The MacGuffin: News and Comment (28/Jan/2004)
(c) Ken Mogg (2004)
January 28
Hitchcock during his Selznick years (1939-1947) read Heinrich Heine's verse play 'William Ratcliff' (1822) several times, probably with the thought of filming a superior, tragic version of Gainsborough's The Wicked Lady (1945). Here's a synopsis: 'Maria has lost two suitors to the murderous hand of William Ratcliff, whom she fears but really loves. Her latest groom, Douglas, succeeds at defeating and wounding Ratcliff. But Ratcliff finds Maria, kills her father, then her, and then he himself dies.' Heine later referred to the tragedy as a 'dramatic ballad', and apparently it was influenced by the famous Scottish ballad 'Edward' (the one that begins with a mother's question, '"Why dois your brand sae drap wi bluid, Edward, Edward,/ Why dois your brand sae drap wi bluid,/ And why sae sad gang yee O?"'). David Stivender reports that the tragedy consists of four acts: the first ends with the delivery of Ratcliff's challenge (to Maria's suitor Douglas?); the second ends with the appearance of the wraiths (that of Ratcliff's father, for one - see entry for January 26); the third act features a duel (presumably the one in which Ratcliff is wounded by Douglas), after which Ratcliff 'falls into a delirium' and has a dream (of his ancestors?); and the final act ends with the double slaying and Ratcliff's suicide. From all of this we can see readily enough that Ratcliff is driven by inner demons (as, in her way, Hitchcock's Marnie will be) and by a kind of idealistic revolt against society (Marnie again?). In 'The MacGuffin' #29 I characterise Hitchcockian suspense as like an analogue for what it means to be human - both driven and riven - and one may sense that 'William Ratcliff' would have lent itself to such a depiction (thus making its tragedy all the more potent). Presumably Maria's secret fascination for the murderous Ratcliff would have appealed to Hitchcock, while another part of him would have gone out to (have identified with?) Ratcliff himself. The clue here is David Stivender's likening of Ratcliff to one of Colin Wilson's 'Outsider' figures, participants in, or heirs to, a special kind of Romantic outlook. Stivender feels that Wilson's description of the famous French murderer Lacenaire (1800-1835) fits William Ratcliff perfectly: '[He] was a highly intelligent man, driven by self-pity. His intellectual perception of the social injustice around him did not lead him to plan to overthrow the social order, it led to an ironic and embittered defeatism. He was a true romantic; looking at the world in which he found himself, he decided that his situation was tragic, and that this was inevitably so. So there was an odd fatalism about his crimes. In his own eyes, they were always justified.' In sum: to study the reasons why Hitchcock read Heine's "William Ratcliff' several times is to gain valuable insights into the director's art and attitudes. Notice, too, that Heine (1797-1856) was exactly contemporaneous with the pessimistic philosopher Schopenhauer (1788-1860) whom I continue to insist can give us some of the very best pointers to understanding Hitchcock and his films. (But now it may be time to lighten up a bit! I'll see what I can do next week!)
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