Ilmenau (poem)
Ilmenau is a hymn by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe about the city of Ilmenau in Thuringia . He presented it to Duke Carl August von Sachsen-Weimar on September 3, 1783on his 26th birthday.
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In the poem Goethe describes the beauty of the landscape around Ilmenau and the difficult life of the residents. He pays homage to the father of the country and friend and admonishes him, in the spirit of the Enlightenment : “So may, oh prince, the corner of your country // be an example of your days! // You have long known the duties of your class ” . Goethe exhorts himself beforehand: “Where is my path that I lost without worrying? // What rare voices do I hear in the distance? "
In an authentic episode about a hunting camp in 1783 in Finsteren Loch in Schortetal near Stützerbach , he mentions friends and acquaintances:
- "The marcky figure from an old hero line // He eagerly sucks on the beloved pipe" ( Karl Ludwig von Knebel )
- "And its long, finely designed limbs // corner table lazy on all sides" ( Karl Siegmund von Seckendorff )
- "Dark, wild on bright days // irrepressible without being happy" (Duke Carl August)
Origin context
Johann Peter Eckermann later gave Goethe's description of the hunting camp:
- “We had built small huts at the foot of a rock and covered them with fir branches so that we could spend the night on dry ground. Several fires were burning in front of the huts, and we cooked and fried what the hunt had given. Knebel, for whom the tobacco pipe didn't get cold even then, sat next to the fire and delighted with all kinds of dry jokes while the wine bottle went from hand to hand. Seckendorf, the slim man with the long, fine limbs, was comfortably stretched out against the trunk of a tree and was humming all sorts of poetic things. The Duke lay in a deep sleep in a similar little hut. I myself sat in front of it, by glowing coals, in all sorts of heavy thoughts, also in surges of regret about the various calamities that my writings caused ... "
With the poem, Goethe's times, which were characterized by fun and enjoyment with the young duke, came to an end.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ JP Eckermann: "Conversations with Goethe in the last years of his life", October 23, 1828