763536

Eichendorff's Auf einer Burg and Schumann's Liederkreis, Opus 39Author(s): Karen A. HindenlangReviewed work(s):Source: The Journal of Musicology, Vol. 8, No. 4 (Autumn, 1990), pp. 569-587Published by: University of California PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/763536 .Accessed: 20/03/2012 09:24

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Eichendorff's

Auf einer Burg and Schumann's Liederkreis, Opus 39*

KAREN A. HINDENLANG

obert Schumann's curious and haunting song Auf einer Burg occupies the musical, poetic, and spiritual center of the Liederkreis von Eichendorff. The presence of this unconventional and problematic lied at the very heart of the Opus 39 cycle challenges performers, listeners, and analysts. The challenge has not been met 569 satisfactorily in musical scholarship. Schumann's setting of the intriguing poem has been misunderstood, and the function of the exceptional song within the cycle has gone unrecognized.

In early May of 1840, about midway through his "Year of Song," Schumann first turned to the works of Joseph von Eichendorff. The

composer had not yet written any settings for poems by Eichendorff (1788-1857), one of the nineteenth century's finest lyric German po- ets, but by late June Schumann had completed the twelve songs of his Opus 39 Liederkreis. The texts of the song cycle were not drawn from a pre-existing poetic cycle. Schumann himself chose the twelve lyrics from different sources. Thus the composer was free to establish his own poetic cycle in his Eichendorff Liederkreis. Yet he did not exercise this freedom in an obvious fashion. The poems, as selected and or-

ganized by Schumann, do not outline a story. Efforts to isolate a continuous narrative thread running through the Liederkreis have been defeated by the lack of a single consistent viewpoint or a chronological order of events. Attempts to find such a thread may be

Volume VIII * Number 4 * Fall 1990 The Journal of Musicology ? 1990 by the Regents of the University of California

* This article developed from a paper I presented at the April 1983 meeting of the New York State, St. Lawrence Chapter of the American Musicological Society. My thanks go to Jurgen Thym and Ralph P. Locke of the Eastman School of Music.

THE JOURNAL OF MUSICOLOGY

misguided, since our current conventional concept of chronological narrative is based on later nineteenth-century literary developments unknown to Schumann.l

Barbara Turchin's discussion of the early nineteenth-century poetic significance of the word Kreis concluded that the term "did not

imply, necessarily, a sequence of events." Instead, she found that "Kreis suggests the presence of a thematic center from which the

poems radiate."2 In Opus 39, the lyrics do share many recurrent

images and ideas: the forest, twilight, evening, loneliness, deception, love, and longing. Yet despite a tenuous relationship based on these shared images and ideas, no single conspicuous "thematic center"

emerges from the collection of Liederkreis poems, and scholars have been unable to agree upon the identity of the cycle's central poetic subject. Very different fundamental themes have been suggested. The proposals include love, strangeness and alienation, endless longing, and the complete relationship of man and woman.3 Despite such

specific proposals, general emotional movement may provide the cycle's only meaningful literary organization. Two balanced arches of emotion have been discerned defining two large textual units in the

570 Liederkreis. These two progressions transform the poetic mood from introverted melancholy to exuberant joy in the first through sixth

poems and in the seventh through twelfth.4

Though Schumann did not create an integrated poetic cycle of the familiar narrative or thematic type in the Liederkreis, he did ar-

range the music according to an easily recognized two-part structure. The entire work's overall tonal organization, demonstrated and discussed by a number of authors, is approximately symmetrical with

Freedom from a strictly linear conception of time is found in many early romantic prose works, including those by Schumann's favorite, Jean Paul Richter. In temporal organization, these nineteenth-century works have more in common with twentieth-century literary experiments than with the norm of linear narrative established by the turn of the century. See Eric A. Blackall's The Novels of the German Ro- mantics (Ithaca, 1983), pp. 15-20.

2 Barbara Turchin, "Robert Schumann's Song Cycles in the Context of the Early Nineteenth-Century Liederkreis" (Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, 1981), pp. 276-77. Also, see Turchin's Chapter III, pp. 97-116.

3 See Eckhart Busse, Die Eichendorff-Rezeption im Kunstlied: Versuch einer Typologie anhand von Kompositionen Schumanns, Wolfs, und Pfitzners (Wiirzburg, 1975), pp. 50-51; Karlheinz Schlager, "Erstarrte Idyle: Schumanns Eichendorff-Verstandnis im Lied op. 39/VII ('Auf einer Burg')," Archiv fur Musikwissenschaft XXXIII (1976), 131-32; Joachim Draheim, "Robert Schumann: Liederkreis von Joseph Freiherrn von Eichen- dorff Op. 39," Neue Zeitschrfitfiir Musik CXLV (1984), 24; and Jurgen Thym, "The Solo Song Settings of Eichendorffs Poems by Schumann and Wolf' (Ph.D. dissertation, Case Western Reserve University, 1974), p. 213.

4 See Karl W6rner, Robert Schumann (Zurich, 1949), pp. 214-15; Thym, pp. 219- 24; and Turchin, pp. 278-80.

EICHENDORFF AND SCHUMANN

one central division.5 The balance appears to have been intentional, because soon after he completed the Liederkreis Schumann replaced the original opening number with a new song in a key which corre-

sponded to that of the concluding number.6 The tonal symmetry extends beyond the first and last songs. The tonics of the opening three songs are reflected in mirror image by the final three songs:

I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX X XI XII f# A E G E B a a E e A F#

* ------------ ---- -------- [ L ]

In addition, nearly all adjacent lieder in Opus 39 are bound together by close key relationships. The sixth and seventh songs, the only exceptions, are in B major and A minor. This distant tonal relation-

ship points to a structural division of the cycle between these two

pieces. Thus the musical division occurs at the midpoint of the symmetrical cycle and coincides with the textual division of the two

groups of poems (I-IV, VII-XII). Within this balanced structure, the seventh song occupies an important position. Located just past the central poetic and musical division, the seventh lied inaugurates the second half of the Liederkreis. If this crucial seventh number were ineffective, its weakness would threaten the structural integrity of the entire cycle.

