Dr. Ludwig Thoma, perhaps better known to his Bavarian countrymen as Peter Schlemiehl, was born in Oberammergau on January 21, 1867. After graduating from a gymnasium in Munich, he studied at the School of Forestry at Aschauffenburg. He did not finish his course there, but entered the University at Munich and received his degree as Doctor Juris in 1893.
A year later Dr. Thoma began to practice law; but he abandoned that pursuit in 1899 to follow a career for which his inclinations and talents so happily fitted him.
He had been writing humorous verses for Simplicissimus for several years under the pen name of Pete Schlemiehl, with such success that the paper almost became identified by that name. These poems were later published in book form under the title—Grobheiten.
His prose writings in Bavarian dialect as well as his boyhood experiences entitled, Lausbubengeschichten, won a large and warm audience. In 1899 he became the editor of Simplicissimus. From then on his renown grew. The foremost critics of German letters began to take notice of this "Bavarian Aristophanes" and to compare him to Heine and the classics.
When Moral and Lottchen's Birthday appeared, while the reviewers shook their heads and stated that Dr. Thoma was shocking (so in original) they concluded that their author was "casting a long shadow." To-day Dr. Thoma is a recognized figure in Germany. Prof. Robert F. Arnold in "Das Moderne Drama" (Strassburg, 1908) ranks him next to Hauptmann. His writings are numerous. A vein, satirical and humorous, with a conception of the pathetic, makes him more than an equal to Mark Twain. In addition he is possessed of a message, which he delivers in the Moral.
First produced in 1908 the play soon became a part and parcel of the repertoire of the leading theatres in Germany. It was put on for the first time in New York, in German, at the Irving Place Theatre in the spring of 1914, through the efforts of the late Heinrich Matthias and the writer. Mr. Matthias then played the part of Beermann. Mr. Christians, the director, repeated the performance a number of times that season, each performance meeting with a warm response.
The late Percival Pollard was the first American critic to emphasize the importance of Dr. Thoma's work in his excellent resume of contemporary German literature: Masks and Minstrels of Modern Germany. He pointed out "that no country where hypocrisy or puritanism prevail as factors in the social and municipal conduct should be spared the corrective acid of this play."
H. L. Mencken and George Jean Nathan for many years have sung praises of the Moral in the Smart Set. But its production on the English speaking stage still remains an event eagerly to be awaited. Briefly, the play is a polemic against the "men higher up," churchmen, reformers, and social hypocrites.
The translation follows the text implicitly. Four different versions were made all varying in a degree from the original, and although Dr. Thoma wrote to the writer "bin auch damit einverstanden dass Sie in der Ubersetzung meines Schauspieles 'Moral' etwaige Aenderungen oder Adaptiereungen, die durch die englisch-amerikanischen Verhaltnisse und den Geschmack des amerikanischen Theatrepublikums geboten erscheinen, in entsprechender Weise vornehmen ..." it was deemed best for purposes of publication to try to preserve the original atmosphere without an attempt to even transpose such phrases as Gnadige Frau, or Herr Kommerzienrat.
The esteemed, sensitive public will assume that the action takes place in Emilsburg, the capital of the Duchy of Gerlestein. The first and third acts occur in the house of Herr Fritz Beermann; the second act, in the Police Headquarters. It all happens between Sunday afternoon and Monday evening.
To be free from blame, the producers will please note that:
BEERMANN is in the fifties; jovial; lively; with gray side-whiskers and chin carefully shaved.
FRAU BEERMANN is in the late forties, though youthful looking for her age.
FRAU LUND. sixty-eight; a woman of impressive appearance; her manner is energetic; her mass of white hair is carefully coiffured.
FRAU BOLLAND. about forty-five; stout; talkative.
DR. WASNER. a tall German professor with full blond beard; deep voiced; wears pince-nez with black tortoise shell rim and broad black cord.
HANS JACOB DOBLER. is a poet; he is dressed in a poor fitting cut-away coat; unkempt mustache and Van Dyke beard.
FRAULEIN PINNEBERG, a feminist, wears a loose fitting gown.
