Clemens Maria Brentano

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Rating: 4.33

Clemens Maria Brentano Poems

There lies a castle in Austria,
Right goodly to behold,
Walled tip with marble stones so fair,
...

Es sang vor langen Jahren
Wohl auch die Nachtigall;
Das war wohl süßer Schall,
Da wir zusammen waren.
...

O Mutter, halte dein Kindlein warm,
Die Welt ist kalt und helle,
Und trag es fromm in deinem Arm
An deines Herzens Schwelle.
...

Zu Bacharach am Rheine
Wohnt' eine Zauberin
Sie war so schön und feine
Und riß viel Herzen hin.
...

Clemens Maria Brentano Biography

Clemens Brentano, or Klemens Brentano was a German poet and novelist. He was born in Ehrenbreitstein, near Koblenz, Germany. His sister was Bettina von Arnim, Goethe's correspondent. His father's family was of Italian descent. He studied in Halle and Jena, afterwards residing at Heidelberg, Vienna and Berlin. He was close to Wieland, Herder, Goethe, Friedrich Schlegel, Fichte and Tieck. From 1798 to 1800 Brentano lived in Jena, the first center of the romantic movement. In 1801, he moved to Göttingen, and became a friend of Achim von Arnim. He married writer Sophie Mereau on 29 October 1803. In 1804, he moved to Heidelberg and worked with Arnim on Zeitungen für Einsiedler and Des Knaben Wunderhorn. After his wife Sophie died in 1806 he married a second time in 1807 to Auguste Busmann. In the years between 1808 and 1818, he lived mostly in Berlin, and from 1819 to 1824 in Dülmen, Westphalia. In 1818, weary of his somewhat restless and unsettled life, he returned to the practice of the Catholic faith and withdrew to the monastery of Dülmen, where he lived for some years in strict seclusion. He took on there the position of secretary to the Catholic visionary nun, the Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, of whom it was said that, during the last twelve years of her life, she could eat no food except Holy Communion, nor take any drink except water, subsisting entirely on the Holy Eucharist. It was claimed that from 1802 until her death, she bore the wounds of the Crown of Thorns, and from 1812, the full stigmata, including a cross over her heart and the wound from the lance. Clemens Brentano made her acquaintance, was converted to the strong faith, and remained at the foot of the stigmatist's bed copying her dictation without embellishment from 1818-1824. When she died, he prepared an index of the visions and revelations from her journal, The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ (published 1833). One of these visions made known by Brentano later resulted in the actual identification of the real House of the Virgin Mary in Ephesus by Abbé Julien Gouyet, a French priest, during 1881. The latter part of his life he spent in Regensburg, Frankfurt and Munich, actively engaged in promoting the Catholic faith. Brentano assisted Ludwig Achim von Arnim, his brother-in-law, in the collection of folk-songs forming Des Knaben Wunderhorn (1805–1808), which Gustav Mahler drew upon for his song cycle. He died in Aschaffenburg. Brentano, whose early writings were published under the pseudonym Maria, belonged to the Heidelberg group of German romantic writers, and his works are marked by excess of fantastic imagery and by abrupt, bizarre modes of expression. His first published writings were Satiren und poetische Spiele (Leipzig, 1800), a romance Godwi oder Das steinerne Bild der Mutter (2 vols., Frankfort, 1801), and a musical drama Die lustigen Musikanten (Frankfort, 1803). Of his dramas the best are Ponce de Leon (1804), Victoria und ihre Geschwister (Berlin, 1817) and Die Grundung Prags (Pesth, 1815). On the whole his finest work is the collection of Romanzen vom Rosenkranz (published posthumously in 1852); his short stories, and more especially the charming Geschichte vom braven Kasperl und dem schönen Annerl (1817), which has been translated into English, were very popular. Brentano's collected works, edited by his brother Christian, appeared at Frankfurt in 9 vols. (1851–1855). Selections have been edited by J. B. Diel (1873), M. Koch (1892), and J. Dohmke (1893). See J. B. Diel and William Kreiten, Klemens Brentano (2 vols, 1877–1878), the introduction to Koch's edition, and R. Steig, A. von Arnim und K. Brentano (1894). Cultural References Brentano's work is referenced in Thomas Mann's novel Doctor Faustus. A cycle of thirteen songs, based on Brentano's poems, is noted in Chapter XXI as one of the composer protagonist's most significant early works.)

The Best Poem Of Clemens Maria Brentano

The Castle In Austria

From 'The Boy's Wonderhorn'

There lies a castle in Austria,
Right goodly to behold,
Walled tip with marble stones so fair,
With silver and with red gold.

Therein lies captive a young boy,
For life and death he lies bound,
Full forty fathoms under the earth,
'Midst vipers and snakes around.

His father came from Rosenberg,
Before the tower he went:--
'My son, my dearest son, how hard
Is thy imprisonment!'

'O father, dearest father mine,
So hardly I am bound,
Full forty fathoms under the earth,
'Midst vipers and snakes around!'

His father went before the lord:--
'Let loose thy captive to me!
I have at home three casks of gold,
And these for the boy I'll gi'e.'

'Three casks of gold, they help you not:
That boy, and he must die!
He wears round his neck a golden chain;
Therein doth his ruin lie.'

'And if he thus wear a golden chain,
He hath not stolen it; nay!
A maiden good gave it to him
For true love, did she say.'

They led the boy forth from the tower,
And the sacrament took he:--
'Help thou, rich Christ, from heaven high,
It's come to an end with me!'

They led him to the scaffold place,
Up the ladder he must go:--
'O headsman, dearest headsman, do
But a short respite allow!'

'A short respite I must not grant;
Thou wouldst escape and fly:
Reach me a silken handkerchief
Around his eyes to tie.'

'Oh, do not, do not bind mine eyes!
I must look on the world so fine;
I see it to-day, then never more,
With these weeping eyes of mine.'

His father near the scaffold stood,
And his heart, it almost rends:--
'O son, O thou my dearest son,
Thy death I will avenge!'

'O father, dearest father mine!
My death thou shalt not avenge:
'Twould bring to my soul but heavy pains;
Let me die in innocence.

'It is not for this life of mine,
Nor for my body proud;
'Tis but for my dear mother's sake:
At home she weeps aloud.'

Not yet three days had passed away,
When an angel from heaven came down:
'Take ye the boy from the scaffold away;
Else the city shall sink under ground!'

And not six months had passed away,
Ere his death was avenged amain;
And upwards of three hundred men
For the boy's life were slain.

Who is it that hath made this lay,
Hath sung it, and so on?
That, in Vienna in Austria,
Three maidens fair have done.

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