Such a threat may exist, for the seventh song has been described

repeatedly as a disappointment and a failure. Extensive criticism of the song has focused on a perceived breakdown in the wedding of text and music, the marriage so necessary to the art of the lied and so

perfectly consummated in the cycle's exquisite fifth song, Mondnacht. The criticism implies that the composer's skill deserted him while

setting the cycle's seventh poem. Schumann stands accused of writing a self-conscious and awkward song, presenting a one-sided interpretation of the poem, defeating the poet's intentions, undermining the

5 See Heinrich Lindlar, "Zu Schumanns Eichendorff-Zyklus," Neue Zeitschrift fir Musik CXXIII (1962), 339; Rolf Ringger, "Zu Eichendorff-Schumanns Liederkreis: Eine Wort-Ton Analyse," Schweizerische Musikzeitung CVI (1966), 273; Theodore Adorno, "Zum Gedachtnis Eichendorffs," in Noten zur Literature I (Frankfurt, 1968), p. 134; Thym, pp. 216-19; Schlager, p. 119; and Turchin, pp. 312-25. 6 The first edition opened with a setting of Eichendorffs jolly Die frohe Wander- mann: the D-Major song was withdrawn and later re-issued in Opus 77. In the second edition of Opus 39 Schumann opened the cycle with the Ft-minor song, In der Fremde ("Aus der Heimat"). The change in key, mode, and poetic mood contributed to musical and dramatic balance of the cycle's final version.


poem's structure, and distorting the lyric text while matching it with

inappropriate music.7 In many ways, the seventh song of Opus 39 is an anomaly. Its text

seems quite peculiar, especially in comparison to the other Liederkreis

lyrics. Its musical style is unique to the cycle and atypical of Schu- mann's work in general. The fact that the lied is an anomaly, however, does not mean it is a mistake. Rather, the evaluations of the song have been mistaken. Much groundless musical criticism has been founded

upon misinterpretation of the unusual poem. Thus, the equally unusual song has been misjudged, and the role of the seventh lied, Auf einer Burg, in the Liederkreis von Eichendorff has been misapprehended. Through a fresh and thorough examination of the poem, Schu- mann's skill in setting Auf einer Burg can be demonstrated, and the

song's musical and literary function within the cycle may be ex-

plained. Schumann adopted Eichendorffs brief and enigmatic poem with-

out any alterations. The poem (which follows with a literal line-by-line translation) consists of four short strophes, each containing four terse

eight-syllable lines: 572

Auf einer Burg

Eingeschlafen auf der Lauer Oben ist der alte Ritter; Druben gehen Regenschauer, Und der Wald rauscht

durch das Gitter.

Eingewachsen Bart und Haare, Und versteinert Brust und Krause,

Sitzt er viele hundert Jarhe Oben in der stillen Klause.

Draussen ist es still und friedlich, Alle sind in's Tal gezogen, Waldesvogel einsam singen In den leeren Fensterbogen.

Eine Hochzeit fahrt da unten Auf dem Rhein im Sonnenscheine, Musikanten spielen munter, Und die schone Braut, die weinet.

In a Castle

Asleep in the watchtower Up above is the old knight; The rain showers overhead, And the forest rustles through

the portcullis. Beard and hair overgrown, Chest and ruffles turned to

stone, He sits many hundred years Up above in his silent cell.

Outside it is still and peaceful, All have gone into the valley, Forest birds alone sing In the empty window arches.

A wedding passes by below On the Rhine in the sunlight, Musicians play merrily, And the beautiful bride cries.

7 See Stephen Walsh, The Lieder of Schumann (London, 1971), p. 38; Thym, p. 204; Eric Sams, The Songs of Robert Schumann (London, 1969), p. 100; Jack M. Stein, Poem and Music in the German Lied from Gluck to Hugo Wolf (Cambridge, MA, 1971), p. 115.


Unlike many of Eichendorffs lyrics, this poem originally was not included in a novel or novella; the lyric first was published in a collection of poetry in 1837. Therefore, no prose context exists to provide valuable clues to the mysterious poem's meaning. Fortunately, Auf einer Burg displays three characteristic features of Eichendorff's

style which assist in the interpretation of the poem.8 Sounds abound in Eichendorffs work. His writing overflows with

the multifarious sounds of man and nature, and music is a common

ingredient in his prose and poetry.9 As might be expected, in Aufeiner Burg the forest rustles, the birds sing, and, of course, the musicians

play. Yet simple aural descriptions do not generate Eichendorffs so- noral effects. The very sound of his language produces its own music. The chief factor in the poet's resonant style is his habitual use of alliteration and assonance within a line or strophe. Some instances of assonance, the reverberation produced by the repetition of vowel sounds, are found in Auf einer Burg. The opening lines of the poem's first two strophes echo with the recurrence of identical or similar vowel sounds, which then reappear in the rhyming third lines of these same strophes. ("Eingeschlafen auf der Lauer . . . Regenschauer" in the first strophe, and "Eingewachsen Bart und Haare ... Jahre" in 573 the second). The mesmerizing effect of these echoing broad vowels is enhanced because the assonances occur on the strong syllables of the monotonous underlying trochaic meter. The result is truly hypnotic and very appropriate to the description of the ancient knight sleeping through the centuries.

