Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Verzeichniss Der Von Ferdinand Freiligrath Nachgelassenen Bibliothek, Besonders Reichhaltig in Der Deutschen Und Englischen Classischen Literatur: Welche Am Dienstag Den 18. Juni 1878 Und an Den Folgenden Tagen, Vormittags 8-12 Und Nachmittags 3-5 Uhr, Durch Oskar Gerschel's Antiquariats-Buchhandlung (Stuttgart, Schloss-Strasse 37) Zu Cannstatt in Der Wohnung Des Dichters
Ferdinand Freiligrath's name is not an unfamiliar one 111 England. As early as the year 1840 translations appeared from his poems, and the English press took notice of the poet, who 111 his own country, a few years previously, had rapidly made a name for himself, and was classed already among the most popular modern lyric bards. Tait's Magazine, the Athenaeum, Northern Star, The People's Journal, Howitt's Journal, and other papers of that period, brought translations, and more or less detailed biographical and critical articles 011 the life and works of an author, whose destiny ultimately linked him more with England and the English nation, than any other German poet before him.
Born at Detmold 111 1810 the son of a public teacher, he was destined by his father for commerce despite the unusual capacities and eagerness for learning, early displayed by him, and which seemed to point clearly to a student's career. Butpecuniary considerations prevailed, for an unmarried uncle at Edinburgh, who was supposed a wealthy man by his relations in the small German capital, offered to adopt him and to leave him his pro perty, if brought up for business life. This decided the question, and young Freiligrath, much to his regret left the Grammar School at Detmold at the age of fifteen, and was bound apprentice to his uncle at Soest in Westfalia. Long before this apprenticeship had expired, the Edinburgh uncle, together with his commercial concern and all the prospects connected with it, dis appeared like any Fata Morgana of his own future imaginings. The only real gain derived from this expectation by the young poet, was the acquire ment of English and other modern languages, which had been cultivated by him with the utmost zeal, and which at once opened to him the literature of different nations. No sooner was he master of the language, than he began to reproduce French, Italian and English Poetry into German, mani festing even at that tender agea power of identification, and a mastership over the German language, which soon was to secure him a prominent place among the classical translators of his country. But it was the English literature which took hold of his mind before all others, and the prospect of living 111 the country of Ossian, Burns and Scott, principally had recon ciled him to a career which was otherwise utterly uncongenial to his taste and the bent of his mind. Through his masterly interpretations the songs of Burns, Moore, Scott, Southey, Coleridge, Campbell, and later, Tennyson, Hemans, Mary Howitt, L. E. L., Longfellow, Bryant, Barry Cornwall, Monckton Milnes, Browning and others, became popular in Germany, and many of them household words.
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