Poetry
Des Knaben Wunderhorn
Not translated into English
Opening lines
Ein Knab auf schnellem Roß
Sprengt auf der Kaisrin Schloß,
Das Roß zur Erd sich neigt,
Der Knab sich zierlich beugt.
A boy upon a swift steed
Gallops to the Empress's castle,
The steed bows to the ground,
The boy bends gracefully.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from zeno.org
Synopsis
Love songs, soldiers' songs, travel songs and children's songs, ballads and lullabies, from the Middle Ages to the eighteenth century, gathered by the hundred: among them are Le Chevalier et la servante and Dors, enfant, dors. Two poets collected them from old printed sheets and old manuscripts, then reworked them, and wrote a few themselves.
Context
The first volume appeared in Heidelberg, dedicated to Goethe, and the next two in 1808. The editors did not aim at a scholarly edition but at a readable collection, and they never concealed having written some of the poems themselves; between them, Brentano judged Arnim's reworkings too “poetic”. The collection nourished the German lied, from Weber, Schubert, Schumann and Brahms to Mahler, who drew two dozen songs from it and several movements of his symphonies.
Who it is for
A collection of several hundred songs, to be read in fragments; a selected French translation exists.
Prizes and reception
One of the great sources of German folk poetry, which Goethe wished to see in every house, and the material for a century of lieder.
Sources for this page 3
The pages consulted to check this page.