SOURCE: "The Plays of H. C. Andersen," in Hans Christian Andersen and the Romantic Theatre: A Study of Stage Practices in the Prenaturalistic Scandinavian Theatre, University of Toronto Press, 1971, pp. 30-64.

'In Denmark there is but one city and one theatre,' wrote Kierkegaard in 1848,¹ and his characteristic comment suggests the central place occupied by the Royal Theatre in nineteenth-century Danish culture and society. Architecturally as well as intellectually, it dominated the daily life of Copenhagen; it was 'the most important daily and nightly topic of conversation,' Andersen declared, and it 'ranked among the finest in Europe.'² It is no surprise, then, that Andersen's very existence revolved around the imposing playhouse on Kongens Nytorv. His lodgings were always within easy walking distance of it. On most evenings he could be found in the stalls together with the foremost figures of the Danish Golden Age—Oehlenschläger, Thorvaldsen, Heiberg, Kierkegaard—first as a young, promising author, eventually as the renowned mid-point of Scandinavian romanticism. As a dramatist, Andersen turned eagerly and early to the theatre as the best source of the personal admiration and financial support he so desperately sought. He regarded his plays very seriously in comparison with his other work; the stage to him was a 'mighty platform' from which it was possible to 'proclaim for hundreds what would hardly be read by ten.'³ As one of the most widely read novelists in Europe and as a world-renowned writer of fairy-tales, he continued to wage the struggle for acceptance and recognition in the theatre that he had begun long before as 'a musical servant' in Nina.

In Andersen's own pessimistic, persecuted view—although not in terms of production statistics or of theatrical history—his struggle ended in defeat. The Brandes myth of Andersen as 'the hunted animal in Danish literature' has persisted, and posterity has had little to add to this evaluation.⁴ However, as a playwright Andersen forms an important transition between two periods. He belongs among the younger exponents of romanticism, but at the same time points ahead toward the realism which eventually triumphed in the 1870s. The production history of his plays provides a microcosm of the exotic, historical, idyllic, and topical elements that were the popular components of the colourful, romantic stage picture. And it was to the Copenhagen theatre which Andersen's plays reflect that a young apprentice was sent from Bergen on a travelling scholarship in 1852 to learn his craft—an apprentice whose name was Henrik Ibsen.

Andersen's early puerile efforts in the 'tragic' genre were clearly bewildered products of his youthful encounters with the more sensational aspects of romantic theatre. His first complete play, a 'tragedy in five acts' entitled The Forest Chapel / Skovcapellet, was written at the age of sixteen in the hope that it would provide money with which he might continue his schooling.⁵ It is an example of hardboiled terror romanticism adapted from a German short story published in C.N. Rosenkilde's periodical Brevduen (nos 19 and 20, 1819); he was fortunately dissuaded from submitting it to the Royal Theatre. With his next effort, however, a 'patriotic tragedy' called The Robbers of Vissenberg / Røvene i Vissenberg, Andersen became bolder. It was written in two weeks and submitted anonymously to the Royal Theatre in 1822, which reacted by replying in a letter dated 16 June 1822 that it did not in future wish to receive 'plays which to such a degree as this display a lack of all elementary education.'⁶ Although only a single scene of this play, published in A.P. Liunge's magazine Harpen (XXXII, 1822), survives, the melodramatic dialogue in the robbers' den gives ample evidence of the drama's exaggerated sturm und drang tendencies. Yet a third 'tragedy' was finished by Andersen in 1822, a play entitled Alfsol which acquired its subject matter from the historian P.F. Suhm's Nordiske Noveller (1783) and its style from Oehlenschläger and the Danish novelist B.S. Ingemann. Although rejected for production, Alfsol marked the turning point in its author's life since it provided the impetus for the Royal Theatre's decision to support his further education. He expressed his gratitude by dedicating his first book, published at his own expense under the pseudonym William Christian Walter (his own middle name plus his two favourite authors, Shakespeare and Scott!) and containing Alfsol, to the 'exalted Royal Theatre management.' The few copies of the book still in existence belong among the costliest rarities of Scandinavian literature.⁷

Although any of these early, youthful gothic tragedies can be criticized on virtually every count, they nevertheless bear unmistakable evidence—as the Royal Theatre management also realized—of raw poetic talent. It is noteworthy that when Andersen, having completed his formal education, made his debut as a practising dramatist in 1829, it was in a genre which directly parodied the stiff, solemn, and sentimental style of these first tragedies.

For the most part, however, Andersen's uncompleted or unproduced plays have little bearing on his relation to the practical theatre of the nineteenth century. Similarly, four of his translations produced at the Royal Theatre, including Scribe's La quarantaine (as Skibet), Bayard's La reine de seize ans (as Dronningen paa 16 Aar), Dorvigny's La fête de campagne, ou L 'intendant comédien malgré lui (as En Comedie i det Grønne), and Meyerbeer's Le pardon de Ploërmel (as Dinorah), are only indirectly relevant to his personal artistic intentions as a playwright and assume only an incidental place in this discussion. Nevertheless, despite these exclusions, original plays and opera libretti by Andersen produced at the Royal Theatre between 1829 and 1865 account for a total of twenty-one works, embracing such widely diverse forms as vaudeville, opera or singspiel, romantic drama and fantasy, and romantic comedy…. Several of them were later performed at the private Casino Theatre, for which Andersen also wrote four additional dramatic fantasies, but no reliable production records of the Casino performances have survived.

Vaudeville

Andersen wrote for a theatre where musical genres played an extremely important role in the repertory. A large number of its performers were talented both as singers and as actors, and it possessed an excellent orchestra with distinguished traditions. Therefore it is not surprising to discover that vaudeville, opera, and singspiel are dominant forms in his dramaturgy….

The successful production at the Royal Theatre in 1825 of Karl von Holtei's vaudeville-influenced 'musical farce' Die Wiener in Berlin led directly to the introduction of the Danish vaudeville with the performance in the same year of [J.L.] Heiberg's King Solomon. Andersen's enthusiastic discovery of the new genre has already been described, and he was not long in following Heiberg's example. In 1829 he made the first of several efforts in this genre with his vaudeville-parody, Love on St Nicholas Tower, or What Says the Pit / Kjœrlighed paa Nicolai Taarn, eller Hvad siger Parterret.

