Foreign Tales and Traditions/Volume 1/Preface

by George Godfrey Cunningham

PREFACE.

 

Among the many remarkable circumstances connected with that extraordinary literature which has of late grown up in Germany with such sudden and powerful developement, not the least striking is the vast quantity of fugitive matter which is every day evolved from the effervescent intellect of the nation. We have been informed by a learned and intelligent native of that country, that this fact is to be attributed to a certain vivacity of taste, which, in the joy and pride of emancipation from long bondage, distinguishes its reading population to a degree elsewhere unknown. ‘My Public’ in Germany is a book-devouring animal, and does not ruminate. Hence it has happened—if our information is correct—that with all the extraordinary talents to which that country has of late given birth, there is scarcely a single work in its literature which has been able to establish itself as a ‘standard book,’ in our sense of the term,—a κτημα ες αιει as Thucydides styles his immortal history,—or, as Milton in young anticipation speaks of his ‘adventurous song,’ “a work which posterity will not willingly suffer to die.” The idolizing enthusiasm of one generation survives not to another. Kant has resigned the sceptre of philosophy to Jacobi; Klopstock yielded that of poetry to Schiller; even his claims are now in a great degree considered obsolete, and Goethe reigns in his stead. The ruler of the hour’s ascendant in Germany exercises a sort of eclipsing power over all his predecessors, of which we have no example in other countries.

Whether this be a symptom of literary constitution which betokens perfect soundness at the core, and promises permanent health for the future, may perhaps be questioned. But certain it is that in the meanwhile it is productive of an evolution of talent and literary accomplishment unexampled since the days of Athens—where the same peculiarity existed—in rapidity and in copiousness. All the German authors seem to write against Time, for Time with them is an almost infallible destroyer; and hence in the mass of German literature which is destined but to swim for a few years on the surface of that ever-fluctuating public taste, there is to be found an amount of talent and erudition which in our country would have been either carefully husbanded at home, or at least securely embarked ere it were intrusted to the perilous waters.

From the operation of the same causes which have produced these effects even on the more serious and elaborate departments of the Teutonic literature, the department of professedly fugitive productions has been rendered peculiarly rich in quantity, and highly respetable in merit. It is from this department that most of the Tales which which compose the present volumes have been chiefly selected; and we venture to believe that in most cases they will be found decidedly above the average value of those productions of a similar kind to which the public taste has been of late so much familiarised, and to which it has shown itself so uniformly indulgent.

The following Tales taken collectively may serve as a very fair illustration of the former of the two qualities which we have mentioned as characteristic of German fugitive literature,—its high respectability in regard to quality, and extraordinary copiousness in respect of quantity. Of the latter we can give no other illustration than to say, that out of the stores which it contains it were easy to continue such volumes such volumes as the present. And that should this specimen prove acceptable to the public, it must be something else than lack of materials that will prevent the repetition of the offering.

With respect to the Legends and Traditions contained in the present volumes, some of them may be thought so wild and extravagant as to render some apology for their insertion necessary. That apology will be found in the light which they are calculated to reflect upon what may be termed the natural history of Imagination—a subject for the illustration of which, more than for the intrinsic merit of the legends themselves, the traditionary literature of all nations is to be accounted valuable. Regarded in this point of view, the pieces to which we refer will be found to place in a strong light the peculiarities both of early imagination in general, and of Teutonic imagination in particular. The most striking circumstance of the former description—which is proved by the character of all traditionary lore whatever, and not least by that of the Northern nations—is the power which the marvellous, simply as such, possesses over the inexperienced mind. To such a mind, whether in a nation or the individual, the interest which wonder inspires is found to be the most powerful of all spells for arresting the attention and exciting the feelings. The philosophy of this circumstance, and of the change which the progress of time and the accumulation of experience produce on national taste, is a subject worthy of attentive investigation; but what we have now to remark is, the striking illustration which the traditions of the North, and of Germany especially, supply of the fact itself. Nowhere, except perhaps in Arabia, shall we find a system of traditions invested with an interest so purely marvellous as that which characterizes the legendary remains of the German nations. In similar productions of other nations—those, for example, of the Greeks or of the Celts—we find some religious or some patriotic sentiment,—some ideal abstraction or impersonated emotion, for the most part mingling with the tale, and giving all its marvels the character of mythologic miracles or of heroical exploits. But the great mass of ancient German traditions owe their attractiveness and popularity almost entirely to the pure undiluted essence of the wonderful with which they are imbued. They are lifted entirely out of ordinary nature. In this respect they are curiosities in themselves, and possess considerable value as affording the purest illustration of the effect which the wonderful, as such, produces on the human mind, in different stages of cultivation. The gloomy fantastic form, too, which the wonderful so generally assumes in the Teutonic traditions, is an illustration not less striking than that afforded by more elaborate works of the general spirit and character of German imagination. Nursed amidst shaggy woods and cavernous mountains,—rushing waters and a misty air,—the genius of German romance has from its earliest age till now delighted in scenes of supernatural darkness, terror, and mystery, congenial to the scenery. “Our popular traditions,” says Otmar, “have taken their tone and colouring from the aspect and character of our country. Amidst thick gloomy forests, impervious to the light of heaven,—upon solitary heaths and cheerless marshes, whose overhanging vapours obscure the bright sky and cast their gloom alike over the eye and spirit of men, need we wonder to find the fancy dwelling upon the stern and mournful? What too must be the character of a people’s traditions whose earliest festivals were celebrated by deeds of violence and the immolation of human victims,—whose history throughout a long series of ages was but the record of outrages and oppressions mutually inflicted,—whose living generation yet remembers to have heard, in the tales of its grandsires, of wolves and bears entering into the houses of men and tearing the babe from its nurse’s arms, or of the marauding exploits of robbers more savage than the beasts of the field?” And yet amid all this monstrosity and gloominess of conception, there are occasional gleams of a warm and sprightly imagination,—sunbeams of fancy, which ever and anon cast a warm and beautiful radiance over these apocryphal mysteries. And not inconsistent with this character is the fondness which it has always manifested for the description of splendour, wealth, and gorgeous pageantry—which seems, indeed, as distinctive of the character as the taste for the grim and the awful. The truth is, that the association of contrast will be found to operate as strongly among all nations of a powerful imagination, as that of resemblance. In the case of German fiction, in particular, the splendid is frequently introduced in order to heighten and support the effect of the gloomy; and thus the two most striking, and apparently inconsistent characteristics of Teutonic imagination, appear to be only different manifestations of the same essential principles of genius. As illustrations of that genius in its early developement, the Traditional Tales of Germany possess an interest sufficient to justify the high degree of attention which they have excited of late among the antiquarians and reading population of that country; and, for similar reasons, it seems not inappropriate to introduce into the present collection some specimens of these relics of an ancient and a simple race. The reader, it is hoped, if he cannot feel that sympathy in their perusal, on which the interest of modern fiction depends, will at least find in them some of those peculiarities, which, without the aid of sympathetic interest, have attracted so much regard, even from refined and cultivated tastes, to “all that world of wonder which illuminated ancient Bagdad, or grew up like a garden of enchantment on the banks of the Tigris.”