Where I am staying
(Poet's title: Aufenthalt)
Set by Schubert:
D 957/5
[August 1828]
Part of 13 Lieder nach Gedichten von Rellstab und Heine (“Schwanengesang”), D 957
Rauschender Strom,
Brausender Wald,
Starrender Fels
Mein Aufenthalt.
Wie sich die Welle
An Welle reiht,
Fließen die Tränen
Mir ewig erneut.
Hoch in den Kronen
Wogend sich’s regt,
So unaufhörlich
Mein Herze schlägt.
Und wie des Felsen
Uraltes Erz
Ewig derselbe
Bleibet mein Schmerz.
Rauschender Strom,
Brausender Wald,
Starrender Fels
Mein Aufenthalt.
Roaring river,
Rustling forest,
Fixed rock
Where I am staying.
Just as waves
Follow waves,
My tears flow
Endlessly renewed.
High in the tree tops
There is a swaying movement,
In the same way incessantly
My heart is beating.
And like the rock’s
Primeval ore,
Forever the same
My pain endures.
Roaring river,
Rustling forest,
Fixed rock
Where I am staying.
All translations into English that appear on this website, unless otherwise stated, are by Malcolm Wren. You are free to use them on condition that you acknowledge Malcolm Wren as the translator and schubertsong.uk as the source. Unless otherwise stated, the comments and essays that appear after the texts and translations are by Malcolm Wren and are © Copyright.
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Themes and images in this text:
Hearts Mountains and cliffs Pain Rivers (Strom) Tears and crying Trees (general) Waves – Welle Woods – large woods and forests (Wald)
The river never stops roaring, the forest never stops murmuring, but the rock is fixed. The speaker has now come to a stop, but we are not sure if this is temporary or permanent. Is this just a stopping off point on a journey or is all movement impossible anyway? We are not told the nature of the obstruction. Is it an artist experiencing writer’s block, or a lover who has been rejected? Is it a traveller who has found that there is no inner development corresponding with the changing landscape, or someone paralysed by depression?
This is clearly not a character who has found rest. The stopping off point is not a place of comfort or refreshment. The outward bodily stasis is belied by the inner turmoil. Tears flow as regularly as the waves on the water. The heart beats and is beaten as relentlessly as the tree tops being buffetted in the wind. The only thing that does not flow, that is fixed, is the inner pain, as central to the speaker’s identity as the metal bound into the rock itself.
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Original Spelling Aufenthalt Rauschender Strom, Brausender Wald, Starrender Fels Mein Aufenthalt. Wie sich die Welle An Welle reiht, Fließen die Thränen Mir ewig erneut. Hoch in den Kronen Wogend sich's regt, So unaufhörlich Mein Herze schlägt. Und wie des Felsen Uraltes Erz, Ewig derselbe Bleibet mein Schmerz. Rauschender Strom, Brausender Wald, Starrender Fels Mein Aufenthalt.
Confirmed by Peter Rastl with Gedichte von Ludwig Rellstab. Erstes Bändchen. Berlin, bei Friedrich Laue. 1827, page 124; and with Gesammelte Schriften von Ludwig Rellstab, Neue Ausgabe, Fünfter Band: Sagen und romantische Erzählungen, Leipzig, F. A. Brockhaus, 1860, pages 132-133.
To see an early edition, go to page 124 [140/265 ] here: http://digital.ub.uni-duesseldorf.de/download/pdf/3376501