Finally learn enough German to read poetry decently

>finally learn enough German to read poetry decently
>read Rilke's poetry in side-by-side translation to see what I was missing
>the German is like reading the best of Shakespeare
>it's like music
>the English is like a retarded person repeating a story he was just told

Ein Gott vermags. Wie aber, sag mir, soll
Mann ihm folgen durch die schmale Leier?
Sinn ist Zwiespalts. An der Kreuzung zweier
Herzwege steht kein Tempel für Apoll.

Gods are able. Tell how a man, though,
could possibly thread the lyre's narrow modes?
Vacillating at the heart's dark crossroads,
he beholds no temple of Apollo.

>ever reading poetry in translation
It's like listening to an acoustic cover of a Kraftwerk tune

Spanish is superior
Lmao

Thanks for reminding me to read Rilek's collected poems. Very nice.

Das Stunden-Buch is hard to top. I struggle to explain just how magnificent it is to non German speakers. They pick up a translation and they are like: "yea, its pretty good". If they could only experience it in German. THEY WOULD KNOW.

>anglo translation
ishygddt, english is too poor to proper translate poetry

Can you graduate from an American university being monolingual?

I know people getting PhDs in German Literature at Yale who have a lousy grasp of German after 7 years studying it nigga

Any respectable one will have some sort of foreign language requirement but it's just one or two years and you can barely scrape by in your classes and still satisfy it, so yes.

>need to read literature
>need to read philosophy
>need to know about art history
>need to know about world history
>need to know especially about American history and politics
>need to know the basics of higher level mathematics
>need to know basics of natural sciences
>need to know several languages so I can read poetry w/out translation
>spend all day on internet

Should I learn German solely in order to read the German classics? It's a language I like the sound of.

Please have a look at the Brandt Brauer Frick Ensemble.

German here. Our manga translations are pretty good. You should do it.

I am German native and Rilke is honestly one of the most overrated poets I've ever encountered. Do you guys actually see this second-rate stuff as great? Outside of Schiller and some of Goethe German is not a good poetic language, stop tricking anglos into bothering to learn it. Rilke is literally just babby's first serious poet, the Nietzsche of the form.

u are trolling right m8?
Rilke is a fucking god you filthy pleb, absolut aesthetic perfection, the guy was a divine bard like no other
and don't forget
>Kloppstock
>Novalis
>Tieck
>Eichendorff
>Hölderlin
>Heine
>Droste-Hülshoff
>Mörike
>Fontane
>Hesse
>Benn
>Brecht
just to name a few
now get outta here b4 I call the cops

*blockiert deinen Weg*

Is there anything more pleb than reading books in the original language?

>jealous monoglots can only read books in the original language
>patrician polyglots like myself can read the works of Goethe in French, the masterpieces of Proust in the superior Russian, Chinese and Japanese works in the opposite language, etc., opening up new vistas of interpretation and understanding

I tried reading a book in the original language once, just to see what it's like being a pleb, and it was a suffocating and nauseous experience. I pity those for whom there is no other option.

>List of a handful of middle-tier romantic nonsense poets=German is a poetic language
You literally had to include Hesse in that list for fuck's sake lol. I don't know if you're a triggered German or just a passionate outsider but let's acknowledge that poetry is not our strength. I get annoyed when other Euros on here start feeling ultra smug about their bilingual powers because it encourages anglos to ignore their own superior poetic tradition in favour of wasting their time on duolingo so they can be "blown away" by flat garbage like Rilke. This is not b8, I'm just being honest whilst most Germans on here want desperately to feel superior.

>T. Anglofat

>stop tricking anglos
lolno

German, actually. But stay mad.

>superior poetic tradition
>anglos
I'm sorry?

I'm only bilingual so I don't read Italian. But three major poets in a language does not make for a great poetic tradition imo.

>muh iambic pentameter
admittetly some of the english romantics are pretty good no denying it but saying
>that poetry is not our strength
is ridiculous
None of them surpasses Hölderlin and his Ode's in that sweet, sweet Hexameter, or the witty tongue-in-cheek romantic style of Heine, or the aesthetic beauty of Rilke

Italy has more than three major poets my dude.

>None of them surpasses Hölderlin...Heine...Rilke
You have your own preferences but if we're being honest then both Milton and Spenser alone are light years ahead of these figures. I'll accept that Hölderlin has his moments but Keats run circles around his oeuvre, and romanticism as a poetic tradition was really perfected by English not German.

I saw a band do a cover of Autobahn on Youtube a few years ago. It was actually pretty good.

Spanish is so poetic, Quevedo and Góngora tolled each other in verse just for the sake of it. That is some real legacy.

me pls leave

>italian have 3 major poets
Fucking burn this retarded board already

Sure amerifat, whatever you say

Is reading German poetry a good way to improve vocabulary? I'm around A2 and it feels like it's impossible to break the barrier to B1.

How old are you?

Rilke is literally the only reason I want to learn German.

s-stop that