With thanks to AC Benus* for reminding me that I had not yet researched Ernst Stadler and for translating Stadler’s poem “Fahrt über die Kölner Rheinbrücke bei Nacht” which is featured in Rudolf Binding’s “A Fatalist at War”
Ernst was educated in the nearby city of Strasbourg, a port on the River Rhine. He attended Strasbourg University and in 1906 he was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to study at Magdalen College, Oxford, England. He went on to teach German at Brussels University.
In 1914 Ernst volunteered to join the German Army and was killed on 30th October 1914 fighting at Zandvoorde near Ypres on the Western Front.
Ernst Stadler’s collection of poems “Der Aufbruch” was published in 1914.
In his book "A Fatalist at War" Rudolph Binding featured the following poem with his comments about Ernst Stadler:
West Flanders, April 23, 1916
… One can get sad over quite different things. For instance, I read a poem yesterday, and I swear to you that the man who could write such a poem was a poet by the grace of all the gods. But he is dead; he was killed in the autumn of 1914 on the Western Front. His name was Ernst Stadler, born in August 1883, in Kolmar.
But here is the poem ; it seems to me so splendid that I am very sad that he will never write one again. Here it is :
"Fahrt über die Kölner Rheinbrücke bei Nacht"
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| The Bridge at Cologne |
Der Schnellzug tastet Sich und stößt die Dunkelheit entlang.
Kein Stern will vor. Die ganze Welt ist nur ein enger, nachtumschienter Minengang,
Darein zuweilen Förderstellen blauen Lichtes jähe Horizonte reißen: Feuerkreis
Von Kugellampen, Dächern, Schloten, dampfend, strömend . . . nur sekundenweis . . .
Und wieder alles schwarz. Als führen wir ins Eingeweid der Nacht zur Schicht.
Nun taumeln Lichter her . . . verirrt, trostlos vereinsamt . . . mehr . . . und sammeln sich . . . und werden dicht.
Gerippe grauer Häuserfronten liegen bloß, im Zwielicht bleichend, tot – etwas muß kommen . . . oh, ich fühl es schwer
Im Hirn. Eine Beklemmung singt im Blut. Dann dröhnt der Boden plötzlich wie ein Meer:
Wir fliegen, aufgehoben, königlich durch nachtentrissne Luft, hoch überm Strom. O Biegung der Millionen Lichter, stumme Wacht,
Vor deren blitzender Parade schwer die Wasser abwärts rollen. Endloses Spalier, zum Gruß gestellt bei Nacht!
Wie Fackeln stürmend! Freudiges! Salut von Schiffen über blauer See! Bestirntes Fest!
Wimmelnd, mit hellen Augen hingedrängt! Bis wo die Stadt mit letzten Häusern ihren Gast entläßt.
Und dann die langen Einsamkeiten. Nackte Ufer. Stille. Nacht. Besinnung. Einkehr. Kommunion. Und Glut und Drang
Zum Letzten, Segnenden. Zum Zeugungsfest. Zur Woll-lust.[i] Zum Gebet. Zum Meer. Zum Untergang.
The man is dead ; what one would give to bring him back to life! But others remain and will not be killed, although they can sing of nothing but their lecherous blood and the greasy grimaces of their cushions. But when one is overcome by a great and natural disgust — see, there comes a Stadler with whom one "flies, flowery exalted, kinglike through night-enfolded air, high over the stream."
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| The Resurrection of the Soldiers Sir Stanley Spence CBE, RA (1891 - 1959) National Trust |
From "A Fatalist at War" by Rudolf Binding, translated by Ian F.D. Morrow
pp 102 - 103 https://archive.org/details/fatalistatwar00rudo/page/102/mode/2up
AC Benus has very kindly translated the poem for us:
"Passage across the Cologne Rhine Bridge at night"
The express train feels its way along to plow through the darkness.
