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The Double Garden
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- GenresEssays
352 pages, Paperback
Published April 1, 2002
About the author
Maurice Maeterlinck
1,288 books302 followersMaurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck (also called Count Maeterlinck from 1932) was a Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist who was a Fleming, but wrote in French.
He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911 "in appreciation of his many-sided literary activities, and especially of his dramatic works, which are distinguished by a wealth of imagination and by a poetic fancy, which reveals, sometimes in the guise of a fairy tale, a deep inspiration, while in a mysterious way they appeal to the readers' own feelings and stimulate their imaginations".
The main themes in his work are death and the meaning of life. His plays form an important part of the Symbolist movement.
He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911 "in appreciation of his many-sided literary activities, and especially of his dramatic works, which are distinguished by a wealth of imagination and by a poetic fancy, which reveals, sometimes in the guise of a fairy tale, a deep inspiration, while in a mysterious way they appeal to the readers' own feelings and stimulate their imaginations".
The main themes in his work are death and the meaning of life. His plays form an important part of the Symbolist movement.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 18, 2018
Various thoughts from a Belgian playwright and essayist.
The very first essay was my favourite because it was about dogs. I like this summary of our canine friends special relationship with us: 'He has solved, in an admirable and touching manor, the terrifying problem which human wisdom would have to solve if a divine race came to occupy our globe.'
He writes about a visit to the casino at Monte Carlo, the 'spot in which more nervous force and more human passions are accumulated and squandered than in any other in the world.' Notice that he doesn't mention even mention money, that would be too prosaic. Chance is the 'mystic god', best not to grapple with it.
Universal suffrage he saw as inevitable but by no means an end, rather 'the best preparation for that which most inevitably come.' He didn't namecheck Socialism but that was his prefered politics around this time.
As a dramatist his opinion on contemporary theatre was naturally significant. He identified 'the decay, one might almost say the creeping paralysis, of external action.' The dramatists had turned their attentions towards representing internalised action. Ibsen was singled out for praise.
Other essays, of varying interest, covered topics from a ride in an automobile ('the dreadful hippogriff'), ruminations on Time, Space, and the Future, and saying lots of complimentary things about pretty flowers and their equally pretty names.
Yes, flowers do have very pretty names.
The very first essay was my favourite because it was about dogs. I like this summary of our canine friends special relationship with us: 'He has solved, in an admirable and touching manor, the terrifying problem which human wisdom would have to solve if a divine race came to occupy our globe.'
He writes about a visit to the casino at Monte Carlo, the 'spot in which more nervous force and more human passions are accumulated and squandered than in any other in the world.' Notice that he doesn't mention even mention money, that would be too prosaic. Chance is the 'mystic god', best not to grapple with it.
Universal suffrage he saw as inevitable but by no means an end, rather 'the best preparation for that which most inevitably come.' He didn't namecheck Socialism but that was his prefered politics around this time.
As a dramatist his opinion on contemporary theatre was naturally significant. He identified 'the decay, one might almost say the creeping paralysis, of external action.' The dramatists had turned their attentions towards representing internalised action. Ibsen was singled out for praise.
Other essays, of varying interest, covered topics from a ride in an automobile ('the dreadful hippogriff'), ruminations on Time, Space, and the Future, and saying lots of complimentary things about pretty flowers and their equally pretty names.
Yes, flowers do have very pretty names.
Want to Read
March 17, 2015
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/48504Opening: Our Friend The Dog: I have lost, within these last few days, a little bull-dog. He had just completed the sixth month of his brief existence. He had no history. His intelligent eyes opened to look out upon the world, to love mankind, then closed again on the cruel secrets of death.
The friend who presented me with him had given him, perhaps by antiphrasis, the startling name of Pelléas. Why rechristen him? For how can a poor dog, loving, devoted, faithful, disgrace the name of a man or an imaginary hero?
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews