(Claude Debussy: born in St. Germain-en-Laye (Seine-et-Oise), France, August 22, 1862; now living in Paris)

PRELUDE TO "THE AFTERNOON OF A FAUN"[37]

Debussy's prelude, composed in 1892, was the first of his representative works for orchestra. It was inspired, as he indicates in a sub-title, by the singular poem of the French symbolist, StÉphane MallarmÉ, L'AprÈs-Midi d'un Faune. This "eclogue," published in 1876, aroused fierce contention because of its obscurity and the uncompromising manner in which it exemplified MallarmÉ's novel poetic method; which was, as Mr. Edmund Gosse has lucidly stated it, "to use words in such harmonious combinations as will suggest to the reader a mood or a condition which is not mentioned in the text, but is nevertheless paramount in the poet's mind at the moment of composition." Mr. Gosse thus interprets "The Afternoon of a Faun," which has defied literal translation:

"A faun—a simple, sensuous, passionate being—wakens in the forest at daybreak and tries to recall his experience of the previous afternoon. Was he the fortunate recipient of an actual visit from nymphs, white and golden goddesses, divinely tender and indulgent? Or is the memory he seems to retain nothing but the shadow of a vision, no more substantial than the 'arid rain' of notes from his own flute? He cannot tell. Yet surely there was, surely there is, an animal whiteness among the brown reeds of the lake that shines out yonder? Were they, are they, swans? No! But naiads plunging? Perhaps! Vaguer and vaguer grows the impression of this delicious experience. He would resign his woodland godship to retain it. A garden of lilies, golden-headed, white-stalked, behind the trellis of red roses? Ah! the effort is too great for his poor brain. Perhaps if he selects one lily from the garth of lilies, one benign and beneficent yielder of her cup to thirsty lips, the memory, the ever receding memory, may be forced back. So, when he has glutted upon a bunch of grapes, he is wont to toss the empty skins into the air and blow them out in a visionary greediness. But no, the delicious hour grows vaguer; experience or dream, he will never know which it was. The sun is warm, the grasses yielding; and he curls himself up again, after worshipping the efficacious star of wine, that he may pursue the dubious ecstasy into the more hopeful boskages of sleep."

The manner in which Debussy has set to music this extraordinary conception cannot be better indicated than in the exposition by Louis Laloy, the French critic: "One is immediately transported into a better world; all that is leering and savage in the snub-nosed face of the satyr disappears; desire still speaks, but there is a veil of tenderness and melancholy. The chord of the wood-wind, the distant calls of the horns, the limpid flood of harp-tones, accentuate this impression. The call is louder, more urgent, but it almost immediately dies away, to let the flute sing again its song [the exotic and dreamy phrase with which the prelude begins]. And now the theme is developed: the oboe enters in, the clarinet has its say; a lively dialogue follows, and a clarinet phrase leads to a new theme, which speaks of desire satisfied; or it expresses the rapture of mutual emotion rather than the ferocity of victory. The first theme returns, more languorous, and the croaking of muted[38] horns darkens the horizon. The theme comes and goes, fresh chords unfold themselves; at last a solo 'cello joins itself to the flute; and then everything vanishes, as a mist that rises in the air and scatters itself in flakes."[39]