young and belongs to life, not to the world of the dead, and the only road that leads to death is the road of life. The specter mocks him, knowing that he won Isabelle long ago and that she is on her way to accompany him to the other world—else, “what is this pallor spreading over her face?” The young man stands as a barrier between them, imposes his will to protect her, and pours forth his love and his respect for her; the scale tips, and there escapes from Isabelle a word of tenderness and appreciation for the young man's ardor and devotion. The specter's fury flares up and he leaves Isabelle in anger; and she falls into the arms of her betrothed, her strength spent, asking for his help and the strength of his two arms.
Among the elements of this magic are the moments of silence that recur between the dialogues, for they have an effect surpassing the most eloquent expressions. If we add to them the music that accompanies the events of the play, and the artistic decoration of the stage, we have formed a picture of this splendid creativeness in the theatrical art, of that perfect piece which “Giraudoux” created.
And behind this magic, which astonishes us and takes hold of our feelings, lie political and social opinions, psychological analysis, urbane irony, and a philosophy of his own, which Giraudoux offers us in this beguiling mold; one glimpses them between the lines, and they penetrate to the depths of the soul with an endearing ease. He calls for a practical, temperate wisdom, that man may profit from the opportunities of life; and he unveils the beauty latent in nature—in the glittering stars, in the fragrant gardens, in the artless smile of a child, and even in the daily tasks that may seem to us trivial.
He has excursions of thought that remind us of Sartre, for
he calls for man's humanity and his liberty, holds that everything in this life is relative, and that man must do his duty within his individual possibilities.
When the First World War came to its end, Giraudoux called for an understanding with Germany and brought out his famous play “Siegfried”—the tale of a young Frenchman who fell wounded in the enemy's trenches and was carried to a German sanatorium, where he was healed of his wounds but lost his memory and forgot his past. A German lady took him under her wing and handed him the leadership of the German national movement, and he became a leader to whose every gesture the crowds turned, to obey his command. It is as though Giraudoux wished to say that there is no difference between what we call German and what we call French: here is Jacques, the brilliant French writer, become Siegfried, the obeyed German leader; and here are commanders of the Prussian army of French Protestant stock, whose forefathers migrated to Germany after the revocation of the famous Treaty of Nantes.
Giraudoux died in 1945, leaving behind him a heritage of matchless dramatic literature that is counted among the glories of the world's theater. London embraced his plays, staging “The Trojan War Will Not Take Place” and “Ondine”; Audrey Hepburn took the part of Ondine in New York, and Diana Cilento that of Helen of Troy.
Those who knew him say that to this artistic creativeness he joined an attractive human personality, commanding respect and esteem: he was ready with a jest, adroit in his conduct, and found in the ordinary happenings of life his amusement and his inspiration.
Yet time has not spoken its final
word on Giraudoux; he is still in that period of sifting which usually follows a writer's death, and which sometimes stretches out to twenty years. Many of his folded-away treasures await the critics and scholars who will undertake that mighty task; for his easy, magical writing conceals windings and touches both fine and deep...
One of the mine workers in America lost his wallet during work. In the wallet were a sum of dollars and his identity card. And it so happened that a shipment of coal was carried to Italy, and the wallet was in it.
Seven months later, a poor Italian workman was feeding the furnace of a factory with coal when he came upon the wallet. The sum it contained was a real treasure to this poor workman: for months he had been trying in vain to save, out of his slender wage, the price of a bicycle to ride between his distant home and the factory! But when he examined the identity card and learned that the owner of the wallet was an American workman, he went, after finishing his work, to the police station and handed it over; and the officer delivered it to the American Embassy.
The management of the American mine so admired the honesty of the Italian workman that it invited him to be its guest in America for a few weeks, and sent him the expenses of the journey... And when the term of his stay came to its end, the mine workers collected a sum of money with which they bought a bicycle, and presented it to him as a gift.