reception of Melodrama in Flanders 1800-1914 113 Kotzebue and Iffland whom he prefers over the pernicious French melodrama: “I more than rather prefer Kotzebue and Iffland”. 24 Few however embraced ‘hardcore’ melodrama the way Anton Cramer did. Cramer, who wrote reviews for several journals (Het kritisch lampje, Het tooneelklokje, De arke Noach’s), admitted freely that he was “a Kotzebuan, a Pixericourt [sic]”. 25 He loved melodrama, its action, the often-improbable developments and coincidences, which he called the seasoning, “the ragoutsauce” of the play. 26 A play had to be entertaining, and he couldn’t care less for the observance of Aristotelian laws. In Flanders we haven’t met any critic like Cramer, with the exception of Jan Frans Willems, who reports rather favorably of Devos’s translation into Dutch of Victor Ducagne’s Zestien jaren, of de brandstichters. 27 Cramer really loved the early, the ‘classic’ melodrama, that which McConachie calls ‘providential melodrama’: “The setting [...] is usually timeless and universal, as in a fairy tale. [...] [It] always assures the audience that God watches over innocent goodness, and His power will ensure a happy ending”. 28 This is exactly the reason why Cramer defended melodrama against philistines like Samuel Wiselius in De Tooneelkijker. He is on a par with Nodier - who wrote the first lengthy essay on early melodrama as a preface to the collected works of Guilbert de Pixerécourt - for all the same reasons: these plays demonstrate the victory of virtue over evil and provide the audience with a set of moral rules to live by. 29 Whereas in the Netherlands, Leo Simons and later Ben Albach would take up the defense of melodrama in their historical writings on 19 th -century Dutch theatre, 30 Maurits Sabbe in his contribution to the single most important publication on 19thcentury Flemish theatre to date, treats Pixerécourt and his like as “pale talents’‘ and their plays are called “monstrosities”. 31 Lode Monteyne, for twenty years (1920-1940) Flanders’ most eminent theatre critic, it is true, judges mildly but not because he likes these plays, but because he admits that they clearly surpassed the indigenous (Flemish) drama production at that time; Carlos Tindemans, who deals with 19th century Flemish drama only, not with its theatrical practice, refrains on methodological grounds from an esthetical judgement. 32 J. Prinsen’s Het drama in de 18 e eeuw in West-Europa (1931) meant academic rehabilitation for Kotzebue, and Pixerécourt is treated in relationship with Goethe and Schiller, from whose Götz and Die Räuber he borrowed useful ideas for two of his melodramas. In doing so, Prinsen links “the pope of melodrama” 33 with these two giants of early romanticism. A nice and quite unique gesture. The theatre 1830-1914 The turmoil of 1830 stopped the salutary progress of our proper linguistic activities and of our Flemish theatre performances. This revolution, enhanced for the larger part by the French parties in the Walloon provinces, was utmost pestiferous for the moral independence and the intellectual development of the Flemish people […] 34 The last three years [since Belgian independence, F.P.] have had a very negative influence on the different Flemish chambers of rhetoric. Many a promising youngster, who had been acclaimed on the national stage, has, in spite of Melpomene, exchanged the harmless dagger of tragedy for musket or sable, and wil not be able to resume the peaceful art of the theatre. 35 Philip Blommaert and J.F. Willems quite accurately phrase what many Flemish intellectuals must have felt when the Dutch were chased out in September 1830 and Belgium became independent. On 21 July the German prince Leopold von Sachsen Coburg Gotha was sworn in as Leopold I. The Belgian state, 114 Frank Peeters which replaced the Kingdom of the Netherlands, met with great distrust among Flemish intellectuals and this would also reflect on their attitude towards all forms of cultural expression, not in the least the theatre. The call for authentic, Flemish drama and theatre would be heard louder than ever before. Leopold, married to Louise-Marie, the daughter of the French king, hoped that Belgium would not be faced with the threat of French annexation, but to Flemish intellectuals like Blommaert or Willems, this kinship to the French monarchy wasn’t reassuring at all, on the contrary, it made them even more suspicious of the omnipresence of the French in Belgian political and public life. Under Dutch rule efforts had been made to make Dutch/ Flemish the official language in public affairs, education, the courts etc; Willem I founded the first Flemish university in Ghent (1817), chairs for Dutch language and literature were established in Ghent (prof. J.M. Schrant), Liège (prof. J. Kinker), and Leuven (prof. A. Ten Broecke Hoekstra) and Chambers of Rhetorics got financial support and the Royal epithet. 