Die Harzreise

Die Harzreise ("The Harz Journey") is a travel report about a trip to the Harz Mountains by German poet and author, Heinrich Heine, compiled in autumn 1824, which was first published in January and February 1826 in the magazine, Der Gesellschafter, by Friedrich Wilhelm Gubitz and ran for fourteen issues. Some editorial changes were made beforehand. Later in 1826 Die Harzreise appeared in the first part of Reisebilder ("Travel Scenes"). For the book, Heine made revisions and changes, and added the famous Göttingen section. Heine himself described his record as a literary fragment. The book was the first of Heine's to be published by Hoffmann and Campe of Hamburg, the publisher who later brought out all Heine's writings.

Content

In his work, Heinrich Heine describes his journey as a student from Göttingen through the Harz, over its highest mountain, the Brocken, to the village of Ilsenburg. During the trip he meet well known and unknown contemporaries, who he sometimes describes in detail and compares with other people, sometimes historical protagonists.

For example, he meets in Göttingen the physician and (like Heine) Jewish Burschenschaft member, Karl Friedrich Heinrich Marx and recounts their exchange about medicine as well as Marx' treatise, Goettingen in medicinischer, physischer und historischer Hinsicht ("Göttingen From a Medical, Physical and Historic Perspective").[1][2]

Nature is also a subject of this travel account:

In the work, he mentions all the rest points and overnight stops made by this group of travelling poets:

The route, which took Heinrich Heine about four weeks,[3] has become a trail that tourists can follow in and which, as the Heinrich Heine Way (Heinrich-Heine-Weg) is described in several travel guides.[4]

A duel, which was illegal at the time, between students is also a subject of his writings.

Appraisal

The work goes far beyond what might be expected from the early works of a budding writer. Romantic longing and disappointment, illusion and irony are already freely woven into the writing:

This is now the Ilse, the lovely, sweet Ilse. She runs through the blessed Ilse valley, on whose twin sides the mountains rise gradually higher, and they are, down to their feet, most often covered in beech, oak and familiar leafy bushes, no longer in firs and other pinewood trees. ... Yes, the legend is true, the Ilse is a princess, who runs down the mountainside, blooming and laughing. How her white bubbling robe glints in the sunshine! How her silver sashes flutter in the wind! How her diamonds sparkle and flash!.

Translations into other languages

References

  1. ↑ Die Harzreise in: Reisebilder Vol. 1. Hamburg 1826, S. 117.
  2. ↑ Katarzyna Jastal: Körperkonstruktionen in der Frühen Prosa Heinrich Heines. Krakau, 2009, p. 76 und pp. 90 ff.
  3. ↑ http://www.literarischegesellschaft.de/Heinrich_Heine_HarzreiseII.html
  4. ↑ http://www.erlebnisgruenesband.de/erlebnis-gruenes-band/touren-am-gruenen-band/harz/harz-gebirge/der-heinrich-heine-weg.html

Literature

External links