This short, delightful farce treats the star-crossed love affair of Ellen, daughter of the 'knight' (ie, watchman) of St Nicholas Tower, and the brave little tailor Søren Pind, about whom we learn:

A tailor is a rosebud here below,A butterfly that flutters to and fro,Too fragile, thin, and paleTo withstand the wild and stormy gale.12

Together this engaging pair battle the stormy gales of destiny, embodied in the person of Peer Hansen, a watchman from a neighbouring tower who also seeks Ellen's hand in marriage. The play is a characteristic student parody of the romantic tragedy of destiny, in which watchmen and tailors assume heroic poses and speak stilted verse. The farcical element in the action was further heightened by means of numerous topical points of reference in the setting, the music, and the dialogue. Satirical jibes at actual persons, especially Adam Oehlenschläger, proved particularly upsetting to the more conservative elements; reviews in Maanedsskrift for Litteratur (1, 1829, 543) and Kjøbenhavnsposten (22 May 1829) both reproached the young playwright for having parodied 'our finest tragedies.' Three years later, Andersen was ready to express appropriate contrition for having 'really believed at that time that parody of something excellent, or use of something truly moving, might be permitted in jest without thereby having a bad heart.'¹³Mea culpa.

The Royal Theatre readers' report of Love on St Nicholas Tower, which has not previously been printed, is so characteristic of contemporary opinion regarding vaudeville and parody that it deserves to be cited at some length:¹⁴

That the vaudeville Love on St. Nicholas by no means corresponds to my ideas about the purpose and dignity of drama is hardly necessary to point out. Should it, however, despite my dissent, secure majority support, I must at least request that a fellow citizen is not mentioned on the stage in order to evoke a shameful laughter, as is the case on p. 35 and elsewhere.¹⁵ It is high time to stop the boyish foolishness that more and more dominates our stage, and which naturally finds all-too-ready support from the crowd of boys in the house … Furthermore, I feel that the Theatre would act ignobly and unwisely to parody, by favouring such examples as this, some of the most beautiful situations and scenes which adorn our theatre.

31 Dec. 1828 RAHBEK

If the author, as I do not doubt, observes with dutiful care the foregoing hints by my colleague, I do not believe that the present vaudeville should be rejected; the original turn at the end of the play, the fine, flowing verse, and the vigorous action throughout speak in its favour; at any rate I regard it as one of our best vaudevilles, and vote unconditionally for its acceptance.

5 Jan. 1829 G.H. OLSEN

Olsen, theatre manager, and Rahbek, author and critic, represented established, eighteenth-century conservatism; both were sixty-nine at this point, Olsen died the same year and Rahbek a year later. The conservative establishment triumphed, however. Despite the success of the play's unusual ending in which the audience is allowed to decide whether or not the tailor wins Ellen, its appearance at the close of the season, coupled with a heated controversy concerning the leading actress, resulted in a short run of only three performances.

Andersen's subsequent vaudevilles helped to shape the genre which Thomas Overskou later defined as 'a small, delicately drawn comedy stemming from local affairs, daily events, or piquant situations.'¹⁶ The theme of the love affair threatened by circumstances remained the predominant one. In his later vaudevilles, however, Andersen abandoned almost entirely the satirical, burlesque tone for which Love had been criticized. Thus in writing Parting and Meeting, which takes for its background the visit of Spanish troops to Odense in 1808, his aim, as he hastened to assure an acquaintance in a letter dated 11 April 1831, was now a sentimental, rather than a satirical, vaudeville. 'Do not imagine,' he declared, 'that my new vaudeville will ridicule the dear town of my birth; no, the play is sentimental, very serious, written from the heart. I read some scenes for Heiberg recently, and they pleased him greatly because of the melancholy tone.'¹⁷ Andersen benefited greatly in this vaudeville from the detailed, skilful dramaturgical hints on construction provided by Heiberg.¹⁸ Following a sharp initial rejection by the Royal Theatre in 1833, a revised version of Parting and Meeting consisting of two short, separate but related plays was accepted for production in November 1835.¹⁹ In the first playlet, Spaniards in Odense/Spanierne i Odense, Augusta falls in love with a dashing Spaniard, Francesco, who is stationed in Odense. However, her sense of duty persuades her to marry Ludvig, childhood sweetheart, as the Spanish troops march away in the distance. The sequel, 25 Years After / Fem og Tyve Aar derefter, presents the same characters 'twenty-five years later' in Elsinore—a novelty to which the actors, in the opinion of the critic for Dagen (19 April 1836), proved unequal in their depiction of the age changes. The sentimental conclusion to this romance unites the daughter of the now—widowed Augusta, Louise, to Diego, the son of a Spanish ambassador who proves to be none other than Augusta's sometime soldier, Francesco.

Lovers' intrigues also provided the main themes in two other Andersen vaudevilles. Mikkel's Parisian Love Stories / Mikkels Kjœrlighheds Historier i Paris is a brief vaudeville monologue composed for a benefit for the celebrated Danish comedian, Ludvig Phister, and performed twice in 1840. Mikkel, a character revived from an earlier Heiberg vaudeville, relates his amorous adventures in the French capital. In The Bird in the Pear-Tree / Fuglen i Pœretrœet the quarrel of two neighbours provides the comic background for the amorous intrigue of Herman and Henriette; here, too, love surmounts all obstacles, including a fence erected between the feuding neighbours' gardens and figuring prominently in the action. A high point in this atmospheric genre sketch is Andersen's rich characterization of Counsellor Arents, who in spite of his basically friendly nature becomes entangled in the neighbour dispute over the pear-tree. His outburst when he is finally compelled to recognize the fact that his daughter's heart has been captured by the son of the enemy suggests his nature:

Where is my daughter! Don 't look at me like that!I know very well where she is! But it's a lie!20