36 All this changed drastically after Belgium’s independence when attention would shift from a mere discussion of the quality of the plays performed to that of the founding of a truly national theatre with a Belgian dramatic literature. The Belgian state above all was interested in establishing and propagating its own existence. And, because it was commonly accepted that in addition to historical paintings and parades theatre was an excellent tool of propaganda to involve the largely illiterate population in a project of civilising its people, the government took some initiatives to promote the rise of a national theatre culture. One of the first measures het Voorlopig Bewind (the provisional government) took after it had proclaimed Belgian independence was to declare that theatres could be established anywhere on Belgian territory with no restrictions. The fact that Belgium was notorious for its illegal printing of French drama texts (Faber lists several publishers and their production) and for not paying any royalties to authors, makes it easy to understand why so many French plays were produced on Belgian stages. Moreover, as Lode Monteyne said, their quality was far superior to anything written in Belgium in Flemish or French alike. In an effort to counter this dominance of French plays - most of them melodrama -, the so-called premium scheme was established in 1860, allowing for subsidising patriotic theatre texts that carried a message of civil ethos. Attracted by relatively easy additional earnings, dozens of authors emerged - generally teachers, self-employed persons or lower level civil servants - who, with little self-criticism, flooded Belgium with hundreds of plays. In 1872 alone, 175 pieces were premiered and more than 120 historical pieces were written between 1860 and 1890, even though only a handful actually made it onto the stage. Ironically, the bulk if not all of the plays written as a consequence of the premium scheme, took foreign, especially French and to a lesser degree German melodrama as an example. In 1858, the tri-annual state prize for drama was set up, its main aim being to reward theatrical pieces where the subject “must be related to national history or national manners and customs”. In spite of all this, the government still had to urge companies again and again to schedule a minimum number of works by Belgian authors, because spontaneously theatres tended much more to the favoured French, and to a lesser degree to German, romantic and melodramatic repertoire, where the ‘providential melodrama’ of De Pixerécourt had been replaced by the extravagant products of romantic melodrama, with Alexandre Dumas Sr., Adolphe Dennery, Félix Pyat, Georges Ohnet and Xavier de Montépin as its main representatives. Countless are the reprimands and incitements on the part of municipal and provincial Toneelcommissies to do away with this roman- The Reception of Melodrama in Flanders 1800-1914 115 tic, melodramatic repertoire. As late as 1872, Jan Van Beers, a famous Flemish author and critic (there was even a Jan Van Beers Chamber of Rhetoric in Utrecht) wrote an alarming letter to the Commission for the comfort of the National Theatre, stating that French melodrama still contaminated the Antwerp stage. This is not hard to understand when we know that the library of Eloy Lemaire, a former manager of the Antwerp municipal theatre, counted in 1874 no less than 2000 French texts and only 517 in Dutch/ Flemish. The reports of the Antwerp Tooneelraad (Theatre Council) read as a continuous urging for quality and the banishment of romantic drama. As late as 1901, when Ibsen’s A Doll’s House had been staged in the Koninklijke Nederlandsche Schouwburg (Royal Dutch Theatre of Antwerp), bloodand-thunder plays (the so-called draken which means literally ‘dragons’) still persisted on the repertoire. This tenacious practice would eventually lead to Herman Van Overbeke’s pamphlet Siegfried, read at the Ghent Municipal Theatre in April 1918, on which we will report briefly at the end of our contribution. We know that in the middle of the nineteenth century in Holland the question of a National Theatre was high on the agenda of disquieted intellectuals like Schimmel, who fulminated at the irresponsible way theatres were managed by people who, to his view, were only interested in making money, for which reason they programmed popular, melodramatic, plays: “our theatre has become the receptacle of thoughtless creations from abroad”. 