The Debasement of the Intellectual in Contemporary Continental Drama

THE DEBASEMENT OF THE INTELLECTUAL IN CONTEMPORARY CONTINENTAL DRAMA ONE OF THE STRIKING ASPECTS OF CONTEMPORARY THEATER is its remarkable diversity. Not only is there the theater of the absurd, as represented by Ionesco and Beckett; there is also the epic theater which has gained popularity thanks to the works of Brecht and has been perpetuated by the most recent plays of Adamov and Frisch; less well-known but equally impressive in a more subtle manner is the theater of poetic fantasy of which the plays of Supervielle, Pichette~ and Schehade are such moving examples. But within this very diversity it is possible to find certain common themes which the most important playwrights of the 20th century have utilized. One of these leitmotifs is the degradation of the intellectual, who is usually presented in the guise of a professor. By juxtaposing some of the portraits which our contemporary dramatists have drawn of professors , it is possible to gain an interesting insight into the antiintellectual spirit of our age. Before doing this, however, it is necessary to go back to the end of the 19th century, for Anton Chekhov, the precursor of the contemporary theater in so many other respects, also anticipated this. very theme. His depiction of Serebriakov in Uncle Vania (and in its earlier version, The Wood Demon) could almost be said to be the model for all future professors brought to the stage in the 20th century. Vania describes the selfish and vain professor with cruelty: . . . a dull old stick, a sort of scholarly dried fish . . . afflicted with gout, rheumatism, migraine ... his liver swollen with jealousy and envy.... For twenty-five years he has been chewing over other people's ideas about realism, naturalism and all that sort of nonsense; for twenty-five years he has been lecturing and writing about things that inteIli~ent people have known all the time, and stupid people aren't mterested in anyway-, in fact, for twenty-five years he's been just wasting time and energy. And yet, what an opinion of himselfl What pretensionsI ... But just look at him-he struts around like a little tin godll And it is with anger that Uncle Vania speaks of "... people wh() conceal their utter lack of talent, their dullness, their complete 1 The Seagull and Other Plays (London, 1954), Penguin Books, 97-gB. 454 1965 THE DEBASEMENT OF THE INTELLECTUAL 455 heartlessness under the guise of the professor, the purveyor of learned magic. •• ."a Indeed, Uncle Vania has cause for his violent antipathy, for the professor's arrival had completely disrupted life on the estate. In the perhaps overly dramatic early version of the play, Serebriakov's irresponsible egotism is the direct cause of a suicide. But in both versions of the play, the real key to Uncle Vania's hatred is to be found in jealousy. Uncle Vania resents the fact that the decrepit and unattractive professor should have the beautiful, young Elena Andreyevna as his faithful wife. While Chekhov limits himself to depicting the disastrous influence of the professor on the society of which he is a part, Bertolt Brecht, in his free adaptation of an 18th century play by Lenz, Der Hofmeister , describes the progressive disintegration of the teacher, a creature undone by his uncontrollable sexual appetite. It is interesting to note that in this play Brecht seems to follow the pattern established by Heinrich Mann in his novel, Professor Unrath. In each instance there is a dizzying fall which leads to the total decomposition of a personality, a movement which transforms the main character from a respected and admired pedagogue into a pitiful object of ridicule. The protagonist of Der Hofmeister is the son of a poor country pastor who obtains an excellent position as tutor in the magnificent home of a wealthy and socially prominent major. However, Lauffer incriminates himself by seducing his pupil, the young daughter of the major. He is forced to flee in danger of his life. He seeks refuge in the home of a village schoolmaster who not only grants him asylum, but, once his confidence has been gained, a teaching position. The generous schoolmaster has a young ward, Lise, and, as can...