Then came the period during which Strindberg attained the highest
peaks of his work, the years 1886-90, with his autobiography, "The
Servant Woman's Son," the tragedies, "The Father," and "Countess
Julie," the comedies, "Comrades," and "The Stronger," and the
tragi-comedies, "The Creditors" and "Simoon." Of these, "The
Father" and "Countess Julie" soon made Strindberg's name known and
honored throughout Europe, except in his home country.
In "The Father" perhaps his biggest vision is felt. It was
published in French soon after it appeared in Sweden, with an
introduction by Zola in which he says, "To be brief, you have
written a mighty and capitvating work. It is one of the few dramas
that have had the power to stir me to the depths."
Of his choice of theme in "Countess Julie," Strindberg says: "When
I took this motive from life, as it was related to me a few years
ago, it made a strong impression on me. I found it suitable for
tragedy, and it still makes a sorrowful impression on me to see an
individual to whom happiness has been allotted go under, much more,
to see a line become extinct." And in defence of his realism he has
said further in his preface to "Countess Julie": "The theatre has
for a long time seemed to me the Biblia pauperum in the fine arts,
a bible with pictures for those who can neither read nor write, and
the dramatist is the revivalist, and the revivalist dishes tap the
ideas of the day in popular form, so popular that the middle class,
of whom the bulk of theatre-goers is comprised, can without
burdening their brains understand what it is all about.
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