Such were the main influences at work on his mind when, early in
1872, his royal protector died, and Strindberg found himself once
more dependent on his own resources. To continue at the
university was out of the question, and he seems to have taken
his final departure from it without the least feeling of regret.
Unwise as he may have been in other respects, he was wise enough
to realize that, whatever his goal, the road to it must be of his
own making. Returning to Stockholm, he groped around for a while
as he had done a year earlier, what he even tried to eke out a
living as the editor of a trade journal. Yet the seeds sown
within him during the previous winter were sprouting. An
irresistible impulse urged him to continue the work of Buckle.
History and philosophy were the ultimate ends tempting his mind,
but first of all he was impelled to express himself in terms of
concrete life, and the way had been shown him by Goethe. Moved by
Goethe's example, he felt himself obliged to break through the
stifling forms of classical drama. "No verse, no eloquence, no
unity of place," was the resolution he formulated straightway.
[Note: See again The Bondwoman's Son, vol. iii: In the Red Room.]

Having armed himself with a liberal supply of writing-paper, he
joined his two friends in the little island of Kymmendo. Of money
he had so little that, but for the generosity of one of his
friends, he would have had to leave the island in the autumn
without settling the small debt he owed for board and lodging.
Yet those months were happy indeed--above all because he felt
himself moved by an inspiration more authentic than he had ever
before experienced. Thus page was added to page, and act to act,
until at last, in the surprisingly brief time of two months,