FOOTNOTES:
[12] Anz. f. d. Alt., vol. 22, p. 212-218.
[13] In a letter to his mother he writes: "Freilich ist's mir auch angeboren, dass ich alles schwerer zu Herzen nehme." ("Friedrich Hölderlins Leben, in Briefen von und an Hölderlin, von Carl C.T. Litzmann," Berlin, 1890, p. 27. Hereafter quoted as "Briefe.").
[14] "Hölderlins gesammelte Dichtungen, herausgegeben von B. Litzmann," Stuttgart, Cotta (hereafter quoted as "Werke"). Vol. II, p. 9.
[15] It is a reminiscence of Hölderlin's boyhood which finds expression in the words of Hyperion: "Ich war aufgewachsen, wie eine Rebe ohne Stab, und die wilden Ranken breiteten richtungslos über dem Boden sich aus." Werke, Vol. II, p. 72.
[16] Werke, Vol. I, p. 86.
[17] Werke, Vol. I, p. 36.
[18] "Auf einer Heide geschrieben," Werke, Vol. I, p. 44.
[19] Briefe, p. 27.
[20] Briefe, p. 29.
[21] Werke, Vol. I, p. 53 f.
[22] Briefe, p. 36.
[23] Briefe, p. 120.
[24] "Mein Vorsatz," Werke, Vol. I, p. 44.
[25] Werke, Vol. II, p. 69.
[26] Werke, Vol. II, p. 90.
[27] Werke, Vol. II, p. 86.
[28] Briefe, p. 49.
[29] Briefe, p. 50.
[30] Werke, Vol. I, p. 74.
[31] "Friedrich Hölderlin, Eine Studie," Preuss. Jahrb., 1866, p. 548-568.
[32] Anz. f. d. Altertum, Vol. 22, p. 212-218.
[33] Werke, Vol. I, p. 75.
[34] Werke, Vol. I, p. 146.
[35] Werke, Vol. II, p. 107.
[36] Werke, Vol. II, p. 188.
[37] "Vorträge und Aufsätze," 1874, Fried. Hölderlin, p. 354.
[38] Werke, Vol. II, p. 96.
[39] Werke, Vol. II, p. 189.
[40] Cf. op. cit., p. 352.
[41] Werke, Vol. I, p. 51.
[42] Werke, Vol. I, p. 50.
[43] Werke, Vol. I, p. 49.
[44] Werke, Vol. I, p. 66.
[45] Werke, Vol. I, p. 165.
[46] Werke, Vol. II, p. 198.
[47] Werke, Vol. II, p. 97.
[48] Werke, Vol. II, p. 200.
[49] Werke, Vol. II, p. 200 f.
[50] Werke, Vol. I, p. 105.
[51] Werke, Vol. I, p. 196.
[52] Werke, Vol. I, p. 214.
[53] Werke, Vol. I.
[54] Werke, Vol. I, p. 234.
[55] "An die Nachtigall," "An meinen Bilfinger," Werke, Vol. I, p. 42f.
[56] Werke, Vol. I, p. 43.
[57] Werke, Vol. I, p. 197.
[58] Briefe, p. 160.
[59] Briefe, p. 162.
[60] Cf. supra, p. 22.
[61] "Oedipus Coloneus," 1225 seq.
[62] Werke, Vol. II, p. 81.
[63] Cf. Introduction, p. 1 f.
[64] Werke, Vol. I, p. 89.
[65] Briefe, p. 382 f.
[66] Briefe, p. 403-405.
[67] Werke, Vol. II, p. 175.
[68] Briefe, p. 404.
[69] Werke, Vol. II, p. 68.
[70] Werke, Vol. II, p. 100.
[71] Werke, Vol. II, p. 68.
[72] Werke, Vol. II, p. 85.
[73] Werke, Vol. II, p. 181.
[74] Werke, Vol. I, p. 253.
CHAPTER III
Lenau
If Hölderlin's Weltschmerz has been fittingly characterized as idealistic, Lenau's on the other hand may appropriately be termed the naturalistic type. He is par excellence the "Pathetiker" of Weltschmerz.
Without presuming even to attempt a final solution of a problem of pathology concerning which specialists have failed to agree, there seems to be sufficient circumstantial as well as direct evidence to warrant the assumption that Lenau's case presents an instance of hereditary taint. Notwithstanding the fact that Dr. Karl Weiler[75] discredits the idea of "erbliche Belastung" and calls heredity "den vielgerittenen Verlegenheitsgaul," the conclusion forces itself upon us that if the theory has any scientific value whatsoever, no more plausible instance of it could be found than the one under consideration. The poet's great-grandfather and grandfather had been officers in the Austrian army, the latter with some considerable distinction. Of his five children, only Franz, the poet's father, survived. The complete lack of anything like a systematic education, and the nomadic life of the army did not fail to produce the most disastrous results in the wild and dissolute character of the young man. Even before the birth of the poet, his father had broken his marriage vows and his wife's heart by his abominable dissipations and drunkenness. Lenau was but five years old when his father, not yet thirty-five, died of a disease which he is believed to have contracted as a result of these sensual and senseless excesses. To the poet he bequeathed something of his own pathological sensuality, instability of thought and action, lack of will-energy, and the tears of a heartbroken mother, a sufficient guarantee, surely, of a poet of melancholy. Even though we cannot avoid the reflection that the loss of such a father was a blessing in disguise, the fact remains that Lenau during his childhood and youth needed paternal guidance and training even more than did Hölderlin. He became the idol of his mother, who in her blind devotion did not hesitate to show him the utmost partiality in all things. This important fact alone must account to a large extent for that presumptuous pride, which led him to expect perhaps more than his just share from life and from the world.
Lenau's aimlessness and instability were so extreme that they may properly be counted a pathological trait. It is best illustrated by his university career. In 1819 he went to Vienna to commence his studies. Beginning with Philosophy, he soon transferred his interests to Law, first Hungarian, then German; finding the study of Law entirely unsuited to his tastes, he now declared his intention of pursuing once more a philosophical course, with a view to an eventual professorship. But this plan was frustrated by his grandmother, the upshot of it all being that Lenau allowed himself to be persuaded to take up the study of agriculture at Altenburg. But a few months sufficed to bring him back to Vienna. Here his legal studies, which he had resumed and almost completed, were interrupted by a severe affection of the throat which developed into laryngitis and from which he never quite recovered. This too, according to Dr. Sadger,[76] marks the neurasthenic, and often constitutes a hereditary taint. Lenau thereupon shifted once more and entered upon a medical course, this time not absolutely without predilection. He did himself no small credit in his medical examinations, but the death of his grandmother, just before his intended graduation, provided a sufficient excuse for him to discontinue the work, which was never again resumed or brought to a conclusion. But not only in matters of such relative importance did Lenau exhibit this vacillation. There was a spirit of restlessness in him which made it impossible for him to remain long in the same place. Of this condition no one was more fully aware than he himself. In one of his letters he writes: "Gestern hat jemand berechnet, wieviel Poststunden ich in zwei Monaten gefahren bin, und es ergab sich die kolossale Summe von 644, die ich im Eilwagen unter beständiger Gemütsbewegung gefahren bin."[77] That this habit of almost incessant travel tended to aggravate his nervous condition is a fair supposition, notwithstanding the fact that Dr. Karl Weiler[78] skeptically asks "what about commercial travellers?" Lenau himself complains frequently of the distressing effect of such journeys: "Ein heftiger Kopfschmerz und grosse Müdigkeit waren die Folgen der von Linz an unausgesetzten Reise im Eilwagen bei schlechtem Wetter und abmüdenden Gedanken an meine Zukunft."[79] Many similar Statements might be quoted from his letters to show that it was not merely the ordinary process of traveling, though that at best must have been trying enough, but the breathless haste of his journeys, combined with mental anxiety, which usually characterized them, that made them so detrimental to his health.
It is as interesting as it is significant to note in this connection the fact that while on a journey to Munich, just a short time before the light of his intellect failed, Lenau wrote the following lines, the last but one of all his poems:
's ist eitel nichts, wohin mein Aug' ich hefte!
Das Leben ist ein vielbesagtes Wandern,
Ein wüstes Jagen ist's von dem zum andern,
Und unterwegs verlieren wir die Kräfte.
Doch trägt uns eine Macht von Stund zu Stund,
Wie's Krüglein, das am Brunnenstein zersprang,
Und dessen Inhalt sickert auf den Grund,
So weit es ging, den ganzen Weg entlang,—
Nun ist es leer. Wer mag daraus noch trinken?
Und zu den andern Scherben muss es sinken.[80]
Hölderlin also uses the striking figure contained in the last line, not however as here to picture the worthlessness of human life in general, but to stigmatize the Germans, whom Hyperion describes as "dumpf und harmonielos, wie die Scherben eines weggeworfenen Gefässes."[81]
That Lenau was a neurasthenic seems to be the consensus of opinion, at least of those medical authorities who have given their views of the case to the public.[82] This fact also has an important bearing upon our discussion, since it will help to show a materially different origin for Lenau's Weltschmerz and Hölderlin's.
Much more frequent than in the case of the latter are the ominous forebodings of impending disaster which characterize Lenau's poems and correspondence. In a letter to his friend Karl Mayer he writes: "Mich regiert eine Art Gravitation nach dem Unglücke. Schwab hat einmal von einem Wahnsinnigen sehr geistreich gesprochen.... Ein Analogon von solchem Dämon (des Wahnsinns) glaub' ich auch in mir zu beherbergen."[83] He is continually engaged in a gruesome self-diagnosis: "Dann ist mir zuweilen, als hielte der Teufel seine Jagd in dem Nervenwalde meines Unterleibes: ich höre ein deutliches Hundegebell daselbst und ein dumpfes Halloh des Schwarzen. Ohne Scherz; es ist oft zum Verzweifeln."[84] This process of self-diagnosis may be due in part to his medical studies, but much more, we think, to his morbid imagination, which led him, on more than one occasion, to play the madman in so realistic a manner that strangers were frightened out of their wits and even his friends became alarmed, lest it might be earnest and not jest which they were witnessing.
Lenau was not without a certain sense of humor, grim humor though it was, and here and there in his letters there is an admixture of levity with the all-pervading melancholy. An example may be quoted from a letter to Kerner in Weinsberg, dated 1832: "Heute bin ich wieder bei Reinbecks auf ein grosses Spargelessen. Spargel wie Kirchthürme werden da gefressen. Ich allein verschlinge 50-60 solcher Kirchthürme und komme mir dabei vor, wie eine Parodie unserer politisch-prosaischen, durchaus unheiligen Zeit, die auch schon das Maul aufsperrt, um alles Heilige, und namentlich die guten gläubigen Kirchthürme wie Spargelstangen zu verschlingen." The letter concludes with the signature: "Ich umarme Dich, bis Dir die Rippen krachen. Dein Niembsch."[85] Not infrequently this humor was at his own expense, especially when describing an unpleasant condition or situation, as for example in a letter to Sophie Löwenthal in the year 1844: "Jetzt lebe ich hier in Saus und Braus,—d. h. es saust und braust mir der Kopf von einem leidigen Schnupfen."[86] Again, on finding himself on one occasion very unwell and uncomfortable in Stuttgart, he writes as follows: "Beständiges Unwohlsein, Kopfschmerz, Schlaflosigkeit, Mattigkeit, schlechte Verdauung, Rhabarber, Druckfehler, und Aerger über den trägen Fortschlich meiner Geschäfte, das waren die Freuden meiner letzten Woche. Emilie will es nicht gelten lassen, dass die Stuttgarter Luft nichts als die Ausdünstung des Teufels sei.—Ich schnappe nach Luft, wie ein Spatz unter der Luftpumpe.—In vielen der hiesigen Strassen riecht es am Ende auch lenzhaft, nämlich pestilenzhaft, und die guten Stuttgarter merken das gar nicht; 'süss duftet die Heimat.'"[87] In his fondness for bringing together the incongruous, for introducing the element of surprise, and in the fact that his humor is almost always of the impatient, disgruntled, cynical type, Lenau reminds us not a little of Heine in his "Reisebilder" and some other prose works. Hölderlin, on the other hand, may be said to have been utterly devoid of humor.
