Miss Julie by August Strindberg - Delphi Classics

By August Strindberg

This eBook features the unabridged text of ‘Miss Julie by August Strindberg - Delphi Classics (Illustrated)’ from the bestselling edition of ‘The Collected Works of August Strindberg’.

Having established their name as the leading publi

• Language: English
• Publisher: Delphi Classics (Parts Edition)
• Release date: Jul 17, 2017
• ISBN: 9781788779357

August Strindberg

August Stringberg was a novelist, poet, playwright, and painter, and is considered to be the father of modern Swedish literature, publishing the country’s first modern novel, The Red Room, in 1879. Strindberg was prolific, penning more than 90 works—including plays, novels, and non-fiction—over the course of his career. However, he is best-known for his dramatic works, many of which have been met with international acclaim, including The Father, Miss Julie (Miss Julia), Creditors, and A Dream Play. Strindberg died in 1912 following a short illness, but his work continues to inspire later playwrights and authors including Tennessee Williams, Maxim Gorky, and Eugene O’Neill.

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The Collected Works of

AUGUST STRINDBERG

VOLUME 6 OF 44

Miss Julie

Parts Edition

By Delphi Classics, 2018

Version 1

COPYRIGHT

‘Miss Julie’

August Strindberg: Parts Edition (in 44 parts)

First published in the United Kingdom in 2018 by Delphi Classics.

© Delphi Classics, 2018.

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.

ISBN: 978 1 78877 935 7

Delphi Classics

is an imprint of

Delphi Publishing Ltd

Hastings, East Sussex

United Kingdom

Contact: [e-mail]

www.delphiclassics.com

August Strindberg: Parts Edition

This eBook is Part 6 of the Delphi Classics edition of August Strindberg in 44 Parts. It features the unabridged text of Miss Julie from the bestselling edition of the author’s Collected Works. Having established their name as the leading digital publisher of classic literature and art, Delphi Classics produces eBooks that are individually crafted with superior formatting, while introducing many rare texts for the first time in digital print. Our Parts Editions feature original annotations and illustrations relating to the life and works of August Strindberg, as well as individual tables of contents, allowing you to navigate eBooks quickly and easily.

Visit here to buy the entire Parts Edition of August Strindberg or the Collected Works of August Strindberg in a single eBook.

Learn more about our Parts Edition, with free downloads, via this link or browse our most popular Parts here.

AUGUST STRINDBERG

IN 44 VOLUMES

Parts Edition Contents

The Plays

1, The Outlaw

2, Master Olof

3, Lucky Pehr

4, The Father

5, Comrades

6, Miss Julie

7, Creditors

8, The Stronger

9, Pariah

10, Simoom

11, Debit and Credit

12, Facing Death

13, Mother Love

14, The Link

15, The First Warning

16, The Road to Damascus

17, Advent

18, There Are Crimes and Crimes

19, Gustavus Vasa

20, Erik Xiv

21, The Saga of the Folkungs

22, Easter

23, The Dance of Death

24, The Bridal Crown

25, Swanwhite

26, The Dream Play

27, The Thunderstorm

28, After the Fire

29, Spook Sonata

The Novels

30, The Red Room

31, The Son of a Servant

32, The Confession of a Fool

33, On the Seaboard

34, The Inferno

35, The Growth of a Soul

The Short Story Collections

36, Married

37, Historical Miniatures

38, Fair Haven and Foul Strand

39, The German Lieutenant and Other Stories

40, In Midsummer Days and Other Tales

Non-Fiction

41, Zones of the Spirit

42, Legends: Autobiographical Sketches

The Criticism

43, The Criticism

The Biography

44, August Strindberg: The Spirit of Revolt by L. Lind-Af-Hageby

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Miss Julie

OR, COUNTESS JULIE

Translated by Edith and Warner Oland and Edwin Björkman

Miss Julie was first staged in Denmark in the March of 1889 at the Students’ Union of Copenhagen University. Strindberg had intended a public premiere of the work, with his wife Siri von Essen playing the title role, as part of his Scandinavian Experimental Theatre. However, shortly before the scheduled opening night, the Danish censor banned any public performances of the play. In an act of desperation, he arranged a private staging of it at the Students’ Union. It did not receive its public premiere until 1892 when it was staged in Germany and would not be produced in Sweden until 1904.

The play concerns the eponymous Julie, with all the action is set in one location: in the kitchen. Julie, the daughter of a Count, has recently disappointed her parents by calling off an engagement to a rich suitor. The majority of the play focuses on the interaction between Julie and the Count’s servant, Jean. Julie seeks attention from Jean as she becomes mired in confusion over her identity and desires, while Jean looks to elevate his status and position in society. In the preface to the play, Strindberg contends that the motivation for what occurs between the characters is not simple, but the ‘result of a whole series of more or less deep-rooted causes’. The author famously refers to Miss Julie as ‘man-hating half-woman’ and he explains that this type of woman ‘represents degeneration’. Strindberg not only highlights gender conflict as a crucial theme, but also foregrounds the issue of class and Darwinian notions of struggle and survival. Miss Julie is symptomatic of a decaying aristocracy, whose ruin partially lies in ‘that inherited or acquired sense of honour that has been transmitted to the upper-classes’, while Jean is the beginning of a ‘new species’ that is ‘quick to learn’ and is ‘strong enough not to hesitate to make use of other people’, which means ‘he will escape from the battle unwounded’.