Following two successful summer performances in 1842, The Bird in the Pear-Tree was entered in the regular repertoire with Scandinavia's leading actress, Johanne Luise Heiberg, in the role of Henriette. Notwithstanding her services and the play's initial popularity, however, it was soon attacked by Andersen's opponents and, in the wake of polemical articles and hissing in the theatre, it was taken off the programme after four performances. 'For the past two weeks not a single sin has been commited in Denmark,' wrote Corsaren (11 Nov. 1842), one of the most vitriolic of the many polemically minded periodicals at this time; 'The Bird in the Pear-Tree is no longer applauded, on the contrary it was hissed.' Heiberg, the authoritative voice of Danish culture and intellectual endeavour, succeeded in elegantly damning the play with faint praise: 'It belongs to that species of small creatures,' he commented in his influential Intelligensblade (XIX, 1842), 'whose inclusion in our theatre-menagerie it would be pedantic to oppose, since it can be said of them that if they do no good, neither do they do any harm; they are too small for that, too insignificant, and too innocuous.'²¹ The bitterness caused by this hostility to his play pervades Andersen's diary entries for this period: one such entry notes that his depressed mood inspired him with the idea for his best-known fairy-tale, The Ugly Duckling.²²

One of Andersen's most successful works for the stage, however, was the vaudeville farce The Invisible Man on Sprogø / Den Usynlige paa Sprogø, 'a dramatic jest in one act with chorus and songs' which he admittedly tailored to suit a particular landscape setting originally designed for Henrik Hertz's unsuccessful vaudeville, Flight to Sprogø / Flugten til Sprogø.²³ Following a summer performance in 1839 which became a personal triumph for the actor C.M. Foersom in the title role of Blomme, the gullible merchant who is made 'invisible,' the play went on to become a popular favourite at the Royal Theatre, where it ran for twenty-two performances, and at Casino and Odense Theatre. 'Gulling' was another common subject in vaudeville. In The Bird in the Pear-Tree, Arents is gulled at the end in order that the lovers can be united. In The Invisible Man the entire dramatic situation is based on the 'gulling' of the central character, the enthusiastically credulous Agent Blomme ('I am a Sunday-child, am I! / O, I see more than meets the eye!') who is stranded with his family on the island of Sprogø, and is made to believe that three drops of liquid in a glass of wine together with a magic incantation have the power to render him invisible….

Despite Heiberg's relatively valid criticism that the songs in Parting and Meeting were undramatic, and the highly prejudiced criticism by Andersen's longtime adversary Christian Molbech that he 'under no circumstances understands how to write a Danish vaudeville such as we have become accustomed to that dramatic genre in Professor Heiberg's works,'³¹ he obviously displayed both considerable wit and dramaturgical finesse in this genre. One of the better-known examples from his plays of a scene which succeeds perfectly in capturing the elusive 'vaudeville tone' is the celebrated tour de force by Theodor, man-of-the-world and matchmaker in The Invisible Man, in which he describes his international experience in affairs of the heart. 'It would be odd if I wasn't able to do for others what I have so often done for myself—reach the goal in the kingdom of love,' he boasts to the audience. 'But here it's a question of arranging a wedding—it's true I've never tried that, but the preliminaries … yes, in most countries I've made acquaintances!' An engaging, Maurice Chevalier lead-in is hereby provided for the international catalogue of amorous escapades which follows. Theodor describes the girls he has known in a witty medley of 'national' songs: 'Lovely Minka,' Weyse's 'Dannemark! Dannemark!,' a Swedish folksong, 'God Save the King,' 'La Parisienne,' 'Of Spanish Girls' from the comedy Farinelli, and a Tyrolese melody; the medley is framed by the untranslatably charming verse:

To all the world' s four corners,My heart with me I brought,I left it with the lovely girls,You give them what you 've got.32

It was mainly in the 1830s that Andersen was occupied with the topical, lyrical vaudeville. A letter written from Leipzig and dated 3 July 1841 is indicative of his growing disinterest in this genre; 'this evening I was in the theatre,' he observed, 'to see the first and undoubtedly the only vaudeville … on my entire trip; I have almost forgotten this genre.'³³ The following year saw his final vaudeville effort produced at the Royal Theatre. By then, however, he had already contributed in large measure to popularizing in Denmark the form which Heiberg had succeeded in proving, by a specious application of Hegelian dialectics, was the most suitable type of dramatic art for the stage of the day….

Romantic Drama and Fairy-Tale Fantasy

In the 1830s Andersen's concern as a playwright was chiefly with vaudevilles and with opera libretti featuring the gothic elements of Walter Scott romanticism. In the 1840s he took a new direction, as he consciously turned toward French romantic drama and the style of Victor Hugo. These two apparently found much in common on a personal basis as well. In March 1843 Andersen was a welcome guest of Hugo in Paris, attending Les Burgraves with the French dramatist only a few days after its tumultuous première.⁵⁶

The strong interest during this period in local colour and ethnographic details spurred the popularity of 'exotic,' far-away environments and peoples on the stage. It is in direct relation to this theatrical convention that Andersen's two romantic verse dramas, The Mulatto / Mulatten and The Moorish Girl / Maurerpigen, must be seen. The increasing number of books which appeared on national customs, costumes, and mores served as an important stimulus for early nineteenth-century playwrights in presenting more convincing exotic surroundings and details in the theatre; Andersen's remark that in writing The Mulatto he 'swallowed all the available books on Africa and America' is characteristic. Moreover, in such dramas music was frequently included as accompaniment or as background to strengthen and deepen the impact of the romantic pathos and picturesque localities depicted.

The Mulatto, which Andersen himself felt would mark an epoch in his career, quickly became his greatest scenic triumph when produced at the Royal Theatre in February 1840. Audiences greeted the play with a storm of enthusiasm, and five sold-out houses were registered in the course of the first eleven performances.⁵⁷ Much of this popular success was the result of the drama's piquant subject matter and the illusionistic presentation of its exotic milieu on the stage. The subject of The Mulatto, which Andersen clothed in lyrical rhymed verse 'in order to subjugate the theme to the music of language,'⁵⁸ is reminiscent of Hugo's French romanticism and of numerous popular romantic dramas of the time. The play was adapted from a story by Fanny Reybaud, 'Les épaves,' which the dramatist read in the Revue de Paris (Feb. 1838).⁵⁹ Both Eleonore and Cecilie, the wife and the ward of La Rebelliere, wealthy planter on Martinique, meet and fall in love with the young, cultivated mulatto, Horatio. However, La Rebelliere plots vengeance on the hero and, by unscrupulous means, has him imprisoned and offered for sale at a slave auction. Disaster seems imminent until a legal deus ex machina, in the form of Cecilie's declaration that she will marry Horatio, frees him from slavery and disgrace. Never far beneath the surface of the conflict is Andersen's perpetual preoccupation with the 'ugly duckling phenomenon,' his running apologia for the gifted but poor, persecuted, or 'different' individual, excluded from polite society but ultimately triumphant. The moral of Cendrillon [a stage adaptation of Cinderella in which Andersen had appeared as an actor] was carried forward by Andersen as a banner and a challenge.

