DER HANDSCHUH
Vor seinem Löwengarten,
das Kampfspiel zu erwarten,
sass König Franz,
und um ihn die Grossen der Krone,
und rings auf hohem Balkone
die Damen in schönem Kranz.
Und wie er winkt mit dem. Finger
auftut sich der weite Zwinger:
und hinein mit bedächtigem Schritt
ein Löwe tritt
und sieht sich stumm
rings um,
mit langem Gähnen,
und schüttelt die Mähnen,
und streckt die Glieder,
und legt sich nieder.
Und der König winkt wieder,
da öffnet sich behend
ein zweites Tor,
daraus rennt
mit wildem Sprunge
ein Tiger hervor.
Wie er den Löwen erschaut,
brüllt er laut,
schlägt mit dem Schweif
einen furchtbaren Reif,
und recket die Zunge,
und im Kreise scheu
umgeht er den Leu,
grimmig schnurrend;
drauf streckt er sich murrend
zur Seite nieder.
THE GLOVE
Before his lions’ arena
awaiting the contest
sat King Francis
and, around him, the grandees of the realm
and all around on the high balcony
the ladies in beautiful array.
And when he beckons with his finger
the wide arena opens
and into it with deliberate stride
steps a lion
and silently looks
all around,
with a drawn-out yawn
and shakes his mane
and stretches his limbs
and lies down.
And the king beckons again,
thereupon opens quickly
a second gate
out of which runs
with a wild jump
a tiger.
When he catches sight of the lion
he roars loudly,
describes with his tail
a horrifying circle,
and extends his tongue,
and circling warily
he walks around the lion,
purring grimly;
then growling he lies down
at the side.
Und der König winkt wieder,
da speit das doppelt geöffnete Haus
zwei Leoparden auf einmal aus,
die stürzen mit mutiger Kampfbegier
auf das Tigertier;
das packt sie mit seinen grimmigen Tatzen,
und der Leu mit Gebrüll
richtet sich auf — da wird’s still;
und herum im Kreis,
von Mordsucht heiss,
lagern sich die greulichen Katzen.
Da fällt von des Altans Rand
ein Handschuh von schöner Hand
zwischen den Tiger und den Leun
mitten hinein.
Und zu Ritter Delorges, spottenderweis’,
wendet sich Fräulein Kunigund:
“Herr Ritter, ist Eure Lieb’ so heiss,
wie Ihr mir’s schwört zu jeder Stund,
ei, so hebt mir den Handschuh auf!”
Und der Ritter in schnellem Lauf,
steigt hinab in den furchtbaren Zwinger
mit festem Schritte,
und aus der Ungeheuer Mitte
nimmt er den Handschuh mit keckem Finger.
Und mit Erstaunen und mit Grauen
sehen’s die Ritter und Edelfrauen,
und gelassen bringt er den Handschuh zuriick.
Da schallt ihm sein Lob aus jedem Munde,
Aber mit zärtlichem Liebesblick —
er verheisst ihm sein nahes Glück —
empfängt ihn Fräulein Kunigunde.
Und er wirft ihr den Handschuh ins Gesicht:
“Den Dank, Dame, begehr ich nicht!”
Und verlässt sie zur selben Stunde.
And the king beckons again,
thereupon the house, both gates unlocked, discharges
two leopards, both at once,
which rush with courageous pugnacity
toward the tiger;
he seizes them with his grim paws,
and the lion, with a roar,
arises — then it becomes quiet;
and around in a circle,
burning from the passion to murder
the dreadful cats crouch down.
Then there falls from the balcony
a glove from a beautiful hand
between the tiger and the lion
right between them.
And to the Knight Delorges, mockingly,
turns Damsel Kunigund:
“My knight, if your love is so ardent,
as you swear to me at all hours,
well then, pick up my glove!”
And the knight in a quick run,
descends into the horrible arena,
with firm step,
and from the midst of the monsters
he takes the glove with bold fingers.
And with astonishment and a shudder
the knights and the noblewomen watch,
and calmly he brings back the glove.
Now praise resounds for him from every mouth;
But with a tender glance of love —
it promises him his approaching happiness —
Damsel Kunigund receives him.
And he throws the glove into her face:
“Your gratitude, milady, I do not desire!”
And he leaves her at the selfsame hour.
