Maurice Maeterlinck
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"The Belgian, Maurice Maeterlinck, [is] an example of an utterly childish idiotically-incoherent mysticism. He reveals the state of his mind most characteristically in his poems, of which I will give a few examples. Here is the first of the collection Serres chaudes"--Degeneration (1892) by Max Nordau "Do you know that Iconoclasts is the only book of high and universal critical worth that we have had for years--to be precise, since Georg Brandes. It is at once strong and fine, supple and firm, indulgent and sure."--Maurice Maeterlinck "When this Belgian poet, dramatist, mystic, became known in America, his plays, avowedly written for marionettes, were received with open-eyed wonder or prolonged laughter. Any idea that he be taken seriously was scouted by serious critics, and the usual fate befell them-well-meaning amateurs seized them as legitimate prey. There is no denying the fact that at one time Maeterlinck meant for most people a crazy crow masquerading in tail feathers plucked from the Swan of Avon."--Iconoclasts: A Book of Dramatists (1905) by James Huneker |
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Maurice Maeterlinck (1862 - 1949) was a Belgian writer, known as the foremost Symbolist playwright.
He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911. The main themes in his work are death and the meaning of life.
His La vie des termites (1926) plagiarized Die Siel van die Mier (1925) by Eugène Marais.
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Works
Poetry
- Serres chaudes (1889)
- Douze chansons (1896)
- Quinze chansons (expanded version of Douze chansons) (1900)
Drama
- La Princesse Maleine (Princess Maleine) (published 1889)
- L'Intruse (Intruder) (published 1890; first performed 21 May 1891)
- Les Aveugles (The Blind) (published 1890; first performed 7 December 1891)
- Les Sept Princesses (The Seven Princesses) (published 1891)
- Pelléas and Mélisande (published 1892; first performed 17 May 1893)
- Alladine et Palomides (published 1894)
- Intérieur (Interior) (published 1894; first performed 15 March 1895)
- La Mort de Tintagiles (The Death of Tintagiles) (published 1894)
- Aglavaine et Sélysette (first performed December 1896)
- Ariane et Barbe-bleue (Ariane and Bluebeard) (first published in German translation, 1899)
- Soeur Béatrice (Sister Beatrice) (published 1901)
- Monna Vanna (first performed May 1902; published the same year)
- Joyzelle (first performed 20 May 1903; published the same year)
- Le Miracle de saint Antoine (The Miracle of Saint Antony) (first performed in German translation, 1904)
- L'Oiseau bleu (The Blue Bird) (first performed 30 September 1908)
- Marie-Magdeleine (Mary Magdalene) (first performed in German translation, February 1910; staged and published in French, 1913)
- Le Bourgmestre de Stilmonde (first performed in Buenos Aires, 1918; an English translation was performed in Edinburgh in 1918; published 1919)
- Les Fiançailles (published 1922)
- Le Malheur passe (published 1925)
- La Puissance des morts (published 1926)
- Berniquel (published 1926)
- Marie-Victoire (published 1927)
- Judas de Kerioth (published 1929)
- La Princess Isabelle (published 1935)
- Jeanne d'Arc (Joan of Arc) (published 1948)
- L'Abbé Sétubal (published 1959)
- Les Trois Justiciers (published 1959)
- Le Jugement dernier (published 1959)
- Le Miracle des mères (first published in book form 2006)
Essays
- Le Trésor des humbles (The Treasure of the Humble) (1896)
- La sagesse et la destinée (Wisdom and Destiny) (1898)
- La Vie des abeilles (The Life of the Bee) (1901)
- Le temple enseveli (The Buried Temple) (1902)
- Le Double Jardin (The Double Garden, a collection of sixteen essays) (1904)
- L'Intelligence des fleurs (The Intelligence of Flowers) (1907)
- La Mort (Our Eternity ,first published in English, incomplete version entitled Death ,1911; in enlarged and complete version in original French, 1913)
- L'Hôte inconnu (first published in English translation, 1914; in original French, 1917)
- Les Débris de la guerre (1916)
- Le grand secret (The Great Secret) (Fasquelle, 1921; Bernard Miall trans., 1922)
- La Vie des termites (The Life of Termites) (1926) Plagiarized version of Die Siel van die Mier (The Soul of the White Ant) by Eugene Marais (1925)
- La Vie de l'espace (The Life of Space) (1928)
- La Grande Féerie (1929)
- La Vie des fourmis (The Life of the Ant) (1930)
- L'Araignée de verre (1932)
- Avant le grand silence (Before the Great Silence) (1934)
- L'Ombre des ailes (The Shadow of Wings) (1936)
- Devant Dieu (1937)
- L'Autre Monde ou le cadran stellaire (The Other World, or The Star System) (1941)
Memoirs
- Bulles bleues (1948)
Translations
- Le Livre des XII béguines and L'Ornement des noces spirituelles, translated from the Flemish of Ruusbroec (1885)
- L'Ornement des noces spirituelles de Ruysbroeck l'admirable (1891)
- Annabella, an adaptation of John Ford's 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (performed 1894)
- Les Disciples à Saïs and Fragments de Novalis from the German of Novalis, together with an Introduction by Maeterlinck on Novalis and German Romanticism (1895)
- Translation and adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth (performed 1909)
See also