In creating his sonorous works, the poet moved beyond the sim-

ple and customary use of perfect rhymes at the ends of the lines. In fact, he felt free to ignore rhyming conventions when it suited his

purpose. For example, as Auf einer Burg progresses towards its denou- ement, the end-line rhymes become increasingly inexact. The gently jarring effect of impure rhymes anticipates and emphasizes the sudden disturbing appearance of the weeping bride at the conclusion of the poem. (Compare the perfect alternating rhymes of the first two

" No significant literary scholarship has been devoted solely to Auf einer Burg. A general study of Eichendorffs poetic style is found in Hans Jurg Liithi's Dichtung und Dichter bei Joseph von Eichendorff (Bern and Munich, 1966). Oskar Seidlin's Versuche iiber Eichendorff (Gottingen, 1965) offers an evaluation of the poet's lyric style. English language scholarship on Eichendorff is scarce, and much of his work remains untrans- lated (and perhaps untranslatable). Egon Schwarz did write a helpful chapter on "The Lyrics" in his introductory book, Joseph von Eichendorff (New York, 1972), pp. 79-101.

9 See Lawrence R. Radner, "The Instrument, The Musician, The Song: An In- troduction to Eichendorffs Symbolism," Monatshefte LVI (1964), 339-45; and Walter Salmen, "Eichendorffs Musikanschauung," Neue Zeitschrift fur Musik CXVII (1956), 332-35?


strophes with lines one and three of the third strophe, and all four lines of the last strophe.)

While sonority is an important element in Eichendorff's poetry, space is an equally essential feature of his writing. Incredibly spacious landscapes are a hallmark of his work. The poet painted enormous scenes, creating images of vast distances which exceed quotidian vision. Frequently his landscapes are presented from a strangely om- niscient viewpoint fixed high in the air; the view simultaneously em- braces an entire vista and the tiniest distant detail. In addition to this

special point of view, Eichendorffs landscapes owe much to the con- stant and distinctive use of spatial adverbs, prepositions, and direc- tional verb prefixes which direct the reader's inner sight across the

great distances depicted in his poems.lo In Aufeiner Burg, Eichendorff

portrays a stony knight on the stormy heights, a decaying watchtower, and a wedding party passing in the valley below. The poem's single landscape easily encompasses these various elements. From a point that seems to be suspended in mid-air, the view stretches across the whole poem: up and into the tower high above ("oben," stated twice in the first two strophes), outside and around the watchtower ("draus-

574 sen," in strophe three), and far down to the river below ("da unten" in the last strophe). Rather than presenting two self-contained and contrasting scenes, the typical all-inclusive view sweeps through the entire work. The resulting picture, with its impression of great space and distance, resembles those painted by Eichendorffs contemporary, Caspar David Friedrich.ll

The wedding party of Auf einer Burg is not situated in a scene separate from the watchtower. Though it may seem impossible that the bride's tears are visible such a great distance from the knight, the two figures are part of the same landscape. It is not unusual for Eichendorff's landscapes to exhibit this sort of "spatial and visual ... disregard for the empirical possibilities of sense perception." In one novel, for example, there are many instances of views unimpeded by reality: a woman spots a piece of jewelry sparkling across a wide valley, the crashing beams of a burning house are seen at an aston- ishing distance, and a hero high on a hilltop catches the eye of a girl

1o Translation often destroys the spatial effect of Eichendorffs linguistic manip- ulations (e.g., placing detachable prefixes denoting direction far from their verb roots). Details on how Eichendorffs grammar contributes to his spacious scenes are in Richard Alewyn's important article, "Eine Landschaft Eichendorffs," Euphorion LI (1957), 42- 60; reprinted in Eichendorff Heute, edited by Paul Stocklein (Munich, 1960), pp. 17-43; and Leo Spitzer's response to Alewyn in "Zu einer Landschaft Eichendorffs," Euphorion LII (1958), 142-52.

" Schlager, p. 115.


riding on horseback far below.l2 Such instances are not the result of

faulty depth perception or accidents in perspective. For, unlike the

scenery found in much romantic prose and poetry:

Eichendorffs landscapes are not decorative material introduced at will for the sake of background or atmosphere.... [they] are not self-contained pictures, vehicles for the transmission of subjective emotions, but they express the ontology of man's fate and existence.

Quite simply, Eichendorffs unique landscapes are "illustrative of metaphysical positions."'l To appreciate the metaphysical significance of the landscape in Auf einer Burg, a third aspect of Eichen- dorffs style must be examined.

Traces of Germanic folk tradition are apparent in many of Eichendorffs works. These stylistic influences are easily identified in Auf einer Burg: the simple syntax, four-line strophes, end-rhyme pat- tern of a-b-a-b, and the occasional impure rhymes. In addition to general stylistic influences, Eichendorff's writings often were inspired by specific stories from Germanic folklore.'4 It is German mythology that dictates the content of the puzzling poem Auf einer Burg. The 575 profound impact of legend on this poem has been ignored, underes- timated, or misunderstood. Yet permeating the entire lyric is precise and significant reference to one particular and centrally important myth: the legend of Friedrich Barbarossa.

There was an historical Emperor Friedrich I, nicknamed Bar- barossa. He was a popular German ruler who, by some accounts, drowned en route to Jerusalem in 1190. According to legend, however, Barbarossa is not dead. Rather, he miraculously survives in a secret cavern inside a mountain called Kyffhauser. There he sits, seemingly asleep, as still as a statue on an ancient throne, awaiting his opportunity to return and lead the German people in their time of need. As he keeps watch through the centuries, his renowned red beard continues to grow to such great length and strength that it mingles with the very roots of the mountain. Meanwhile, the royal castle on the mountain's peak, deserted for many years, has fallen into ruin. Only the emperor's enormous blackbirds remain, circling the

12 Detlev W. Schumann, "Some Scenic Motifs in Eichendorffs Ahnung und Gegen- wart," Journal of English and German Philology LVI (1957), 562. 13 Oskar Seidlin, "Eichendorffs Symbolic Landscape," Publication of the Modern Language Association LXXII (1952), 465-81; reprinted in Essays in German and Compar- ative Literature (Chapel Hill, 1961), pp. 150, 145, 150.