Miss Julie would become one of Strindberg’s most successful works and remains one of his most frequently performed plays in the twenty-first century. It has been adapted for both television and film, including a 1951 Swedish film, called Froken Julie, starring Ulf Palme and Anita Bjork. There was also a 1965 BBC television adaptation starring Alan Bridges and Ian Hendry; and in 1999, Mike Figgis directed a film version, starring Saffron Burrows and Peter Mullan.

An image from the 1984 London Internationalist Theatre production

CONTENTS

Edith and Warner Oland Translation

CHARACTERS

COUNTESS JULIE

Edwin Björkman Translation

INTRODUCTION

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

PERSONS

MISS JULIA

The first production in Stockholm of ‘Miss Julie’ in November 1906, at The People's Theatre

Edith and Warner Oland Translation

CHARACTERS

COUNTESS JULIE, twenty-five years old

JEAN, a valet, thirty

KRISTIN, a cook, thirty-five

FARM SERVANTS

The action takes place on Saint John’s night, the mid-summer festival surviving from pagan times.

COUNTESS JULIE

[SCENE. — A large kitchen. The ceiling and walls are partially covered by draperies and greens. The back wall slants upward from left side of scene. On back wall, left, are two shelves filled with copper kettles, iron casseroles and tin pans. The shelves are trimmed with fancy scalloped paper. To right of middle a large arched entrance with glass doors through which one sees a fountain with a statue of Cupid, syringa bushes in bloom and tall poplars. To left corner of scene a large stove with hood decorated with birch branches. To right, servants’ dining table of white pine and a few chairs. On the end of table stands a Japanese jar filled with syringa blossoms. The floor is strewn with juniper branches.]

[Near stove, an ice-box, sink and dish-table. A large old-fashioned bell, hangs over the door, to left of door a speaking tube.]

[Kristin stands at stove engaged in cooking something. She wears a light cotton dress and kitchen apron. Jean comes in wearing livery; he carries a large pair of riding-boots with spurs, which he puts on floor.]

JEAN. Tonight Miss Julie is crazy again, perfectly crazy.

KRISTIN. So — you’re back at last.

JEAN. I went to the station with the Count and coming back I went in to the barn and danced and then I discovered Miss Julie there leading the dance with the gamekeeper. When she spied me, she rushed right toward me and asked me to waltz, and then she waltzed so — never in my life have I seen anything like it! Ah — she is crazy tonight.

KRISTIN. She has always been. But never so much as in the last fortnight, since her engagement was broken off.

JEAN. Yes, what about that gossip? He seemed like a fine fellow although he wasn’t rich! Ach! they have so much nonsense about them. [Seats himself at table.] It’s queer about Miss Julie though — to prefer staying here at home among these people, eh, to going away with her father to visit her relatives, eh?

KRISTIN. She’s probably shamefaced about breaking off with her intended.

JEAN. No doubt! but he was a likely sort just the same. Do you know, Kristin, how it happened? I saw it, although I didn’t let on.

KRISTIN. No — did you see it?

JEAN. Yes, indeed, I did. They were out in the stable yard one evening and she was training him as she called it. Do you know what happened? She made him leap over her riding whip, the way you teach a dog to jump. He jumped it twice and got a lash each time; but the third time he snatched the whip from her hand and broke it into pieces. And then he vanished!

KRISTIN. Was that the way it happened? No, you don’t say so!

JEAN. Yes, that’s the way the thing happened. But what have you got to give me that’s good, Kristin?

KRISTIN. [She takes things from the pans on stove and serves them to him.] Oh, it’s only a bit of kidney that I cut out of the veal steak for you.

JEAN [Smelling the food]. Splendid! My favorite delicacy. [Feeling of plate]. But you might have warmed the plate.

KRISTIN. You’re fussier than the Count, when you get started. [Tweaks his hair.]

JEAN. Don’t pull my hair! You know how sensitive I am.

KRISTIN. Oh — there, there! you know I was only loving you.

[Jean eats, and Kristin opens bottle of beer.]

JEAN. Beer on midsummer night — thank you, no! I have something better than that myself. [Takes bottle of wine from drawer of table.] Yellow seal, how’s that? Now give me a glass — a wine glass you understand, of course, when one drinks the genuine.

KRISTIN. [Fetches a glass. Then goes to stove and puts on casserole.] Heaven help the woman who gets you for her husband. Such a fuss budget!

JEAN. Oh, talk! You ought to be glad to get such a fine fellow as I am. And I don’t think it’s done you any harm because I’m considered your intended. [Tastes wine.] Excellent, very excellent! Just a little too cold. [Warms glass with hands]. We bought this at Dijon. It stood at four francs a litre in the bulk; then of course there was the duty besides. What are you cooking now that smells so infernally?

KRISTIN. Oh, it’s some devil’s mess that Miss Julie must have for Diana.

JEAN. Take care of your words, Kristin. But why should you stand there cooking for that damned dog on a holiday evening? Is it sick, eh?

KRISTIN. Yes, it’s sick. Diana sneaked out with the gatekeeper’s mongrels and now something is wrong. Miss Julie can’t stand that.

JEAN. Miss Julie has a great deal of pride