Paul Ernst's Conception of Classicism as Found in His Dramas

Abstract

THE CLASSICAL ELEMENTS of Paul Ernst's dramas can be understood only after a study of the poet's theories on classicism. According to Ernst a drama can be classical only if it shows action, conflict, realistic heroism, and ethical standards. Ernst demands that a real drama is one filled with action. Victims of circumstance and characters lacking a strong personality fall short of the standards he set-human beings must not be mere puppets and toys of fate. That fact Ernst insists upon in his statement: Was im Drama interessiert, nennt man gewihnlich Handlung. Es muB vor allen Dingen etwas geschehen, durch die Menschen oder mit ihnen.' Action gives strength and value to a drama. The classicists see in action the quintessence of life's standards. Ernst's Der Weg zur Form urges that one get away from the unheroic victims of circumstance which earlier literary trends portray. Dramas are only worthy of being called such if they reveal an optimism, a Dionysian exuberance and an Apollonian serenity. To attain these, man's actions and thoughts must be the creators of culture. The drama needs these qualities to inculcate living values into works which without them would be mere reflections of conditions. In order to produce action there must be conflict. Life can be enriched and made real only by taking up the battle with fate and circumstances. Man, according to Ernst, must not blindly succumb to fate. In the ancient Greek fate dramas man always had to yield to the inexorable hand of fate. A drama can only be full of vital action if man struggles. Ernst claims: Das willenlose Unterliegen ist das Alltiigliche und deshalb gleichgiiltig; das Bewegende ist der Kampf.2 Then, too, classicism teaches that human beings should not be mere products of environment and circumstance. By struggling they should become motive cultural forces. Intellectual and moral forces must become weapons with which to combat ignoble and opposing tendencies. Pegwitz summed up this theory from that