14 See Gillian Rodger, "Eichendorffs Conception of the Supernatural World of the Ballad," German Life and Letters N.S. XIII (1959/60), 195-206; Jacob Harold Hein- zelmann, The Influence of the German Volkslieder on Eichendorffs Lyric (Leipzig, 1910); and Thym, pp. 24-29.


abode of their master. Though storms rage on Kyffhauser whenever Barbarossa is angered by the failures of his countrymen, the emperor has yet to rouse himself and come to their aid. One day, the birds will leave Kyffhiuser. Their disappearance will signal the imminent return of the king to his people.'5

All the essential elements of the Kyffhauser folk tale are present in Auf einer Burg: an ancient sleeping knight with his stony counte- nance and ever-growing beard, the ruins of a deserted tower, the rainstorms, and the birds.'6 Some writers (represented below by the

scholarly extremes of an article on Opus 39/VII by Karlheinz Schlager and an introductory study of lieder by Elaine Brody and Robert Fowkes) have recognized a vague relationship between the poem and the legend of Kyffhauser mountain, but they have misunderstood or

ignored the precision and significance of the work's specific mythological allusions. For example:

These strophes rely on the knight, castle, and the Kyffhauser legend as signs of the legacy of the middle ages, and the forest breezes and singing birds as evidence of the nature worship of the romantics.'7

576 This poem is reminiscent of the legend of Barbarossa. ... What the connection may be between the legend and the present poem is unclear. Romanticism was exceedingly fond of castles, especially those in ruins. The birds singing into glassless windows is also a romantic touch.s1

In such analyses, important symbolic components are misinterpreted and mistakenly dismissed as typical romantic literary gestures.

Consider the bird,, for instance, within the mythological context of the poem. Although singing birds commonly inhabit nineteenth-

century German lyric poetry, the mountain-top Waldesvogel in Auf einer Burg do not function as conventional romantic symbols. For the mountain described in this poem is a numinous site, sacred since

pre-historic times. Beneath the surface of the Barbarossa legend lies an earlier layer of Kyffhauser mythology which relates that Wotan took refuge within this same mountain when the Germanic tribes abandoned the old beliefs and converted to Christianity. The birds in

15 For information on the legendary and the historical Barbarossa, see Peter Munz, Frederick Barbarossa: A Study in Medieval Politics (Ithaca, 1969); and Marcel Pa- caut, Frederick Barbarossa, translated by A.J. Pomerans (New York, 1970).

'' Though the knight is not named, his identity is confirmed by the symbolic context. Likewise, the name of an anonymous king could be supplied in an English poem containing references to a magical sword, a mysterious lake, and a round table.

'7 Schlager, p. 122. '8 Elaine Brody and Robert A. Fowkes, The German Lied and Its PoetrN (New York,

1971), p. 153.


Auf einer Burg represent one of the more ancient and fascinating aspects of the Kyffhauser tradition, for Barbarossa's birds have been identified as the direct mythological descendants of Wotan's ravens.l9 Such magical birds are not simple "romantic touches," or mere signs of romantic "nature worship," as stated above. Nor are they "images of the present which animate the landscape of the concluding two stanzas" in order to contrast with the knightly "representative of the

past" who dominates the poem's first two strophes.20 The lonely birds, the only living creatures remaining on the mountain, are important symbolic threads from the rich fabric of Kyffhauser legend which Eichendorff worked into the texture of Auf einer Burg.

Friedrich Barbarossa's appearance in a German poem of 1837 is not surprising. His myth had been an important part of the German

imagination for centuries. During the upheavals of the Reformation, the emperor was expected to appear in defense of the Catholic faith. Years later, during another politically difficult period, he was supposed to return and restore German honor by defeating Napoleon. (Severe rainstorms were reported on Kyffhliuser during the infamous German defeat at the Battle of Jena.) The legend's strong national

appeal grew throughout the nineteenth century.2' After Napoleon 577 was removed from the scene-with no apparent help from Barbarossa-the legendary Emperor's mission became one of estab- lishing German spiritual, cultural, and political unity.

The ancient king's appearance in a work by Eichendorff is not

surprising, either. The myth's traditional sixteenth-century religious interpretations and contemporary nineteenth-century political impli- cations held personal appeal for the poet. A Roman Catholic by birth and conviction, Eichendorff faced religious intolerance during his career in the Protestant Prussian bureaucracy; he responded by in- fusing his literary work with the imagery and lessons of his faith. Barbarossa, in his traditional guise as the restorer of the true church, is quite at home in Eichendorff's poetic world. So, too, is Barbarossa as the nemesis of Napoleon, for the crises of the post-revolutionary world profoundly disturbed Eichendorffs life and greatly influenced

19 Munz, p. 12. 20

Thym, pp. 115-16. 21 A few examples of the legend's popularity in the nineteenth century: Novalis

discussed the myth in his letters c. 1800; in 181o a music festival was held in Franken- hausen to honor Barbarossa; Riickert wrote a poem called Der alte Barbarossa c. 1815; Grimm included the story in the Deutsche Mythologie of 1816; Bechstein recounted the tale in a collection of Thuringian legends in 1835; and in 1871 Kaiser Wilhelm I erected a statue of himself mounted on a pedestal containing a representation of Barbarossa sleeping in his secret cavern. See Munz, pp. 3-18; and Pacaut, pp. 205-08.


his writing. The poet volunteered for military service in anti-

Napoleonic forces, bitterly resenting the French occupation of Halle while he was there as a student. In the aftermath of the Napoleonic wars, his aristocratic family lost their beloved ancestral manor, and Eichendorff was reduced to working as a civil servant.22 Freiherr Eichendorffs beautiful estate-its castle, gardens, and entire way of life-were idealized in the writer's later works as a lost paradise.

