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IBSEN 39
tolerate. Men long for the ease and assurance
of conformity and so soon as they are suffi-
enforce it. Truth is the
ciently organized
enemy ecrasez Vinfdme ! Poor, silly old
Stockmann in An Enemy of the People blurts it
out, blurts out that the is water-supply contaminated
and his native health-resort no
better than a death-trap, for no better reason
than that he feels it is what he ought to do.
He fails to consider the feelings and, what is
even more important, the financial interests of
his neighbours, and the neighbours make short
work of him, as they generally do of people
who think and feel and act for themselves
of saints and artists in fact. Thus it comes
about that the prophets are stoned and the
best plays censored, while people such as Ibsen
loathe the State with its herd-instincts, now
decently baptized however, and known as
Morality
and Idealism.
Whether Ibsen was in the is right not for a
reviewer to decide. Mr. Roberts has strong
views on the subject, which he is at no pains
to conceal. For this we are far from blaming
him. Indeed, we feel that the personal note
imported by the author's intellectual bias
gives some flavour to a book which, owing to
the complete absence of charm or distinction,
would be otherwise insipid.
It is a competent,
but woefully uninspiring, piece of work.