Friedrich Hölderlin
(1770—1843)
Hyperion, the hero of Hölderlin’s novel about Greece’s heroic struggle against Turkey, intones this song after the cause of Greek liberty is lost and his beloved, Diotima, Hölderlin’s vision of Hellenic perfection, has died. But “Hyperion’s Song of Destiny” is also the pathetic expression of Hölderlin’s own tragic fate. The tumbling water, which in the poem is hurled from precipice to precipice, also symbolizes how the poet himself was preoccupied with an uncertain future. Abandoning his initial occupation as a private tutor, which he disliked thoroughly, Hölderlin wandered restlessly about in Switzerland and Southern France and in 1802 returned mentally ill to his home in Swabia. An improvement in his condition enabled him to work briefly as a librarian — but in 1806 he had a relapse and spent the remaining thirty-seven years of his life in total mental darkness, first in an asylum, then in the house of a kindly carpenter in Tübingen near his hometown on the river Neckar.
Hölderlin’s poems seem to capture the very spirit of Hellenism; the ones written in classical or free verse forms on Greek themes represent the poet at his best. Hölderlin, however, did not see ancient Greece as Winckelmann or Goethe had seen it: calm, sublimated, classic, Apollonian. Anticipating Nietzsche, Hölderlin no longer deified Greek culture for its “noble simplicity and quiet grandeur;” to him Greek culture was irrational and emotional, an outburst of elemental forces dominated by Dionysos, the god of ecstasy and bacchanalian orgies. Like “Hyperion’s Song of Destiny” most of Hölderlin’s poems reflect his passionate yearning for a harmony he never attained; his verse is the outpouring of the god-inspired poet filled with poetic frenzy. Although the language and meaning of his poems are often difficult to penetrate and will always remain a stumbling block to some readers, he has appealed with ever-increasing force to our generation and in the last decades has come to be recognized as one of the world’s great lyric poets.
HYPERIONS SCHICKSALSLIED
Ihr wandelt droben im Licht
auf weichem Boden, selige Genien!
Glänzende Götterlüfte
rühren euch leicht,
wie die Finger der Künstlerin
heilige Saiten.
Schicksallos, wie der schl
afende
Säugling, atmen die Himmlischen;
keusch bewahrt
in bescheidener Knospe,
blühet ewig
ihnen der Geist;
und die seligen Augen
blicken in stiller
ewiger Klarheit.
Doch uns ist gegeben
auf keiner Stätte zu ruhn;
es schwinden, es fallen
die leidenden Menschen
blindlings von einer
Stunde zur andern,
wie Wasser von Klippe
zu Klippe geworfen,
jahrlang ins Ungewisse hinab.
HYPERION’S SONG OF DESTINY
You stride up there in the light
on soft ground, blessed spirits!
Luminous divine breezes
touch you gently,
as the fingers of a woman player
touch holy strings.
Freed of all fate, as the sleeping
infant, breathe those in heaven:
chastely preserved
in a modest bud,
their spirit
blossoms eternally;
and their blessed eyes
look out in peaceful,
perpetual clearness.
But to us has been allotted
to rest at no abode;
vanish and fall
will a suffering mankind
blindly from one
hour unto the next,
be cast like the water
from cliff unto cliff,
through the years, down into the uncertain.
Friedrich von Hardenberg (Novalis)
(1772-1801)
Novalis, the pseudonym by which the poet is generally known, was the outstanding lyric genius of the early German Romantic movement. He created the Blue Flower as the symbol of romantic longing — the color blue standing for the infinity of the sky. Paradoxically enough he was both a mining engineer and a religious mystic, an efficient business man and the most visionary of poets.
Novalis’ poetic genius was aroused to fervid intensity by the death of his bride, Sophie von Kühn, to whom he had become engaged when she was barely thirteen, and who died shortly after her fifteenth birthday. From his deeply felt grief and an occult death-wish sprang his Hymnen an die Nacht, a lyric cycle, to some extent influenced by Young’s Night Thoughts. Despite Novalis’ sorrow, the Hymns to the Night (and here night is a symbol for death) are no lamentation. Instead all the poems in the cycle, including the one quoted, express the poet’s intense desire to follow his beloved into death, for death frees all mortals from their unrequited longings. Death is the ultimate reality, the reunion with the Infinite, with God. But to Novalis, Death also becomes an erotic fulfilment, a sensual longing beautifully expressed by the sensuous flow and liquid quality of his verse.
Novalis’ death-wish was soon to be granted; he died of consumption at the age of twenty-eight, four years after Sophie.
From HYMNEN AN DIE NACHT
Hinüber wall ich,
Und jede Pein
Wird einst ein Stachel
Der Wollust sein.
Noch wenig Zeiten,
So bin ich los,
Und liege trunken
Der Lieb im Schoss.
Unendliches Leben
Wogt mächtig in mir,
Ich schaue von oben
Herunter nach dir.
An jenem Hügel
Verlischt dein Glanz —
Ein Schatten bringet
Den kühlenden Kranz.
O! sauge, Geliebter,
Gewaltig mich an,
Dass ich entschlummern
Und lieben kann.