Roman Catholic faith, anti-Napoleonic sentiment, nostalgia for the pre-revolutionary world, and obsession with the unrealized dreams of a romanticized past, are evident in many of Eichendorff's works, not the least of which is Auf einer Burg. In this poem, the

Kyffhauser legend provides the means for Eichendorff's characteristic poetic utterance. Friedrich Barbarossa represents the promise of the past for which Eichendorff yearned. The emperor's appearance in the poem is highly significant, not coincidental. The poem's imagery relates directly and meaningfully to the myth; it is not simply the stock issue of romantic German lyric poetry.

What, then, is the role of the bride in this poem, and why is she

crying? Appearing without introduction in the last line with her tears 578 made manifest in the last word, she has caused no end of difficulty for

those trying to analyze the poem Auf einer Burg in order to evaluate Schumann's lied of the same name. Many explanations have been offered for her seemingly inexplicable final gesture. For example, in answer to Jack Stein's presumption that the woman "is probably crying from happiness or simple nervous tension," Jurgen Thym proposed that the bride weeps because, "one may assume that the image of the petrified knight has reminded her of life's transitoriness."

Though literary scholars might question the affinity of Eichendorff and Heinrich Heine, Karlheinz Schlager concluded that whether the bride cries out of joy, emotion, or fear of the eerie ruin looming above, her tears are "in any case, a moment of irritation similar to the

unexpected ironic endings found in many poems by Heine." Rather than irony, Barbara Turchin believes it is primarily a "sense of alienation" that is so "vividly expressed in the vision of the bride who weeps

22 An understanding of these aspects of Eichendorffs life contributes to compre- hension of his work. A brief biography is found in Paul Stocklein's "Joseph von Eichen- dorff' entry in volume three of Die grossen Deutschen: Deutsche Biographie, edited by H. Heimpel, et al. (Berlin, 1956), pp. oo-16. His article on "Eichendorffs Personlichkeit" published in Eichendorff Heute, pp. 242-73, provides additional insights. Religious influences are considered in Blackall's discussion of Eichendorffs work, pp. 242-62. The impact of the French Revolution is assessed in a discussion of Eichendorffs Schloss Diirande by Josef Kunz in Eichendorff: Hohepunkt und Krise der Sptitromantik (Darmstadt, 1967), pp. 9-32.


in the midst of sunshine and merriment."23 Brody and Fowkes, on the other hand, openly admit defeat:

The wedding [in Aufeiner Burg] ... reminds one of another poem by Eichendorff called Die weinende Braut ... [wherein the bride] cries because her real lover has deserted her and the man she is marrying is not one she loves. But what that may have to do with the present poem or what the wedding in the sunlight has to do with the ruined castle in the rain is obscure indeed.24

In deference to Eichendorff's poetic style, and in order to remedy this confusion, the troublesome bride must be considered as another

integral feature of the poem's mythological milieu and symbolic land-

scape. In so doing, it should be mentioned that among the many variant details of the numerous versions of the Barbarossa myth is a

description of the old knight in the mountain being served by an attendant, his virginal daughter. This detail may be the source of Eichendorff's bride. Whatever her origin, her placement is of great importance because she is assigned a definite location. Such designa- tions are rare, because Eichendorff's landscapes normally adhere to 5 "the general rule of geographical anonymity." The atypical identifi- cation of an authentic site in Aufeiner Burg is significant, for in Eichen- dorff's works "it can almost be stated as a rule that the more clearly a

description is related to a specific locality, the more visionary it turns out to be."25 In Auf einer Burg, the bride does not travel on an anonymous stream. She sails by on the German river unequaled in its wealth of powerful historical and literary associations, the sacred river of German romanticism and nationalism, the Rhine.

Within a symbolic landscape by Eichendorff, a view from the

Thuringian Harz mountain of Kyffhiauser all the way to the Rhine is entirely possible. In similar literary landscapes created by the author with characteristic disregard for actual distance, some fictional char- acters in northern Italy have clearly seen the Danube nearly two hundred miles away, while others have traveled on foot from Vienna to the Rhine in a single evening!26 Obviously, Eichendorff does not use place names for geographic accuracy but for symbolic impact. Rivers in general are among his most potent images, and the Rhine in particular is one of his favorite geographic symbols. The Rhine figures

23 See Stein, p. 115; Thym, p. 116; Schlager, p. 122; and Turchin, p. 324. 24 Brody and Fowkes, p. 153. 25 Schumann, p. 568; and Seidlin, "Eichendorffs Symbolic Landscape," p. 145. 26 See Seidlin, "Eichendorffs Symbolic Landscape," p. 145-46; and Schumann, p.

568.


prominently in Ahnung und Gegenwart, Eichendorff's first important prose work. In this book, the river's first appearance is intriguing:

Als sie aus dem Walde auf When they came out of the einen hervorragenden Felsen woods and stepped up upon a heraustraten, sahen sie auf projecting rock, suddenly they einmal aus wunderreicher saw coming from a miraculous Ferne, von alten Burgen und distance, from ancient castles ewigen Waldern kommend, and timeless forests, the stream den Strom vergangener of past ages and immortal in- Zeiten und unverganglicher spiration, the royal Rhine. Begeisterung, den konigli- chen Rhein.27

Evaluating this important description of the Rhine and the fol-

lowing dramatic incident, a swim which marks the story's turning point, Oscar Seidlin writes:

The numerous ruins, covered with creepers and grass, are not scat- tered about as picturesque props, but they symbolize lived time which is being kept slumbering.... The river Rhine is here the