Lack of self-control, perhaps the most characteristic trait among men of genius, was even more pronounced in Lenau than in Hölderlin. This shows itself in the extreme irregularity of his habits of life. For instance, it was his custom to work long past the midnight hour, and then take his rest until nearly noon. He could never get his coffee quite strong enough to suit him, although it was prepared almost in the form of a concentrated tincture and he drank large quantities of it. He smoked to excess, and the strongest cigars at that; in short, he seems to have been entirely without regard for his physical condition. Or was it perverseness which prompted him to prefer close confinement in his room to the long walks which he ought to have taken for his health? Even his recreation, which consisted chiefly in playing the violin, brought him no nervous relaxation, for it is said that he would often play himself into a state of extreme nervous excitement.
All these considerations corroborate the opinion of those who knew him best, that his Weltschmerz, and eventually his insanity, had its origin in a pathological condition. Indeed this was the poet's own view of the case. In a letter to his brother-in-law, Anton Schurz, dated 1834, he says: "Aber, lieber Bruder, die Hypochondrie schlägt bei mir immer tiefere Wurzel. Es hilft alles nichts. Der gewisse innere Riss wird immer tiefer und weiter. Es hilft alles nichts. Ich weiss, es liegt im Körper; aber—aber—"[88] In its origin then, Lenau's Weltschmerz differs altogether from that of Hölderlin, who exhibits no such symptoms of neurasthenia.
Lenau's nervous condition was seriously aggravated at an early date by the outcome of his unfortunate relations with the object of his first love, Bertha, who became his mistress when he was still a mere boy. His grief on finding her faithless was doubtless as genuine as his conduct with her had been reprehensible, for he cherished for many long years the memory of his painful disappointment. The general statement, "Lenau war stets verlobt, fand aber stets in sich selbst einen Widerstand und unerklärliche Angst, wenn die Verbindung endgiltig gemacht werden sollte,"[89] is inaccurate and misleading, inasmuch as it fails to take into proper account the causes, mediate and immediate, of his hesitation to marry. Lenau was only once "verlobt," and it was the stroke of facial paralysis[90] which announced the beginning of the end, rather than any "unerklärliche Angst," that convinced him of the inexpediency of that important step.
Beyond a doubt his long drawn out and abject devotion to the wife of his friend Max Löwenthal proved the most important single factor in his life. It was during the year 1834, after his return from America, that Lenau made the acquaintance of the Löwenthal family in Vienna.[91] Sophie, who was the sister of his old comrade Fritz Kleyle, so attracted the poet that he remained in the city for a number of weeks instead of going at once to Stuttgart, as he had planned and promised. What at first seemed an ideal friendship, increased in intensity until it became, at least on Lenau's part, the very glow of passion. We have already alluded to the poet's premature erotic instinct, an impulse which he doubtless inherited from his sensual parents. In his numerous letters and notes to Sophie, he has left us a remarkable record of the intensity of his passion. Not even excepting Goethe's letters to Frau von Stein, there are no love-letters in the German language to equal these in literary or artistic merit; and never has any other German poet addressed himself with more ardent devotion to a woman. A characteristic difference between Hölderlin and Lenau here becomes evident: the former, even in his relations with Diotima, supersensual; the latter the very incarnation of sensuality. Lenau was fully conscious of the tremendous struggle with overpowering passion, and once confessed to his clerical friend Martensen that only through the unassailable chastity of his lady-love had his conscience remained void of offence. Almost any of his innumerable protestations of love taken at random would seem like the most extravagant attempt to give utterance to the inexpressible: "Gottes starke Hand drückt mich so fest an Dich, dass ich seufzen muss und ringen mit erdrückender Wonne, und meine Seele keinen Atem mehr hat, wenn sie nicht Deine Liebe saugen kann. Ach Sophie! ach, liebe, liebe, liebe Sophie!"[92] "Ich bete Dich an, Du bist mein Liebstes und Höchstes."[93] "Am sechsten Juni reis' ich ab, nichts darf mich halten. Mir brennt Leib und Seele nach Dir. Du! O Sophie! Hätt' ich Dich da! Das Verlangen schmerzt, O Gott!"[94] Instead of experiencing the soothing influences of a Diotima, Lenau's fate was to be engaged for ten long years in a hot conflict between principle and passion, a conflict which kept his naturally oversensitive nerves continually on the rack. He himself expresses the detrimental effect of this situation: "So treibt mich die Liebe von einer Raserei zur andern, von der zügellosesten Freude zu verzweifeltem Unmut. Warum? Weil ich am Ziel der höchsten, so heiss ersehnten Wonne immer wieder umkehren muss, weil die Sehnsucht nie gestillt wird, wird sie irr und wild und verkehrt sich in Verzweiflung,—das ist die Geschichte meines Herzens."[95] It would seem from the tone of many of his letters that there was much deliberate and successful effort on the part of Sophie to keep Lenau's feelings toward her always in a state of the highest nervous tension. So cleverly did she manage this that even her caprices put him only the more hopelessly at her mercy. One day he writes: "Mit grosser Ungeduld erwartete ich gestern die Post, und sie brachte mir auch einen Brief von Dir, aber einen, der mich kränkt."[96] For a day or two he is rebellious and writes: "Ich bin verstimmt, missmutig. Warum störst Du mein Herz in seinen schönen Gedanken von innigem Zusammenleben auch in der Ferne?"