DR. HAUSER. fifty; smooth shaven; wears gold rimmed spectacles,
VON SCHMETTAU, sixty; remains stately looking with effort; military bearing.
MADAME DE HAUTEVILLE—indefinitely twenty; her ultra-fashionable Parisian gowns invite the cloak and suit patrons.
(Card room in Beermann's house. In the background a swinging door opens into the dining room. To the right a smaller door leads to the music room. On the left side another door opens into the entrance hall. To left upstage in a corner a small card table with chairs. To right upstage a large sofa and comfortable chairs. Parallel to background down stage, tea table with coffee service thereon; near it to right, smaller table, on it a humidor.
A butler is engaged at the tea table, another man servant is holding swinging door open. [Business of getting up from table.] Many voices and rattle of chairs are heard from dining room. Through swinging doors enters Bolland and Frau Beermann, Beermann with Frau Bolland, Dr. Hauser with Effie, Dr. Wasner with Fraulein Koch-Pinneberg, Dobler alone.)
General greeting of "Mahlzeit."
Dr. Wasner is vigorously shaking hands—going to Frau Beermann says, "Ich wunsche Gesegnete Mahlzeit."
The servants pass around coffee—Beermann conversing with Bolland comes down stage ...
BOLLAND. You will receive two thousand votes more than the Socialists. That's certain.
BEERMANN [skeptical]. No,—no.
BOLLAND. If all the Liberals combine with the Conservatives, the result cannot be in doubt.
BEERMANN [taking coffee from the servant]. If ...
BOLLAND. Fusion is here. It's the logical development. I am an old politician. The time for discussion is over. Now it's a straight fight to a finish.
DR. WASNER [coming nearer]. The German fatherland is rallying to the support of the national flag.
BEERMANN. But there are controversies everywhere. I know best. I always am told by campaign managers: don't say this and don't say that.
BOLLAND. In what way?
BEERMANN. For instance, I'm to speak at the Liberal Club the day after to-morrow. You would not expect me to say the same things I told the Conservatives last night ...?
BOLLAND. Your details, of course, must differ. But fundamentally it amounts to the same thing.
BEERMANN. The same thing? Believe me, all this masking confuses me. [Drinks.]
EFFIE [calling across the tea table where she has been standing with others]. Papa! Listen to Frau Bolland. She also says that the Indian Dancer is so interesting.
FRAU BOLLAND. Positively won—derful, Herr Bolland! You can conceive the entire spirit of the Orient.
EFFIE. Why haven't we gone to see her?
FRAU BOLLAND. You surely ought to go. Professor Stohr—you know him—told me he never in his life saw anything so gorgeous.
FRAULEIN KOCH-PINNEBERG. She's so picturesque in her greenish gowns.
FRAU BOLLAND. I did not know that the Hindoos could be so charming.
BEERMANN. We'll have a look at her some night.
EFFIE. But to-morrow night is her last appearance.
BEERMANN [going to the humidor]. Very well darling. Will you remind me of it to-morrow? [Taking a box of cigars offers one to Dobler who is standing near him.] Smoke?
DOBLER [taking one]. Thanks. But I am not accustomed to the imported ones.
BEERMANN [patronizingly]. You'll get used to high living soon enough.
BOLLAND [to Dobler]. How long have you been in the city now?
DOBLER. Two years.
BOLLAND. And before that you were in ... eh?
FRAU BOLLAND. You must excuse him Herr Dobler. Why in Unterschlettenbach, dear ... You know that!
BOLLAND [correcting himself]. Certainly. Bit of literary history. Mighty interesting place that Unterschlettenbach ... eh?
DOBLER. Hardly, Herr Kommerzienrat. Poor and unsanitary. Most of its inhabitants are miners.
BOLLAND. Fancy that! And I never knew it. Full of miners! Tell me though, what do you think of our set here ...? How do you like this well-to-do circle ... the big city ... wealthy surroundings?
DOBLER [lighting a cigar]. I like it well enough. But I think I will always feel out of place here.
BOLLAND. Can't get used to it?