37 The solution was to be found in an incorruptible manager with ‘good taste’ on the one hand, and a valuable, indigenous Dutch drama production. A similar concern preoccupied the Belgians, but at the same time their situation was much more complicated. The source of the problem was the bilingual nature of its society, which was guaranteed by the constitution. This meant, at least in theory, that both Dutch and French - spoken by respectively 65 percent and 35 percent of the population - were allowed to be used in private and government matters and in contacts with the government. In reality, however, the young Belgium state was entirely ‘Frenchified’ and it would continue for about a century before both regional languages were treated more or less equally, not only de jure but also de facto. During the first decades after independence, the whole issue of founding a national theatre repertoire dominated the search for a seemingly impossible compromise: a theatre repertoire that at the same time represented both language communities and the Belgian state. In 1839 Englebert-Théophile Van Hecke (1809-1867), a retired medical doctor and officer, provided an analysis of the problem in his Considérations sur le Théâtre en Belgique et sur les Difficultés et les Moyens d’y créer une Scène Nationale (Reflections on the Belgian Theatre and on the Difficulties and Means to Create a National Stage). 38 The text by Van Hecke is highly interesting because it can act as a model for the lines of thought of the Frenchspeaking part of the Belgian population or the ‘Frenchified’ middle classes, to which the majority of theatre producers and their audiences also belonged. Because it was unthinkable for this part of the population that Belgian theatre would involve spoken Dutch because it was considered unsuitable for science or art, the typical Belgian ‘couleur locale’ of the plays should see to it that this type of theatre, in spite of the fact that it was written and performed in French, nevertheless would be nationalist Belgian theatre. This picturesque ‘belgitude’ was found among the ‘Belgian’ ancestors who acted as the main protagonists of the plays: artists, soldiers and kings. The Flemish, of course, didn’t agree with this cultural hegemony of their French-speaking countrymen, and proclaimed, quite on the contrary, that the Walloons were 116 Frank Peeters gallicized Belgians, whose sole chance of acquiring Belgian identity rested in undoing the gallicization as soon as possible. This is important to know when one wants to interpret correctly the epithet ‘national’ in the numerous so-called national theatres that were founded in Flanders from 1853 onward. A national theatre was first and foremost a theatre that produced original plays (in other words, no translations) which, in addition, was morally justifiable and had an educational value. Both contemporary plays, which criticized the mistakes of “modern times”, and historical dramas, which exemplified the forefathers’ and nation’s grandness, made for good “national theatre”. It is here that Hippoliet Van Peene comes in. Maurits Sabbe calls him, rightly, “the Flemish Scribe”. 39 Van Peene seemed to fulfil all the necessary requirements to create this genuine, national (Belgian? Flemish? ) drama. The most successful Flemish playwright for half a century - also in Holland, where he was regularly performed on the Amsterdam and The Hague stages - he was a polygraph like Scribe, who he admired immensely. Van Peene wrote one Scribe-like vaudeville after the other, and yet he was embraced both by the public and the critics alike. They were lenient when they spoke of the literary qualities, but praised his dexterity (which he learned from Scribe) as far as plot construction and the arrangement of scenes was concerned. Van Peene would also be the first to win the tri-annual State prize for Flemish drama in 1858. When one of his first and highly successful plays, Keizer Karel en de Berchemse boer (1841), 40 was first published and performed, De Noordstar published a very enthusiastic song of praise: “Flemish comedy returns to life, the first step has been taken, the race-track is open. Writers only have to step into the arena and the national theatre will be saved [...]”. 41 Frans Rens, a playwright himself, passed a mild judgement in his obituary on Van Peene and obliquely refers to his admiration for the famous Scribe and focuses mainly on his qualities as a craftsman. 42 Although posterity would judge his work more severely, 43 we can say that Van Peene achieved a certain balance between the needs of the public for entertainment and the demands of the intellectuals for authentic Flemish (Belgian? ) plays, although they were aware of its literary fallibility. Van Peene didn’t write melodrama proper but vaudeville, which was considered less excessive, and thus less problematic. In a way his plays fitted perfectly to the ethics of moderation of the bourgeois, a class of which Van Peene himself was the perfect prototype. Acting in the melodramatic age and mode In sharp contrast with the way melodrama as a dramatic genre is castigated, the actors who gave shape to these spectacular play-texts, are, in general, spared of criticism, as long as they performed well. Yzendyck is one of the few to blame also the actors. 44 According to him, it is their love of ease, their unwillingness to learn new texts that lies at the bottom of the crisis. They prefer playing the old French texts and copy the histrionic gestures of their French colleagues. In the list of remedies to heal the national theatre in the Netherlands De Tooneelkijker does not mention of the actors. 45 For sure, we know that Flanders absolute ‘star’ of melodrama, Victor Driessens, went indeed regularly to the Parisian Théâtre du Porte Saint-Martin or the Ambigu-Comique to watch his idol Frédérick Lemaître and to copy in shorthand the new productions in order to stage them a couple of weeks later in the Théâtre des Variétés in Antwerp; and we also know that he plagiarized Lemaître’s exuberant acting style. But Driessens was a fine craftsman, adored by his public, and none of his ‘weaknesses’ were held against him. Quite on the contrary, on Christ- The Reception of Melodrama in Flanders 1800-1914 117 mas Eve 1865, his 25 th anniversary as a professional actor was boisterously celebrated in the Royal Theatre of Antwerp. Moreover in two important actors’ handbooks, Lewes’s On actors and the Art of Acting (1875) and Roobol’s (a Dutch translation of August Lewald’s handbook from 1846) Handboek voor praktische tooneelspeelkunst (1858) both treat melodrama very favorably. Roobol explicitly refers to the ‘providential’ melodrama when describing the genre “these plays always satisfy the human sense of justice, albeit often at the expense of the poetical quality”. 46 Lewes, in the account of his visit to Paris in 1865, sings the praises of the Porte Saint-Martin where Vingt Ans Après of Dumas was performed: Altogether, my visit to this Boulevard theatre was very gratifying, and I could not help thinking what a gain it would be to our actors if they would go there and study the art. […] It is no exaggeration to say that to see this young man, Montal, play the part of Mordaunt in ‘Vingt Ans Après’, is worth a journey to Paris for any actor who is bent on mastering some of the secrets of his art. 47 Epilogue: melodrama und ‘kein Ende’ When the Flemish actor Herman Van Overbeke pronounced his anti-melodramatic pamphlet Siegfried (who slaughtered the ‘dragon’-plays, see above) in April 1918 on the stage of the Royal Flemish Theatre in Ghent, he echoed an attitude that was first expressed a century before in journals like De Tooneelkijker. Ironically, he thus provided the most convincing argument for the immense success of melodrama, which, although critics and philistines alike had incessantly bashed it, never fell out of grace with the masses. It is true, after World War I romantic drama by and large disappeared from the major Western European stages, but, in the best tradition of pantomime and melodrama, the ‘dragon’ had already transmuted, rendering Van Overbeke’s action futile. All he fought was nothing more than a simulacrum for the ‘dragon’ of melodrama had already found a new host in silent cinema, which deployed the full range of melodramatic rhetoric and histrionics. Later it would again defy its opponents when it moved into the storyboards of television soaps and the pope of postdramatic theatre, Antonin Artaud, in his urge to get rid of the limitations of the conventionalized stage, became a herald of the histrionics of melodrama. The dragon proved more of a phoenix, reinventing itself over and over again. It has never stopped since. Notes 1 “amalgame le plus complet” and “union intime et complète”, in: Jeroen Janssens, De helden van 1830. Feiten en mythes, Antwerpen- Amsterdam 2005, p. 13; Theo Luyckx, Politieke geschiedenis van België, Amsterdam-Brussel 1973, p. 40. 