580 "stream of ages past"; it not only conveys and alludes to, but actually is history. And the swim which the two friends take in the river clearly indicates that scenic view here stands for historic event; for the leap into the Rhine takes place in our novel just before the two friends enter upon their soldierly careers.... This dive into the Rhine . . ., is actually the hero's commitment to and leap into Ger- man history. What is presented here as a scenic view is in reality history, past, present, and future. Through the medium of landscape Eichendorff articulates again and again the perspective of time, its pastness and future encompassed in the present.28

In Auf einer Burg, a woman, a conventional symbol for a nation, who is also a bride, an ancient symbol for the Christian church, sails

by on the one river which represents the course of German history. Above her is the saviour of the German people, the single figure who could restore political stability, religious harmony, and the peace of a vanished golden age. A new era is at hand. The wedding is prepared: the sun shines on the beautiful bride and the musicians play merrily. Yet, while the river flows through time, the ancient king remains frozen in time. The bride and the knight, the expectant and the expected, though within sight of each other, are kept apart. The ominous birds remain on the mountain, singing among the ruins.

27 Joseph von Eichendorff, Eichendorffs Werke, ed. Richard Dietze, 2 vols. (Leipzig, n.d.) II, 189.

28 Seidlin, "Eichendorffs Symbolic Landscape," pp. 155-56.


Barbarossa does not descend. And the bride, quite understandably, weeps.

The masterful allegorical poem is all of one piece. Through rich

mythological allusions developed within a carefully designed symbolic landscape, the bride and the knight are inextricably and tragically bound to one another, unable to separate or unite. Eichendorffs

poem, misinterpreted by so many, was comprehended fully by Robert Schumann. Music scholars have consistently evaluated the poem in terms of two sharply opposed figures, scenes, or ideas: mountain and

valley, rain and sunshine, knight and bride, past and present, death and life, Sein oder Schein. They have denigrated Schumann's setting for not reflecting these divisions. But their literary evaluations force contrasts upon the unified poem which contradict its basic nature. Schumann, on the other hand, recognized the fully integrated mythological symbolism of the poem and the true relationship of the bride and the knight. He therefore set their descriptions to the same music, using a simple strophic formula which incorporates two poetic stanzas in each musical strophe. The musical form thus reflects the poetic content. The strophic setting does not "defeat the poet's intention" or

"subjugate the language to the force of the musical form." The final 581

poetic strophes do not "need some fresh musical idea." The musical

repetition in the last two stanzas does not represent a "one-sided clarification in interpreting the ambiguous imagery of the poem," or a "strange mismatch" of text and music. Nor is it likely that the com-

poser intended the allegorical bride's music to illustrate Clara Wieck's

"painful struggle back and forth between filial devotion to her father and love for Schumann."29

We can assume that Schumann, a well-read man of his time, was familiar with the popular legend of Friedrich Barbarossa as it appeared in German romantic literature. At the very least, Schumann would have met Barbarossa in the famous poem by Rtickert, a poet whose work the composer held in high esteem. Schumann clearly recognized the presence and significance of the Kyffhauser legend in Eichendorff's poem. Beyond simple strophic form, many other atypical features of Auf einer Burg represent appropriate and intelligent musical responses to the poem's content and meaning.

Specifically, Schumann created a sense of timelessness and antiq- uity in his setting of Auf einer Burg through the use of archaic musical techniques. The piano's strict four-part imitative counterpoint, a very unusual feature, evokes the past. Expressed primarily in half notes,

29 "Defeat," Sams, p. loo; "subjugate," Busse, p. 28; "fresh idea," Walsh, p. 38; "one-sided," Thym, p. 204; "strange mismatch," Stein, p. 115; and "painful struggle," Draheim, p. 24.


the texture has been said to resemble a ricercar.30 Traces of modality also cast a distinctive antique light on the song, and create confusion

regarding its tonality and mode. Analysts disagree about the key of the lied, some writing of it as E minor, others referring to it as E?, and one saying it fluctuates between E minor, A minor, and E major. The song is manifestly in A minor, as described by Theodore Adorno and Jurgen Thym.31 But uncertainty arises because the tonality is under the modal influence of E aeolian, and the song spends most of its brief life avoiding the tonic.

The beginning of the lied is heard as sounding not in A but in E minor. By opening the seventh song on its minor dominant, Schu- mann established an harmonic link with the previous song (which is in B major) and partially bridged the cycle's central tonal division. In the seventh lied, only a single clear A-minor cadence appears. It is centrally placed, emphatically sounding in measure nineteen at the end of the brief piano interlude between the two strophes. Prior to that, the first strophe ends in measure seventeen with a harsh clash of implied harmonic functions. At that moment, the voice resolves a suspension by moving to the Gt leading tone from the dominant

582 triad, while the bass, imitating the opening motif once again, drops a fifth to land on the tonic A. The resulting clash of Gt and A, instead of moving towards a solution, simply remains unresolved. When repeated at the end of strophe two, the conflict finds an unexpected resolution. The troublesome Gt is not removed; rather, the tonic A is eliminated. We are thus left with an unexpected final E-major triad, which has been misidentified as the completion of a Phrygian cadence and as a major tonic chord.32 Nevertheless, the ear easily recognizes the unmistakable and indecisive sound of an ending on the true dominant as the voice trails off with a tiny melisma. (The full cadential progression is completed with the sounding of the A-minor tonic chord in the second measure of the next lied.) The A-minor tonality acts as the center of gravity for Auf einer Burg, with the song's dominant conclusion linked to its E-minor opening. Unlike any other song in the cycle, the lied ends harmonically off in the middle distance where it began. At the beginning and end it is suspended tonally in mid-air, so to speak, and the musical effect recalls the poem's sen- sation of hovering in space above a vast landscape.