[97] But only a few days later he is again at her feet: "Ich habe Dir heute wieder geschrieben, um Dich auch zum Schreiben zu treiben. Ich sehne mich nach Deinen Briefen. Du bist nicht sehr eifrig, Du bist es wohl nie gewesen. Und kommt endlich einmal ein Brief, so hat er meist seinen Haken—O liebe Sophie! wie lieb' ich Dich!"[98] Her attitude on several occasions leaves room for no other inference than that she was extremely jealous of his affections. When in 1839 a mutual regard sprang up between Lenau and the singer Karoline Unger, a regard which held out to him the hope of a fuller and happier existence, we may surmise the nature of Sophie's interference from the following reply to her: "Sie haben mir mit Ihren paar Zeilen das Herz zerschmettert,—Karoline liebt mich und will mein werden. Sie sieht's als ihre Sendung an, mein Leben zu versöhnen und zu beglücken.—Es ist an Ihnen Menschlichkeit zu üben an meinem zerrissenen Herzen.—Verstosse ich sie, so mache ich sie elend und mich zugleich.—Entziehen Sie mir Ihr Herz, so geben Sie mir den Tod; sind Sie unglücklich, so will ich sterben. Der Knoten ist geschürzt. Ich wollte, ich wäre schon tot!"[99] Not only was this proposed match broken off, but when some five years later Lenau made the acquaintance of and became engaged to a charming young girl, Marie Behrends, and all the poet's friends rejoiced with him at the prospect of a happy marriage, a "Musterehe," as he fondly called it, Sophie wrote him the cruel words: "Eines von uns muss wahnsinnig werden."[100] Only a few months were needed to decide which of them it should be.
The foregoing illustrations are ample to show what sort of influence Sophie exerted over the poet's entire nature, and therefore upon his Weltschmerz. Whereas in their hopeless loves, Hölderlin and to an even greater extent Goethe, struggled through to the point of renunciation, Lenau constantly retrogrades, and allows his baser sensual instincts more and more to control him. He promises to subdue his wild outbursts a little,[101] and when he fails he tries to explain,[102] to apologize.[103] If with Hölderlin love was to a predominating degree a thing of the soul, it was with Lenau in an equal measure a matter of nerves, and as such, under these conditions, it could not but contribute largely to his physical, mental and moral disruption. With Hölderlin it was the rude interruption from without of his quiet and happy intercourse with Susette, which embittered his soul. With Lenau it was the feverish, tumultuous nature of the love itself, that deepened his melancholy.
The charge of affectation in their Weltschmerz would be an entirely baseless one, both in the case of Hölderlin and Lenau. But this difference is readily discovered in the impressions made upon us by their writings, namely that Hölderlin's Weltschmerz is absolutely naïve and unconscious, while that of Lenau is at all times self-conscious and self-centered. Mention has already been made, in speaking of Lenau's pathological traits,[104] of his confirmed habit of self-diagnosis. This he applied not only to his physical condition but to his mental experiences as well. No one knew so well as he how deeply the roots of melancholy had penetrated his being. "Ich bin ein Melancholiker" he once wrote to Sophie, "der Kompass meiner Seele zittert immer wieder zurück nach dem Schmerze des Lebens."[105] Innumerable illustrations of this fact might be found in his lyrics, all of which would repeat with variations the theme of the stanza:
Du geleitest mich durch's Leben
Sinnende Melancholie!
Mag mein Stern sich strebend heben,
Mag er sinken,—weichest nie![106]
The definite purpose with which the poet seeks out and strives to keep intact his painful impressions is frankly stated in one of his diary memoranda, as follows: "So gibt es eine Höhe des Kummers, auf welcher angelangt wir einer einzelnen Empfindung nicht nachspringen, sondern sie laufen lassen, weil wir den Blick für das schmerzliche Ganze nicht verlieren, sondern eine gewisse kummervolle Sammlung behalten wollen, die bei aller scheinbaren Aussenheiterkeit recht gut fortbestehen kann."[107] Hölderlin, as we have noted,[108] not infrequently pictures himself as a sacrifice to the cause of liberty and fatherland, to the new era that is to come:
Umsonst zu sterben, lieb' ich nicht; doch
Lieb' ich zu fallen am Opferhügel
Für's Vaterland, zu bluten des Herzens Blut,
Für's Vaterland....[109]
Lenau, on the other hand, is anxious to sacrifice himself to his muse. "Künstlerische Ausbildung ist mein höchster Lebenszweck; alle Kräfte meines Geistes, meines Gemütes betracht' ich als Mittel dazu. Erinnerst Du Dich des Gedichtes von Chamisso,[110] wo der Maler einen Jüngling ans Kreuz nagelt, um ein Bild vom Todesschmerze zu haben? Ich will mich selber ans Kreuz schlagen, wenn's nur ein gutes Gedicht gibt."[111] And again: "Vielleicht ist die Eigenschaft meiner Poesie, dass sie ein Selbstopfer ist, das Beste daran."[112] The specific instances just cited, together with the inevitable impressions gathered from the reading of his lyrics, make it impossible to avoid the conclusion that we are dealing here with a virtuoso of Weltschmerz; that Lenau was not only conscious at all times of the depth of his sorrow, but that he was also fully aware of its picturesqueness and its poetic possibilities. It is true that this self-consciousness brings him dangerously near the bounds of insincerity, but it must also be granted that he never oversteps those bounds.
Regarded as a psychological process, Lenau's Weltschmerz therefore stands midway between that of Hölderlin and Heine. It is more self-centred than Hölderlin's and while the poet is able to diagnose the disease which holds him firmly in its grasp, he lacks those means by which he might free himself from it. Heine goes still further, for having become conscious of his melancholy, he mercilessly applies the lash of self-irony, and in it finds the antidote for his Weltschmerz.
Fichte, says Erich Schmidt, calls egoism the spirit of the eighteenth century, by which he means the revelling, the complete absorption, in the personal. This will naturally find its favorite occupation in sentimental self-contemplation, which becomes a sort of fashionable epidemic. It is this fashion which Goethe wished to depict in "Werther," and therefore Werther's hopeless love is not wholly responsible for his suicide. "Werther untergräbt sein Dasein durch Selbstbetrachtung," is Goethe's own explanation of the case.[113] And it is in this light only that Werther's malady deserves in any comprehensive sense the term Weltschmerz. Here, then, Lenau and Werther stand on common ground. Other traits common to most poets of Weltschmerz might here be enumerated as characteristic of both, such as extreme fickleness of purpose, supersensitiveness, lack of definite vocation, and the like; all of which goes to show that while for artistic purposes Goethe required a dramatic cause, or rather occasion, for Werther's suicide, he nevertheless fully understood all the symptoms of the prevailing disease with which his sentimental hero was afflicted.
While the personal elements in Lenau's Weltschmerz are much more intense in their expression than with Hölderlin, its altruistic side is proportionately weaker. So far as we may judge from his lyrics, very little of Lenau's Weltschmerz was inspired by patriotic considerations. There is opposition, it is true, to the existing order, but that opposition is directed almost solely against that which annoyed and inconvenienced him personally, for example, against the stupid as well as rigorous Austrian censorship. Against this bugbear he never ceases to storm in verse and letters, and to it must be attributed in a large measure his literary alienation from the land of his adoption. That we must look to his lyrics rather than to his longer epic writings, in order to discover the poet's deepest interests, is nowhere more clearly evidenced than in the following reference to his "Savonarola," in a letter to Emilie Reinbeck during the progress of the work: "Savonarola wirkte zumeist als Prediger, darum muss ich in meinem Gedicht ihn vielfach predigen und dogmatisieren lassen, welches in vierfüssigen doppeltgereimten Iamben sehr schwierig ist. Doch es freut mich, Dinge poetisch durchzusetzen, an deren poetischer Darstellbarkeit wohl die meisten Menschen verzweifeln. Auch gereicht es mir zu besonderem Vergnügen, mit diesem Gedicht gegen den herrschenden Geschmack unseres Tages in Opposition zu treten."[114] The inference lies very near at hand that his opposition to the prevailing taste was after all a secondary consideration, and that the poet's first concern was to win glory by accomplishing something which others would abandon as an impossibility. While recognizing the fact that Lenau's "Faust" and "Don Juan" are largely autobiographical, it is, I think, obvious that an entirely adequate impression of his Weltschmerz may be gained from his letters and lyrics alone, in which the poet's sincerest feelings need not be subordinated for a moment to artistic purposes or demands. And nowhere, either in lyrics or letters, do we find such spontaneous outbursts of patriotic sentiment as greet us in Hölderlin's poems:
Glückselig Suevien, meine Mutter![115]
This could not be otherwise; for was he (Lenau) not an Hungarian by birth, an Austrian by adoption, and in his professional affiliations a German? Had his interests not been divided between Vienna and Stuttgart, and had he not been possessed with an apparently uncontrollable restlessness which drove him from place to place, his patriotic enthusiasm would naturally have turned to Austria, and the poetic expression of his home sentiments would not have been confined, perhaps, to the one occasion when he had put the broad Atlantic between himself and his kin. That his brother-in-law Schurz should wish to represent him as a dyed-in-the-wool Austrian is only natural.[116] However this may be, the poet does not hesitate to state in a letter to Emilie Reinbeck: "Ein Hund in Schwaben hat mehr Achtung für mich als ein Polizeipräsident in Oesterreich."[117] And although he professes to have become hardened to the pestering interference of the authorities, as a matter of fact it was a constant source of unhappiness to him. "So aber war mein Leben seit meinem letzten Briefe ein beständiger Aerger. Die verfluchten Vexationen der hiesigen Censurbehörde haben selbst jetzt noch immer kein Ende finden können."[118] Speaking of his hatred for the censorship law, he says: "Und doch gebührt mein Hass noch immer viel weniger dem Gesetze selbst, als denjenigen legalisierten Bestien, die das Gesetz auf eine so niederträchtige Art handhaben;—und unsre Censoren stellen im Gegensatze der pflanzen- und fleischfressenden Tiere die Klasse der geistfressenden Tiere dar, eine abscheuliche, monströse Klasse!"[119] Roustan expresses the opinion that with Lenau patriotism occupied a secondary place.[120] He had too many "native lands" to become attached to any one of them.
There is something of a counterpart to Hölderlin's Hellenism and championship of Greek liberty in Lenau's espousal of the Polish cause. But here again the personal element is strongly in evidence. A chance acquaintance, which afterward became an intimate friendship, with Polish fugitives, seems to have been the immediate occasion of his Polenlieder, so that his enthusiasm for Polish liberty must be regarded as incidental rather than spontaneous. Needless to say that with a Greek cult such as Hölderlin's Lenau had no patience whatever. "Dass die Poesie den profanen Schmutz wieder abwaschen müsse, den ihr Goethe durch 50 Jahre mit klassischer Hand gründlich einzureiben bemüht war; dass die Freiheitsgedanken, wie sie jetzt gesungen werden, nichts seien als konventioneller Trödel,—davon haben nur wenige eine Ahnung."[121]
All these considerations tend to convince us that Lenau's Weltschmerz is after all of a much narrower and more personal type than Hölderlin's. Again and again he runs through the gamut of his own painful emotions and experiences, diagnosing and dissecting each one, and always with the same gloomy result. Consequently his Weltschmerz loses in breadth what through the depth of the poet's introspection it gains in intensity.
One of the most striking and, unless classed among his numerous other pathological traits, one of the most puzzling of Lenau's characteristics is the perverseness of his nature. His intimate friends were wont to explain it, or rather to leave it unexplained by calling it his "Husarenlaune" when the poet would give vent to an apparently unprovoked and unreasonable burst of anger, and on seeing the consternation of those present, would just as suddenly throw himself into a fit of laughter quite as inexplicable as his rage. He takes delight in things which in the ordinarily constructed mind would produce just the reverse feeling. Speaking once of a particularly ill-favored person of his acquaintance he says: "Eine so gewaltige Hässlichkeit bleibt ewig neu und kann sich nie abnützen. Es ist was Frisches darin, ich sehe sie gerne."[122] And in not a few of his poems we see a certain predilection for the gruesome, the horrible. So in the remarkable figure employed in "Faust:"
Die Träume, ungelehr'ge Bestien, schleichen
Noch immer nach des Wahns verscharrten Leichen.[123]
This perverseness of disposition is in a large measure accounted for by the fact that Lenau was eternally at war with himself. Speaking in the most general way, Hölderlin's Weltschmerz had its origin in his conflict with the outer world, Lenau's on the other hand must be attributed mainly to the unceasing conflict or "Zwiespalt" within his breast. In his childhood a devout Roman Catholic, he shows in his "Faust" (1833-36) a mind filled with scepticism and pantheistic ideas; "Savonarola" (1837) marks his return to and glorification of the Christian faith; while in the "Albigenser" (1838-42) the poet again champions complete emancipation of thought and belief. Only a few months elapsed between the writing of the two poems "Wanderung im Gebirge" (1830), in which the most orthodox faith in a personal God is expressed, and "Die Zweifler" (1831). The only consistent feature of his poems is their profound melancholy. But Lenau's inner struggle of soul did not consist merely in his vacillating between religious faith and doubt; it was the conflict of instinct with reason. This is evident in his relations with Sophie Löwenthal. He knows that their love is an unequal one[124] and chides her for her coldness,[125] warning her not to humiliate him, not even in jest;[126] he knows too that his alternating moods of exaltation and dejection resulting from the intensity of his unsatisfied love are destroying him.[127] "Oefter hat sich der Gedanke bei mir angemeldet: Entschlage dich dieser Abhängigkeit und gestatte diesem Weibe keinen so mächtigen Einfluss auf deine Stimmungen. Kein Mensch auf Erden soll dich so beherrschen. Doch bald stiess ich diesen Gedanken wieder zurück als einen Verräter an meiner Liebe, und ich bot mein reizbares Herz wieder gerne dar Deinen zärtlichen Misshandlungen.—O geliebtes Herz! missbrauche Deine Gewalt nicht! Ich bitte Dich, liebe Sophie!"[128] And yet, in spite of it all, he is unable to free himself from the thrall of passion: "Wie wird doch all mein Trotz und Stolz so gar zu nichte, wenn die Furcht in mir erwacht, dass Du mich weniger liebest";[129] and all this from the same pen that once wrote: "das Wort Gnade hat ein Schuft erfunden."[130]
But just as helpless as this defiant pride proved before his all-consuming love for Sophie, so strongly did it assert itself in all his other relations with men and things. A hasty word from one of his best friends could so deeply offend his spirit that, according to his own admission, all subsequent apologies were futile.[131] For Lenau, then, such an attitude of hero worship as that assumed by Hölderlin towards Schiller, would have been an utter impossibility. We have already seen the extent to which he was over-awed (?) by Goethe's views when they were at variance with their own.[132] On another occasion he writes: "Was Goethe über Ruysdael faselt, kannte ich bereits."[133] Toward his critics his bearing was that of haughty indifference: "Mag auch das Talent dieser Menschen,[TN1] mich zu insultieren, gross sein, mein Talent, sie zu verachten, ist auf alle Fälle grösser."[134] When his Frühlingsalmanach of 1835 had been received with disfavor by the critics, he professed to be concerned only for his publisher: "Ich meinerseits habe auf Liebe und Dank nie gezählt bei meinen Bestrebungen."[135] "Die (Recensenten) wissen den Teufel von Poesie."[136] Whether this real or assumed nonchalance would have stood the test of literary disappointments such as Hölderlin's, it is needless to speculate.
Hölderlin eagerly sought after happiness and contentment, but fortune eluded him at every turn. Lenau on the contrary thrust it from him with true ascetic spirit.
The mere thought of submitting to the ordinary process of negotiations and recommendations for a vacant professorship of Esthetics in Vienna is so repulsive to his pride, that the whole matter is at once allowed to drop, notwithstanding that he has been preparing for the place by diligent philosophical studies.[137] The asceticism with which he regarded life in general is expressed in a letter to Emilie Reinbeck, 1843, in which he says: "Wer die Welt gestalten helfen will, muss darauf verzichten, sie zu geniessen."[138] But more often this resignation becomes a defiant challenge: "Ich habe dem Leben gegenüber nun einmal meine Stellung genommen, es soll mich nicht hinunterkriegen. Dass mein Widerstand nicht der eines ruhigen Weisen ist, sondern viel Trotziges an sich hat, das liegt in meinen Temperament."[139]
Another characteristic difference between Lenau's Weltschmerz and Hölderlin's lies in the fact that the writings of the latter do not exhibit that absolute and abject despair which marks Lenau's lyrics. Typical for both poets are the lines addressed by each to a rose:
Ewig trägt im Mutterschosse,
Süsse Königin der Flur,
Dich und mich die stille, grosse,
Allbelebende Natur.
