Jean-Christophe, vol 1 | Page 2

had already found in the greatest men of other nationalities."
The germ of "Jean-Christophe" was conceived during this period--the
"Wanderjahre"--of M. Rolland's life. On his return to Paris he became
associated with a movement towards the renascence of the theater as a
social machine, and wrote several plays. He has since been a musical
critic and a lecturer on music and art at the Sorbonne. He has written
Lives of Beethoven, Michael Angelo, and Hugo Wolf. Always his
endeavor has been the pursuit of the heroic. To him the great men are
the men of absolute truth. Jean-Christophe must have the truth and tell
the truth, at all costs, in despite of circumstance, in despite of himself,
in despite even of life. It is his law. It is M. Rolland's law. The struggle
all through the book is between the pure life of Jean-Christophe and the
common acceptance of the second-rate and the second-hand by the
substitution of civic or social morality, which is only a compromise, for
individual morality, which demands that every man should be delivered
up to the unswerving judgment of his own soul. Everywhere
Jean-Christophe is hurled against compromise and untruth, individual
and national. He discovers the German lie very quickly; the French lie
grimaces at him as soon as he sets foot in Paris.
The book itself breaks down the frontier between France and Germany.
If one frontier is broken, all are broken. The truth about anything is
universal truth, and the experiences of Jean-Christophe, the adventures
of his soul (there are no other adventures), are in a greater or less
degree those of every human being who passes through this life from
the tyranny of the past to the service of the future.
The book contains a host of characters who become as friends, or, at
least, as interesting neighbors, to the reader. Jean-Christophe gathers
people in his progress, and as they are all brought to the test of his
genius, they appear clearly for what they are. Even the most unpleasant
of them is human, and demands sympathy.
The recognition of Jean-Christophe as a book which marks a stage in

progress was instantaneous in France. It is hardly possible yet to judge
it. It is impossible to deny its vitality. It exists. Christophe is as real as
the gentlemen whose portraits are posted outside the Queen's Hall, and
much more real than many of them. The book clears the air. An open
mind coming to it cannot fail to be refreshed and strengthened by its
voyage down the river of a man's life, and if the book is followed to its
end, the voyager will discover with Christophe that there is joy beneath
sorrow, joy through sorrow ("Durch Leiden Freude").
Those are the last words of M. Rolland's life of Beethoven; they are
words of Beethoven himself: "La devise de tout âme héroïque."
In his preface, "To the Friends of Christophe," which precedes the
seventh volume, "Dans la Maison," M. Rolland writes:
"I was isolated: like so many others in France I was stifling in a world
morally inimical to me: I wanted air: I wanted to react against an
unhealthy civilization, against ideas corrupted by a sham élite: I wanted
to say to them: 'You lie! You do not represent France!' To do so I
needed a hero with a pure heart and unclouded vision, whose soul
would be stainless enough for him to have the right to speak; one
whose voice would be loud enough for him to gain a hearing, I have
patiently begotten this hero. The work was in conception for many
years before I set myself to write a word of it. Christophe only set out
on his journey when I had been able to see the end of it for him."
If M. Rolland's act of faith in writing Jean-Christophe were only
concerned with France, if the polemic of it were not directed against a
universal evil, there would be no reason for translation. But, like
Zarathustra, it is a book for all and none. M. Rolland has written what
he believes to be the truth, and as Dr. Johnson observed: "Every man
has a right to utter what he thinks truth, and every other man has a right
to knock him down for it...."
By its truth and its absolute integrity--since Tolstoy I know of no
writing so crystal clear--"Jean-Christophe" is the first great book of the
twentieth century. In a sense it begins the twentieth century. It bridges
transition, and shows us where we stand. It reveals the past and the

present, and leaves the future open to us....
GILBERT CANNAN

CONTENTS
THE DAWN
I II III
MORNING
I. THE DEATH OF JEAN MICHEL II. OTTO III. MINNA
YOUTH
I. THE HOUSE OF EULER II. SABINE