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Tieck's Essay Über Das Erhabene

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Edwin H. Zeydel*
Affiliation:
University of Cincinnati

Extract

In Box 18 of the “Ludwig Tieck-Nachlass” in the Preussische Staatsbibliothek, Berlin, we find, in Tieck's hand, on six quarto leaves, an unfinished essay entitled Über das Erhabene, dated 1792. It has never been published and is barely touched upon in the voluminous literature on Tieck, although it is not without significance in the long series of critical works for which its author is famed.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1935

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References

1 Zu Ludwig Tiecks Nachlass,“ Archiv für Literaturgeschichte, xv, 316 ff.

2 Tieck-Studien. Drei Kapitel zu dem Thema: Der junge Tieck. Berlin-Wilmersdorf (1903).

3 An error on Regener's part for “Home.”

4 Reprinted in Tieck's Kritische Schriften (Leipzig, 1848), i, 3 ff.

5 This essay has never been noticed or even mentioned by any writer on Tieck. It covers four quarto sheets and gives preference to the dramatic poets (not surprising in view of Tieck's early interest in histrionics), entirely overlooking nature itself as a possible subject, perhaps because the author had only historical painting in mind. Tieck here opposes both Caylus and Lessing, who, he claims, recommend epics, especially those of Homer. But he adds: “Ich mag es nicht wagen, darüber zu streiten, ob Lessing in seiner Critik gegen Caylus nicht vielleicht zu weit gegangen sei, denn es ist zu gefährlich, sich mit einem solchen Gegner in einen Zweikampf ein zu lassen.”

6 Reprinted Krit. Schr., i, 37 ff.

7 Das Buch über Shakespeare. Handschriftliche Aufzeichnungen von Ludwig Tieck. Aus seinem Nachlass [i.e., Stadtbibliothek, Berlin] herausgegeben von Henry Lüdeke (Halle, 1920), pp. 1–364.

8 This sentence, with the omission of “selbst,” is quoted in Regener, op. cit., p. 21.

9 C. H. Heinecke published his translation of Longinus, with commentary, life and critical essay, in Dresden, 1737–38: J. G. Schlosser his in Leipzig, 1781–82.

10 Corrected from “in seinem achten Abschnitt.”

11 Quoted by Regener, p. 21.

12 Several illegible words, crossed out.

13 This word is underscored.

14 Here the words “und es mit meinem Blick” are crossed out.

15 Tieck quotes very freely and inaccurately. Cf. Deutsche Nationallit., 452, p. 173:

… von blühenden Fruchtbäumen schimmert

Der Garten, die kreuzende Gänge mit roter Dunkelheit füllen,

Und Zephyr gaukelt umher, treibt Wolken von Blüten zur Höhe,

Die sich ergiessen und regnen.

16 Here the word “fühlen” is crossed out.

17 The original has “ietzund.” Cf. Friedrichs von Logau sämtliche Sinngedichte herausgeg. von Gustav Eitner, Bibl. des Literar. Vereins in Stuttgart, cxiii (Tübingen, 1872), epigram 2434.

18 Cf. Deutsche Nationallit., 412, p. 110. The authentic text has “rung” and “schwung.”

19 Cf. Deutsche Nationallit., ibid. Quoted, with three serious errors, in J. G. Sulzer's Allgemeine Theorie der schönen Künste, 2. Teil, neue verm. zweite Aufl. (Leipzig, 1792), sub “Erhaben,” p. 99.

20 Accurate text in Deutsche Nationallit. 412, p. 111: “Zeit und Schall und Wind.” The first four lines are quoted by Sulzer (ibid., p. 98) with “finden” instead of “hoffen” in line 4.

21 The original has “wann … March.”

22 In Irdisches Vergnügen in Gott. A favorite concept of Brockes, suggested in his shorter poems, too.

23 The original has “bebüschten.” Cf. Sämtliche poetische Werke von J. P. Uz, 1. Band (Leipzig, 1768), p. 191. The title of the poem is “Empfindungen an einem Frühlingsmorgen.”

24 The original has “dieß.”

25 The original has “düftenden.”

26 Shakespeare's King Lear, iv, 6:

How fearful

And dizzy 'tis, to cast one's eyes so low!

The crows and choughs that wing the midway air

Show scarce so gross as beetles: half way down

Hangs one that gathers samphire, dreadful trade!

Methinks he seems no bigger than his head;

The fishermen, that walk upon the beach,

Appear like mice, and yond tall anchoring bark,

Diminish'd to her cock; her cock, a buoy

Almost too small for sight: the murmuring surge,

That on the unnumber'd idle pebbles chafes,

Cannot be heard so high.

Baudissin's translation, first published in 1832 (cf. Shakspeares dramatische Werke übers, v. A. W. v. Schlegel u. Ludwig Tieck, 11. Band [Berlin, 1840], p. 98), is more accurate in form and content.

27 The words “auf einen” are crossed out here.

28 Quoted very freely (but in quotation marks!) by Regener, p. 21.

29 Quoted by Regener, p. 21.

30 King Henry V, Act ii, Prolog:

For now sits Expectation in the air,

And hides a sword from hilts unto the point

With crowns imperial, crowns and coronets,

Promised to Harry and his followers.

Schlegel's translation, first published in 1801 (cf. op. cit., 2. Band [Berlin, 1840], p. 131), is more accurate in form and content.

31 The reference is either to Eclogae, Georgica et Aeneidos libri XII cum notis novis. … Chr. Junker, Leipzig, 1787; or to Bucolica et Georgica, Hirtenlieder und wirtschaftliche Gedichte nach Heyne, mit deutschen erklärenden Anmerkungen von Johann G. Brieger, Grottkau, 1790.

32 Iliad, xiv, 413.

33 Here Tieck probably has Heyne in mind. His edition first appeared in Leipzig in 1767–75.

34 Odes, No. xiv.

35 The first edition of Sulzer, in two volumes, appeared in Leipzig, 1771–74. It is possible that Tieck used the second edition. See note 19 above.

36 Sulzer, op. cit., 2nd ed., ii, 108.

37 Loc. cit., p. 105.

38 von der Leyen, Wackenroders Werke und Briefe (Jena, 1910), ii, 67; Lüdeke, Das Buch über Shakespeare, p. 138.

39 von der Leyen, op. cit., i, 297.

40 See E. Edernheimer, J. Böhme und die Romantiker, Heidelberg, 1904; W. Feilchenfeld, Der Einfluss J. Böhmes auf Novalis, Berlin, 1922; and F. Strich, Die Mythologiein der deutschen Literatur von Klopstoch bis Wagner, 2 vols., Halle, 1910.