Critical regard for The Mulatto was high. 'This widely admired author has,' wrote Dagen (4 Feb. 1840), 'again managed to grasp the tones which find response in the audience's breast.' In addition, fine acting by Johanne Luise Heiberg, for whom Andersen had written the role of Cecilie, and an exciting scenic representation of the exotic atmosphere, particularly in the dramatic juxtaposition of Horatio's dank prison with a glittering ballroom in the fourth act and in the sensational slave-auction scene of the last act, substantially aided the success of the play.

In marked contrast, generally wretched acting and apparent indifference toward the exotic Spanish setting in Andersen's romantic drama The Moorish Girl resulted in a disappointing run for this play of only three performances in December 1840.⁶⁰ Countless difficulties prior to the opening of The Moorish Girl, including Johanne Luise Heiberg's pointed refusal to play the 'masculine' leading role, led to an open breach between the playwright and the powerful House of Heiberg. The apologia which the tormented author added as a preface to the play was particularly ill-timed. The 1840s marked the beginning of a new development in Danish theatrical criticism, characterized by the rise and eventual predominance of newspaper 'reviews' at the expense of the more sober evaluations of the critical journals. The domination of newspaper reporting in theatrical matters brought with it a wave of glib, slashing polemics, as publications like Figaro and Corsaren (The Corsair, which sported a Barbary marauder delivering a cannon salvo on its masthead!) spearheaded a reign of terror from which no dramatist or actor was safe. Seeking to vindicate The Moorish Girl, Andersen introduced it with a jeremiad which reproached such hostile treatment and which began: 'It is rather well known that I have suffered a miserable childhood, and even though the good God has since led me forward, I have, however, at each step had to survive many battles.'⁶¹ This document, judiciously omitted from his collected works, bore its own punishment in the form of devastating ridicule in the columns of Corsaren (1 Jan. 1841) and other papers.

Separating evidence from outraged sensibilities, however, The Moorish Girl is clearly inferior to most of Andersen's other plays. Although the dramatist styled this five-act verse drama a 'tragedy,' its theme and use of background music composed by Hartmann bring it closer to the category of conventional melodrama. Raphaella, a Spanish Saint Joan-figure who wins the love of the King of Cordova after saving his life in a battle against the Moors but who flees from his proposal of marriage on patriotic grounds, is basically a stock melodramatic heroine with 'ugly duckling' overtones. Although Raphaella discovers that she is in reality the daughter of the enemy King of the Moors, the King of Cordova nevertheless renews his proposal. She pretends to agree, only to take her own life on rather vague grounds of honour and decency. The play should, however, be seen from a theatrical rather than a literary vantage point; 'all is and must be calculated for the stage, for performance, thus it must be judged,' Andersen insisted in his preface.⁶² In this context, the picturesque exoticism in costuming, landscape, and architecture suggested in the text provided the concrete means by which the dramatist sought to invest the melodramatic story with an interesting and evocative atmosphere. His conference with the stage manager, the scene designer, and the costume designer which followed Heiberg's reading of the play in the greenroom on 20 Sept. 1840 was undoubtedly aimed at clarifying this objective.⁶³ Hence when the Royal Theatre succumbed to the negative attitude of the Heibergs and neglected to provide a suitable physical exoticism in the production, the disappointing result was a foregone conclusion.

After the florid exoticism of The Mulatto and The Moorish Girl, Andersen turned closer to home and explored the areas of Danish history and Danish folk material for romantic subjects. Moreover, following the failure of his ballad dramatization, Agnete and the Merman, he sought refuge in anonymity, a common practice in Denmark during this decade marked by the 'reign of terror' of the newspaper polemic. The first of Andersen's anonymous productions was the one-act romantic drama performed in 1844, Dreams of the King, which treats the historic imprisonment of King Christjern II in Sønderborg Castle. In many ways this short play ranks among Andersen's most interesting theatrical productions; in his critique as dramaturge Heiberg praised the work for its originality and inventiveness—causing Edvard Collin to remark: 'Anonymity already begins to have its interesting sides.'⁶⁴

Dreams of the King is based on Samsøe's eighteenth-century historical tragedy, Dyveke, and on Andersen's own youthful studies of Christjern II conducted in connection with an unfinished historical novel.⁶⁵ The play depicts, by means of a 'flashback technique' which was effectively supported in production by Henrik Rung's dramatic music, Christjern's dreams of his mistress Dyveke, whom he meets in Bergen and subsequently allows to be poisoned in Copenhagen. The play's national-historical subject, verse treatment, and poetic-psychological contrast between the realms of fantasy and reality all make it a typical representative of the genre of romantic drama. The critical debate which greeted the production became essentially an aesthetic discussion of 'dramatic rules'; critics of the play's romanticism opposed its 'lack of dramatic action' and its violation of correct classical versification through an overabundance of caesura and hiatus.⁶⁶ It was Heiberg, meanwhile, who, in a brilliant review in his Intelligensblade (1 March 1844), cut through the foggy theoretical discussion to demonstrate the effective theatricality of the play's situation, and the visually striking manner in which the dreams become a part of reality. The scenic treatment of these dream transitions, foreshadowing more modern techniques, comprises the essential core of Dreams of the King as theatre.

The Blossom of Happiness / Lykkens Blomst, which appeared the following year and which Andersen designated a 'fairy-tale comedy,' similarly transfers the main character to two dream situations, thereby poetically contrasting the realms of fantasy and reality. Although the basic tones of Dreams of the King and The Blossom of Happiness are very different, the subject matter of the latter play is again national-historical. Henrik, a forester, 'becomes,' by means of an elf's magic pearls, first the eighteenth-century Danish poet Johannes Ewald and next the mediaeval Prince Buris at the castle of King Waldemar. However, once he discovers that 'wishing will make it so' and experiences the terrible sorrows of the poet and the torments of the prince, the forester of Andersen's fable is happy to find that true happiness—the 'blessed peace of mind' of the wise Alidor in Cendrillon—is to be sought in his humble cottage together with his little family.

If the moral of the play was thus reminiscent of Andersen's own fairy-tales, its immediate theatrical model was most probably Heiberg's historical dream-play, Day of the Seven Sleepers / Syvsoverdag, first produced in 1840. In his role as the Royal Theatre's consultant, Heiberg charged (unjustly) that The Blossom of Happiness was a direct copy of the three spheres in his own play, the realistic as represented by Henrik and his wife Johanna, the fantastic as represented by the mischievous elf and the good fairy Kirsten Piil, and the ideal, depicted in the worlds of Johannes Ewald and King Waldemar. Heiberg found Andersen's unusual treatment of the material, particularly the fact that Henrik actually becomes Ewald and Prince Buris, 'absurd.'⁶⁷ Andersen studied and followed historical reality closely in the Ewald episode, and the actor who played the poet tried to achieve 'a portrait likeness,' thereby discarding the character of Henrik entirely.⁶⁸

Although the play was finally accepted in spite of Heiberg's hostile attitude, the difficulties were thereby far from being overcome. Andersen's utter disregard for 'rules' of form and propriety distressed his contemporaries greatly. Bournonville refused on the grounds of decorum to choreograph a scene in which Kirsten, Prince Buris's sweetheart, is forced to dance herself to death.⁶⁹ Johanne Luise Heiberg temperamentally turned down the part of Kirsten; 'Fru Heiberg suggests that Kirsten's role be given to a dancer and not to her,' wrote Andersen in his diary on 10 Oct. 1844. 'In a furious rage! Would like to leave Denmark forever!' Finally, although the acting proved to be a strong point in the Royal Theatre's production in February 1845, the staging of the demanding poetic contrasts and transitions in this fantasy was beset by severe technical problems in performance.⁷⁰ 'The entire structure [of the play] conflicts with the existing and customary dramatic rules governing an ordinary (eg, Scribean) play,' declared the unimaginative reviewer for Dansk Album (23 Feb. 1845). While the play 'reveals a poetic genius' and 'a truly brilliant eye for scenic effect,' this critic advised Andersen to concentrate on a stricter and more 'well-made' construction.

In contrast to other prominent Danish authors such as Heiberg or Henrik Hertz, H.C. Andersen was immediately responsive when Casino Theatre, the first private theatre authorized in Copenhagen, opened in 1848 under the direction of W.H. Lange. Andersen was attracted from the outset by the idea of a smaller, popular theatre, and at Casino he found consolation for the unresponsiveness and high-handed treatment he was often forced to endure at the Royal Theatre. He became Casino's unofficial house dramatist, and for a time also functioned as its literary consultant and served on the board of directors. During the early 1850s he achieved considerable fame as a playwright at Casino with a series of fairy-tale fantasies similar in form to The Blossom of Happiness. His success in turn attracted other established dramatists to the new popular theatre and helped greatly to increase its prestige.

Following the production, five months after Casino's opening, of Andersen's one-act adaptation of Warin and Lefevre's Une chambre à deux lits, called A Night in Roskilde / En Nat i Roskilde, he turned for inspiration to the type of popular fairy-tale play perfected by the Austrian actor and dramatist Ferdinand Raimund, whose fantasies he later recommended for careful study to the young director Henrik Ibsen during his visit to Copenhagen in 1852.⁷¹ During his first trip to Vienna in 1834 Andersen had had an opportunity to see the special Viennese Zauberpossen at first hand. He was particularly enthusiastic about Karl Meisl's Das Gespenst auf der Bastei, which he saw at the Theater an der Wien on 2 July, noting in his diary that 'the whole light fantastic humour delighted me,' especially Johann Nestroy as the ghost 'who very humorously haunts the Bastei.'⁷² In 1838 Andersen tried unsuccessfully to secure a production at the Royal Theatre for his rather undistinguished translation of Der Verschwender, Raimund's saga of a reckless spendthrift. At Casino, however, he succeeded in capturing the unique style and flavour of the Viennese fairy-tale comedy. 'The talent which the world acknowledges in me as an author of fairy-tales must surely also bear some fruit in this direction,' he reasoned.⁷³ His prediction proved correct. His fairy-tale fantasy More than Pearls and Gold / Meer end Perler og Guld, produced for the first time at Casino on 3 October 1849, played to a succession of capacity audiences in the 2500-seat playhouse and enjoyed no fewer than 162 performances in the repertory until 1888. The play is an adaptation of Raimund's Der Diamant des Geisterkönigs, the story of a young man promised a statue of diamond if he can find a girl who has never told a lie. The technique is pure Raimund, presenting a fantastic mixture of realistic scenes from contemporary life and frankly unreal, supernatural situations in order to demonstrate the worth of good, honest, simple integrity. A sincere and honest girl is 'the finest diamond,' worth 'more than pearls and gold.' To Raimund's play Andersen added ideas from The Arabian Nights and a piquantly localized Copenhagen flavour. The audience was treated to a stream of topical details woven into the action: Tivoli with Lumbye's popular orchestra, the amazing wonders of the new railroad to Roskilde, a balloon ascent, the newly formed Parliament, and even Andersen's publisher were mentioned. …

In concluding his review of More than Pearls and Gold, the novelist and critic M.A. Goldschmidt remarked on Raimund's 'flirtation' with the notion of fantastic wealth: 'Many a spectator of such a folk-comedy perhaps goes home to his simple parlor and finds it poorer than before, is even more dissatisfied with life than before going to the theatre. We believe that H.C. Andersen, when he creates an original play, will offer the public healthier nourishment for its imagination.'⁷⁵ The play to which Goldschmidt alluded was Ole Shuteye / ole Lukøie, which appeared at Casino five months later and became Andersen's most solid success in the genre of fairy-tale fantasy. It is based on one of his own fairy-tale characters, Ole Shuteye, the Nordic sandman or god of sleep. Its moral is that implied in Goldschmidt's remark and dramatized by Raimund in, for example, Der Bauer als Millionär—'health, good humour, and peace of mind' are worth more than the world's riches. The method used to demonstrate this optimistic message was, of course, the technique of the Viennese Zauberpossen—the free intermingling of topical reality and supernatural fantasy—presented with calculated naïveté and witty dialogue.

