Poetry
Emajõe Ööbik
Not translated into English
Lydia Koidula · 1867
Synopsis
Poems in which the language of the peasants speaks of the homeland, the Emajõgi and its banks, the mother, and fidelity sworn until death. One addresses the country as a beloved and promises never to leave it, even if one had to die a hundred times; another, “Sind surmani”, swears attachment to the grave; yet another sings of a mother's heart, the only refuge that is never lost. The collection bears no name: the one who opens it in 1867 does not know who is speaking to him.
Context
The booklet appeared in Tartu with Heinrich Laakmann, anonymous like the previous year's collection; it passed the censor without a single deletion, bears the date 1866 on its cover and reached bookshops only in the height of summer 1867. Carl Robert Jakobson included several of its pieces in his school reader, which spread them throughout the country. Aleksander Kunileid set two of them to music for the first song festival, in 1869; Gustav Ernesaks gave one of them a new melody in 1944.
Who it is for
A slim notebook in Estonian, never published in French: three plays appeared in translation in a 1999 anthology and can also be read online. Old spelling.
Prizes and reception
Sung as the finale of every song festival since 1947, “Mu isamaa on minu arm” was an unofficial anthem under the Soviet regime.