DOBLER. Everything is so different. It seems to me at times as though I had suddenly entered a beautiful house while outdoors my old comrade was awaiting me patiently—the open road.
FRAU BOLLAND. Isn't that won—derful? So very re-a-lis-tic-ally put! I can just picture it. Oh Herr Dobler ... I must tell you: your novel—my husband and I talk about it all day long.
BOLLAND. Tell me though—did you yourself experience the life of that young man you describe?
DOBLER. It's the story of my youth.
BOLLAND. But it's somewhat colored by poetic imagination?
DOBLER. N—-o.
BOLLAND. For instance, you have never actually starved?
DOBLER. Oh, yes. There's no imagination in that.
BOLLAND. Just the way you describe it—so that everything turned red?
DOBLER. Everything had a pink color. On one occasion I did not eat anything for four and one-half days.
FRAU BEERMANN [compassionately]. You poor thing!
FRAU BOLLAND. That's exceedingly interesting!
BOLLAND. Do tell us all about it! Then you saw dancing fires?
DOBLER. Yes. Everything danced before my eyes, and I saw it all through a hazy veil, and towards the end my hearing was affected.
BOLLAND. You don't say so? Your hearing also?
DOBLER. When any one spoke to me it sounded as if he stood a great distance off—a great distance.
FRAU BOLLAND. Our set never dreams of such things.
BEERMANN. How did it all turn out?
DOBLER. What do you mean?
BEERMANN. Well, in the end you got something to eat again?
DOBLER. Finally I fainted; I was found lying in a meadow, and was taken to the hospital.
FRAU BEERMANN [sighing]. Are such things still possible in our day?
FRAU BOLLAND. What can you expect—of these idealists! DR. HAUSER. They deserve nothing better.
BEERMANN. And after you were in the hospital—how did you get out?
DOBLER. As soon as I got stronger. Later on I became a printer—found a position—studied and published my book.
BEERMANN. That's all in your novel, I know. But the part where you describe how you were a tramp—that's not true?
DOBLER. Yes, I "hoboed" almost a whole year.
FRAU BOLLAND. "Hoboed!" Fancy that! How unique!
FRAULEIN KOCH-PINNEBERG. I can just picture it. Tramping along the railroad tracks.
DOBLER. Yes. You folks think you can picture it with four square meals a day. But it's quite different, I assure you. There were three of us at that time. We worked our way from Basel upwards—sometimes on the left—sometimes on the right bank of the Rhine. In Worms we spent the last of our money and we had to PEDDLE for HAND-OUTS.
FRAU BOLLAND [not understanding him]. "Handouts?" What is that?
DOBLER [with pathos]. To beg for something to eat, gnadige Frau, for our daily bread.
[They all remain silent. Only the voice of the butler who is serving liqueur can be heard.] "Cognac monsieur! Chartreuse! Champagne?"
BEERMANN [taking a glass]. To a man of refinement, such an existence must have been quite unbearable.
DOBLER [taking a glass of cognac from the butler]. Unpleasant. [Drinking.] But you lose your sensitiveness. At first it is hard—but one learns. In one hot day on the road ... when you get fagged out—and with every stone hurting your feet—you'll learn. The dust blinds you—but you've got to go on just the same. In the evening you come to a small hamlet with smoke curling above the house-tops and the houses themselves look cozy—then you have to hold your hat in your hand and beg for a plate of warm soup. [A short pause.]
DR. WASNER [deep bass voice]. Home sweet home!
BOLLAND. The story reminds me exactly of my late father.
FRAU BOLLAND. But, Adolph!
BOLLAND. Indeed, I say it does!
FRAU BOLLAND. How can you draw such a comparison? Herr Dobler has become a celebrated poet.
BOLLAND. My father also achieved something in life. At his funeral four hundred employees followed the coffin.
FRAU BOLLAND [impatiently]. We've heard that before ... Herr Dobler, did you write poetry in those days?
DOBLER. No, Frau Bolland. Much later.
FRAU BOLLAND. I'll have to read your novel all over again, now that I know it is all autobiographical.