The specific literary influences in Ole Shuteye are many.⁷⁶ Raimund and Andersen's own fairy-tales have been mentioned. The basic dream structure of the play is clearly related to the framework of the powerful Der Traum, ein Leben by the Viennese dramatist Franz Grillparzer, a close friend of Andersen. In Der Traum, the Eastern hero dreams in such a way that his real life is influenced by what he has experienced when asleep. In Ole Shuteye, Christian, the honest but discontented chimney-sweep, wishfully dreams of acquiring limitless wealth—a dangerous fantasy in the fairy-tale genre! On Østergade in Copenhagen Christian encounters, in the dream which forms the play-within-the-play, the ghost of a vagabond 'dressed all in white with white cane and white cigar,' who allows the chimney-sweep the traditional three wishes. The genealogy of the figure in white is not difficult to discern: the very same character haunted the Bastei, the favourite promenade in old Vienna, in Meisl's Das Gespenst auf der Bastei, which Andersen had seen sixteen years earlier at the Theater an der Wien. Finally, Christian's plight closely resembles that of the charcoal-burner Peter Munk in Wilhelm Hauff's popular fairy-tale, Das kalte Herz. Both young heroes relinquish their hearts to the powers of evil in order to attain riches; the evil junk-dealer Blake replaces Christian's heartbeat with the tick of a costly gold watch. The ultimate moral of Hauff's tale is fully equivalent to the gospel of Ole Shuteye: 'Es ist doch besser, zufrieden sein mit wenigem, als Gold und Güter haben, und ein kaltes Herz' [Far better to be satisfied with little, than to have gold and goods and a cold heart].⁷⁷

In the Viennese Zauberpossen the machinist was the dramatist's closest collaborator, and thus in Ole Shuteye spectacular theatricality played a major role. The audience was treated to surprising scene changes, lavish dance numbers, sudden transformations, and, not least, a scene of black magic in the second-hand shop of the wicked Blake, in which the furniture danced, portraits moved, and the fireiron performed pirouettes! Although no production records have survived, Andersen found that his spectacular fantasy was staged 'as properly as possible' on the 'small, narrow, oppressive stage at Casino.'⁷⁸

Least successful of Andersen's fairy-tale fantasies was his one-act dramatization of another of his own tales, Mother Elder / Hyldemoer. Its production at Casino in December 1851 convinced him that most Danes had 'little appreciation for the fantastic,' preferring 'to nourish themselves honestly on wretched dramatic recipes right out of the cookbook.'⁷⁹ Conservative critics found it difficult to accept Andersen's loosely structured and frankly impressionistic fantasy. 'The play lacks nearly all the conditions for being called a drama,' asserted Berlingske Tidende (2 Dec. 1851). 'Instead of a plot, the author gives us a series of isolated scenes which, since they lack all inherent connection, he has found necessary to paste together by means of "Phantasus," who at every turn must support poet and public with opinions and explanations.'

Comedy

In marked contrast to the complexities of his fairy-tale fantasies, Andersen's charming short comedy, The New Maternity Ward / Den nye Barselstue, provided the Royal Theatre with an uncomplicated and immediate success when first performed there anonymously in March 1845. The popularity of Andersen's best-known play has also been permanent, and to date it has been given a total of 116 performances in the Royal Theatre repertory. The inspiration for this comedy was undoubtedly a capricious little publication by Søren Kierkegaard entitled Foreword / Forord, which had appeared the previous June and which suggested that someone should write a new, literary version of Holberg's classic comedy, The Maternity Ward / Barselstuen.⁸⁰ Hence Andersen's comedy is a 'new' Maternity Ward in literary terms, written in the classical manner and presenting a cavalcade of amusing caricatures from the Copenhagen of Christian VIII. Its action follows Holberg's model. Doctor Wendel returns home after many years in America to find that his old friend Jespersen has just had a great success as the author of a comedy called Love. A group of foolish visitors therefore flocks to the 'maternity ward'—Jespersen's study—to pay homage to the new 'child.' Unlike Holberg's play, however, Jespersen is ironically not the father of the child, and it rapidly emerges that Doctor Wendel himself wrote the play as a poem of unrequited love for Jespersen's sister Christine, and gave it to his friend before going away. However, to the 'poet's' relief Wendel agrees to keep the secret, the latter decides to renew his suit to Christine, and the curtain falls on an ovation by the guests for the chastened Jespersen. If several of the comic portraits and coups de theâtre, such as Christine's opening speech about the guest list, were patterned directly on Holberg's play,. Andersen's satire nevertheless had a sharp topical and contemporary edge. 'Taken from raw reality' was Heiberg's phrase, but this fact by no means hampered its sweeping popularity as he had implied it would.⁸¹ The play's piquant salon tone represented a particular forte of the Royal Theatre personnel, led by its dominant spirit and chief artist Johanne Luise Heiberg, and the comic character portraits in the classical tradition afforded rewarding acting material.

