Feuilleton (idea)

People who read the Glass Bead Game as part of a Herman Hesse binge, are often surprised by an unfamiliar word that never gets explained in the text: “feuilleton”.

It’s supposed to be so important, that the whole 20th century is supposed to be the “Age of the Feuilleton.” Americans can't understand this, because they've never seen one.

Simply put, a feuilleton is a section of a European newspaper that runs on the bottom of the page, separated by a thick black line and often in smaller type, devoted to theater and literary reviews, gossip, and other ‘light’ content. In the 19th century, it was also a   way to serialize a novel. In turn-of-the-century Vienna, the feuilleton was considered more important than the actual news. The reason for that was deeply caught up in the very nature of European journalism.

While in America, we have Freedom of the Press deeply ensconced in our Constitution, in 19th century Europe, this was not so. Government censorship of the press  was the norm, not the exception, throughout the Continent, which monitored all the “official” news and  political commentary  – the content above the black line. However, for certain subjects, they tended to look the other way – things like theater reviews, for instance. Novels, as long as they weren’t too far out of line. Music. Society and fashion news. General chit-chat. Wordplay. Fun and games. 

Imagine the possibilities…

Spotlighting a play which may have some political content,  like maybe, (in contemporary terms) Angels in America? Oh, Calcutta? Hair? Lysistrata? You might be talking about a breakthrough in medicine, that might lead  to anesthesiology, or the chemistry of schizophrenia. Like maybe, Dr. Moreau’s experiments with edibles, given as a sizzling account of a "bohemian" party? A serialized novel by Alexandre Dumas -- surely, it was just sheer adventure and escapism! Or  that hemlines just might  be shorter this  year, or waistlines just a little more free? Really. This  wasn’t anything anyone  in power should have an interest in.

Right?

Of course, you couldn't editorialize outright, nor could you talk about explicit political messages. Part of the fun of the thing was being just a little vague...You may not, perhaps, expound on the class and gender messages in the latest version of The Marriage of Figaro, but you can certainly praise the soprano playing Cherubino, in a "breeches" (female-to-male) part.You couldn't talk about women's rights, but you could certainly talk about how all-female clubs were very much in vogue right now -- and give some examples. Neither could you be too deep: as  Hesse said, it was far more acceptable to talk about Gœthe's having had sex with the chambermaid (tee-hee!) than it was to talk about his philosophy. (Though I do like the story about his cat "worshipping" his cast of Jupiter by licking its nose.) Part of the role of the feuilleton was to popularize culture. But if you were in the know...you knew what the news was "really" about.