30 See Herwig Knaus, Musiksprache und Werkstructur in Robert Schumanns "Liederkreis" (Munich and Salzburg, 1974), p. 63; and Turchin, p. 370.

31 See Lindlar, p. 273; Knaus, p. 18; Turchin, p. 312; Draheim, p. 25; Adorno, p. 89; and Thym, p. 170.

32 Turchin, p. 323.


Harsh simplicity and exceptional austerity distinguish Schu- mann's setting of Auf einer Burg. The unique expressive restraint reflects the distilled essence of the poem, what Schlager termed "die Erstarrung," the knight's eternal living death in suspended animation.33 For instance, the melody of the seventh song of Opus 39 is not animated or dramatic. The basically static vocal rhythm adheres with stifling closeness to the poem's underlying trochaic meter and robs the song of rhythmic drive. The vocal range is restricted to one octave in a relatively low tessitura, and the dynamic level is uniformly hushed. Except for the final brief melisma, the textual declamation is consistently syllabic, and it is frequently rendered on repeated pitches. The accompaniment's rigid polyphonic texture, with its in- flexible independent voice leading, lacks vitality. The very simple opening motif, a falling fifth followed by a rising third, is obstinately imitated. Straightforward and persistent sequence dominates the second half of the strophic melody, while a stubborn interior pedal point on C sounds through the central six measures of each strophe. The adagio tempo does not enliven the sluggish harmonic pace, and the slow-moving accompanimental half notes lack momentum. The piano texture is thin and the accompaniment minimal. Unlike other settings 583 in the cycle, Auf einer Burg stands without piano introduction or postlude to alleviate its stark simplicity. Each of the song's thirty-nine measures seem to contain the fewest notes possible.

The severe economy of expression which dominates this unex- pansive song produces a feeling of psychological distance, a lack of emotional involvement. The wind, rain, river, birds, and players, call forth no direct musical response. The bride's tears occasion no dramatic musical outburst. Instead, the song sensitively echoes the aloof mythological atmosphere of the poem, and nothing disrupts the plain and placid surface of the music. The setting remains so restrained that in some performances the lied runs the risk, as Jack Stein put it, of falling apart.34 Nevertheless, the objectivity of this very restricted setting perfectly mirrors the text, for the poem Auf einer Burg is also impersonal and dispassionate. It is the only poem in Opus 39 to draw material from the distant, timeless realm of mythology.35 And, unlike the other poems in the cycle, it contains neither ich, nor du, nor any dialogue. The seventh poem has no explicit or implicit protagonist with whom the reader or listener can identify.

33 Schlager, p. 130. 34 Stein, p. 115. 35 "Die hexe Lorelei," found in the cycle's third song, is not a resident of the

ancient mythological realm inhabited by Barbarossa. A popular figure in German romanticism, the witch Lorelei was invented c. 1800 by Brentano.


What purpose might such a truly extraordinary song serve in the Liederkreis von Eichendorff? Rolf Ringger suggested that, in comparison to the sixth song, the seventh was meant to "begin the second half [of the cycle] as if exhausted."36 The subdued seventh lied does contrast

markedly with the cycle's sixth lied, Schine Fremde, which represents the first section's climax in terms of dynamic level, range, tempo, rhythmic activity, and expression of joyful emotion. Yet the severely circumscribed Aif einer Burg stands in exaggerated contradistinction not only to the preceding song, but also to every other song in the

cycle. The contrast is so great that Auf einer Burg seems to belong to a

completely different poetic realm and a foreign musical world. Why was this anomaly included in the Liederkreis, and why was it placed in a crucial position within the cycle?

The answer lies in the concept of dualism, or bi-centrality, which influenced almost all aspects of early romantic art and aesthetics.

Diptych structures, framing effects, mirror images, dual perceptual levels, and the Doppelginger are common examples of the many dualistic features found in early romantic works. Schumann did not have exclusive rights to the literary device or mental process which gave

584 birth to Florestan and Eusebius. That type of dualism was rampant in German romanticism. The most widespread of dualistic art forms in the nineteenth century was the German novella with inserted poems. In these once very popular but now little-known literary works, the

prose narrative represented one artistic level while the interjected lyrics represented another. The earliest German romantic fiction writers often placed their poetic inserts in a random fashion. The next

generation of novelists (which included Eichendorff) strategically placed their poems so that they could articulate the structure of the

prose narrative. These insertions interrupted the flow of time in the narrative, providing a temporary pause and a glance into a timeless realm. Carefully inserted at critical points, the poems illuminated the

larger structure of the entire prose work. Marshall Brown's evaluation of the form and intent of early German romantic fiction is very helpful in comprehending this twofold literary form:

The contrast between propulsive narration and lyrical pause ... is fundamental in the German romantic fiction. The interaction of the two worlds is explored in countless modulations: the song [appearing in a novel as a poem] may be a sudden revelation or a distraction, an analogue or a pointed irrelevance .... But whatever the specific circumstances, the very regularity of rhythm and rhyme constitutes an interruption of the linear impetus of time.

3'( Ringger, p. 342.


Of romantic bicentral forms, the most widely used combines history and poetry: it is the prose narrative with inserted lyrics.... Time- lessness characterizes the lyric interruptions of the flow of events in general.... Whatever the format, the poems give access to a timeless world that is the ground of our mortal existence. .... [The] poems likewise provide an indispensable higher plane ... without which novels are mere entertainment.37

The particular dichotomy of this romantic literary form is a model for Schumann's Liederkreis. Within the Opus 39 cycle, the style, placement and function of Auf einer Burg parallels that of the lyric insert within the German novella. Placed among lieder with which it has little in common textually or musically, Auf einer Burg offers a

particular type of romantic dualism. In the song cycle, the seventh lied acts as the secondary "higher plane" typically afforded by a poetic insert in German romantic fiction. The song's poetic subject, a noble and ancient legend with modern resonance, is perfectly suited to this role. The concerns of Auf einer Burg are far removed from the conventional romantic preoccupations of loneliness, love, and longing which typify the cycle's other eleven lyrics. The ancient myth, pre- 585 sented with impersonal objectivity, contrasts with the subjective and self-centered surrounding poems in a way which duplicates the intent of the poetry/prose dualism of the romantic novel. The elevated and

legendary subject of the seventh poem assures that the cycle is not "mere entertainment," and it "gives access to a timeless world."

