''Aquis Submersus'' is an 1877 novella by the German writer

Theodor Storm Hans Theodor Woldsen Storm (; 14 September 18174 July 1888), commonly known as Theodor Storm, was a German writer. He is considered to be one of the most important figures of German realism. Life Storm was born in the small town of Husum, on th ...

. It has also been published as ''Beneath the Flood''. It is set in

Northern Germany Northern Germany (german: link=no, Norddeutschland) is a linguistic, geographic, socio-cultural and historic region in the northern part of Germany which includes the coastal states of Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Lower Saxony an ...

right after the

Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (80 ...

and tells a tragic love story.

Publication

An English translation by

Geoffrey Skelton Geoffrey David Skelton (1916–1998) was a British author and translator. He specialized in German music, writing biographies of Richard Wagner, Cosima Wagner, Wieland Wagner and Paul Hindemith. He also translated numerous plays by leading German ...

was published in 1962 as ''Beneath the Flood''. New translations under the original title have been published in 1974 and 2015.

Adaptations

The novella was the basis for the 1951 film ''

Immortal Beloved The Immortal Beloved (German "Unsterbliche Geliebte") is the addressee of a love letter which composer Ludwig van Beethoven wrote on 6–7 July 1812 in Teplitz. The unsent letter is written in pencil on 10 small pages. It was found in the compo ...

'', directed by

Veit Harlan Veit Harlan (22 September 1899 – 13 April 1964) was a German film director and actor. Harlan reached the highpoint of his career as a director in the Nazi era; most notably his antisemitic film ''Jud Süß'' (1940) makes him controversial ...

. It was also the basis for

Wolfgang Schleif Wolfgang Schleif (14 May 1912 – 21 August 1984) was a German film director, screenwriter and film editor. Life and career Wolfgang Schleif studied philosophy, psychology and pedagogy at the University of Leipzig. In 1934 he passed the State ...

's 1979 television drama ''Wie Rauch und Staub''.

References

1877 German novels German novels adapted into films German-language novels Novellas by Theodor Storm Novels set in the 17th century {{1870s-novel-stub