LILIENCRON
Detlev von Liliencron, a countryman of Hebbel and Storm, was born in Kiel, June 3, 1844. He loved a soldier's life and served his country in two wars, 1866 and 1870-71, and thus saw life in its grim reality. Because of wounds and debts, he tells us, he left the army. An inborn love of adventure and action made him try his fortune in America, where his mother's father had served under Washington. His aim was to enter the military service of one of the Central or South American states. Disappointed in his hopes, he returned to Germany and for a number of years was a government official. This task, however, proved too irksome for his restless spirit, and in spite of his continual financial embarrassments, he resigned to live as he pleased. He died in Hamburg, July 22, 1909.
In his younger days, Liliencron felt the throb and stir of life far too keenly to find leisure for literature. Not till 1884 did his first volume of verse appear, recollections of his soldier days. The volume contains graphic descriptions of the most concise brevity, single words taking the place of whole sentences (132).
He delineates war with all its horror, not however without a sad pathos (133). He is also a master at depicting the more joyous side of a soldier's life, the carefree maneuvres of a regiment with its colors and music passing through a village (130). In his love of nature Liliencron is akin to Storm, and even surpasses the older poet in the impressionistic vividness of his descriptions.
130. The poem pictures a German village scene: soldiers with their music approach from the distance, march through and disappear.
3. BRICHT'S, breaks forth or bursts forth.
6 ff. The attention is first focused on the deeper notes. A gradual rise in pitch is noticeable in the lines from instrument to instrument named.
24. LATERNENGLAS, of the street lanterns.
29. WILHEL(MINE), KATHARINE (TRINE), CHRI(STINE)
131.—9. SIRRT, an onomatopoetic word coined by the poet to imitate the sound of the scythe cutting through the grain.
10. ARBEITSFRIEDEN, the quiet peace of daily labor.
11. HEIMATWELT, home world. Compare Alltagswelt, work-a-day world.
132.—4. march and flood of victory.
11 f. DURCH DIE LÜFTE BRAUST, etc., with horrible whir of wings a flight of vultures passes through the air.
133. Famous battle in the Seven Years War, in which Frederick the Great was defeated with enormous losses by the Austrians.
2. SOMMERHALM, lit. summerstalk, i.e., growing grain.
4. IST AUS, is over.
9. he had to go.
16. BEVERN, a small town in Brunswick.
22. HINEIN, into the book.
134.—4. WINZERVOLK, collective sing. Best rendered as plural of Winzer.
136. A lullaby for the poet's son Wulff (Wolf).
3. MONDESKAHN, i.e., crescent moon-shaped like a boat. Render the line, slowly the crescent moon floats like a boat.
137.—5. The content of life not stirred by a breeze.
138.—6 ff. SONNENGRÜN … WEISS … STILL. The peculiar effect of sunlight on colors and on quiet is depicted by these compounds.
14. -FÄLTIG, -fold.
16. slowly the dusk of evening lowers.