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The romantic or classical character of a picture, a poem, a literary work, depends, then, on the balance of certain qualities in it; and in this sense, a very real distinction may be drawn between good classical and good romantic work. But all critical terms are relative; and there is at least a valuable suggestion in that theory of Stendhal's, that all good art was romantic in its day.
A writer of fiction could indeed produce some dark tale in the style of De Stendhal's 'Nouvelles, and christen it 'The Crucifix of Crema. And how delighted would Webster have been if he had chanced to hear of such a sword-sheath! He might have placed it in the hands of Bosola for the keener torment of his Duchess.
The trouble is that every one is a critic, your gallery-god as well as the most stately practitioner of the art severe. Balzac was an excellent critic when he saluted Stendhal's Chartreuse de Parme as a masterpiece; as was Emerson when he wrote to Walt Whitman.
And guess what he replied? That he thought of a recipe of Stendhal's to recite from memory four Latin verses, before firing. 'And might one know what you chose? I asked of him. Thereupon he repeated: 'Tityre, tu patulae recubens!"
Again, the psychology of Stephen Crane's "Red Badge of Courage," published a few years after "La Debacle," and received with acclamations by critics most of whom had never in their lives been under fire, also seems to me to be of an exceptional character. I much prefer the psychology of the Waterloo episode in Stendhal's "Chartreuse de Parme," because it is of more general application.
Having recovered possession of her estates, thanks to the amnesty proclaimed by the Emperor Francis Joseph, she sought in literary labour a field for the activity of her restless intellect. Balzac points to that great female artist and republican, the Duchess of San-Severins, in Stendhal's "La Chartreuse de Parme," as a portrait of the princess.
She gazed at Henry with large admiring eyes as he read aloud to her chapter after chapter. 'What do you think I'm going to call it? he had demanded of her once, gleefully. 'I don't know, she said. 'Red and Black, he told her. 'Isn't that a fine title? 'Yes, she said. 'But it's been used before; and she gave him particulars of Stendhal's novel, of which he had never heard.
Tolstoy wrote of life; Dostoïevsky lived it, drank its sour dregs for he was a man accursed by luck and, like the apocalyptic dreamer of Patmos, a seer of visions denied to the robust, ever fleshly Tolstoy. His influence on Tolstoy was more than Stendhal's Stendhal whom Tolstoy called his master. Tolstoy denies life, even hates it after having enjoyed it to the full.
But the Comedie Humaine has a breadth and magnificence of general conception which govern all its details, and Stendhal's work is linked to one of the most significant periods of European history, and reflects its teeming ideas. Mr. Bennett's work seems to many readers to be choked by detail. But a writer of a certain quality may give us as much detail as he pleases witness the great Russians.
One article of criticism praised to the skies Stendhal's Chartreuse de Parme published in the previous year. A letter he had addressed to Stendhal in April 1839 was more moderate in its tone, though eulogistic with its well-turned compliment: "I make a fresco, and you have made Italian statues." He blamed the writer in his letter for situating the plot of the Chartreuse in Parma.
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