The times., 1899-06-26
LITERARY WAR In DENMARK.
Trouble Caused by the Appearance
of NNcttc GuiIbcrt.

OF NNettc Guiibert.
Copenhagen, June 25.-The Danish ma
tion is stirred from centre to circumfer-
ence. ANONYMOUSLY enough, an artistic de
variete and great industrial lockout are
the causes which have removed the COM
placent Copenhagen burghers and their
households from their rest-inspiring pro-
montories to a level of agitation which
threatens to work revolution in the exist
ing order of things.
Yvette Guilbert it is who has stirred up
the latent emotionalism of the Danes. She
of the expressive countenance and the
sombre- gloved arms came from her de-
voted Paris to give the descendants of
Hamlet a taste OF her art. True. the allied
trades lockout, shares part of the excite
ment which has been rampant in Den
mark for some days. But far and above
the sordidness of industrialism the citi-
zens of the little kingdom TO the north
are now concerned with "art for arts
sake Is Guilbert an artist, or is she an
exponent of degeneracy? Are her songs
the expression of Partisan thought, or is
her performance simply a question of ca
tering to a public denand2 More than
this, the advent and departure of Yvette
current literature of the Danish people.
Great and small, atheist and churchman,
socialist and mouarchist. all shades of the
national life and existence have been
mixed up in the controversy which now
fills the press as no other subject since
the Prussian war.
While Yvette Guilbert rests indolently
in her Partisan home; while her purse is
heavy and her cares are light; while the
1cnlTc vol b,r Win
tories in France and in America and on
the Continent and on her latest conquest,
Denmark, staid professors at the univer-
sity and the opponents of the new school
in literature are at swords point
Aside from the question as to what con-
stitutes legitimate art and its representa-
tion on the stage, what the Danes most
would like to know now is where the agi-
tation will end. With men like Dr.
Brandes Alfred Ipsen Bishop Setback, and
other equally well-known personalities
concerned, small wonder that the yellow
journals of Copenhagen have found food
for gossip, and that the daily papers in
general are filed with the matter to the
brim. Denmark has representatives at the
Peace Conference at The Hague; but while
the reports from there receive some no ice
the other qustion is the all-absorbng one.
The lockout has drawn thousands of
workers and many capitalists into a con-
troversy which locks detrimental to citi-
zens and country alike. but this disturb
ance is disposed of compiacently, while
the problem of degeneracy and the litera-
ture of Denmark gets the cream of the
space at hand in the daily press. 1t has
led to an Indictment of Dr. Edward
Brandes, because of his latest novel,
young Blood
DIR. Edward Brandes is one of the most
prominent litterateurs in Denmark, and his
dramas are considered psychologically in
teresting, as well as historically correct
That Young Blood" therefore. would
be pounced upon by the novel-reading
public with avidity was self-evident. At
the present moment not one copy can be
obtained, whether in bookstalIs or circu-
lating libraries. The further issuing of the
novel has been put off until the law has
had chance to have its say.
Dr.. Edward Brandes is a philosopher in
the modern sense of the term. His writ
ings certainly bear the stamp OF realism.
and it is because of this realistic phase
in life that Brandes now finds himself
subject to Governmental scrutiny as well
as public notice, Which his latest novel
has called forth.
Recurring TO the subject of Yyette Gull
bert and the clergy, Bishop Setback OF this
city, recently published pamphlet dealing
with the appearance of the singer at a con-
cert arranged by the Students Society, and
touching her advent at the Concert Pal
ace, where the best and most cultured of
Copenhagen's society HES Itself in quest OF
the dulcet strains. The clergyman calls
his pamphlet fart ss the Servitor OF Bru-
tality," and through it all there breathes
protest against the tendency which has
evinced itself among the younger Dani.h
writer's to produce ''art for arts sake
American readers can scarcely realize
the Importance which attaches to a lit
erary war such as how disquiets Denmark.
In common with many other institutions
of transatlantic birth literature abroad is
set on pedestals entirely apart. Not that
the liberty-loYing people OF this or that
country feel ,slbseryient to the express
sions which some literary genius may
deign to offer; but in Denmark. as in sew
eral other countries across the water.
certain awe-inspirfng halo surrounds the
brows from where spring the facts and
fiction of the native soil, as given utter
ance by busy pen. For this reason to the
Danes it means more than political issues
could bring about. when such literary
giants as Edward Brandes and Alfred Ip-
sen meet in the arena of dispute.
However, it is not for nothing that Co
penhagen has been called the Paris of the
matte superstructure of the Dane a some
thing which needs only the touch of a.
spring to make of the individual a French
man as vivacious as the most vivacious of
the French. Can it be that slowly, almost
mperceptibly, this latent force of Zolaism
has found its outlet by an appearance such
as that of Yvette Guilbert among the
Danes2 Is the proverbial melancholy of
Shakespeare's Hamlet to be relegated to
place where this figure of dramatic SOM
breness shall no longer infringe upon the
more modern disposition of his kinsmen of
today? Be this as it may. the grave of
Hamlet whether he lived or otherwise. is
almost within earshot of the Hall OF Joy,
where the petite Guilbert began her per-
formance which led to what has been
chronicled above. And as for labor strikes
and lockouts and other prosaic incidents of
life so familiar to Americans. these dis
turbing factors of modern civilization may
be safely left to their own solution. To
the Danes, at any rate, the ''soulfulness"
of the thing is the one inspiring quantity.
and that is why the Danes will long re-
member the little French woman who
brought it forth.
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