No star leads from the front. The whole world’s merely a night-shrouded, mineshaft,
Into which, from time to time, conveyors of bluish light abruptly disrupt horizons: fire-rings
Of spherical streetlights, factory roofs, smokestacks, steaming, streaming . . . only a second’s worth . . .
And all is black again. As if we’re led into the bowels of the night for a graveyard shift.
Now lights stagger past . . . lost, desolately lonely . . . more . . . to congregate . . . to become thick.
The framework of gray housefronts lie bare, blanching in the half-light, dead –something must come . . . oh, I feel it ponderous on the brain. An apprehension sings in the blood. Then suddenly the ground rumbles like the sea:
We’re flying, elevated, kinglike through night-torn air, high above the current.
O riverbend of a million lights, mutely watched,
Before the waters’ flashing parade heavily rolls downstream.
A never-ending cordon, received gravely by night.
Like lit torches surging! Jubilantly! Bonfire of ships over bluer pools! Some starry festival!
Thriving with life, bright eyes penetrating! Up to where the last houses of the city discharge their patrons.
And then the lengthening seclusions. Naked shores. Silence. Night.
Reflection. Contemplation. Communion. And passion and desire
To the very last, consecrated. To the festival of begetting. To woolly exuberance.
To prayer. To the sea. To ultimate perdition.
Poetry by Heart featured the following poem by Stadler:
“Setting Out” 1913
There was a time before, when fanfares bloodily tore apart my own impatient brain,
So that, up-rearing like a horse, it bit savagely at the rein.
Then tambourines sounded the alarm on every path
And a hail of bullets seemed like the loveliest music on earth.
Then, suddenly, life stood still. Different paths were leading between the old trees.
Rooms were tempting. It was sweet to linger and sweet to rest at ease,
And, unchaining my body from reality, like some old dusty armour,
To nestle voluptuously in the down of soft dream-hour.
But then one morning through the misty air there rolled the echo of the bugle’s ring.
Hard, sharp, whistling like a sword-thrust. As if suddenly on darkness lights had started shining.
As if, through the tented dawn, trumpet-jolts had roused the sleeping forces,
The waking soldiers leapt up and struck their tents and busily harnessed their horses.
I was locked into lines like splints that thrust into morning, with fire on helmet and stirrup,
Forward, with battle in my blood and in my eyes, and reins held up.
Perhaps in the evening, victory marches would play around my head.
Perhaps we all would lie somewhere, stretched out among the dead.
But before the reaching out and before the sinking,
Our eyes would see their fill of world and sun, and take it in, glowing and drinking.
Although that poem was used to symbolise the early excitement and positivity felt in Germany towards the start of the First World War, in letters written by Stadler in 1914, he expressed his sadness and shock at the pointless killing and violence which took place around him.
https://www.poetrybyheart.org.uk/poems/setting-out/
Poetry by Heart is a national competition in which young people in key stages 2,3, 4 and 5 choose poems that they love, learn them by heart and perform them in a school or college competition.
I think this is a lovely idea and agree with the organisers that poetry can certainly help in difficult times such as now. I also think it could be an idea to copy for all age groups - not just school children.
Their website is : //www.poetrybyheart.org.uk/
Tom Boughen of Poetry by Heart contacted me recently via my weblog to ask if I would like to write a piece for their weblog about some of my favourite WW1 female poets. Here is it: https://www.poetrybyheart.org.uk/.../female-poets-of-the.../
Sources:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jun/27/ernst-stadler-german-poet-first-world-war
https://peterln.wordpress.com/2020/02/23/ernst-stadler-two-poems/
https://www.projekt-gutenberg.org/stadler/aufbruch/aufbruch.html
https://archive.org/details/fatalistatwar00rudo/page/102/mode/2up
*AC Benus is the author of a book about German WW1 poet Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele : “The Thousandth Regiment: A Translation of and Commentary on Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele’s War Poems” by AC Benus (AC Benus, San Francisco, 2020). Along with Hans's story, the book includes original poems as well as translations. ISBN: 978-1657220584
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1657220583
