Everyman, I will go with thee, and be thy guide, In thy most need to go by thy side. This is No. 694 of Everyman’s Library. A list of authors and their works in this series will be found at the end of this volume. The publishers will be pleased to send freely to all applicants a separate, annotated list of the Library. J. M. DENT & SONS LIMITED 10-13 BEDFORD STREET LONDON W.C.2 E. P. DUTTON & CO. INC. 286-302 FOURTH AVENUE NEW YORK EVERYMAN’S LIBRARY EDITED BY ERNEST RHYS POETRY & THE DRAMA THREE PLAYS BY FREDERIC HEBBEL · INTRODUCTION BY L. H. ALLEN FREDERIC CHRISTIAN HEBBEL, born in 1813 in Schleswig-Holstein, in humble circumstances. After travelling about Europe he settled in Vienna in 1846. He died there in 1863. THREE PLAYS [Illustration] FREDERIC HEBBEL LONDON: J. M. DENT & SONS LTD. NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO. INC. _All rights reserved_ _Made in Great Britain_ _at The Temple Press Letchworth_ _and decorated by Eric Ravilious_ _for_ _J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd_. _Aldine House Bedford St. London_ _Toronto · Vancouver_ _Melbourne · Wellington_ _First Published in this Edition 1914_ INTRODUCTION If a stringent quality be noticeable in Hebbel, it can well be traced to his early environment. The greater ills which strike the manhood into human nature are drastic godsends; but the long draw of poverty, the depressing atmosphere of dour faces, the helpless baffle of young and ignorant art “made tongue-tied with authority”--it is these things that in a sensitive nature are prone to twist strength into rancour. Luckily this was not the effect on Hebbel, but in the caustic, if honest, introspection, the rigid or hesitant self-examinings, the loathing of poverty and uncongenial work that was almost a panic, in these things whose excess tends to stunt the energy, the bane of Hebbel’s early years is seen. Nothing more can be said for his great stature than that through all his miseries he won his way to a mature confidence and mellow resignation.