Produced by Nicole Apostola
Introduction to "There Are Crimes and Crimes"
THERE ARE CRIMES AND CRIMES
Introduction to "Miss Julia"
Author's Preface
MISS JULIA
Introduction to "The Stronger"
THE STRONGER
Introduction to "Creditors"
CREDITORS
Introduction to "Pariah"
PARIAH
Strindberg was fifty years old when he wrote "There Are Crimes andCrimes." In the same year, 1899, he produced three of his finesthistorical dramas: "The Saga of the Folkungs," "Gustavus Vasa,"and "Eric XIV." Just before, he had finished "Advent," which hedescribed as "A Mystery," and which was published together with"There Are Crimes and Crimes" under the common title of "In aHigher Court." Back of these dramas lay his strange confessionalworks, "Inferno" and "Legends," and the first two parts of hisautobiographical dream-play, "Toward Damascus"—all of which werefinished between May, 1897, and some time in the latter part of1898. And back of these again lay that period of mental crisis,when, at Paris, in 1895 and 1896, he strove to make gold by thetransmutation of baser metals, while at the same time his spiritwas travelling through all the seven hells in its search for theheaven promised by the great mystics of the past.
"There Are Crimes and Crimes" may, in fact, be regarded as hisfirst definite step beyond that crisis, of which the precedingworks were at once the record and closing chord. When, in 1909, heissued "The Author," being a long withheld fourth part of hisfirst autobiographical series, "The Bondwoman's Son," he prefixedto it an analytical summary of the entire body of his work.Opposite the works from 1897-8 appears in this summary thefollowing passage: "The great crisis at the age of fifty;revolutions in the life of the soul, desert wanderings,Swedenborgian Heavens and Hells." But concerning "There Are Crimesand Crimes" and the three historical dramas from the same year hewrites triumphantly: "Light after darkness; new productivity, withrecovered Faith, Hope and Love—and with full, rock-firmCertitude."
In its German version the play is named "Rausch," or"Intoxication," which indicates the part played by the champagnein the plunge of Maurice from the pinnacles of success to thedepths of misfortune. Strindberg has more and more come to seethat a moderation verging closely on asceticism is wise for mostmen and essential to the man of genius who wants to fulfil hisdivine mission. And he does not scorn to press home even thiscomparatively humble lesson with the naive directness and fieryzeal which form such conspicuous features of all his work.
But in the title which bound it to "Advent" at their jointpublication we have a better clue to what the author himselfundoubtedly regards as the most important element of his work—itsreligious tendency. The "higher court," in which are tried thecrimes of Maurice, Adolphe, and Henriette, is, of course,the highest one that man can imagine. And the crimes of which theyhave all become guilty are those which, as Adolphe remarks, "arenot mentioned in the criminal code"—in a word, crimes against thespirit, against t