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HERNANI
A DRAMA BY VICTOR HUGO
EDITED WITH NOTES AND AN ESSAY ON VICTOR HUGO
BY GEORGE McLEAN HARPER, PH.D.
Professor of Romance Languages in
Princeton University
PREFACE.
The text of this edition is the same as that of the éditiondéfinitive, Paris, 1880. The unusual length of the introduction willbe pardoned, it is hoped, in view of the paucity of general reviews ofmodern French literature that are available for students in schoolsand some colleges. It contains the matter which I should require aclass of my own to get up for examination in connection with readingthis play or any other of Hugo's works. The Historical Note is anecessity, and is introduced before the play to save students fromconfusion and waste of time.
Mr. H.A. Perry and Dr. John E. Matzke, in their editions of «Hernani»,have so thoroughly annotated it that it has been impossible to avoidthe appearance of following them very closely; and there are indeedseveral notes for which I am directly indebted to them. Without theirindications, I should in other cases have been obliged to spend agreat deal more time in looking up references than has been necessary.It would be unfair to Dr. Matzke, in particular, not to pay tribute tothe completeness of his notes, which leave his successor little chancefor originality.
GEORGE McLEAN HARPER. PRINCETON UNIVERSITY June 16, 1894.
VICTOR HUGO.
For American and English readers who are at all well informed aboutmodern European literature the name of Victor Hugo stands out moreprominently than any other as representing the intellectual life ofFrance since the fall of Napoleon. Even the defects of his characterare by many considered typically French. They see him excessivelyconceited, absurdly patriotic, a too voluminous producer of veryvaried works; and it is not unusual to find that such readers believehim to be all the more French for these peculiarities. It would opentheir eyes if they should read what M. Ferdinand Brunetière, the mostauthoritative French critic of our generation, says of Victor Hugo.They would be surprised, if they conversed with intelligent Frenchmengenerally, to hear their opinions of him. Indeed if they had a wideracquaintance with French letters and French character they would notneed M. Brunetière or any other guide, because they would feel forthemselves that Hugo must seem to the French just as peculiar, just asphenomenal, as he does to foreigners. For it is only to superficialreaders that French literature can appear to be in the main frivolousor eccentric. Dignity is not necessarily severe. It cannot be heavy;indeed, grace is of its essence. And dignity is the note of Frenchliterature in the seventeenth century, its Augustan age. To say thatseriousness is the note of the eighteenth-century literature in Francemay sound less axiomatic, but I think it is even more true. No menare more serious than those who believe it to be their mission torevolutionize and reform society. We may not now take Diderot andVoltaire and Rousseau as seriously as they took themselves; but thatis partly because their purposes have been to a large extent achieved,and the result is an old story to us. The note of the nineteenthcentury in French literature is harder to catch, perhaps cannot becaught; for the voices are many, and we are too near the stage. Butif anything is evident it is that t