He may wage war with principles, prejudices, giants, or windmills.
Provided that there be a battle, there will be a theatre for it.
The fact that George Sand's theatre was the forerunner of the theatre of Dumas _fils_ gives it additional value. We have already noticed the analogy of situations and the kinship of theories contained in George Sand's best plays and in the most noted ones by Dumas.
I have no doubt that Dumas owed a great deal to George Sand.
We shall see that he paid his debt as only he could have done.
He knew the novelist when he was quite young, as Dumas _pere_ and George Sand were on very friendly terms. In her letter telling Sainte-Beuve not to take Musset to call on her, as she thought him impertinent, she tells him to bring Dumas _pere_, whom she evidently considered well bred. As she was a friend of his father's, she was like a mother for the son. The first letter to him in the _Correspondance_is dated 1850. Dumas _fils_ was then twenty-six years of age, and she calls him "my son."He had not written _La Dame aux Camelias_ then. It was performed for the first time in February, 1852. He was merely the author of a few second-rate novels and of a volume of execrable poetry.
He had not found out his capabilities at that time. There is no doubt that he was greatly struck by George Sand's plays, imbued as they were with the ideas we have just pointed out.
All this is worthy of note, as it is essential for understanding the work of Alexandre Dumas _fils_. He, too, was a natural son, and his illegitimate birth had caused him much suffering. He was sent to the Pension Goubaux, and for several years he endured the torture he describes with such harshness at the beginning of _L'Affaire Clemenceau_.
He was exposed to all kinds of insults and blows. His first contact with society taught him that this society was unjust, and that it made the innocent suffer. The first experience he had was that of the cruelty and cowardice of men. His mind was deeply impressed by this, and he never lost the impression. He did not forgive, but made it his mission to denounce the pharisaical attitude of society. His idea was to treat men according to their merits, and to pay them back for the blows he had received as a child.[49]
It is easy, therefore, to understand how the private grievances of Dumas _fils_ had prepared his mind to welcome a theatre which took the part of the oppressed and waged war with social prejudices.
I am fully aware of the difference in temperament of the two writers.
Dumas _fils_, with his keen observation, was a pessimist.
He despised woman, and he advises us to kill her, under the pretext that she has always remained "the strumpet of the land of No." although she may be dressed in a Worth costume and wear a Reboux hat.
[49] See our study of Dumas _fils_ in a volume entitled _Portraits d'ecrivains._As a dramatic author, Alexandre Dumas _fils_ had just what George Sand lacked. He was vigorous, he had the art of brevity and brilliant dialogue. It is thanks to all this that we have one of the masterpieces of the French theatre, _Le Marquis de Villemer_, as a result of their collaboration.
We know from George Sand's letters the share that Dumas _fils_had in this work. He helped her to take the play from her novel, and to write the scenario. After this, when once the play was written, he touched up the dialogue, putting in more emphasis and brilliancy.
It was Dumas, therefore, who constructed the play. We all know how careless George Sand was with her composition. She wrote with scarcely any plan in her mind beforehand, and let herself be carried away by events. Dumas' idea was that the _denouement_is a mathematical total, and that before writing the first word of a piece the author must know the end and have decided the action.
Theatrical managers complained of the sadness of George Sand's plays.
It is to Dumas that we owe the gaiety of the Duc d'Aleria's _role_.
It is one continual flow of amusing speeches, and it saves the piece from the danger of falling into tearful drama. George Sand had no wit, and Dumas _fils_ was full of it. It was he who put into the dialogue those little sayings which are so easily recognized as his.
"What do the doctors say?" is asked, and the reply comes:
"What do the doctors say? Well, they say just what they know: they say nothing."
"My brother declares that the air of Paris is the only air he can breathe," says another character.
"Congratulate him for me on his lungs," remarks his interlocutor.
"Her husband was a baron . . ." remarks some one.
"Who is not a baron at present?" answers another person.
A certain elderly governess is being discussed.
"Did you not know her?"
"Mademoiselle Artemise? No, monsieur."
"Have you ever seen an albatross?"
"No, never."
"Not even stuffed? Oh, you should go to the Zoo. It is a curious creature, with its great beak ending in a hook. . . . It eats all day long. . . . Well, Mademoiselle Artemise, etc. . . ."The _Marquis de Villemer_ is in its place in the series of George Sand's plays, and is quite in accordance with the general tone of her theatre. It is like the _Mariage de Victorine_ over again.
This time Victorine is a reader, who gets herself married by a Marquis named Urbain. He is of a gloomy disposition, so that she will not enjoy his society much, but she will be a Marquise.
Victorine and Caroline are both persons who know how to make their way in the world. When they have a son, I should be very much surprised if they allowed him to make a _mesalliance_.
George Sand was one of the persons f or whom Dumas _fils_had the greatest admiration. As a proof of this, a voluminous correspondence between them exists. It has not yet been published, but there is a possibility that it may be some day. I remember, when talking with Dumas _fils_, the terms in which he always spoke of "la mere Sand," as he called her in a familiar but filial way.
He compared her to his father, and that was great praise indeed from him.