A haunting sense of timelessness is supplied not only by the poem's subject. It is also achieved in the lied's music, a remarkable feat

considering that the basic medium of music is sound in time. The

poem's setting acts as an "interruption of the linear impetus of time"; it contrasts with the "propulsive narration" of the surrounding musical material. Following the sixth song's musical climax, forward momentum in Opus 39 comes to a halt with the demonstrably static

setting of Auf einer Burg. Little happens here: no rhythmic drive pro- pels the song, no clearly defined tonal goal urges it forward, no harmonic tension furthers its progress, no dramatic melodic line carries it onward, and no crescendos lift it toward a climax. The musical flow of time seems temporarily arrested; we are given a glimpse into an unchanging world. Immediately thereafter we are jolted back to mun- dane temporal reality with the long anticipated A-minor opening of the eighth lied. Rapid running sixteenth figurations and articulated

37 Marshall Brown, The Shape of German Romanticism (Ithaca, 1979), pp. 212 and 208-09.


sixteenth chords hurry us away from the timeless scene. Impersonal- ity is left behind: the first word of the eighth poem is "ich." (And the

protagonists notes that he seems to see a castle, though it is very far away!38)

In the romantic novel, the author's self-imposed restrictions of form, meter, and rhyme set the poetic inserts apart from the freer and more spontaneous language of the surrounding prose narrative.

Obviously, in a collection of twelve poems, one poem cannot contrast with the other poems in this way. However, in setting the Liederkreis

poems Schumann provided the seventh poem with an analogous dis- tinction. Schumann imposed very restrictive compositional proce- dures on Auf einer Burg: strophic form, imitation, sequence, rhythmic repetition, limited range, uniform dynamic level, and sparse accom-

paniment. These limitations are similar to those adopted when writ-

ing poetry instead of prose. The restrictions distinguish the seventh song from all the other songs in the cycle, which are generally freer, less controlled, and more spontaneous or prose-like.

Schumann's youthful literary ambition, his mature literary so- phistication, and his life-long involvement with literature need not be

586 recounted here. The use of literary models in his musical work was acknowledged long ago. His Opus 2, Papillons, is a well-documented example; it is based specifically on the final scene of a story by Jean Paul Richter.39 For his Opus 39, instead of adopting a specific model, Schumann designed a musical scheme based generally on a popular contemporary literary form, the German romantic prose novella with poetic inserts which function as momentary and illuminating breaks in the passage of time.4?

Close examination of the cycle's most enigmatic, controversial, and challenging song reveals that Schumann's Opus 39 contains here- tofore unsuspected additional evidence of the composer's sensitive and creative musical response to the influence of romantic literature. Schumann did not misunderstand Eichendorffs Auf einer Burg. He did not give it an inadequate setting, or misplace it in his Liederkreis. The perplexing features of the seventh song can be comprehended

38 "Die Mondesschimmer fliegen, als sah' ich unter mir das Schloss im Thale liegen, und ist doch so weit von hier!" See In der Fremde ("Ich hor die Bachlein").

39 See Robert L. Jacobs, "Schumann and Jean Paul," Music and Letters XXX (1949), 250-58; and Edward A. Lippmann, "Theory and Practice in Schumann's Aesthetics," Journal of the American Musicological Society XVII (1964), 310-45.

40 One other writer senses a prose foundation to the selection and order of poems in Opus 39. But rather than suggesting a generic literary model, as proposed above, Herwig Knaus, pp. 13-14, asserts that the Liederkreis is actually based on Eichendorffs novel Ahnung und Gegenwart. Knaus provides little detail on the supposed correlation of the cycle and the novel, and does not discuss Auf einer Burg in this regard. Turchin convincingly dismisses this speculation for lack of evidence, pp. 277-78.

EICHENDORFF AND SCHUMANN EICHENDORFF AND SCHUMANN

and explained by first examining the original creation, the poem, before evaluating the composite work of art, the lied. An understanding of this unusual song and its important function in the Opus 39 cycle is unlocked by a literary key which is held in the stony hand of Friedrich Barbarossa.

Aurora, New York

587 CORRECTION

and explained by first examining the original creation, the poem, before evaluating the composite work of art, the lied. An understanding of this unusual song and its important function in the Opus 39 cycle is unlocked by a literary key which is held in the stony hand of Friedrich Barbarossa.

Aurora, New York

587 CORRECTION

The article by Geoffrey Payzant, "Hanslick on Music as Product of Feeling," from which Peter Kivy quoted in his "What Was Hanslick Denying?" was incorrectly cited (this Journal VIII, no. 1 [Winter 1990], 4). It appeared in the Journal of Musicological Research IX, nos. 2-3 (1989), 133-45.

The article by Geoffrey Payzant, "Hanslick on Music as Product of Feeling," from which Peter Kivy quoted in his "What Was Hanslick Denying?" was incorrectly cited (this Journal VIII, no. 1 [Winter 1990], 4). It appeared in the Journal of Musicological Research IX, nos. 2-3 (1989), 133-45.

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Documents

auf einer burg

ahnung und gegenwart

musicians play merrily

jean paul richter

joseph von eichendorff

eichendorffs symbolic landscape

aufeiner burg

symbolic landscape