Röschen unser Schmuck veraltet,
Sturm entblättert dich und mich,
Doch der ew'ge Keim entfaltet
Bald zu neuer Blüte sich![140]
Unmistakable as is the melancholy strain of these verses, they are not without a hopeful afterthought, in which the poet turns from self-contemplation to a view of a larger destiny. Not so in Lenau's poem, "Welke Rosen":
In einem Buche blätternd, fand
Ich eine Rose welk, zerdrückt,
Und weiss auch nicht mehr, wessen Hand
Sie einst für mich gepflückt.
Ach mehr und mehr im Abendhauch
Verweht Erinn'rung; bald zerstiebt
Mein Erdenlos; dann weiss ich auch
Nicht mehr, wer mich geliebt.[141]
The intensely personal note of the last stanza is in marked contrast with the corresponding stanza of Hölderlin's poem just quoted. Further evidence that Lenau's Weltschmerz was constitutional, while Hölderlin's was the result of experience, lies in this very fact, that nowhere do the writings of the former exhibit that stage of buoyant expectation, youthful enthusiasm, or hopeful striving, which we find in some of the earlier poems of the latter. In Hölderlin's ode "An die Hoffnung," he apostrophizes hope as "Holde! gütig Geschäftige!"
Die du das Haus der Trauernden nicht verschmähst.[142]
Lenau, in his poem of the same title, tells us he has done with hope:
All dein Wort ist Windesfächeln;
Hoffnung! dann nur trau' ich dir,
Weisest du mit Trosteslächeln
Mir des Todes Nachtrevier.[143]
Even his Faust gives himself over almost from the outset to abject despair.
Logically consequent upon this state of mind is the poet's oft-repeated longing for death. The persistency of this thought may be best illustrated by a few quotations from poems and letters, arranged chronologically:
| 1831. | Mir wird oft so schwer, als ob ich einen Todten in mirherumtrüge.[144] | |
| 1833. | Und mir verging die Jugend traurig, | |
| 1837. | Heute dachte ich öfter an den Tod, nicht mit bitterem Trotzund störrischem Verlangen, sondern mit freundlichem Appetit.[146] | |
| 1837. | Soll ich Dir alles sagen? Wisse, dass ich wirklich darandachte, mir den Tod zu geben.[147] | |
| 1838. | Der Gedanke des Todes wird mir immer freundlicher, und ichverschwende mein Leben gerne.[148] | |
| 1838. | Durchs Fenster kommt ein dürres Blatt | |
| 1840. | Oft will mich's gemahnen, als hätte ich auf Erden nichtsmehr zu thun, und ich wünschte dann, Gervinus möchterecht haben, indem er, wie Georg mir erzählte, mir einenbaldigen Zusammenbruch und Tod prophezeite.[150] | |
| 1842. | Ich habe ein wollüstiges Heimweh, in Deinen Armen zu sterben.[151] | |
| 1843. | Selig sind die Betäubten! noch seliger sind die Toten![152] | |
| 1844. | In dieses Waldes leisem Rauschen |
If we should seek for the Leit-motif of Lenau's Weltschmerz, we should unquestionably have to designate it as the transientness of life. Thus in the poem "Die Zweifler," he exclaims:
Vergänglichkeit! wie rauschen deine Wellen
Durch's weite Labyrinth des Lebens fort![154]
Ten per cent, of all Lenau's lyrics bear titles which directly express or suggest this thought, as for example, "Vergangenheit," "Vergänglichkeit," "Das tote Glück," "Einst und Jetzt," "Aus!," "Eitel Nichts," "Verlorenes Glück," "Welke Rose," "Vanitas," "Scheiden," "Scheideblick," and the like; while in not less than seventy-one per cent of his lyrics there are allusions, more or less direct, to this same idea, which shows beyond a doubt how large a component it must have been of the poet's characteristic mood.
If Hölderlin, the idealist, judges the things which are, according to his standard of things as they ought to be, Lenau, on the other hand, measures them by the things which have been.
Friedhof der entschlafnen Tage,
Schweigende Vergangenheit!
Du begräbst des Herzens Klage,
Ach, und seine Seligkeit![155]
Nowhere is this mental attitude of the poet toward life in all its forms more clearly defined than in his views of nature. That this is an entirely different one from Hölderlin's goes without saying. Lenau has nothing of that naïve and unsophisticated childlike nature-sense which Hölderlin possessed, and which enabled him to find comfort and consolation in nature as in a mother's embrace. So that while for Hölderlin intercourse with nature afforded the greatest relief from his sorrows, Lenau's Weltschmerz was on the contrary intensified thereby. For him the rose has no fragrance, the sunlight no warmth, springtime no charms, in a word, nature has neither tone nor temper, until such has been assigned to it by the poet himself. And as he is fully aware of the artistic possibilities of the mantle of melancholy "um die wunde Brust geschlungen,"[156] it follows consistently that he should select for poetic treatment only those aspects of nature which might serve to intensify the expression of his grief.
Among the titles of Lenau's lyrics descriptive of nature are "Herbst," "Herbstgefühl" (twice), "Herbstlied," "Ein Herbstabend," "Herbstentschluss," "Herbstklage," and many others of a similar kind, such as "Das dürre Blatt," "In der Wüste," "Frühlings Tod," etc. If we disregard a few quite exceptional verses on spring, the statement will hold that Lenau sees in nature only the seasons and phenomena of dissolution and decay. So in "Herbstlied":
Ja, ja, ihr lauten Raben,
Hoch in der kühlen Luft,
's geht wieder ans Begraben,
Ihr flattert um die Gruft![157]
"Je mehr man sich an die Natur anschliesst," the poet writes to Sophie Schwab, "je mehr man sich in Betrachtungen ihrer Züge vertieft, desto mehr wird man ergriffen von dem Geiste der Sehnsucht, des schwermütigen Hinsterbens, der durch die Natur auf Erden weht."[158] Characteristic is the setting which the poet gives to the "Waldkapelle":
Der dunkle Wald umrauscht den Wiesengrund,
Gar düster liegt der graue Berg dahinter,
Das dürre Laub, der Windhauch gibt es kund,
Geschritten kommt allmählig schon der Winter.