Andersen's attempt a year later to reduplicate the witty tone, comic characterizations, and 'mistaken parenthood' intrigue of The New Maternity Ward in a comedy entitled Herr Rasmussen led, however, to his most resounding failure as a dramatist. Herr Rasmussen received a single, anonymous performance, after which it was, for very good reason, banished from the repertoire, ignored in Andersen's autobiography, and expunged from his collected works.⁸² Reviews of the debacle are short and to the point; 'this evening the audience in the Royal Theatre was obliged to hiss a new play off the stage,' wrote the critic for Kjøbenhavnsposten (20 March 1846), 'which would never have been put on the stage if the Royal Theatre management was not—the Royal Theatre management.' It is no surprise to find that production records for this play are few and meagre. 'Everything functioned in the proper order. The play was completely hissed off,' recorded the Theatre's Regiejournal tersely.⁸³

Apart from his libretti for Wedding at Lake Como and The Nix, and the short prologue play The Bulwark of Art / Kunstens Dannevirke, a patriotic panegyric of Danish arts and letters commissioned for the Royal Theatre centennial on 18 December 1848, eighteen years passed after Herr Rasmussen before Andersen was represented by another new play at the theatre on Kongens Nytorv. This was the romantic comedy He is not well-born / Han er ikke født, which was produced in April 1864. In that year the attention of Andersen and of the Danish nation was focussed on the war with Germany in Slesvig-Holstein rather than on the stage of the national theatre. Under the circumstances, however, the production was relatively successful, due largely to the acting of romantic idol Michael Wiehe, whose tragic death in October put an end to further performances of the play. Although he found the plot of this comedy 'very slender,' Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson regarded He is not well-born as 'a delightful little work,' written with 'elegance and psychological, adept refinement.'⁸⁴

The play contrasts the nobility of blood, of money, and of intellect, a contrast effectively conveyed in the dialogue and the characterization. Gathered within a rather loose framework of mistaken parenthood, a gallery of amusing character portraits surrounds the two lovers, Frederik and Elisabeth. The topicality of this romantic comedy lent itself of effective realization on the stage. Particularly the caricature of a sensitive and temperamental poet named Kluhd (Rag), author of an 'apocalyptic comedy in nine acts' entitled Death and Damnation, was drawn by Andersen with fine self-irony; 'they shall be all rotting in the ground when I am ripe fruit on the public tongue!' cries the vexed Kluhd vindictively, and when told that the company was concerned after he had rushed out in a rage he strikes an injured pose which epitomizes the Andersen whimsy: 'Let them worry! Let them torment themselves! Have they dragged for me in the canals?'

By this time Andersen's world renown had at last won him immunity from the vituperous domestic criticism that had previously dogged his steps as a dramatist. 'The public has realized,' wrote critic Erik Bøgh in Folkets Avis (29 April 1964), 'that although [Andersen] has never succeeded in forming a work for the stage according to the accepted rules of the art, he is a far greater poet than someone possessing the most complete talent for dramatic construction, and when he leaves his limitless realm in the world of the fairy-tale to visit the narrow stage with the slanting floor, upon which each step must be measured, he should be considered as a guest who brings rich gifts from another land, where art makes other demands.' In the eyes of the younger critics representing a new generation, Andersen's genius had already passed into legend. Yet their praise of his 'innocent—satirical, naïve-ingenious dialogue' tends somewhat to neglect his insights as a dramatist and the purely theatrical merits of his later comedies.

When the Spaniards were here / Da Spanierne var her, Andersen's last play, was a romantic comedy produced in April 1865 and written with his customary awareness of contemporary theatrical taste. Based on a rewriting of his vaudeville Parting and Meeting, the popular historical theme of the Spanish troops stationed in Odense in 1808 provided the scenic milieu. 'His picture has a large and brilliant ornamentation,' remarked the reviewer for Berlingske Tidende (7 April 1865), 'conveyed through scenic effect, the use of music, and the illumination of the spoken word. The scene is set in Middelfart and southern Jutland … the spectator has the Great Belt before him, where British warships cruise.' Andersen's diary entries for 15 and 16 June 1864 indicate that historical studies were made for the play, and the contemporary interest in historical 'accuracy' was also the basis for the rather pedantic objection, raised by the critic for Tilskueren (9 April 1865), that the Marseillaise heard at the end of the play had in reality been forbidden under Napoleon's emperorship from 1804 to 1814.

The Spanish element in this scenic environment was, however, projected through the ear rather than the eye: the sound of Spanish songs and castanets is heard but the Spaniards themselves are never shown, with the exception of three children dressed in uniform who appear at the close of the first scene. Unlike Francesco in Parting and Meeting, Hermania's Spanish soldier, Don Juan de Molina, never actually appears on stage; only his serenades are heard in the distance. Against this dim, idealized outline of the Spanish soldier, the character of the strong-willed and spirited Hermania stands out in yet bolder relief to dominate the action. Her attraction to and pursuit of the unseen Spanish lover assumes an added dimension and becomes in the play a flight towards a romanticized ideal which echoes the richest strains in Andersen's art:

I need to cross the rolling water! I have the swan's nature—I won't stay in this stagnant pond, nice enough for geese and ducks to swim in.⁸⁵

Hence the sharply etched character portraits, the love affairs, happy or otherwise, the intrigues of mistaken parenthood, the fairy-tale transformations, and the quests for a romantic ideal which pervade Andersen's dramaturgy received expression in a wide variety of styles and an assortment of dramatic forms that included vaudeville, opera, singspiel, romantic drama, fairy-tale fantasy, and comedy. This chapter [in The Plays of H. C. Andersen] has tried to suggest some of the more significant influences on Andersen's plays—the Heiberg vaudeville, Walter Scott romanticism, exoticism, Danish history, and folk material. In each of the genres he attempted, he registered popular successes—The Invisible Man, The Mulatto, Dreams of the King, Little Kirsten, Ole Shuteye, and The New Maternity Ward, to mention the more obvious examples—although the myth of his totally fruitless career as a playwright prevails, nourished no doubt by his own misleading accounts. In reality, Andersen's plays were generally written with an acute awareness of the practical theatre of his time and a concrete image of that theatre constantly in mind. As such, they are remarkably informative reflections of the nineteenth-century theatrical context, the interplay of styles, methods, conventions, and techniques in staging, costuming, and acting which preceded the emergence of naturalism.

Notes

¹ Søren Kierkegaard, Samlede Værker, XIV (Copenhagen 1963), 118

²Mit Livs Eventyr, 1, 215

³Ibid., 218

⁴ See H. Topsøe-Jensen, H.C. Andersen og andre Studier [Odense 1966], p. 35

⁵ The play is unpublished; the manuscript is in the Royal Library, Collinske Samling 18, 7, with corrections by Andersen's tutor.

⁶ E. Collin, H.C. Andersen [og det Collinske Huns, (Copenhagen 1882)], p. xv

⁷ See Cai M. Woel's facsimile edition of Gjenfærdet ved Palnatokes Grav (Copenhagen 1940)

…..

