Vaterlandslied is the name of several patriotic German poems. The most famous one is ″Ich bin ein deutsches Mädchen″ written by Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock in 1770 and dedicated to Johanna Elisabeth von Winthem.
Contents
Historic background
Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock already was a devout patriot as a youth, as is shown by a War Song written in 1749 honouring the Prussian king Frederick the Great. When the king, however, did not patronize German artists and poets but declared his love for French culture, Klopstock thought that it was up to him to defend German poetry.
Due to the political development during his lifetime, the disappointment with regard to the king's distaste of German culture, and the zeitgeist, his patriotism did not refer to Klopstock's present but to the past. The War Song consequently was rededicated to Henry the Fowler, and Arminius became a regular figure in Klopstock's œuvres. Among these works dedicated to the "liberator of Germany" are the poem "Hermann und Thusnelda" and the "Bardiete" (Klopstock's term for the genre of barditus or "battle song" after Tacitus' Germania) Hermann's Schlacht (1769), Hermann und die Prinzen (1784) and Hermann's Tod (1787).
The Vaterlandslied as a paean of German patriotism joins this list of literature exalting the nation. It was originally written for Johanna Elisabeth von Winthem, Klopstock's stepdaughter, who still was a child in 1770.
Music
As the poem became very popular, several composers set its lyrics to music. Among them are:
Other Vaterlandslieder
Matthias Claudius replied to Klopstock′s poem and wrote ″Ich bin ein deutscher Jüngling″ (I am a German lad). Both Joseph Martin Kraus and Maria Theresia von Paradis provided a melody for the song.
August Silberstein wrote a poem of the same name for which Anton Bruckner composed the music: Vaterlandslied, WAB 92.
The most famous song of that name, besides Klopstock′s version, is, however, Ernst Moritz Arndt′s ″Der Gott, der Eisen wachsen ließ″ (The God who made iron grow), a patriotic anthem written during the Wars of Liberation against Napoleonic France. In the poem he incites his fellow countrymen to fight against the French invaders, and denounces those who actively or passively aid the occupiers and thus betray their country.