2 “On ne pourra donner sur ce théâtre des ballets dans le genre historique et noble; ce genre, tel qu’il est indiqué plus haut, étant exclusivement réservé au Grand-Opéra.” The document is quoted in Frédéric Faber, Histoire du Théâtre Français en Belgique, Bruxelles 1880, vol. 4, p. 137. Other documents relevant to the legal prescriptions can be found in Alfred Bouchard, La langue théâtrale, Paris 1878, pp. 337-376. 3 Frédéric Faber, o.c., vol. 4, p. 146. 4 P h. B lo mm a e rt, G e s c hi e d e ni s d e r Rhetorykkaler: De Fonteine te Gent, Gent 1847, p. 82. 5 On the presence of German and French melodrama on the Dutch stage: Oscar Westers, Welsprekende burgers. Rederijkers in de negentiende eeuw, s. l., 2003, pp. 28-30. 6 All translations from the Dutch orginals are mine. Their aim is to convey the content in English not to render the original stylistic qualities of the texts. Readers who know Dutch 118 Frank Peeters can savour the archaic and sometimes poetic phrasing. 7 Blommaert, o.c., p. 75, who quotes prof. Schrant’s address to the chamber in 1820: “[…]maer nog meer ryst myne achting by de overweging, dat het die zelfde instelling is, welke, in de laetste jaren der onderdrukking, toen alles aen het vreemde wierook bragt, alleen aen het eigene getrouw bleef, en alzoo den geheelen ondergang voorkwam, welke der moedertaele dreigde”. 8 Henny Ruitenbeek, Kijkcijfers . De Amsterdams e Schouwburg 1814-1841, Hilversum 2002, pp. 298-345. 9 Ph. Blommaert, o.c., p. 69: “[...] trotseert die wangedrochten, zoo verdervelyk voor den staet als schaedelyk aen de konst”. 10 Titles of plays are quoted in the original. If relevant for a correct understanding of the text, a approximative translation in English is given: “The Magpie and the Maiden, or the Innocent Theft”. 11 “Brief van den heer Poedel over de Beestenmelodrama’s”. 12 De Tooneelkijker 1 (1816), pp. 183-193. 13 Idem, p. 571: “[...] dat een Kapitein Paulus, een Ekster, een Rolla, enz. enz. enz. allen geschikt waren, om Nationaliteit, eerbied voor Overheden en Christendom te sloopen”. 14 Idem, p. 574: “[...] de buitenlandsche gedrochten dénationaliseren het Nationaal Tooneel”. 15 Disarray and revolution on the Flemish Parnassus. 16 Quoted in Maurits Sabbe, Lode Monteyne, Hendrik Coopman Thz., Het Vlaamsch Tooneel inzonderheid in de XIXe eeuw, Brussel 1927, p. 116. The poet accuses the Flemish theatre of imitating both Kotzebue and the French playwrights. It hides itself in obscurity, and the only winner is the French theatre; the Flemish has neither lustre nor financial means. In attending these immoral French plays, the Flemish people debases itself. 17 “A beauty who inspires such delicious sentiments as you, should however be sensitive for the veneration of someone like me”. (Jan Frans Willems, Quinten Matsys, of wat doet de liefde niet! , Antwerpen 1816, [act I,scene 5], p. 21.) 18 “Wat er van zy, ik durf beweeren dat den tyd der fransche overheersching, in het byzonder voor de belgische Tael-en Letterkunde, niet zoo nadelig is geweest als men zich voorstelt.” (Jan Frans Willems, Verhandeling over de Nederduytsche tael-en Letterkunde opzigtelijk de Zuydelyke Provintien der Nederlanden, Antwerpen 1819, vol. II, p. 204.) 19 “De beroeringen en burgertwisten, welke den afloop dier eeuw en het begin der volgende zoo ongunstig kenmerken, de vele en zware rampen, welke den Nederlandschen Staat in die dagen troffen, en ten laatste in eene gansche vernietiging van denzelven eindigden, hadden ten minste dit weldadig uitwerksel, dat daardoor de geest als uit eene doodsche sluimering ontwaakte, en tot eene nieuwe inspanning van krachten werd opgewekt.” (Matthijs Siegenbeek, Beknopte geschidenis der Nederlandsche letterkunde, Haarlem 1826.) See also Willem de Clercq who, in his Verhandeling van den Heer Willem de Clercq, ter beantwoording der Vraag: welken invloed heeft vreemde letterkunde, inzonderheid de italiaansche, spaansche, fransche en duitsche, gehad op de nederlandsche taal-en letterkunde, sints het begin der vijftiende eeuw tot op onze dagen? Amsterdam 1824, pp. 9-10, speaks in a similar way of early 19th century Dutch literature. 