Ferdinand Freiligrath

Ferdinand Freiligrath (17 June 1810 – 18 March 1876) was a German poet, translator and liberal agitator, who is considered part of the Young Germany movement.

Life

Freiligrath was born in Detmold, Principality of Lippe. His father was a teacher. He left a Detmold gymnasium at 16 to be trained for a commercial career in Soest. There he also familiarized himself with French and English literature, and before he was 20 had published verses in local journals. He worked in Amsterdam from 1831 to 1836 as a banker's clerk. After publishing translations of Victor Hugo's ''Odes'' and ''Chants du crépuscule'', and launching a literary journal, ''Rheinisches Odeon'' (1836–38), in 1837 he started working as a bookkeeper in Barmen, where he remained until 1839. Later on, he started writing poems for the ''Musen-Almanach'' (edited by Adelbert von Chamisso and Gustav Schwab) and the '' Morgenblatt'' (ed. Cotta).

His first collection of poems (''Gedichte'') was published in 1838 in Mainz. This contained his poems "Löwenritt", "Prinz Eugen", and "Der Blumen Rache". His early poems were inspired by Victor Hugo's '' Orientales'', which he also partly translated into German; they often dealt with exotic subjects. The poem "Der Mohrenfürst", for example, tells the story of a black prince who was a fierce warrior. He is defeated in battle, sold as a slave and ends up as a drummer in a circus, only the lion's skin he wore that now decorates the drum still reminding him of his previous life. This poem was set as a song by Carl Loewe.

His 1838 book of poems won immediate and wide favour, and he decided upon a literary career which he embarked upon in 1839. He cooperated in several now unimportant works, and in 1842 received a pension of 300 thalers from the Prussian king, Frederick William IV. He married, and, to be near his friend Emanuel Geibel, settled at St. Goar.

Freiligrath was a friend of the American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. In 1842, when Longfellow was taking a rigorous water cure at a health spa in the former Marienberg Benedictine Convent at Boppard on the Rhine, a fellow patient introduced him to Freiligrath at the latter's home in St. Goar. Freiligrath had a special interest in English and American poetry. There followed many meetings and outings in Germany where this topic was discussed, and Longfellow presented Freiligrath with copies of his books '' Hyperion'' and ''Ballads and Other Poems''. The friendship developed further in their correspondence.

Due to political repression (censorship), and the encouragement of fellow poet Hoffmann von Fallersleben, A German reader. The notes are in English for the most part. The copy at archive.org is missing some pages of the notes. Freiligrath later became more political. In 1844, he surrendered his pension, and in his ''Glaubensbekenntnis'' (Confession of Faith) placed his poetic gifts at the service of the democratic agitation that was to culminate in the Revolution of 1848. Such poems as "Trotz alledem" (a translation of Burns's "A man's a man for a' that"), "Die Freiheit", "Das Recht" and "Hamlet" made his absence from Germany expedient.

He left for Belgium where he met Karl Marx. From there, he proceeded to Switzerland and then to London, publishing in 1846 ''Englische Gedichte aus neuerer Zeit'', a volume of translations, and ''Ça ira'', a collection of political songs. He lived until 1848 in England, where he resumed his commercial career. At the invitation of Longfellow, he meditated going to America, but on the short-lived triumph of liberalism returned to Germany as a democratic leader. In 1843, Franz Liszt set Freiligrath's poem "O lieb, so lang du lieben kannst" to music, published in 1847 — the song was later arranged by Liszt for solo piano as his "Liebesträume" No. 3 (1850), which subsequently became one of his most famous piano pieces.

Upon his return to Germany, Freiligrath settled in Düsseldorf, and worked for the ''Neue Rheinische Zeitung'' (general editor: Karl Marx, editor of cultural pages: Georg Weerth), a paper which he cofounded with Marx, Friedrich Engels

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