Rückert was evidently aware of his tendency to overproduction. He offers an explanation in "Spruchartiges," p. 157:
Mir ist Verse zu machen und künstliche Vers' ein Bedürfnis,
Fehlt mir ein eigenes Lied, so übersetz' ich mir eins.
And again to his own question, Musst du denn immer dichten?, p. 159, he answers:
Ich denke nie ohne zu dichten,
Und dichte nie ohne zu denken.
Graf von Schack has aptly applied to Rückert's poems the famous sentence which a Spaniard pronounced about Lope de Vega, that no poet wrote so many good plays, but none also so many poor ones.[191]
Whatever defects it may have, Rückert's Oriental work is nevertheless indisputably of the greatest importance to German literature. More than any one else he brought over into it a new spirit and new forms; and it is due primarily to his unsurpassed technical skill that the German language is to-day the best medium for an acquaintance, not only with the literature of the West, but also with that of the East.
FOOTNOTES:
[145] See Beyer, Friedrich Rückert, Fkft. a. M. 1868, pp. 101, 102.
[146] Vol. v. pp. 200-237.