Theodor Storm, like Friedrich Hebbel, is a child of the North Sea Plain; but while in Hebbel's verse there is hardly any direct reference to his native landscape, Storm again and again sings its chaste beauty; and while Hebbel could find a home away from his native heath, Storm clung to it with a jealous love.
He was born in Husum ('die graue Stadt am grauen Meer': 'the grizzly town at the grizzly sea') on the west coast of Schleswig-Holstein of well-to-do parents. While still a student of law, he published a first volume of verse together with the brothers Tycho and Theodor Mommsen.
His favorite poets were Eichendorff and Mörike, and the influence of the former is plainly discernible even in Storm's later verse. Storm left his home in 1851 and did not return until 1864, after Schleswig-Holstein had become German.
(Analysis and original text of the poem from A Book of German Lyrics, ed. Friedrich Bruns, which is available in Project Gutenberg at http://ibiblio.unc.edu/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext05/8glyr10.txt.)Analysis
Samples
Die Stadt
The town
Am grauen Strand, am grauen Meer
On grizzly beach, on grizzly sea
Und seitab liegt die Stadt;
An sideways is the town;
De Nebel drückt die Dächer schwer,
The roofs depress'd by fog
Und durch die Stille braust das Meer
And through the quiet hisses sea
Eintönig um die Stadt.
Dully around the town.
Es rauscht kein Wald, es schlägt im Mai
No forrest sounds, no bird sings
Kein Vogel ohn' Unterlaß;
In May without interuption;
Die Wandergans mit hartem Schrei
The roaming goose with loud cry
Nur fliegt in Herbstesnacht vorbei,
Only in fall's night flies by,
Am Strande weht das Gras.
At the beach blows the grass.
Doch hängt mein ganzes Herz an dir,
Still clings whole my heart to you,
Du graue Stadt am Meer;
You grey town on the sea;
Der Jugend Zauber für und für
The youth magic forever
Ruht lächelnd doch auf dir, auf dir,
Rests laughing still on you, on you,
Du graue Stadt am Meer.
You grey town on the sea.