¹² Andersen, Samlede Skrifter, XII, 6

¹³ [H. Topsøe-Jensen (ed.),] H.C. Andersens Levnedsbog [1805-1831 (Copenhagen 1962)], p. 190

¹⁴ Loose sheet in the collection 'Det Kgl. Teater: Censurer 1821-29' (Rigsarkivet)

¹⁵ The reference is to Samlede Skrifter, XII, 14: 'She sits often in a corner, Humming me a song by Bay,' ie, composer Rudolph Bay (1791-1856).

¹⁶ [Thomas] Overskou, 'Johan Ludvig Heiberg og den danske Vaudeville,' Danmarks ill. Almanak for 1861, 90

¹⁷ [C.St.A.] Bille and [N.] Bøgh, Breve fra H.C. Andersen [(Copenhagen 1878) 1, 89; cf Mit Livs Eventyr, 1, 109

¹⁸ See Heiberg's letter to Jonas Collin dated 22 Nov. 1833 in Collin, H.C. Andersen, pp. 215-21; cf Bille and Bøgh, Breve til H.C. Andersen [(Copenhagen 1877)], pp. 109-10, and [H.] Topsøe-Jensen, Brevveksling med Jonas Collin d. Ældre [(Copenhagen 1945)], 1, 99-100

¹⁹ The reader's report is reproduced in G. Hetsch, H.C. Andersen og Musikken [(Copenhagen 1930)], pp. 33-7

²⁰Samlede Skrifter, XI, 192. [B.] Jensen, 'H.C. Andersens dramatiske Digtning og det moderne Teater,' [Tilskueren XLIV (August 1927), 120-9] has presented a good evaluation of this vaudeville, to which Rostand's Les Romanesques (better known as The Fantasticks) bears some resemblances.

²¹ See [J.L.] Heiberg, Prosaiske Skrifter [(Copenhagen 1861-2)], VII, 287-90

²² 4 July 1842, Collinske Samling 7, 1

²³Mit Livs Eventyr, 1, 219

…..

³¹ Collin, H.C. Andersen, p. 218, and Hetsch, H.C. Andersen, pp. 50-1

³²Samlede Skrifter, XI, 128-9

³³ Topsøe-Jensen, Brevveksling med Jonas Collin, 1, 185

…..

⁵⁶Mit Livs Eventyr, 1, 274

⁵⁷ Overskou, Den danske Skueplads, [i dens Historie (Copenhagen 1854-76)] v, 405

⁵⁸Mit Livs Eventyr, 1, 219

⁵⁹ This provoked a hefty debate on originality in Fædrelandet (16 Feb. 1840); see P. Høybye, 'H.C. Andersen og Frankrig,' Anderseniana, ser. 2, 11 (1951-4), 146-7

⁶⁰Fædrelandet, 28 Dec. 1840

⁶¹ Topsøe-Jensen, Omkring Levnedsbogen, [(Copenhagen 1943)] p. 216

⁶²Ibid., p. 217

⁶³ Two and a half weeks before the actual reading rehearsal on 8 Oct.; see Andersen's letter of 16 Sept. in Topsøe-Jenson, HCA og Henriette Wulff, [(Odense 1954-60)] 1, 276, and his diary for 20 Sept. Heiberg was dramatic consultant for the Royal Theatre and also led the reading of new scripts for the actors. See [M.] Borup, Johan Ludvig Heiberg, [(Copenhagen 1947-49)] II, 163-4

⁶⁴ Bille and Bøgh, Breve til H.C. Andersen, p. 93

⁶⁵ Cf [T.] Høeg, H.C. Andersens Ungdom, [(Copenhagen 1934)] pp. 271-304

⁶⁶ For the various viewpoints see Kjøbenhavnsposten (15 Feb 1844), Berlingske Tidende (15 Feb.), Fædrelandet (17 Feb.), Journal for Litteratur og Kunst (1844), p. 129, and Ny Portefeuille for 1844, I, 187

⁶⁷ Heiberg's hostile report is reprinted in Topsøe-Jensen, Brevveksling med Edvard og Henriette Collin, [(Copenhagen 1933-37)] v, 116-17. For Andersen's description of the production of Day of the Seven Sleepers see Topsøe-Jensen, H.C. Andersen og H. Wulff, I, 274

⁶⁸Dansk Album, 23 Feb. 1845. For the Ewald episode Andersen studied F.C. Olsen's 'Digteren Johannes Ewalds Liv og Forholdene i Aarene 1774-77,' published in 1835 in Kjøbenhavns flyvende Post.

⁶⁹ Bille and Bøgh, Breve til H.C. Andersen, p. 43

⁷⁰Berlingske Tidende, 17 Feb. 1845

⁷¹ [Robert] Neiiendam, Gennem mange Aar, [(Copenhagen 1950)] p. 99

⁷² Topsøe-Jensen, H.C. Andersen og andre Studier, p. 169

⁷³Mit Livs Eventyr, II, 111-12

…..

⁷⁵Nord og Syd, I (1849), 411

⁷⁶ Topsøe-Jensen presents a perceptive analysis of this play in H.C. Andersen og andre Studier, pp. 153-72.

⁷⁷Wilhelm Hauffs sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden (Stuttgart: Cottasche Bibliothek der Weltliteratur, nd), VI, 322

⁷⁸Mit Livs Eventyr, II, 112

⁷⁹Ibid., 144

⁸⁰ [F.J.] Billeskov Jansen, Danmarks Digtekunst [(Copenhagen 1947-58)], III, 195

⁸¹ Heiberg's official report appears in Collin, H.C. Andersen, p. 371.

⁸² Edvard Agerholm first edited the play, with a short introduction describing its bizarre history, in 1913. It might be noted that Andersen earned only 70 Rdl. for his labours (Theaterkassens Regnskaber, 7 April 1846, Rigsarkivet).

⁸³Regiejournal Jan. 1837-April 1848, 16 March 1846 (Royal Theatre library)

⁸⁴ Cf Bille and Bøgh, Breve til H.C. Andersen, p. 637

⁸⁵Samlede Skrifter, XXXII, 46