prose version, on the other hand, was produced as early as 1881,
at the New Theatre in Stockholm, but was not published until the
same year, when it appeared in book form grouped with a number of
other writings from Strindberg's earliest period.

Of the five unprinted versions connecting the original prose
drama of 1872 with the final metrical form of 1878, more or less
complete manuscripts have been preserved, and these are now being
examined in detail by the Swedish literary historian, Professor
Karl Warburg. A summary analysis by Dr. John Landquist is
appended to the second volume of the definitive edition of
Strindberg's complete works (Albert Bonnier, Stockholm), where
the epilogue to the metrical version is also reprinted after so
many years of oblivion.

"Of all the manuscripts preceding the final metrical version,"
says Dr. Landquist, "the original one, written when Strindberg
was twenty-three, is the masterpiece. There everything is
consistent; there the dialogue has a power and an incisiveness to
which it does not attain in any of the unprinted manuscripts. On
the contrary, these seem more youthful than the original,
producing at times an impression of immaturity and uncertainty on
the part of the author. Even when some isolated phrase strikes
one as fortunate, it does not tend to strengthen the drama as a
whole. The later versions lack that sense of inner unity and that
audacious touch which lend fascination and power to the original
manuscript.

"Not until we reach the first metrical version (of 1876) does the
full power of the playwright begin to reassert itself in such