Ich fühle des Todes
Verjiingende Flut,
Zu Balsam und Ather
Verwandelt mein Blut —
Ich lebe bei Tage
Voll Glauben und Mut
Und sterbe die Nächte
In heiliger Glut.
From HYMNS TO THE NIGHT
I’m wandering across,
And every pain
Will someday a sting
Of blissfulness be.
Just a little more time
And I shall be free
And drunkenly lie
In the lap of my love.
Infinite life
Swells mighty in me,
I look from above
Down after you.
At yonder hillside
Your glow becomes dim —
A shadow is bringing
The cooling wreath.
Oh! draw me, beloved,
With force unto you,
That I may fall into slumber
And be able to love.
I feel death’s
Rejuvenating flood,
Into balsam and aether
My blood being transformed —
I live through the day
Full of courage and faith
And die in the nights
In holy fire.
Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff
(1788-1857)
The Silesian Eichendorff was a member of the later Romantic School. Its mouthpiece, the Zeitung für Ein-siedler (Journal for Hermits), was published in Heidelberg. This citadel of poetic glamour with its lovely surroundings taught him wherein his talent lay: seeing and hearing God in all nature. Most of his serene and melodious lyrics are inspired by this devout love of God’s world, especially by his empathy with the magic beauty of moonlit meadows, fields, valleys, mountains, and forests. They reflect his special gift for expressing with a simple piety akin to that of Francis of Assisi his childlike faith and delight in nature as the living evidence and the very embodiment of divine Providence. Like no other poet, Eichendorff glorified romantic Wanderlust and Heimweh (homesickness); he was convinced that the joys of wandering were God’s special gift to mankind. In his poem Mondnacht, as in so many of his nature lyrics, he transmutes nature’s visible beauty into an audible one. He felt that the melody of Nature’s symphony — such as the gentle rustling of the woods or the murmur of a brook — becomes more audible at night or dusk, when all the noises of civilization are muted. Inspired by the flowing musicality of his verses, many great masters of the German art song have set them to music — foremost among more than 1700 compositions to Eichendorff’s poems is Robert Schumann’s Liederkreis, one of the composer’s best known works in this art form. Eichendorff also gained international fame as the author of Aus dem Leben eines Taugenichts, a short novel in praise of dolce far niente, vagabondage, and the happy-go-lucky life.
MONDNACHT
Es war, als hätt’ der Himmel
Die Erde still geküsst,
Dass sie im Blütenschimmer
Von ihm nun träumen müsst’.
Die Luft ging durch die Felder,
Die Ähren wogten sacht,
Es rauschten leis die Wälder,
So sternklar war die Nacht.
Und meine Seele spannte
Weit ihre Flügel aus,
Flog durch die stillen Lande,
Als flöge sie nach Haus.
MOONLIT NIGHT
It was as if Heaven
Had quietly kissed the earth,
Which now, in blossom’s glimmer,
Had to dream of him.
The breeze went through the fields,
The ears of grain surged softly,
The forests rustled gently,
The night was so star-bright.
And my soul extended
Its wings so wide,
It flew through the quiet regions
As though it were flying home.
Adalbert von Chamisso
(1781-1838)
Louis Charles Adelaide de Chamisso was eight years old when his family fled from the terror of the French Revolution and settled in Berlin. Although Chamisso wavered for a while between German and his native French as his poetic medium, his German poems rarely betray his French origin. Most of his poems are taken from German le
gend and story, and some of his ballads are so remarkably German in mood and expression that they have become true folk ballads. Others deal eloquently with the social and political questions of his day. Despite the fact that Chamisso was a victim of the revolutionary upheaval, his poems, such as Das Riesenspielzeug (The Giant’s Toy) or Der Bettler und sein Hund (The Beggar and His Dog), express sympathy for the common people and the need for social reform. Das Schloss Boncourt is one of the rare poems alluding directly to his past. Here nostalgic remembrance of his ancestral castle, destroyed in the Revolution, is ultimately absorbed by a deep love for France and the French people.
Chamisso’s continuing stature as a poet is assured by his Frauenliebe und -leben, immortalized by Robert Schumann, and by his delightful novella Peter Schlemihl, the story of the hapless fellow who sold his shadow to the devil for a bottomless purse.
DAS SCHLOSS BONCOURT
Ich träum’ als Kind mich zurücke
Und schüttle mein greises Haupt;
Wie sucht ihr mich heim, ihr Bilder,
Die lang ich vergessen geglaubtl
Hoch ragt aus schatt’gen Gehegen
Ein schimmerndes Schloss hervor;
Ich kenne die Türme, die Zinnen,
Die steinerne Brücke, das Tor.
Introduction to German Poetry Page 4