20 J. Ferrary, Petit almanach sans prétention dédié aux jolies femmes, Gand 1809, p. 206. In the actual state of morality, our citizens of the major cities need a spectacle where they can relax and pass three or four hours between work and sleep. If the theatre is closed, debauchery and gambling will take over and the stranger will flee as soon as possible the city which offers no public entertainment, pleasant and useful amusement. 21 David De Simpel, Beredeneerde ontleding van de voornaamste grondregelen der Dicht- Redeen Tooneelen Uitgalmkunst, Ijperen [Ypres, F.P.] 1825, vol. II, p. 52: “De Tooneelstukken van Kotzebue zijn vermaard; die groote Schrijver heeft volkomendlijk het menschelijk hart gepeild en de burgerlijke karakters natuurlijk en bevallig afgeschilderd.” 22 De Tooneelkijker 2 (1817), p. 31: “Dit [De zilveren bruiloft] onder de werken van Von The Reception of Melodrama in Flanders 1800-1914 119 Kotzebue zich door geregelde behandeling, inachtneming van kunstwetten en zedelijke strekking zoo gunstig onderscheidend tooneelspel, behoort gewislijk bij alle natiën te huis, en verdient ook dan [...] gewislijk behouden te blijven”. 23 Letter 15 (1820) [21 March 1820], p. 2: “Zonder van de twistredenen op eenheid van plaats en belangen aan te raken, moeten wij bekennen dat Kotsebue (sic) de verschrikkelijke vruchten der lastertong meesterlijk heeft getroffen; en dat dusdanige tooneelspelen in het zedelijke der aanschouwers eenen heilzaamsten indruk moeten laten, vooral wanneer zij doorzaaid zijn met bondige, krachtige en zinvolle spreuken, welke zich ligtelijk in het geheugen laten drukken [...]”. 24 Quoted by C.G.N. de Vooys, in: De Nieuwe Taalgids, 41 (1948), p. 26. 25 Quoted in Henny Ruitenbeek, o.c., p. 317. 26 Henny Ruitenbeek, o.c., p. 318. 27 Jan Frans Willems, in: Nederduitsche letteroefeningen, 1833, pp. 54-55. 28 Bruce McConachie, in: Phillip B. Zarrilli et. alii, Theatre Histories. An Introduction, New York-London 2006, p. 255. 29 Charles Nodier, ‘Introduction’, in: Théâtre choisi de G. De Pixerécourt, Nancy 1841, vol. 1, pp. i-xvi. 30 See my contribution in Lucia van Heteren et. alii, Ornamenten van het vergeten [Theatre Topics], Amsterdam 2007, pp. 29-42. 31 Maurits Sabbe, Lode Monteyne, Hendrik Coopman Thz., Het Vlaamsch Tooneel inzonderheid in de XIXe eeuw, Brussel 1927, resp. p. 84 and p. 474. 32 Carlos Tindemans, Mens, gemeenschap en maatschappij in de toneelletterkunde van Zuid- Nederland 1815-1914, Gent 1973. 33 Julia Przybos, L’Entreprise mélodramatique, Paris 1987, p. 102. 34 Ph. Blommaert, Geschiedenis der Rhetorykkaler: De Fonteine te Gent, Gent 1847, p. 84. “De omwenteling van 1830 onderbrak den weldadigen voortgang van eigene taelbeoefening en van nederduitsche tooneelvertooningen. Deze staetsberoerte, meest door de fransche party in de waelsche provintien bewerkt, was allerverderfelykst voor de zedelyke onafhankelykheid en de geestontwikkeling des vlaemschen volks [...]”. 35 Jan Frans Willems, Letterkundige Overzichten, Nederduitsche letteroefeningen, 1833, p. 54: “De laetste drie jaren hebben eenen zeer nadeligen invloed gehad op de verschillende kunstgenootschappen, gezegd Rhetorykkamers, van Vlaenderen. Menig veelbelovend jongeling, die, met welgevallen op het vaderlandsche tooneel werd gezien en gehoord, heeft, ondanks Melpomene, den ongevaerlyken dolk des treurspels voor het musket of den sabel moeten verlaten, en zal wellicht nog niet spoedig de beoefeneing van de kunsten des vredes hernemen kunnen.” 36 Floris Blauwkuip, De taalbesluiten van Koning Willem I, Amsterdam 1920. 37 H.J. Schimmel, “Melodrama en Tragedie”, in: De Gids 1860, 2, pp. 354-373; the quotation on p. 357. 38 For a broader discussion of this, see Frank Peeters in S. Wilmer (ed.), Writing and Rewriting National Theatre Histories, Iowa City 2004, pp. 88-105. 39 Maurits Sabbe, o.c., p. 133. 40 The emperor Charles V and the peasant from Berchem. 41 De Noordstar, “Overzigten van verschenen werken”, 2 (1841), 1, p. 260: “Het vlaemsche blyspel herleeft, de eerste stap is gedaan, de renbaen is geopend. De schryvers hebben nu maer in het strydperk te treden en het nationael tooneel is gered […]”. 42 Frans Rens, “Necrologie. Hippoliet Van Peene”, in: Nederduitsch letterkundig jaerboekje, 1865, 32, pp. 149-153. 43 Carlos Tindemans, “Hippoliet Van Peene 1811-1864”, in: Spiegel der Letteren 4 (1961), 4, pp. 252-272. 44 Het Taelverbond, “Vlaemsche Tooneelkronyk”, 4 (1848-1849), 5, p. 350. 45 De Tooneelkijker, “Middelen tot herstel van het nationale tooneel”, 1817, II, pp. 239-249. 46 C.J. Roobol, Handboek voor praktische tooneelspeelkunst, Amsterdam 1858, p. 326. 47 George Henry Lewes, On actors and the Art of Acting, Leipzig 1875, pp. 204-205.