Die Sonne ging, umhüllt von Wolken dicht,
Unfreundlich, ohne Scheideblick von hinnen,
Und die Natur verstummt, im Dämmerlicht
Schwermütig ihrem Tode nachzusinnen.[159]
The sunset is represented as a dying of the sun, the leaves fall sobbing from the trees, the clouds are dissolved in tears, the wind is described as a murderer. We see then that Lenau's treatment of nature is essentially different from Hölderlin's. The latter explains man through nature; Lenau explains nature through man. Hölderlin describes love as a heavenly plant,[160] youth as the springtime of the heart,[161] tears as the dew of love;[162] Lenau, on the other hand, characterizes rain as the tears of heaven, for him the woods are glad,[163] the brooklet weeps,[164] the air is idle, the buds and blossoms listen,[165] the forest in its autumn foliage is "herbstlich gerötet, so wie ein Kranker, der sich neigt zum Sterben, wenn flüchtig noch sich seine Wangen färben."[166] A remarkable simile, and at the same time characteristic for Lenau in its morbidness is the following:
Wie auf dem Lager sich der Seelenkranke,
Wirft sich der Strauch im Winde hin und her.[167]
Hölderlin speaks of a friend's bereavement as "ein schwarzer Sturm";[168] when he had grieved Diotima he compares himself to the cloud passing over the serene face of the moon;[169] gloomy thoughts he designates by the common metaphor "der Schatten eines Wölkchens auf der Stirne."[170] Lenau turns the comparison and says:
Am Himmelsantlitz wandelt ein Gedanke,
Die düstre Wolke dort, so bang, so schwer.[171]
Where Hölderlin finds delight in the incorporeal elements of nature, such as light, ether, and ascribes personal qualities and functions to them, Lenau on the contrary always chooses the tangible things and invests them with such mental and moral attributes as are in harmony with his gloomy state of mind. Consequently Lenau's Weltschmerz never remains abstract; indeed, the almost endless variety of concrete pictures in which he gives it expression is nothing short of remarkable, not only in the sympathetic nature-setting which he gives to his lamentations, but also in the striking metaphors which he employs. Of the former, probably no better illustration could be found in all Lenau's poems than his well-known "Schilflieder"[172] and his numerous songs to Autumn. One or two examples of his incomparable use of nature-metaphors in the expression of his Weltschmerz will suffice:
Hab' ich gleich, als ich so sacht
Durch die Stoppeln hingeschritten,
Aller Sensen auch gedacht,
Die ins Leben mir geschnitten.[173]
Auch mir ist Herbst, und leiser
Trag' ich den Berg hinab
Mein Bündel dürre Reiser
Die mir das Leben gab.[174]
Der Mond zieht traurig durch die Sphären,
Denn all die Seinen ruhn im Grab;
Drum wischt er sich die hellen Zähren
Bei Nacht an unsern Blumen ab.[175]
The forceful directness of Lenau's metaphors from nature is aptly shown in the following comparison of two passages, one from Hölderlin's "An die Natur," the other from Lenau's "Herbstklage," in which both poets employ the same poetic fancy to express the same idea.
Tot ist nun, die mich erzog und stillte,
Tot ist nun die jugendliche Welt,
Diese Brust, die einst ein Himmel füllte,
Tot und dürftig wie ein Stoppelfeld.[176]
If we compare the simile in the last line with the corresponding metaphor used by Lenau in the following stanza,—
Wie der Wind zu Herbsteszeit
Mordend hinsaust in den Wäldern,
Weht mir die Vergangenheit
Von des Glückes Stoppelfeldern,[177]
the greater artistic effectiveness of the latter figure will be at once apparent.
The idea that nature is cruel, even murderous, as suggested in the opening lines of the stanza just quoted, seems in the course of time to have become firmly fixed in the poet's mind, for he not only uses it for poetic purposes, but expresses his conviction of the fact on several occasions in his conversations and letters. Tossing some dead leaves with his stick while out walking, he is said to have exclaimed: "Da seht, und dann heisst es, die Natur sei liebevoll und schonend! Nein, sie ist grausam, sie hat kein Mitleid. Die Natur ist erbarmungslos!"[178] It goes without saying that in such a conception of nature the poet could find no amelioration of his Weltschmerz.[179]
In summing up the results of our discussion of Lenau's Weltschmerz, it would involve too much repetition to mention all the points in which it stands, as we have seen, in striking contrast to that of Hölderlin. Suffice it to recall only the most essential features of the comparison: the predominance of hereditary and pathological traits as causative influences in the case of Lenau; the fact that whereas Hölderlin's quarrel was largely with the world, Lenau's was chiefly within himself; the passive and ascetic nature of Lenau's attitude, as compared with the often hopeful striving of Hölderlin; the patriotism of the latter, and the relative indifference of the former; Lenau's strongly developed erotic instinct, which gave to his relations with Sophie such a vastly different influence upon his Weltschmerz from that exerted upon Hölderlin by his relations with Diotima; and finally the marked difference in the attitude of these two poets toward nature.
A careful consideration of all the points involved will lead to no other conclusion than that whereas in Hölderlin the cosmic element predominates, Lenau stands as a type of egoistic Weltschmerz. To quote from our classification attempted in the first chapter, he is one of "those introspective natures who are first and chiefly aware of their own misery, and finally come to regard it as representative of universal evil." Nowhere is this more clearly stated than in the poet's own words: "Es hat etwas Tröstliches für mich, wenn ich in meinem Privatunglück den Familienzug lese, der durch alle Geschlechter der armen Menschen geht. Mein Unglück ist mir mein Liebstes,—und ich betrachte es gerne im verklärenden Lichte eines allgemeinen Verhängnisses."[180]