Literature: 1911

Maeterlinck, Maurice, pronounced MAY tuhr lihngk, moh REES (1862-1949), was a Belgian dramatist, poet, naturalist, and philosopher. He won the 1911 Nobel Prize for literature. His literary works are symbolic and philosophical. Their stories suggest the soul's search for perfection and understanding. In his most famous play, the fairy talelike The Blue Bird (1908), a child searches the world for happiness, only to find it in his own home. The more realistic short plays The Blind and The Intruder (both 1891) are stories of unhappiness that also stress the need to find love and happiness in everyday life. Pelleas and Melisande (1893) is a symbolic drama about ideal lovers destroyed by their search for perfection.

Maeterlinck also wrote two novels and four volumes of poetry. He turned from symbolic writing to direct expression of his philosophy in essays, such as the collection The Treasure of the Humble (1896). He often drew on his close study of nature in these essays. In The Life of the Bees (1901) and Life and Flowers (1907), he used his appreciation and understanding of nature as the basis for analysis of human behavior.

Maeterlinck was born in Ghent. He lived much of his life in France, and he wrote in French.

Contributor: Gerald M. Berkowitz, Ph.D., Former Professor of English, Northern Illinois University.

-